Guild Wars 2

Obsidian.1328:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

You should be careful with that “never”. The pilgrims of the Crystal Desert who build the ancient cities there under the leadership of the Ghostly Hero were quite aggressive towards the Forgotten. Then there’s the White Mantle’s rather uncaring push through the southern Shiverpeaks killing just about anything in the way.

The Elonians in the Crystal Desert were there trying to Ascend. The Forgotten were in the way. A case of the ends justifying the means for them. The Mantle were under orders from the Mursaat. The Mursaat wanted Chosen for fodder on the Door of Komalie. Pretty simple really.

And on the other side, it’s not charr in general – it was the Flame Legion leadership and coercion of the other groups. That much got made evident with Pyre – he could care less about killing humans. Derisive, sure, but he was much much more interested in killing the shamans.

It was the Charr in general. The Flame Legion thing was a construct of the GW2 writers to shift the entirety of the blame on them, nothing more. Can’t have a whole playable race as genocidal in a game with no factions. So they create this artificial evil minority who’s really behind all the hate and voila…instant get-out-of-jail-free card for most Charr. I really don’t see how that’s hard to see.

And if the charr were genocidal, they would have continued on after Ascalon (again). Which they didn’t.

They didn’t because they were slated to be a playable race in GW2, how do you not see that?

And people jump on me when I talk in meta or out of game rationalizations.

This is why I stopped before on this thread – if you start arguing out of game material then you have lore dug up to try to support it. (Or made up.) IF you try to handle it with lore then the out of game bits are thrown up at you as if to say “well of course, n00b, duh”.

Of course I can see they were intended to be a playable race. And of course I can see they tweaked things so we have something different. And they did it without murdering the lore, as early as Nightfall.

But you know what? The charr magically haven’t stopped hating on humans all the time, and it’s not just the Flame Legion. There’s the “renegades” which still want to keep on pushing Ebonhawke. They are derisive of others and even the Adamant Guard treat people with very controlled politeness.

The charr just stopped, realized they might win against Ebonhawke and still lose elsewhere. So that conflict had a ceasefire negotiated so they could win something else rather than keep a stalemate going.

I mean, or you can stick to the out of context argument of “they need to be a playable race and not at odds with the others so blatantly”. I’m cool with that too, mostly because I don’t care about trying to fight over whether to argue Out Of Game or In Game when the target keeps changing modes.

Bio Flame.4276:

As for the forces she’s talking about, there is not a conclusive evidence that she’s talking about “us” (as in, the races of Tyria) and the Dragons. It could be, it might be but that is not the only explanation.
We simply do not know nor do we have enough evidence to say for sure.

No, we don’t. Then again, anything she said I’d have to not take at face value.

As for stories being twisted and changed and only at the end do they make sense. Well…that’s usually either an AWESOME story or an HORRENDOUS story. And in this case, it’s clearly not an awesome story.

Nah, usually it winds up being a decent idea/concept which needed better execution. And extraordinary third act does not save a first act which was terrible. (i.e. no matter how awesome “Revenge of the Sith” was going to be, it would never cancel out “Phantom Menace”. Ever.)

Stories have two major aspects – the story itself and the way that it is told (the “delivery”.

This is true, and the story here may have been only mediocre at best (sorry ANet, I like your games and have tons of fun playing them, but I don’t really see many of your stories hitting “classic of the ages” level . . .)

The delivery was where it just lost its legs.

A great story is a great story. Period.

We are not going to agree on that. There was some site I came across once which had the quest of turning any classic of film or literature into a laconic, sarcastic one-sentence description which made it sound hilariously bad. I think “Romeo and Juliet” went something like: “Teen love comedy where suicide was the answer.”

But as we all know, there are bad stories that are told amazingly by amazing people and they entertain us. I think we all have friends that have the great ability of turning even a mundane event to a great story just by the way they deliver it.

I like to think of those people as “those who work at Rooster Teeth Productions”. Turning a passable FPS into a comedy which has kept going over ten years.

Well, Scarlet’s arch is sorely missing on both aspects. Think about it.

It could have been a better story, and it could have had better pacing. What it really needed was something to tie it together so we got a feeling through the first third (before Scarlet showed up) of it actually being part of the same story instead of separate pieces.

Of course, I could write a thousand words on how it could have been handled better even without changing the writing. That’s not the issue – I’m sure roughly half the forumgoers could do that intelligently and without resorting to personal attacks on the writers, derogatory comments about the character of the company, or various other detraction from the actual point:

The first season of the Living Story was only a qualified success, and not a project which leave many players anything other than skeptical of what’s coming next. Either in terms of story plot, or mechanics involved, everywhere there’s either derision at worst or at best the sentiment of “please let the next run do better”.

Zeefa.3915:

While I am not against it, the only acceptable way to do it, would be making it a human exclusive organisation… seeing it kinda is and should stay as such.
Which means a similar choice should be the for the other races imo.
All the races have a sort of guard/police to keep order and peace in their respective homelands…. charr have the adamant guard I belive they are called… asura… peace keepers?

The humans have the Seraph, the asura have the Peacekeepers, the charr have the Adamant Guard, the sylvari have the Wardens, and the norn have the Wolfborn.

Then there’s the Lionguard of Lion’s Arch, the Fallen Angels of Ebonhawke, the Sentinels who keep watch over the Dragonbrand, and the Zaishen who couch surf in Fort Marriner.

. . . no, really I’m sure they have things to do. Wish we could see that in this game as opposed to before.

So it would end up very complex and possibly a lot of work for Anet. But it would be a great way to expand on what each race is and can be, as it is now you join one of the 3 orders and you pretty much stop being affiliated with your own race, which is a shame. It would also open up for a new possible tier of cultural armor? I would really really want more cultural armor. Not to mention a motivator to play all my characters again to get the perspectives and happenings of all 5 races.

Important though that those that do not have all races, maybe even just play one, don’t feel they are missing something from the others too much.

Just do something unthinkable – a force solidifies across Tyria to start enforcing peace, by drawing on refugees and volunteers who want to work to fight against what Scarlet Briar did to the world. The Pact was created to fight dragons, primarily starting with Zhaitan as the most active threat to the broadest region . . . but public sentiment leads some of the higher ranking members to establish a defensive group to stay behind while the Pact chases after Mordremoth. Or whomever is next.

These volunteer forces begin patrolling areas with known dragon corruption and there are events which can be kicked off by players, and help show there is an awareness of the races realizing they must work together to do more than simply assault the dragons. They need to work together to keep the peace.

. . . at least, until we can learn how to control asura gates and torch Rata Sum.

Bio Flame.4276:

There’s something in these words that is yet to be explained.
Scarlet is saying that their creator [the Sylvari Creator – the Pale Tree? A Dragon?] is compelling them to do something. Ok.
But more interesting is her idea that the the forces that push them can be redirected and set against one another.

Of course it can, we did it before. Well, we had it done to us before. (Prophecies, Vizier Khilbron’s method of dealing with the White Mantle and Mursaat in the way? Sic us on them. We do his work for him.)

Also, the creator in that was seemingly definite to be the Pale Tree.

If waking up a Dragon were Scarlet’s only and final purpose….where does that idea about redirecting forces against one another fit into?
Someting is missing here.

Not really. Again, possible she’s redirecting us and the dragons to take greater focus on each other.

In my own opinion, I believe that the original Scarlet story would be different from what we ultimately got but, due to the overwhelming negative criticism about Scarlet, ANET’s writers chose to “cut the story” and hence, we got a final, patched version that wasn’t their original idea. That’s why there are lots of pieces that don’t make sense and some clues to something greater and/or different about to happen.

Or it’s like Lost where the pieces which don’t make sense now will make more sense later. And like Lost, it was cut shorter and compressed so everything hit a dead sprint for the end midway through.

But ANET decided to quickly wrap the story up (what an horrid story btw!) and it was patched and twisted to this end, since it was the fastest way to get rid of Scarlet’s arch and end the story.

I don’t blame ANet for doing that, considering there was endless, tireless “kill Scarlet now or I quit, kthnx” type stuff any time the LS was updated. I also don’t think it was badly shifted. I think the first part was leaving too much slow progress and the second part was “fin-a-fricking-lly”.

Again. Like Lost.

All in all, a very badly written story and badly executed. The Living Story updates were good, some bad, but the actual story itself was horrendously planned and executed.

Eh, I find the actual story itself ran into the problem with early execution building some interesting questions on how this was tying together, then there was a lot of “wait, this makes no sense” in the middle, followed by trying to wrap it up. How well they wrapped it up depends on many things, primarily how much slack you were giving the writers to begin with.

. . . like Lost.

Stephen.6312:

I felt pretty certain that I could piece-together Ceara’s ultimate goal from the story arc. It is not so much the final conclusion that causes me to stumble, but explaining the lore mechanics behind it – that is what has confused me and led to a lot of frustration. But as posters have stated: Keep it simple. I think that simplicity leads away from Lazarus. There is more evidence in favor of viewing the entity as either Mordremoth or Mordremoth’s champion than there is for viewing Lazarus, the Inquest, or any other small-time crook for that matter.

It’s worth noting, what Scarlet has done and her method makes sense if you approach it backwards. Start with the effect which took place with the Breachmaker and figure out what pieces she needs to make it happen. Then it starts falling neatly into place . . . with the only exception of “why”.

As has been noted already – Scarlet was showing signs of either a dual personality or being controlled outright at times. I’m sort of siding with the first – the depiction (of questionable canonicity) in “What Scarlet Saw” is of someone who is careless with her studies and only cares about practical uses . . . she departs all her “lessons” after getting basics down because she figures there’s nothing more to learn. Then Omadd happens.

What we see afterwards for the first time is someone capable of many things, but still doesn’t care about the effects . . . just on getting through things. We know she’s been gathering things, but once again . . . it’s not about the whole picture and only about “what do I need out of this”.

One aspect of Scarlet Briar and the previous being of Ceara are alike in this notable detail. They do not consider the full ramifications of their acts, only what they want to do and what is needed to do it.

Then there’s the odd parts – we see in her journal and some of her correspondences she’s not completely bonkers all the time. She clearly has something in mind and is pursuing it with increasing intensity the closer she gets to pulling it off. Please note, while she does have the silly comments at the marionette test there’s still a deadly sincerity . . . and while she is making her last stand before us? Taunting, but she is in control of herself.

The other aspect of Scarlet Briar is her sharp, monomaniacal drive. She fixates on one thing, and that is what draws her in.

These two aspects are not exclusive to each other, especially if there is foresight. And if she was seeking to do any act against that which was influencing her . . . she would need to play a long game indeed.

Xae Isareth.1364:

But really, all new content in MMOs is somewhat ‘thin’. They aren’t going to last long on their own merits because simply its impossible given the time contraints and budget to make it not thin. Even WoW’s expansions, which are huge in terms of MMOs, last for what a month? before it descends into a grind, that they come out every 2 years, not every 2 weeks.

The game which had the most “content” in that score really kind of was Ultima Online, due to a lot of it being the first, quintessential “sandbox” form MMO. Currently, the successor is EvE Online . . . where “content” is really things like those massive battles which make headlines in gaming news. And they’re the rare things which happen, not the every day things.

And, unsurprisingly, both of those games have a significant amount of grind attached.

Kuro Zetsumei.1397:

hmmm Norn lose half their territory to a single dragon..

Charr fight three opponents and dont budge an inch..

Charr also lost a swath of their territory to the Brand, though they really don’t admit it as “lost completely”. And that’s from Kral not even trying as Jormag did . . . I don’t doubt if Kralkatorrik decided to go back and mess with the charr?

We’d see them make one glorious last stand and get eradicated as any sort of power on Tyria. Much like the dwarves.

Donutdude.9582:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Why would my charr warrior care about joining the Seraph? Aside from doing so just so he could swagger around Divinity’s Reach, naturally.

Like I said in a previous comment, this idea could be used as a “pilot” idea to see if there is interest. If there is, it could be expanded upon to organisations within the other races of Tyria.

Also wonder why anyone would want to work for the Peacekeepers instead of letting Rata Sum explode in a puff of experimental magic.

This is not a new concept, it is simply the first time I’ve been present when a company went “all in” towards supporting it rather than making it a side line.

But I’ll recount one which also held promise – Bloody Kithicor. Supposedly the culmination and climax of a lot of GM run events in EverQuest before the first expansion hit. It was a battle between players and hostile NPCs on different factions, and ended when the zone broke If that ending sounds somewhat familiar to people who were present for Lost Shores, now imagine that was a lore event which was one god saying “screw this” and killing everything in the zone. Supposedly there was more to come and we got a little token bits and pieces through the next expansion with rescuing the High Elf princess (a GMPC worse than any claims of Trahearne).

In the end, there wasn’t much support for the idea. They did try smaller arcs sometimes (a plague called down on a major section of one continent which had many many monsters spawn and it was released in phases) but nothing quite as world-changing. In short, throughout the years I played ol’ EverQuest? There was as much story forward motion and permanent changes because of that as there was during Living Story year 1.

(Yes, there were more additions through patches, but they were more content dumps than a story. And some of them . . . well, terrible. Just terrible.)

Why would my charr warrior care about joining the Seraph? Aside from doing so just so he could swagger around Divinity’s Reach, naturally.

And my ranger is much more intrigued with the idea of the Shining Blade rather than the Seraph. Though being allowed to be aide-de-camp to Captain Thackeray and continually go “you know, I was Commander of the Pact and Trahearne did a better job at this” would be so worth it.

Zardul.3952:

HEARTHSTONE <— ( that awkward moment when blizzard can balance a card game better than ANET can balance a MMO )

Nah.

It really doesn’t feel balanced compared to physical card games, even some of those shovel-ware CCGs back in the day.

Just let “Upgrade Extractors” drop off Daily achievement bonus spins, like Instant Armor Repair Canisters, or Transmutation Stones?

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

Charr are used to fighting in an army, norn are used to fighting alone.
So in 1v1, Norn. In a full scale war, Charr hands down.

I’d have said “charr are used to unit tactics” since they function in warbands more than armies. But norn have no need of armies, they are norn . (Yes, thank you, go back to your game now.)

Obsidian.1328:

Humans were never genocidal, Charr were.

You should be careful with that “never”. The pilgrims of the Crystal Desert who build the ancient cities there under the leadership of the Ghostly Hero were quite aggressive towards the Forgotten. Then there’s the White Mantle’s rather uncaring push through the southern Shiverpeaks killing just about anything in the way.

And on the other side, it’s not charr in general – it was the Flame Legion leadership and coercion of the other groups. That much got made evident with Pyre – he could care less about killing humans. Derisive, sure, but he was much much more interested in killing the shamans. And if the charr were genocidal, they would have continued on after Ascalon (again). Which they didn’t.

I chose the second option as an attempt to at least shame Marjory a little and throw her back some.

Honestly, yes the options could have been better. I’m less annoyed at that and more annoyed Rox made a U-turn on her drive to join the Stone Warband.

My Sweet Lily.1952:

This is for all Rangers out there:
1.Please, use 20/0/0/10/0 as a core to your PvE build. Spotter and traited Frost Spirit is all you need to bring. From there, you can build how ever you like (preferably zerker and full dmg build). If all Rangers would use this as the core of their build, it would make us all look better in pugs.

If all rangers would use this as the core of the build, it would mean we’d get a ton of rangers who are almost built the same. Sure, we’d be effective, but it’s like telling the warrior to suck it up and get back to hammer-time.

It may be effective, or efficient, but I’d rather reach my own equilibrium on what I like. And as Trait resets over and over can get expensive right now, I’ll wait.

2.Lose the bear and the longbow. Take cats and if you really must take ranged, use shortbow. It out-dps’ the longbow at “Spotter range”, which is the range where your allies get the Spotter buff (note: I haven’t tested the damage difference, this is what I have heard from several different sources). When I use the shortbow (in fractals), I like to flank the foe just outside of melee range, and I always see the Spotter buff on my allies.

I stopped using a bear to just soak damage and aggro a while ago, even if it was there to wait out the death timer for the other pet. I pretty much stick to wolf right now, I find the knockdown/howl works pretty decently in PvE. Alternatively, Black Widow because I do not like the Black Moa.

(And freely admitting to nostalgic choice as I kept a wolf pet almost entirely through my GW1 career. And when it wasn’t a wolf it was a black moa. Because that one scene outside the Sunspear hall is hilarious. Every. Time.)

As for longbow, I drag it out when I absolutely do not want to be near something dropping mid-range AOEs, or just roaming around. I mostly stick with shortbow and axe/horn. Again, I stay out of melee because I’ve not been very good at surviving in it and my reflexes are not tuned for it.

I hate my ranger because he killed my puppy.

Mike Winters.6871:

There is a difference between “being skeptical of scientists” and “being skeptical of science”, my friend. Science isn’t something you can be skeptical of, because it exists outside of whims, purposes, or intent. Science doesn’t care whether or not you need 2+2 to equal 5 if that’s not how it works. No malice, no ill will, just how it works.

Scientists, on the other hand . . . are people. They’re flawed. Their interpretation can be flawed. They might have approached the subject in a flawed manner. Of course you should question them, but if you’re not able to give a rebuttal to their work other than “you’re wrong because I say so” . . .

Question everything, including the need to question.

But science is a abstract human concept that we have created of things that we see as true though observation and even then can be wrong or misinterpreted.

Science can be questioned there are many times something was viewed as improbable or pseudo-scientific that held up to scrutiny and was proved true. etc the laws of physics had to be completely reworked in order to understand how a heavier then air fixed winged machine could fly without flapping its wings like a bird, we got the laws of aerodynamics out of that.

Like Michio Kaku says impossible is a dirty word in science. Of course then you have the pure BS like the stuff on History channel and Animal planet that they pass as real because people are to stupid to know entertainment from real science.

There is a difference between “science” as it is and “theories”. Science is a method, a construct, and a way to approach analysis. It is a construct like the quadratic equation or differential math. Much like those things however, it cannot hold beliefs, it cannot press social agendas, it cannot do anything other than be true or false.

Theories, on the other hand, are what are derived from the scientific method and analysis through peer review. As much as it is a dirty phrase to throw around education and scientific discussions – evolution is a theory, albeit one with evidence which supports it. It is not fact as much as “this board is two inches wide, by four inches deep, by three feet long” or “this cable has a tensile strength of…”.

So, are we on the same page with this? And can we stop being off topic again to dissect what “is” means?

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

I need to ask, for the sake of my curiosity: exactly what is the alternative to science which may be proven . . . faith, which cannot be proven and only felt? Or personal experiences, which cannot be truly shared with others who were not there? Blind distrust is as useful as blind faith.

We do have to take someone’s word with the trust they aren’t lying, or there is no point to allowing the pursuit of understanding or knowledge through scientific methods. Cynicism must be tempered by limitation somewhere, or you run into only one possible conclusion: nothing can be trusted.

Now, may we discuss the nice young ladies who have a thing for each other again and how that’s a thing which happened?

The whole point of science is to be skeptical of science. Otherwise, if you just accept anything that you find in any journal anywhere without questioning the methods, reasoning, or inspiration behind it, then “science” just becomes another form of crystal balls and Latin chanting. Complete with Latin. There’s rhyme and reason to things, and I hate when people divorce rhyme and reason from science and scientists.

If you want to talk Epistemology, well that is a whole other topic. Also complete with Latin.

There is a difference between “being skeptical of scientists” and “being skeptical of science”, my friend. Science isn’t something you can be skeptical of, because it exists outside of whims, purposes, or intent. Science doesn’t care whether or not you need 2+2 to equal 5 if that’s not how it works. No malice, no ill will, just how it works.

Scientists, on the other hand . . . are people. They’re flawed. Their interpretation can be flawed. They might have approached the subject in a flawed manner. Of course you should question them, but if you’re not able to give a rebuttal to their work other than “you’re wrong because I say so” . . .

Question everything, including the need to question.

Fafnir.5124:

Boysenberry.1869:

When I pass through Lion’s Arch I can’t help but think for a moment that somehow I failed. It’s like I played the game and lost. Obviously I have no influence over the story, but it still feels like I should have done more.

good question though is how can you feel like you failed when you never had a chance to succeed? I like how the play loss of npc life this time it was completely missed in queens juballie and why people though scarlet was cartoony the entire time. When she kill everyone in the audience. We only where able to save 3 people out of the entire stadium. Now if “Gwens” dead body was there i think people would care a lot more.

If they somehow had Gwen’s dead body there, I’d dance for them reviving her just to kill her off again. No, not really, I’d ask why the heck didn’t she show up to keep the charr out of Ascalon City so King Adelbern didn’t blow everything up. She’s Gwen the Goremonger.

Lane.3410:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

. . . someone must be thinking of a different Twilight.

Someone must be thinking the writing in the LS was leagues better than it actually was.

Not leagues better, but definitely better than Twilight. It’s no Silmarillion, but neither is it as much trash as people want to claim.

It still beats Factions.

Lostwingman.5034:

CureForLiving.5360:

Lasica.5068:

Thinking about this I wonder why people think the Pact should be involved?

With great power comes great responsibility?

It. wasn’t. their. power.

All the more reason to use it responsibly.

Lane.3410:

Talonblaze.3175:

I will say one thing:

Still a better love story than Twilight.

No, no it’s not. It makes Twilight look like the greatest love story ever told.

. . . someone must be thinking of a different Twilight.

I don’t like Piercing Arrows with Longbow currently, I like it with Shortbow more – I’m more likely to tag more people with Shortbow.

So if I wanted to go for a Longbow trait arrangement, Piercing Arrows would get the kick. And I didn’t trait for Signet of the Beastmaster anyway, so giving up something I didn’t have is fine with me.

Sreoom.3690:

GW1 was far superior (from a ranger perspective)

And yet . . . I ran into the same issues with groups people do here in GW1. So much so I learned to Hench it for the first two campaigns. Sure, it was better in some ways but it was worse in others – notably, in GW2 I can play ranger in open world or WvW and the most people can do is complain at me. I can only be kicked from Dungeons/Fractals, while in GW1 most of the game was that way.

McWolfy.5924:

Substance E.4852:

Sarision.6347:

Well thing with Drizzt is that he’s not balanced around his pet, not to mention he can even permastow it!

Ya, I’m pretty sure he was more about disemboweling folks with his dual scimitars than anything else.

Hahahaha! This and this! ^^

Drizzt is most about “I am an outcast of my race of evil kin” than either of those things, and does far more navel-gazing about getting involved than actually doing things.

He’s also one of the most copied characters I’ve heard of. I don’t know why, they should be copying Jarlaxle . . .

CureForLiving.5360:

If all of Tyria had but a single neck…
Also instead of a talking-cat let’s put a horse in charge of the Black Citadel!

I’m all for that, let’s kick out Rytlock and those other walking rugs and hand it to the Harathi in return for them getting out of the hinterlands. Then the charr can know how it feels to constantly have centaurs messing with your stuff.

It’s payback for Ascalon . . . Settlement, because it’s always contested.

Nage.1520:

I’m not sure that’s true.

. . . those last few posts of mine went over your head, didn’t they?

Nage.1520:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Nage.1520:

Reanne.5462:

Why do you base the quality of the game by its price? and not its content? A living breathing world should not get boring after living it once, when you reincarnate there should be new things to do and learn.

Real life is a living breathing world and people get bored with it all the time. Just saying.

Not for lack of content

But end game content is highly lacking. The developer needs to get in on that fast.

How sure are we that most players want end game content in the first place?

Well the alternative is quitting and I don’t think we’re going to see that start happening soon in great numbers.

Substance E.4852:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Is that what you read? What I read is “we need to figure out how to get their damage figures down without everyone quitting”, and “burst damage is generally broken anyway”.

Not that the second one is a surprise to me, there’s few games where throwing bursts around has much of a downside short of allowing friendly fire damage.

More like they want the Ranger to be like the Pyro from TF2 and burst classes to work like the Spy. High risk, but high lethality as well. Burst is powerful but countered by steady, flowing sustained damage.

Pyro is probably a good analogy actually – situationally, they’re really useful but they’re only “meh” outside those situations. They can do some really neat tricks, but lack a lot of options. And a good team might actually be able to get by without a Pyro anywhere.

Kind of like rangers currently – they can do stuff, they have some neat tricks, and they do actually work. But for almost anything specific they’re not required.

Cold Hearted Person.6154:

Ok, let’s summarize the discussion:

1. Tyria is dumb.
2. LA Council even more.
3. PACT is a bunch of zoofiles, only Dragons in their minds, tho i’m not sure if Dragons can be considered an animals, hmm.

That’s sure give us a good view of a prospect of great future……..

Anet, please give us, the players, an ability to start our own business, i will start then my own PMC and finaly ther will be someone that can at least try to protect Tyria.

AS a historical note, guilds are . . . were . . . PMCs and they had the whole “Guild War” thing way in the past when some of them got bored and picked fights with other nations’ guilds. You know how that ended? The Searing.

And even considering that, most guilds fighting in the Mist War could qualify as private armies anyway.

But if content starts being marketed to allow them to really get to work flexing muscle, you’re gonna see a lot more zerging going on.

bullyrook.2165:

What I don’t understand is why the writers are trying to pitch it like Keil was the only one trying to do anything on the council. We know that she and Magnus – who is also on the council if I am not mistaken – are joined at the hip. Did Magnus have a sudden change of heart about his support of Keil?

Who knows, we do know that Evon’s been saying a lot too about Scarlet for ages but we don’t know if he directly talked to the council or if he was just rabble-rousing. By judging his character, I’d say the latter.

Anyway, off to go start a petition to the Captain’s Council to set aside funding to pay adventurers for quality lumber, metal, and stone.

Konrad Knox.5162:

I have read the lore of GW and GW2 off the Wiki enough to coherently roleplay in the universe. The Living Story content is not up to my quality standard for serious roleplay.

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Marjory: “So tell us, Konrad, how did it feel to finally kill Scarlet? Just don’t make me laugh, my ribs still hurt.”

What my reply would be, were I able to speak for Konrad?

Konrad: "Laugh, Marjory? Laugh, really? You were there, you should know how it felt. Or maybe tongue exchange with the hiccup girl here wiped your memory? Let me refresh it for you. How did it feel to do the dirty work for you, in a mission you dragged me into? You ask for my help, and I agree to kill someone for you, because you cannot do it yourselves, and then you ask me how it felt? People are suffering in Lion’s Arch right now, dying of hunger and wounds, trying to rebuild their homes. Children are crying for their lost parents. Siblings are separated. Thousands of people are now refugees needing new homes. That makes you laugh? Well then, glad your life works out for you, you spiteful little harlot. How did it feel? Like I’ve got the easy job. The hard work begins now. I’m out of here. Anyone of you who has any decency left, get up on your feet and let’s go. People need help. There’s a lot of work left. There are huts to rebuild, and roofs to thatch, wounds to bandage, and children to feed.

Hey, wonderful, she almost dies trying to fight all this and your character feel the need to scold her. And not just scold but eviscerate so thoroughly there’s nothing to have even an admittedly somber gathering over.

Everyone there is trying to have some time to unwind and convalesce from assorted injuries and problems. They’re doing a real bad job of having fun, because even with the attempts at joking there’s no fun there.

Less is more.

Tobias Trueflight: “How did it feel? Well now I know how my ancestor felt helping to put down the mad prophet Varesh Ossa. Dirty business, and still too much left to get done. Plenty of things left to fix and wounds which need healing. So drink and be merry now . . . there’s tough times coming.”

And then I might have gone off to target-practice on Inquest.

Nage.1520:

Reanne.5462:

Why do you base the quality of the game by its price? and not its content? A living breathing world should not get boring after living it once, when you reincarnate there should be new things to do and learn.

Real life is a living breathing world and people get bored with it all the time. Just saying.

Not for lack of content

But end game content is highly lacking. The developer needs to get in on that fast.

waylander.7695:

Game of Thrones and GW2 in same sentence … lol

I’ll put Game of Thrones and Twilight in the same sentence. Well a second time.

“Twilight has less thought and talent put into it than Game of Thrones.”

Bran.7425:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

And already there’s the conspiracy theories about Allie’s “sickness” again. Sigh. I shouldn’t be surprised or disheartened, but I still am.

I’ll note, approaching a CDI with the attitude of “well they won’t listen anyway” or “it doesn’t matter, just a publicity stunt” isn’t going to be of any use if they’re a legitimate attempt. All it’s going to do is be not-helpful, and if enough people do it I’m relatively sure ANet will just give up for real.

TL:DR? “This is why we can’t have nice things.”

From the CDI page 17
“Yes, like I said about the sustained vs burst, it’s not necessarily fully functional in the game. This is one of those things that we would have to balance with bringing other classes down a bit as far as damage output. Burst damage needs to have risk involved, and we know that right now many classes don’t have that associated risk.”

TLDR: “The other professions are why we can’t have anything.”

Is that what you read? What I read is “we need to figure out how to get their damage figures down without everyone quitting”, and “burst damage is generally broken anyway”.

Not that the second one is a surprise to me, there’s few games where throwing bursts around has much of a downside short of allowing friendly fire damage.

And already there’s the conspiracy theories about Allie’s “sickness” again. Sigh. I shouldn’t be surprised or disheartened, but I still am.

I’ll note, approaching a CDI with the attitude of “well they won’t listen anyway” or “it doesn’t matter, just a publicity stunt” isn’t going to be of any use if they’re a legitimate attempt. All it’s going to do is be not-helpful, and if enough people do it I’m relatively sure ANet will just give up for real.

TL:DR? “This is why we can’t have nice things.”

Dahkeus.8243:

GW2 has had some truly amazing characters (Tybalt, Taimi, etc.), but Trehearne is not one of them.

I would have been fine if they just left him out or let him get killed off in the LA fight.

Poor Tybalt…I still miss him. =-(

Have an apple, you’ll feel better.

Blood Red Arachnid.2493:

You really didn’t. You retreated into widespread dismissal via worship of science, and didn’t understand the point at all.

I need to ask, for the sake of my curiosity: exactly what is the alternative to science which may be proven . . . faith, which cannot be proven and only felt? Or personal experiences, which cannot be truly shared with others who were not there? Blind distrust is as useful as blind faith.

We do have to take someone’s word with the trust they aren’t lying, or there is no point to allowing the pursuit of understanding or knowledge through scientific methods. Cynicism must be tempered by limitation somewhere, or you run into only one possible conclusion: nothing can be trusted.

Now, may we discuss the nice young ladies who have a thing for each other again and how that’s a thing which happened?

Little Old Lady.3742:

its like the ending of a bad movie with a cliffhanger, do you really care if the sparkly 109 year old vampire marries a 17 year old girl?

Yes. It means the resultant heckspawn child isn’t born out of wedlock. This makes all the difference in the world, obviously.

By the way, what I got from this epilogue scene was different. It was confirmation these people are a group going to be sticking together and covering each other, since Rox said she’s trying to find the courage to turn down Rytlock over the warband. (Said courage may be at the bottom of the next mug . . . maybe.)

We also may have reason to pack Taimi into her golem and a catapult can launch them over enemy lines with that aetherphaser weapon. We need to totally try this, like tonight.

Evalia.7103:

If we talk lore, it’s norn.
But then again norns have been scaled down for in-game purposes.
If I’d have to wager on in-game model duel.
Max-sized charr is quite a big deal bigger than a max-sized norn(taller? Well human is also taller than a bear if a bear stands on 4 paws when human stands on his 2 feet!). Wields significantly bigger weapons too(in-game of course), not to mention claws, horns, much bigger teeth and jaw. A winner would be obvious.

Yes.

It’s still the asura.

Alice.8694:

Theres an entire island of undead that cannot just sit there, not to mention 5 dragons off on their own little missions of world domination. The pact has a daunting job and it’s hands are way too full for excursions into vigilante justice.

Not to mention they had grievous damage to their air forces while fighting Zhaitan, including their flagship. I count that as one airship heavily damaged, one which had to be scuttled, and some number quietly nicked by Aetherblades (probably from repair drydocks).

And there were intense losses during the campaign through Orr. An armor unit was devastated trying to march through Malchor’s Leap, some others were lost during even the initial scouting phase, and there were still more who fought and died pushing to Arah.

Depending on how long game-time has passed between Zhaitan’s demise and current, it’s really questionable how close to being ready they are to mobilize.

It’s not just a writer’kitten she has to wear. It’s a GM’kitten, as if it was planning a tabletop game. She’s responsible not just for writing the lore but making sure it can be put into the game, and that the parts are in proper placement for it to work. You sometimes have a villain who is paper-thin because the game requires it to set up something else.

. . . but then, Scarlet isn’t exactly paper-thin or out of reach of what we can understand. Once we put together what we have outside of the game (the short story) with what was worked together inside of it, we see what happened. And we can see most of why she acted as she did.

She wanted the drill and she wanted to make sure she had the time needed for it to operate as she needed it to. Which was to poke and disrupt the ley lines to stir up a dragon. Why she wished to do that is less clear, but it’s theorized she was fighting its influence on her and it was done to get that thing to stop. I could stretch further but that’s deduction without a net and I’m not doing that today.

Back to the other hat of a GM. Scarlet had to serve a function for the story, and to do that she needed to have certain powers and resources. So she has them, simply because it must be so.

(Don’t pretend this wasn’t done before, either, because there is no excuse for how Varesh or Kahyet had known about Abaddon, but they needed to in order for the plot to make sense. This didn’t start with this particular writer and it goes back to Prophecies too . . . like how Vizier Khilbron has the ability to bamf in and out teleporting and nobody has that ability otherwise in the narrative.)

Scarlet has to have the pieces so the backwards working needs to be done to get her the pieces. She needs a means of keeping people out of Lion’s Arch, so the miasma has to be made to exist. She needs shock troops to keep people busy, so she has the Twisted Watchwork . . . or the steam creatures if the Watchknights hadn’t existed, since we know she studied those too. She needs highly mobile forces to hit and fade quickly, so the Aetherblades were cultivated – initially intended to get on the Council and keep it confused/distracted. (Luckily, they were just as idiotic as the Pirate Lords were in “At World’s End” but that’s a long long digression of stupidity .) She needs tools to dig quickly and pierce magic, which is where the dredge/Flame Legion got cultivated . . . and she started with them since they also could be used to mine resources she needed to get the Breachmaker built. (“How did she get that thing built?” Well, consider how big the cave of the Molten Weapons Facility was, and how much metal was there. Consider it’s implied there wasn’t only one. Realize the dredge are really good at mining. She had the means, and she had the time to put it together.)

This fits together better than people are willing to agree upon because of the way it got introduced and placed before us as small splinters of something which was made into a big deal later. But if you look at it from building it backwards by deciding she had X and then deciding how she had to get it? It starts making some sense.

Brow.9425:

DarcShriek.5829:

ViralVarda.2739:

Two sentences of a dragon and that’s it. No one saying, “shouldn’t we go try to find the dragon?” Instead it’s, “my leg hurts,” “I don’t wanna talk about things, I wanna make things,” “I just asked for a chicken,” and “here’s my sister, and I’m a lesbian.” They vaguely alluded to Scarlet interrupting the leyline because she wanted to mess with the dragon. So… Mord didn’t ask her to do it? Why isn’t anyone worried about a new dragon? Why isn’t anyone researching the new dragon?

Why isn’t anyone worried about a new dragon?

Did you miss the part where Marjory’s sister says she going to Brisban Wildlands for a while?

Has anyone been to Brisban to see if there are any changes yet?

This.

The next living story will be in Brisbane Wildlands (and maybe a parallel story about rebuilding Lion’s Arch.) Brisbane Wildlands. You know, in the jungle. Where a dragon lives?

It’s also the home to some weird bandit fort with level 80 guards. And a zone portal which was otherwise unreachable.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

Lilith Ajit.6173:

Smooth Penguin.5294:

Lilith Ajit.6173:

I get that in real life, if I get a broken leg, I won’t be standing on it really. But it isn’t like we saw the bone come out of his leg. As a Norn I don’t think it should be affecting him as much.

With one single post, you admit that having a broken leg is a big deal, and go on to say it can’t be that bad if the bone isn’t sticking out. I take it that you’ve lived a pretty safe life. Compound fractures are indeed bad, but even grown men can cry when their legs break.

OKAY.

We are talking about the Norn.

The same Norn that everyone argued with me about 2 weeks ago that they could face entire armies solo and still stand.

You’re telling me a broken leg is holding this. Norn back, and that, this is normal for a. Norn?

I do live a safe life. But I have had broken legs. It sucks. But this is a fantasy world where my Asura gets slashed in the face by a greatsword and bleeds a little.

And in this fantasy world, my ancestor helped a human become a god, and all his wares disappeared from the Hall of Monuments.

No, we know where they went.

Evon’s selling them for Gems. Well, not directly. He’s selling a chance at claim tickets for gems, then trading the weapons for the tickets.

. . . and people tell me he’s not evil.

Windu The Forbidden One.6045:

We, the players, have been pierced by thousands of arrows, stabbed, electrocuted, frozen, set on fire, slashed at, crushed and sometimes all at once. Yet we still fight on. And one broken leg stops Braham.

Yes I get the whole gameplay and story segregation, but it’s a funny topic nonetheless.

It’s always hilarious. So is this . . .

Always. Hilarious.

chemiclord.3978:

Does that sound stupid to you? It should.

Yeah I know, who would buy The Last Of Us? They can’t even get the area around Austin right.

daimasei.4091:

You mean like in GUILDWARS Factions?

Wasn’t just Factions, we had cheering crowds of a sort in Lion’s Arch after we kicked Izzy . . . I mean Confessor Isiah . . . to the curb and killing every mursaat which dared stick their stupid Tyrael-lookalike selves through the city gate.

Unknownhero.6745:

I was hoping they would go all out, and maybe steal the ending from the original Star Wars, have all the citizens lined up cheering, have the Queen show up and a few other racial Dignitaries, and maybe hand out some medals. A few fireworks and some cake
Then a nice speech about hope , rebuilding, and maybe a hint to watch the skies for future evils coming…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yixG8pfncOs

I don’t need a medal clogging up my storage, thanks. And cake is overrated but I’ll take some omnomberry cookies.

Lastly, according to what the skritt have to say, maybe handing out shinies isn’t the best idea anyway.

Qawsada.4251:

Tobias Trueflight.8350:

Realistically, that kind of thing can start wars. Just saying.

Realistically, we are in a war. With Scarlet!

Dead now, so no more war. Yay for that, I was getting tired of hearing about her. Now we can get back to bashing Trahearne like normal people.

Thanks to some nobody asura thief I hear. I also hear the esteemed Dulfy took care of it in record time, so I don’t know which one is false.