draxynnic.3719

To an extent, yes.

I'm on a server that hasn't stood on it's own for a long time, so I've seen the reaction of a few servers to the prospect of going up against BG since server matching began. It tends to be summed up as "puppy that, let's throw for a few weeks so we don't have to go up against them for a while".

I'm a bit ambivalent about it myself.

On the one hand, it does look like a properly fortified city now. It's lacking in actual housing and places where people live, but that's common for ArenaNet's cities - you generally have to assume that you're seeing the commercial districts and the housing districts are offscreen. But it's certainly lost a lot of character, and I _hate_ that historical landmarks were literally paved over.

In truth, I think there is a certain degree of truth in what Torolan is saying, in this:

She's not a team player. Having her work as part of a team doesn't suit her skills and temperament, she doesn't listen to orders well, and is likely to unknowingly create discord among the team.

However, she is emphatically _not_ a traitor. Having Mordremoth in her mind was probably the biggest test of her loyalty since discovering Faolain's true nature, and perhaps even that isn't really comparable, since at least then she was still reasonably certain that her thoughts were her own. From what Caithe said about her mindset after Mordremoth awoke, she wasn't able to compartmentalise it the way Canach, Occam, and (mostly) the PC did - she was in a state where she didn't know which thoughts were her own and which were Mordremoth's. So when she thought "I can trust the Commander", for instance, she didn't know whether that was _her_ thought... or Mordremoth's. So she took the approach where she felt most certain she wasn't delivering it directly to Mordremoth: which is to say, running off with it on her own, where as long as _she_ didn't succumb (arguably the weak spot, but in the end, she proved strong-minded enough not to), she was not giving it away without a fight.

And this is without going into the possibility that the Dream told her to steal the egg _specifically to keep the egg off the Pact fleet_. Since if the Commander and the egg had gone down with the fleet, it would probably have been an unmitigated disaster.

Given that, Caithe probably is better employed as a lone agent, reporting back to the PC every so often rather than being an integral part of the team. Certainly, dumping her like a hot potato is not going to help anything. She's going to keep doing what she thinks best regardless - better for there to be some coordination rather than ending up acting at cross-purposes.

To be fair, it's possible that he considered that 'need to know' once it was revealed that the stranger was Balthazar. Even so, though, releasing a random stranger from imprisonment hardly seems to be state secret material.

Honestly, whatever you think about the first time she disappeared with the egg, the second time around, she was doing the right thing. There was no guarantee that we'd beat the Shadow of the Dragon, so the egg is better off if someone whisks it away while everyone else stays to fight. And up until the still-unhatched Aurene chose us as her champion granting us improved Zephyrite powers, as seventy-something percent of Destiny's Edge's firepower we were the best to stay since we had the best chance of killing the Shadow.

And the first time around... could well have been the Dream acting to keep the egg off the fleet.

The commander makes a valid point when he sets her as an additional layer of defence for Aurene: "Whatever else you've been, you've never been an enemy to this dragon". She's been a loose cannon at times, but her loyalties are something we can be confident about.

Unless you count her current status, I'd argue we still know more about Zojja. Her apprenticeship to Snaff fills out a lot of her history and her hatred of the Inquest, and I believe we know her college (Synergetics, I think?) as well. There are certainly details we don't know, but thus far those details are things that can be glossed over with "she had a typical upbringing for an asura of her intelligence before being apprenticed to Snaff", as opposed to Rytlock's history which raises a tonne of questions and answers few.

To be honest, I don't really see a situation where engineers aren't going to be thinking that carrying at least one weapon kit wouldn't be useful. You can make builds without them, to be sure, but having a second weapon is a really useful thing to have.

Frankly, though, I'm inclined to think that mace _should_ be in the core kit. Give a second mainhand beside pistol, and a melee weapon set as core.

Part of me does wonder, however, if ArenaNet might deliberately avoid mace in order to keep their active weapon visible: now that kits no longer have backpacks an engineer using the mace with the wrench skin could make it hard to tell at a glance whether they're actually using the mace or the toolkit (not impossible, of course, but harder).

The general point stands, though: if an engineer regards their primary weapon as something that is classified as a kit, then using a wrench, hammer, club, or even an inert stick-grenade as a backup makes a lot of sense.

> @Crinn.7864 said:

> According to the Gw1 wiki the Gryphon Banner is the banner of the Salma royal line.

> https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Salma

> However it would not make sense for the Seraph to be using the royal banner, since Kryta is a nation-state and not a feudal kingdom, so the usage of the royal family banner for the military would be irregular. Also if any Krytan military group used the royal banner, it would be the Shining Blade, since the Shining Blade are actually directly affiliated with the monarchy.

>

Technically, both are affiliated with the monarchy - the Seraph are the royal army, while the Shining Blade are the royal guard slash secret police. Formally speaking, the monarch is the only person who has command of _all_ the Seraph: each company captain is independent of the others (Logan had a 'first among equals' status, but that came more from being Jennah's champion than formally outranking the other Seraph captains).

Given that the Shining Blade already had an ensign at Salma's coronation, it makes sense that the Shining Blade would keep its existing symbol, while the Seraph - or at least the first company therof - would use the royal ensign to represent that they are now the royal army.

Out of curiosity, though, I went and visited the Seraph Headquarters in Divinity's Reach, and there are a couple of large banners of a golden winged helm on a field of white at the back there. So my guess would be on that being the Seraph ensign.

Edit: From the wiki, clearest example is at the back towards the left: [https://wiki.guildwars2.com/images/9/96/Seraph_Headquarters.jpg](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/images/9/96/Seraph_Headquarters.jpg "https://wiki.guildwars2.com/images/9/96/Seraph_Headquarters.jpg")

There's also the gryphon banner that's seen in Lake Doric.

Given that the Seraph are essentially the standing army of Kryta, using regular Krytan banners - such as the royal gryphon and the crown banner on the Tamini pole linked by Konig - makes sense. It's also worth noting that the Seraph are (supposed to be) much larger than the Shining Blade and Ministry Guard and is organised into multiple companies that don't have a formal overall commander, so its possible that each company has its own heraldry. So Konig's link might be the heraldry of the company stationed at Seraph's Landing, while the gryphon banner in Lake Doric might be the heraldry used by the Divinity's Reach Seraph.

> @vier.1327 said:

> And now, after the death of Caudecus, now has a spy in the Shinning Blade. Lady Wi's daugther is the pet of Anise. She is in contact with the secret service of Kryta.

I suspect that Valette isn't being made privy to anything Anise really cares about the OoW knowing. Consider that a nonhuman character in E6 hears that a nonhuman has never taken the oath before - which indicates that Canach was never brought into the inner circle.

For all Anise made comments about Canach's real crime was being caught, she seemed to mostly use him as an agent in circumstances where she didn't care if people knew he was her agent... or even outright _wanted_ it to be known. Valette will probably be used in a similar way. If she proves herself and volunteers to join the Shining Blade once her debt is considered paid and she's free to go, that might change, but in the meantime...

> @Rognik.2579 said:

> > @draxynnic.3719 said:

> > > @Rognik.2579 said:

> > > > @moonstarmac.4603 said:

> > > > I would love if we could restore her or at least free her in LWS4. With Livia's help, it shouldn't be too hard.

> > > Even if she were freed from Joko's influence somehow, she's also blind, handless and mostly dead. Restoring her is definitely not an option, considering she's been like that for around 200 years. Releasing her from Joko's influence probably will involve killing Joko somehow, which will not be easy. Plus, if we do release her, how will those who haven't unlocked the griffon mount unlock it? Or will that be a prerequisite to freeing her?

> >

> > It's part of the point that she isn't under Joko's control. Joko had the ability to withdraw the animating power from her (and did so) but if another necromancer animated her corpse and gave her control over it, there's probably not much Joko could do. At most he could withdraw the 'spark of Awakening' altogether... which would release her spirit to potentially fight on as a ghost.

> Joko can't control her actions, but she is "alive" on his whim, and she says he has given her the barest glimmer of a spark just so she can't move on but also can't cause any more trouble. At least until the storm cleared up so a troublesome hero could come and help her rebuild the Sunspears.

In a world where people coming back as ghosts if they feel they have sufficient drive to do so is a thing - and Dunkoro has already set a precedent for that - it's probably better for Joko to have Tahlkora's spirit bound to an inert corpse rather than free to wander and cause trouble as a ghost.

Unless he's refined his degree of control substantially since _Nightfall_, he doesn't appear to have the ability to "de-Awaken" somebody remotely. Even if he does, though, there's a good chance it would be doing Tahlkora a favour by releasing her spirit.

> @Rognik.2579 said:

> > @moonstarmac.4603 said:

> > I would love if we could restore her or at least free her in LWS4. With Livia's help, it shouldn't be too hard.

> Even if she were freed from Joko's influence somehow, she's also blind, handless and mostly dead. Restoring her is definitely not an option, considering she's been like that for around 200 years. Releasing her from Joko's influence probably will involve killing Joko somehow, which will not be easy. Plus, if we do release her, how will those who haven't unlocked the griffon mount unlock it? Or will that be a prerequisite to freeing her?

It's part of the point that she isn't under Joko's control. Joko had the ability to withdraw the animating power from her (and did so) but if another necromancer animated her corpse and gave her control over it, there's probably not much Joko could do. At most he could withdraw the 'spark of Awakening' altogether... which would release her spirit to potentially fight on as a ghost.

> @"Sir Vincent III.1286" said:

> > @"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:

> > > @"Sir Vincent III.1286" said:

> > > The mirror of Lyssa might not even be a portable item. Back in GW1, there was a lake called The Mirror of Lyss in Vabbi, which is the place where they worship Lyssa. That same lake is now called the Grand Court of Sebelkeh in GW2 with a POI called "Ruins of the Mirror of Lyss". It is more plausible to me the mirror being talked about is the lake.

> >

> > Lyssa's Mirror is 100% a portable item. Marjory says that he carried it with him all the time, and [we see it ourselves in Taimi's Pet Project, after we broke it](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Broken_Mirror).

>

> As far as we know, the mirror is just that a mirror. To me, it's probably a way for Balthasar to see himself to not forget who he is. When we cornered him in the lab, we didn't break the illusion by breaking the mirror, Balthasar broke the illusion himself and breaking all the mirrors including the one he's holding in the process. Besides, he no longer needs the mirror to remind himself who he really is.

Everything we're told indicates that the mirror was the source of the illusion. What probably happened is that Balthaddon realised that the mirror was about to break, and decided it was better to control the circumstances of the reveal to maximum effect.

Otherwise, everything the characters said in the instance was wrong, and most of the instance was completely pointless.

> @"Aaron Ansari.1604" said:

> > @Torolan.5816 said:

> >Xenophobic does not mean inflexible, especially when you think that Dredge, Sylvari and Krait do not compete for the same ressources.

> That's part of the problem, though. One of the things that make krait _krait_ is that none of the other races have anything they want, besides a source of slaves and sacrifices. Scarlet turned that upside down by somehow acquiring pieces of one of their lost obelisks... which solved the problem of giving the krait something they wanted, but at the cost of adding 'acquired ancient krait relic from the bottom of the sea when the krait themselves couldn't' to the long list of implausible feats Scarlet pulled off with no visible effort.

>

>

And on top of that, if you go into the story of the Nightmare Court, one of the events that lead to Cadeyrne forming the Nightmare Court was because he thought the sylvari should be more ruthless with their enemies - _specifically the krait_ - for their own survival. So the Nightmare Court allying with the krait was out of character from both sides.

> @"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:

> Though of all the gods, Lyssa and Kormir are the ones most likely to wish to help Tyrians with their plight. In Kormir's case, because she's so young a god - this resulted in her waiting until Path of Fire to leave them, and even blessed Tahlkora with telepathy after Joko had cut out her eyes and tongue and failed to Awaken her. In Lyssa's case, this is supported by [her desire to live with humans in the past](https://wiki.guildwars2.com/wiki/Orrian_History_Scrolls#The_Six), and it could serve to be a motivating factor if she believed Balthazar wouldn't go full out Abaddon/Menzies on Tyrians.

I'd say Dwayna as well. She is the goddess of compassion, after all, and GW1 did have quests given by her avatars such as 'give the ghosts of a couple one last meeting with their orphaned child to say their goodbyes and go to rest knowing their child is being looked after'. Which seems to indicate that she also cares.

Possibly somewhat ruined by the fact that said child is probably now a Foefire ghost, but you never know...

Apart from the odd animation issue, the only difference between one race/profession combination and another is the racial skills. I've seen a build using an asura soulbeast to get additional poison stacks from Radiation Field... but that was explicitly described as a 'bad build'. So you probably don't want to emulate that.

Scholar professions are probably the most fitting for asura thematically, but you don't have to go with that. Engineers are also quite fitting, particularly if you want to get the toolbelt effects on the racial skills, but racial skills are deliberately underpowered as a rule so you probably won't find yourself using them much anyway.

ADDENDUM: Now that I'm a little less rushed:

The majority of asura are magic-using inventors. Thus why the scholar professions and engineers are the most fitting thematically. Anything works, though - there are exceptions to every rule, and ways to make every profession work with a 'typical' asura mindset. Guardian might actually be an underrated case as well - asura technology is filled with various force fields and guardians are strong in that area.

Asura racial skills, if you use them, probably work best with condition-based builds. Toolbelt racial skills (for asura engineers) are... well, they exist, but they're not something I would specifically roll an asura engineer for. But then, racial skills are rarely your best choice anyway.

Taking into account elite specialisations... I would be inclined to feel that engineers and mesmers probably have the most asura-appropriate elite specialisations. While the base engineer is more oriented towards charr technology, both the scrapper (gyros and electric hammer) and holosmith (Zephyrite crystals may be the final ingredient, but holomancy in general has been established as an asura thing since release) move more towards asura magitech. For mesmers, chronomancers are about fiddling around with time, while mirages enhance the teleportation aspect: both of which are fitting for asura.

Elementalist and necromancer elite specs... _work_, but they don't feel so asura-esque to me. Your mileage may vary. Thieves and their specialisations also work thematically - they're not super asura-esque, but I don't see anything strange in an asura becoming a daredevil or a deadeye, and some asura do specialise in... "acquisitions".

Ranger is a bit of a weird one for asura - most asura just don't care about nature. There are exceptions, however.

For warrior and guardian... asura would probably gravitate towards more 'deliberate' fighting styles. There are probably few asura berserkers, but spellbreaker would likely be very popular among asura warriors. For guardian... I'm not sure about asura using longbows, but the trapping fighting style of dragonhunters might appeal to asura, and to me, guardian in general feels like the soldier profession most likely to appeal to asura. Firebrand might be too tied up in some other race's history for a typical asura to care about, though.

Similarly for revenant, at least until a legend from asura history crops up.

> @Chaith.8256 said:

> > @draxynnic.3719 said:

> > I recall that at one point ArenaNet indicated they were considering making Explosive Shot and Jump Shot classify as explosions. Never happened in the end, but it would make pistol more worthwhile.

> >

> > Sooner or later they really are going to have to recognise that it can't be left as-is. Maybe when they want to introduce an elite spec with an offhand?

>

> Hah, yeah, Pistol mainhand is just not even in the ballpark. Probably my suggested buffs aren't enough.

Heck, Shattershot has basically everything Fragmentation Shot used to have... and the rev players regard renegade shortbow as bad. Granted, you have to consider the other skills as well, but that was pretty much the first thing I thought when I saw Shattershot: "Isn't this exactly what pre-nerf engineer pistol used to do?"

It's a good question.

My guess is that she possibly had more sympathy for Balthaddon than the others, for reasons unknown, but when push came to shove, she sided with the others. Possibly because, given that according to the lore in Orr she was the most reluctant to stop living among humans, she may have wanted to fight in their defence as well, but was finally persuaded that doing so could only make the situation worse. While Balthaddon probably wouldn't have been happy with her, if she had been the only one advocating for his side until the very end, that might explain why she's not on the curse list.

The second option is that she did agree with Balthaddon, but unlike the headstrong Balthaddon, she recognised that it was a fight they couldn't win, and therefore acquiesced basically because she didn't think the fight was worth being taken down by the other four gods for.

In either case, it's possible that she gave the mirror to Balthaddon on the principle that while she couldn't help him to escape, she could give him the means to not be immediately recaptured if he did escape. I don't think, however, that Lyssa would have agreed with the course Balthaddon did eventually take, unless ArenaNet is planning to character assassinate her like they did Balthazar.

> @"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:

> > @draxynnic.3719 said:

> > I don't consider this to be in any way conclusive. The titans are mentioned separately to the followers of Dhuum - it is just as valid a reading of the passage, possibly even more so, that the titans and the followers of Dhuum are separate (but allied) groups within the Foundry, rather than that the titans belong to Dhuum.

> >

> > Consider that there are five groups of minions and allies of Abaddon (Margonites, Torment Demons, titans, Shadow Army, Dhuum-followers) and four realms before the Ebony Citadel. So two of them had to share a realm. It makes sense that given the origins of the titans that Dhuum might be involved, but I don't think there's anything that demonstrates that the titans were minions of Dhuum on loan to Abaddon, as opposed to being minions of Abaddon that Dhuum helped to create.

>

> It's stated outright that the "followers of Dhuum" gathered at the Foundry. At the Foundry of Failed Creations you see only a handful of Margonites, many many titans, and a tiny couple of dryders and dream riders, most of which consist of The Fury and his guard.

>

> As such, if titans were not the followers of Dhuum you'd expect far more dryders and dream riders, at the very least.

>

> More telling however was the first quote NPC's line: "The Fury and his minions await the opening of the Door of Komalie, a gateway that leads from here into Tyria."

>

> Who went through the Door of Komalie? Titans. Who made the titans? The Fury.

>

> There isn't a single line anywhere that indicates that titans were being made outside of The Fury's purview.

I recall quite a few dryders and dream riders in the rooms on the way in, too.

We don't really know how many followers of Dhuum there were actually left in the Domain of Anguish at that point, or how many were under the Fury's control rather than another of Dhuum's representatives. If his job was to help with producing the titans, he might not actually have had a huge army to begin with.

It's possible that, after Abaddon's death, the Fury assumed command of the titans, either through his own power or as a delegate of Mallyx, but I don't think anything points to the titans being Dhuum's as opposed to being Abaddon's.

> @Tamias.7059 said:

> > @"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:

> > > @Tamias.7059 said:

> > > Actually, I think fleshreavers were created by the charr Rragar Maneater way back in GW1. The Master Dungeon Guide on Rragar's Menagerie says,

> > > -snip-

> > > In GW1 fleshreavers were only ever encountered in Rragar's Menagerie and one other Depths of Tyria map, the Heart of the Shiverpeaks. It wasn't until GW2 that we get any suggestion that they have anything to do with the Mists.

> >

> > Rragar breed the fleshreavers, as that entry says. He did not create them. The fact they could be found in the Heart of the Shiverpeaks, so very, very far away from charr homelands, shows this.

>

> It says that he bred a race of them. If someone is said to have bred a breed of dog, you would assume that that breed originated with them, rather than that person being one of many who cultivates that breed. Plus, we have Rragar himself calling Hidesplitter a "magnificent creation" and his "most prized speciment", and the Master Dungeon Guide entry says that Blobby is "among Rragar's failed creations".

>

> More concretely, in the quest [Veiled Threat](https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Veiled_Threat) there are _plenty_ of direct references to fleshreavers being Rragar's creations. "[Rragar] rears a new breed of creatures he intends to utilize to destroy humans", "Be sure to destroy his creations as well", "We've found you and your vile creations", ""You seem in a hurry to be devoured by our creations. My fleshreavers shall accomodate you". I'm sure there'd be more if I continued to look.

>

> Also, I think you might be exaggerating the distance between the Heart of the Shiverpeaks and the charr homelands. It's right near the Central Transfer Chamber, which is somewhere between the Shiverpeaks and Ascalon. The presence of fleshreavers in the Heart of the Shiverpeaks is most easily explained from the piece of trivia on GWW (from which most of the above information comes from) that says, "The first level in [Rragar's Menagerie] includes the entire last level of Heart of the Shiverpeaks as part of its map".

The lore on fleshreavers is a bit all over the place. My interpretation from the Master Dungeon Guide is that fleshreavers existed before Rragar, but Rragar found them to be a suitable starting point for his experiments - to use your breeding analogy, he created new breeds of fleshreavers, but he didn't create the species (you wouldn't say that your hypothetical dog breeder created the species of dogs, after all, just the specific breed(s). The life cycle of fleshreavers seems to have some similarities with the Torment demons as seen in the Stygian Veil, which start out skeletal and grow musculature from there. The Stygian demons don't appear to need fleshreaving to achieve their full growth, but it does seem as if "skeleton first and then add flesh" has some precedent among Mist creatures.

> @ProtoGunner.4953 said:

> You forgot something: As of now they had to introduce new features with every expansion. Gliding in HoT, mounts in PoF. For the next expansion they need something new and I could imagine new type of weapon(s).

That is an interesting observation. I would contend, though, that what they really want is new masteries, and gating new weapons behind masteries will probably infuriate people.

Still, they could make the masteries something that doesn't involve art assets, and have the artists make a few more weapon types.

I recall that at one point ArenaNet indicated they were considering making Explosive Shot and Jump Shot classify as explosions. Never happened in the end, but it would make pistol more worthwhile.

Sooner or later they really are going to have to recognise that it can't be left as-is. Maybe when they want to introduce an elite spec with an offhand?

> @Slyven.8637 said:

> Why, why, why, do people think that an engineer should use their tools for a weapon? Um, They use tools to CREATE weapons. it's like expecting a gunsmith to go hunting with a screwdriver.

If you have to carry a big wrench in order to fix your portable mortar, why not use it as your backup melee weapon?

The assumption with some of these ideas is that most engineers are still going to be using a kit, possibly as their primary weapon. A construction tool might well make a lot of sense as a secondary if you're doing most of your fighting with grenades, an elixir gun, portable mortar, or even a flamethrower.

> @Lily.1935 said:

> A janky profession that caused lots of balancing problems in the first game that made the devs scream in frustration and being ported over to GW2 they completely change its theme so that its unrecognizable from its original incarnation only for the very few reminantes of its GW1 designed to further cause massive balance problems.

None of the professions translated directly, except maybe ranger if you don't consider being forced to have a pet to be a major change. Mesmers are now a summoner rather than what they were in GW1. Elementalist gameplay now focuses on cycling through attunements (unless you're a fire staff ele only focusing on max DPS). Even warrior adrenaline mechanics have gone from allowing you to cycle through multiple adrenaline skills to just having one burst skill (berserker and spellbreaker change that up, but it still doesn't behave like a GW1 warrior).

Necromancer changed not because of any balancing problems it had in GW1, but because GW2's mechanics are just so different to GW1's that the professions _had_ to change.

It is worth noting that Kryta was once classified as an Elonan colony. So if Palawa Joko has a 'must have everything that was once Elona' attitude, then that might give him incentive to attack Kryta. Including areas that were once part of Kryta, such as the northern Caledon...

Attempting to seize Orr is also an interesting possibility. The Pact wouldn't be happy with that, but in their current state, would they be able to stop him? Could be interesting to see a warzone in Scavenger's Causeway as he tries...

> @"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:

>

> > What will we find inside the Foundry?

> > "Inside the Foundry is the Door of Komalie...a passage to the realm of the living. Countless Titans wander these halls. They are sick, twisted creatures formed by tormented souls. **The followers of Dhuum have gathered here** under the command of The Fury, seeking to gain favor with Mallyx the Unyielding."

>

> https://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Aurus_Trevess

>

> Khilbron was commanding not Abaddon's forces, but Dhuum's forces offered to Abaddon.

I don't consider this to be in any way conclusive. The titans are mentioned separately to the followers of Dhuum - it is just as valid a reading of the passage, possibly even more so, that the titans and the followers of Dhuum are separate (but allied) groups within the Foundry, rather than that the titans belong to Dhuum.

Consider that there are five groups of minions and allies of Abaddon (Margonites, Torment Demons, titans, Shadow Army, Dhuum-followers) and four realms before the Ebony Citadel. So two of them had to share a realm. It makes sense that given the origins of the titans that Dhuum might be involved, but I don't think there's anything that demonstrates that the titans were minions of Dhuum on loan to Abaddon, as opposed to being minions of Abaddon that Dhuum helped to create.