Bast.7253

> @"Blood Red Arachnid.2493" said:

> As far as the story missions go, I hated them. They're an annoying combination of tedious and frustrating. I couldn't even imagine getting the achievements. The worst part was definitely in Joko's Lair, where you had to deal with heat vents and lasers at the same time. Particularly the impassable laser wall on a 20 second timer, where you're stuck in a corner with no way to avoid the all of the damage for the vents. That part made me so frustrated that I threw my cat across the room. Of course, if you're attempting the achievements, there's several minutes of wasted time eaten up by Joko rambling and slowly spawning enemies one at a time. "Here's this super hard achievement, now excuse us while we throw 10 minutes of dialogue in the middle of every attempt."

>

>

 

I hope you didn't really throw your cat across the room. If that's the case you should probably just uninstall. :-P

> @"Randulf.7614" said:

> There is a quite a large physical difference between a Seer and Joko, including they appear to have 4 arms. Seer's look more like mutated, floating alien greys than anything else. Joko looks like a well preserved mummified human.

>

> Also, the line about Gods and Dragons can pretty much refer to now as much as history. He will have been around for Dhuum, Abaddon and Balthazar going (plus the entire remaining pantheon upping sticks and leaving Tyria altogether). He will have been around for Kormir coming. He will have been around for Vlast and Aurene coming and Zhaitan, Mordremoth, Vlast, Glint going. Plus it is not inconceivable other lesser dragons existed.

>

>

 

Oh, I didn't see the other pair of arms in the picture. My bad.

 

 

 

I don't have a lot to go on, but...

 

Joko's face looks an awful lot like the images I've seen of Seers. His body shape appears to be human, and he isn't "floating" like the seers, but I kept thinking his face looked oddly alien when I looked at his holograms in all of the images. And his bright little round glowing eyes. They look very similar to me.

 

 

The major difference outside of floating is the shape of his feet, but with guild wars 1 being older and having simpler modeling, that could explain the difference.

 

 

So, let's say Joko was an evil Seer from long long ago imprisoned by his people or even killed. Perhaps the reading of the Apocrypha awoke him from this state?

 

 

Like I said, not much to go on, but they look very similar. And if his lines about observing the coming and go of dragons and gods, what other race would be more fitting for seeing this kind of thing other than a seer, whose origins and age are still mostly unknown. Would also explain how he might have more intricate knowledge of the working of the world, such as the dragons being the life force. (Though the original battle against the elder dragons with the other pre-existing races would kind of contradict this.)

 

 

And admittedly, the Mursaat look fairly similar without the armor, and even have the long pointy toes.

 

 

Aquatic Ruins kind of seems like it has Elonian stuff in it. Cliffside I've always got a Woodlands Cascade vibe, Deepstone seems like it could be dwarven ruins in the Far Shiverpeaks somewhere with the text that's similar to stuff found in Varajar Falls or whatever, and we know Solid Ocean is related to the Jade Sea. I don't know if we get expansion on it, but I'm leaning towards no. I hope so, but I think one thing that's disappointing about fractals aside from how rarely they're added to the game is that they are more often than not just a vague fragment of a past that doesn't tie in to current day and don't really receive any elaboration.

I think the issue with the fractal is the fact that the bosses are all kind of generic. The mechanics were clearly shared with the signet ring from the story instance and I didn't mind them at all, but the bosses themselves were a little dull. I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing though. It kind of depends on if this is a stand alone fractal or one of many. If it's one of many and a teaser for elaboration on "The voice" then I think it's a good set up. But if it's just another plot that won't get any addition, a fragmented vague point in the past like Cliffside that could have really interesting implications that never get touched on, then it's a little lacking. If it's the latter and the plot never gets expanded, I feel like having a collection achievement with vague notes or scrolls hidden everywhere that tell us a little more or somekind of story giving more speculation instead of spamming x-reveal skill to find chests it might have been a bit more exciting. But all in all it was a very neat fractal aesthetically though, minus the bosses. I think it's hard adding something like this in when the last fractal we had was Twilight Oasis which had such a huge tie in to the current story, even if we can't actually access the setting of that city in the open world.

 

 

> @"Walhalla.5473" said:

> > @"zealex.9410" said:

> > Completely agree on the meta part. The story make it seem like a major and epic event while outside the story instance we just get to raid the side of the city, kill generic asura n26 and loot some chests.

> >

> >

> > And they even delayed it...

>

> We don't really know what happened during the delay but it looks like they were thrown back 2 to 3 months and decided to at least get the story stuff done. ( which had really good writing except for one crucial moment and Braham ).

>

> I mean, we have quite a lack of content in the north of Kourna and the meta isn't even finished. I don't expect great metas on every map but at least have them finished and receive SOME dialogue. I mean what did we get? Pre events that are player driven ( which is good ) and then just one line where we capture some stuff, kill a boss in some side street of Gandara, that has absolute no dialogue and no mechanics at all and in the end smash some stuff and if you are unlucky you need a mesmer to get your rewards. Also the rest of Gandara has an invisible wall so we don't get into that fortress..... Why? Why can't we at least use the Griffon to fly into it? This thing is so unfinished even Zhaitan is disgusted by this.

>

> It wouldn'T be that much of an issue if the meta was about something not really lore relevant. ( Looking at the Bittercold region in Bitterfrost Frontier where obviously some meta event was planned ) But this is Gandara, The Moon Fortress. Where we had an epic battle in Guild Wars 1. The place where Kormir failed hard and nearly got everyone around her killed. This place is lore relevant and many people wanted to visit it. The meta around it should have been finished, no matter what. I wouldn't mind even less events in the north and no Bounties at all if that meant that the Gandara Meta would be ready for release. Because right now, this thing is an embarassement and an insult to the Moon Fortress itself.

 

Strong words but I can't say that I disagree. I broke out of the map and looked at the rest of Gandara and from the bay side it is just untextured copy pasted lost precipice buildings without collision and floors. The place you break out of the map is literally a gaping hole in the wall in a pretty obvious location near the meta so it's not like it was hard to find. And when you look out the window during the fight with Joko in the instance and look to the left, you can see one of the buildings outside in the rest of Gandara with no bottom half just floating in mid-air. lol I guess they didn't expect people to look out the window?

 

It's kind of hard figuring out what the focus was on this episode. I think the two things that were done really well were the mount (endurance generation and niche-ness aside), and the story instance/cinematic.

 

It's also kind of odd that Joko has a green projection now and can just awaken people from half a continent away via said projection, and that we haven't seen him do that in any other episode? But that's a small thing that doesn't really bother me so much as seems kind of inconsistent?

 

It definitely feels unfinished in many aspects, but even with an additional month on top of the month delay we already had, I'm not sure how different it would be than it is now. The meta might have been slightly more involved, but it seemed more there was just this constant struggle of indecision of what they wanted to do with the episode. No precise vision, or maybe whatever changes they made during the creation of the episode just threw the whole thing out of order and they had to change things up so much that it lost direction?

 

I know that I should take more time with episodes than I do instead of rushing content, but the fact that I seem to spend more time refreshing the forums to talk about what happened during the story instance or talking about the cons of the new map instead of actually playing in it says something about the episode. Sandswept wasn't my favorite either, but the Zohaqan events and Specimen chamber were certainly far better than any of the events on this map even if they weren't to my liking as much as Palawadan and Great Hall. The story part of this episode was really fun for me, but then after that's over there just isn't anything really interesting about this map. It has a lot of pretty hidden areas such as the waterfalls and the undewater cave, but then there's nothing there outside of a couple chests and a few mobs. (One legendary as well I guess.) I feel like one of these areas with the waterfalls would have been a perfect place to put a no-mounts jumping puzzle or something just to give it a little more reason to be explored and draw people in.

 

The times playing the Heart of Thorns meta with so many people are probably still my favorite in the game so far. It's a shame that they decided to deviate completely from those. I think they maybe attempted to do that with Serpent's Ire on a smaller scale but didn't quite handle the actual mechanics well in terms of how short of a window you have and how much cc you need for the mobs? Not to mention how dangerous the area is because of the brand. I guess maybe they heard complaints about it, saw that it wasn't attracting much attention and gave up completely on attempting that sort of small organized group meta again?

 

Palawadan and Great Hall are pretty great for me though. Even if it's just champ spam it's still fun and has a lot of immersion and is consistent.

 

I think wasted potential and absence of direction kind of sums up my thoughts on Kourna though. Really think a lot of things just went wrong during development and it just became a race to salvage what was left.

 

This is more of a sidenote, but when I first got it and was boosting in Lion's Arch I somehow went rolling up life half the wall beside the portal to Gandarren Fields. That was pretty fun but it was kind of hard to recreate.

 

I can definitely see some skateboard ramp style puzzles being added at some point via guild decoration items or just built in map puzzles.

I wonder why they went with all the Inquest stuff in this zone anyway. I can understand it with the research labs in the mountains I guess, but all of them in Gandara to the point that our meta boss is one Asura and his golem suit? And one room with 6 chests and an access key required that you can only get if you actually tag the asura?

 

I understand that the inquest base in Sandswept was larger, but it seems to me that if Joko has all of this inquest stuff already in Gandara, and with Gandara being his own heavily guarded fortress now, why wouldn't he just have the portals there instead of being built in a remote island that's far more exposed to civilization, closer to Kralk, AND already has what could be seen as a hostile to his agenda Charr tribe?

 

I guess the Inquest base was already there and perhaps the Inquest needed such a large base to create the portals, but given the portals in the First City and the small size of that Inquest facility it doesn't seem like it would be that much more complicated to just relocate everything to his main base of operations.

 

I think that's why I've been so tired of the Inquest lately, it just feels like shoehorned filler stuff to give somewhat unnecessary variation to the map. At least the frogs make a lot more sense in this map given that they come from the east and its understandable that they would be in that area. (Even if they don't really add anything other than heart vendor and small hub to the zone.)

 

I think the map content will definitely get better now that I can't see any reason that we'll deal with even more inquest and random labs. I haven't even bothered with any of this turret collection stuff going on in this patch. I don't know whose idea that was but it seems like a rather large collection and I haven't really seen anyone even remotely interested in it, or anyone talking about what it does or the advantage of it. I guess it is meant to enhance that turret thing we can buy from the heart vendor. But why would we need to even do that when none of the mobs in this zone are even challenging enough really to need something like that item or when the meta outside of the laser champs that usually die in a few seconds is essentially one champion with a lot of hp that stands in one place? I guess they could be useful for bounties, maybe? I'm just not seeing the point in these turrets at all.

 

As much as I'd like to believe that, I don't. They also never really said that. Just that they were making changes that caused a temporary setback and

 

I'm confused. The patches are getting delayed further and further each episode but now you're implying that they're going to be a month apart? Oh wait, I'm forgetting October. Nvm. So 2 months, then another 2 months. I don't know.

 

On one hand, I don't think we'll get another mount again soon, so that will be less tech work to do and less map catering to the mount it's released in meaning possible better use of space.

 

But on the other hand, in the last two episodes they've kept adding other random tech like the magnetics lab which was partially already implemented from the fractal with a few other added things. Then in this new map I imagine that initial stealth mission with Blish's arm was probably a bit of a pain to code with its new tech, the destructible doors and mount in general, plus the scarab tech. I think it's great that they're adding in all these new mechanics and stuff but I'm wondering if maybe they're taking too much of a focus versus putting more resources and focus into what's actually in the map. I think it's partially because we've dealt with so much asura stuff the last two patches and will be happy to hopefully depart form the rest of this season, and partially because they're creating new systems to use for other stuff later on like in the next expansion. I definitely get the sense that the stealth tech we see with Blish's arm will be implemented in a future elite spec. And I'm kind of getting a predator/camouflage ranger with rifle vibe from it. And the bramble wall wasn't overly exciting and shared a lot of similarities to how we see structures in Guild halls phase but I could see it being a possibility for tech used in player housing if that were to be added.

 

All these new things are great at keeping the game fresh, but they're kind of few and far between when they're implemented and haven't added much to the larger picture. At least not yet.

 

Anyway, ranting. I'm hoping you're right and that these next couple of episodes will release closer to their earlier window, but given the delay we had with Sandswept and how I practically never go to that map, and the staleness of this map (especially this meta) and the almost full month delay we had for this one... fool me once, fool me twice...

> @"Fenom.9457" said:

> > @"Skribionkie.2859" said:

> > Now I definitely think he is alive.

> >

> >

>

>

> Episode 4 will be healing aurene, awakened after Joko, OoS and others dealing with power vacuum, and we help before we leave them to it cause Kralk does something

 

Well I missed the dialogue from Taimi at the end of Be My Guest, but apparently she mentions that what happens to Aurene causes Kralk to become more aggressive.

 

I'm not sure if this is because he senses the unbound magic from Joko, or if this is the resonance that she still shares with Kralk and he senses her pain somehow ( I think that's how it works?) but that to me seems like it might cause for an immediate plot jump back to Kralk next episode. I was hoping for some lore on Joko and his history and origin, if only in a vision that Aurene gives us after consuming Joko, but with that dialogue it seems pretty sure to me that Joko and anything Joko related is probably done for with the explanation that Aurene is simply weak from a power spike or that she has some new capabilities from absorbing whatever type of magic made Joko the way he was without any actual dealing with Joko or his soul.

 

The only other thing I can see happening is that we will have an episode dealing with both near the fortress of Jahai and where we finish off what is left of Joko, possibly catch up with the Order of Shadows, and explore the branded near the area setting stage for the rest of the season to focus on Kralk. I think this would be the best tie in of all the various plots right now.

 

Or we'll meet up with everyone in Amnoon for some reason, Taimi and her newfound friends will say Kralk has gotten more aggressive, Aurene will fly in and be slightly bigger and all like "sup guys" and they'll have new research on Kralk that causes us to jump right into the rest of the season focusing on Kralk. And everyone will be like, "Joko who?" And then we'll go to some map with a veteran boss target dummy for the meta and a mastery that lets us collect a new currency called erratic magic that lets us use our mount heal ability as a bomb that instantly kills your character and all mobs in a 500 yard radius.

 

 

 

> @"Sajuuk Khar.1509" said:

> > @"Fenom.9457" said:

> > I imagine either primordus and the ring of Fire’s surrounding water or jormag and the far shiver peak lake will be a source of considerable water content with major improvements to help prepare for a DSD expansion afterwards

> I imagine that the DSD will be before either Jormag or Primordus TBH.

>

> Given that the dragon we faced after Zhaitan was effectively his opposite, and how Jormag and Primordus are opposites, leaving the crystal dragon and the water dragon as opposites, it makes sense we would go after the DSD next after killing Kralk, leaving Primordus and Jormag for the end. Primordus especially is likely to be the last dragon we fight.

>

> I also doubt Primordus will still be under the Ring of Fire when we do decide to hunt him down.

 

Yeah, I definitely see DSD being before Jormag and Primordus given that we just put them to sleep and are working on Kralk now. But I also like the idea of Kunavang or whatever possibly taking the place of the deep sea dragon. I kind of imagine Kunavang as being a champion of the DSD, and that we have to use the forgotten ritual to free his will like they did with Glint.

 

Who knows though. The one thing I do find strange is all of the risen dragons. Where did they come from? There's potential for us to explore some other region of Tyria that was previously unknown and has tons of possible candidates for filling the roles of some of these dragons. It seems odd that the exalted wouldn't have known about them and considered them as a possibility instead of solely relying on Glint's offspring. But as much as I want to explore Cantha, one good thing about exploring some of these other areas like the areas east of Ascalon, the Isles of Janthir, the Woodland Cascades, is that we have the potential to see so many creatures and assets we've never seen before because they're completely new.

 

 

 

> @"Fenom.9457" said:

> > @"Rockin Twilight Sparkle.2615" said:

> > Interesting things to note:

> > The next release is almost certainly going to be Halloween

> > The first release of the current season was Halloween

> > Said first release of the season was also when the Awakened first attacked Tyria

>

>

> Are you saying we may see Joko from the afterlife? Also, EP4 will certainly be September if not August. Anet stated they’ll be picking up the pace again and being closer to 2 months again

 

As much as I'd like to believe that, I don't. They also never really said that. Just that they were making changes that caused a temporary setback and something about quality. Then we got this episode with a lot of unfinished stuff and a story instance that was basically unplayable for almost the full first day of release.

 

I'd love it if we got the next episode as soon as August, but I'm certainly not expecting it. Will probably wind up being 4 months again or even 5. The only thing I can see working in favor of us getting a shorter window this time is if they want to push it out before Halloween so it goes Episode-Halloween-Wintersday - Episode.

 

Idk though. Hoping for the best and looking forward to what happens.

 

> @"derd.6413" said:

> alot of ppl seem to forget we still have to fix the zhaitan/mordremoth fallout before going after kralk.

 

I'm not so sure. I think that's one thing that could use a little clarification from a story perspective. The world seemed to unravel from the death of those two to the point that we know we can't kill one more elder dragon or it's done for. But it seems like that process has stopped. It seems implied to me at least that it's chaotic but still balanced enough that Mordremoth and Zhaitan's death isn't as pressing as Kralk and the fact that we can't just kill him until we have someone to replace him.

 

I think the Kesho cinematic was a bit confusing in the sense that it talked about Vlast and Aurene filling these voids, but right now it seems like Aurene just needs to replace Kralk and keep the world at least somewhat held together.

 

But I'm also confused by the whole Kesho timeline. I mean, Vlast was born long before Zhaitain was even killed wasn't he? So, how is this cinematic acting like they had all this knowledge of Zhaitain and Modremoth's death before it even happened to the point that they had a plan to replace them? Am I missing something?

It’s possible but I don’t think it’s likely.

 

If he does “possess” Aurene it could set up an episode involving finally finding out his backstory and possibly extracting his soul, perhaps with the use of Livia and the scepter of Orr. This might tie into the scepter legendary.

 

So who knows! Maybe, but it’s really hard to tell. Lol

I sorta of tried this set on my Druid and it felt a little slow. But didn’t look up condi healing Druid builds so my build was a mess. Lol

> @"SunTzu.4513" said:

> Generally this would be nice, but please no more of this stupid collections where it is gated behind. If it's not needed to get 100% map then it's okay to have an collection. But so i feel forced to do the collection asap wich is no fun at all. For the Griffon it takes me till a few weeks ago to get it. This was fun to me i have worked on it when ever i feel to do it.

 

The beetle wasn't too bad, but I think it might be better to only be able to unlock it after the story is completed or start it before the story is started. A lot of people simply rushed through part of the story to start on the beetle and it kind of broke it up for them. The only part of the collection I wasn't a fan of was the fact that we had to do Ley Line anomaly for it, but I've done it so little I didn't realize there were daily dedicated groups for it. (Not to mention when I got it it was a group of like 50 people and it died in like 4 minutes without even moving from the bridge it was on. lol)

 

Oh, and the beetle in silverwastes that had a really long undeterminable spawn timer and is just a veteran mob. But I've mostly enjoyed both of the mount collections. The hardest part about these collections is that you do have to kind of rush with the first crowd working on them to complete them more easily. (Which is fine for me because I'm one of those people but I can understand people like my guild mates who still haven't done the griffon even though some of them only need a few bounties. lol)

 

So, I think many of us probably weren't expecting another mount for the remainder of the expansion/living season.

 

Now that we had another one added, do you think we'll get another in the future?

 

I think we'll get at least one more but not sure what it would be.

 

I like the idea of existing mounts getting additional abilities or enhanced functionality, but what other kinds of mounts do you think they could implement?

 

The only one that immediately comes to mind is an underwater mount, but in saying that the skimmer could easily have enhanced functionality through a mastery and fill that role so it may not be entirely necessary. Especially given how little we're actually underwater for long enough distances to actually need a mount. (Only place I can think of where it would be tremendously useful is Frostgorge Sound and potentially future living story maps.)

 

Land movement has pretty much all things covered, speed, height, teleportation, leaps. All of these types of movement can be altered or enhanced with masteries for existing mounts. The only other possibility I can see would be something akin to the spider mount that was canceled, but apparently people are more afraid of spiders than zombies, bloated bubble blowing fish with giant teeth, or fractals that are pitch black littered with spiders. The only other land mount I can think of that would fit a different niche than what exists is a multi-seater mount, but given that mounts are technically a transform I'm not sure that would work out too well.

 

With the beetle came a new way to interact with the environment itself, through the doors. So I suppose it's possible we could potentially see something involving a burrowing mount, like a Junundu. An example of how it could perform differently than other mounts is this: You have a canyon that's split in two by a rock wall, the mount functions similarly to a jackal in that it "blinks" but it blinks in a way that it just goes far enough to go under that wall. Or burrow on top of it. The other possibility of movement is that it functions with a placeable blink and possibly covers a much larger distance. It would use endurance build up and would have to have a camera set up for the blinker similar to the trebuchet in Battle of Khylo in which it zooms out and you place where you want to burrow to and resurface. The engage attack could be a knock up and damage similar to sandsharks. The problem with this logic is that depending on the distance you travel, it makes most of these other land mounts obsolete.

 

The last possibility, but it's rather unlikely as it would make everything else nearly obsolete and could be handled with the mastery system, is a fully functioning flying mount. Perhaps in the final chapter of the season.

 

 

Anyway, what are your thoughts? Any other types of mounts you can think of that could be added?

 

Highly doubt they will do retroactive skins. But I can see them doing a skin pack with some of the favorite skins as their standalone mount pack. I.E. Exo-suit, awakened, Halloween, stardrift, primevil. I doubt they have any of those skins done yet, but who knows. I'm looking forward to seeing what the stardrift mount will look like.

 

Also wish there were more dye channels, but remembering back all mounts only had one dye channel didn't they? So I guess that isn't really a surprise.

> @"maxwelgm.4315" said:

> > @"Tyson.5160" said:

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

> > > > @"maxwelgm.4315" said:

> > > >What crystal could he be referring to and what does it has to do with his magic running loose?

> > >

> > > Nothing. While we don't see the crystal, given the context of when he says it to the PC in the story mission, the crystal is why he can use all those massive amounts of illusions despite being a necromancer and not a mesmer.

> > >

> >

> > I think he is actually talking about bringing out the crystal as in the very fine glass ware used at dinner parties, Champaign flutes, wine glasses etc.

>

> That makes a lot of sense and is probably the case. As a non-native English speaker, manners of speaking go all over my head every time.

>

> > @"Fenom.9457" said:

> > So didn’t he just admit to creating the gods and kralkatorrik?

>

> That was, I believe, just more of his propaganda stuff like claiming to have killed Balthazar and Mordremoth. What I think is the most meaningful parts are when he actually claims to know that he would die right then and there (starting with "If you're hearing this recording, my magic has somehow become unbound", and ending with "assuming I survive this insurrection..."). All the rest is probably just him gloating as usual. In the last fight I think it was the only moment Joko was being completely truthful, for when he says that you're immensely stupid for killing the dragons he stops gloating and actually sounds annoyed at the PC's actions. It's really interesting that he seems to have actual knowledge on such things even if he's lying about his age, but we might never know since the next writing team for episode 4 might not even talk to the one who wrote this episode.

 

After listening to this statue in game, it seems pretty clear that it's nothing more than propaganda. It seems like he's just speaking to his loyalists, not addressing the commander or anything. And when he jokes about not surviving the encounter, it's clearly meant to be sarcastic.

 

As to his speech about the dragons being the life force of Tyria and watching dragons and gods come and go like tides, it is suspicious and I hope there's more to it that we will find out later, but technically speaking, if he were one of the first humans brought here with the gods he would have witnessed Abaddon's fall, the awakening of Primordus because of it, Zhaitan's rise, Orr's fall, the exodus, and all of that right? So it may just mean he's a really old human and is technically one of the first, if not a primevil king himself. I still think that his full name will mean something and we will find out more about it at some point, whether it be talking to a primevil ghost that may have been alive at the same time and the name rings a bell and he was just one of the first that was an outcast for some reason or even the council that wound up causing the original scarab plague or something much older and not entirely human.

 

I'd love him to be more than just an old human lich, but the more I play the story the more I start to feel like it's not that complex. lol

 

Looking forward to the next episode, and wish they hadn't ended it here. Hopefully they'll make it to the shorter end of their release window this time. If I'm not mistaken the Istan group is doing the next episode, and that map and story instance has been my favorite so far so hopefully it will be a great one. Plus I highly doubt we're getting another mount next episode so that might cut back on some of the production time.

> @"Tyson.5160" said:

> > @"Tyson.5160" said:

> > > @"Eekasqueak.7850" said:

> > > > @"Tyson.5160" said:

> > > > > @"Eekasqueak.7850" said:

> > > > > It would make sense that a magic eating dragon is one way to end a lich. It was foreshadowed that Joko's plan never accounted for Aurene, no doubt his death will create a lot of chaos for us to clean up, which ties in with his speech about all the chaos the PC keeps making. So, really the circumstances are fitting in my opinion.

> > > >

> > > > Well what could happen is that Aurene gets a little indigestion, which then requires us to get more background info on where Joko got his power from. Anet seems to like to give a lot of additional details to characters, postmortem. Could require us to go back into the Desolation and maybe north of Kourna to Joko’s monument. Also having to wade through Branded as well.

> > >

> > > Yeah we'll probably get his backstory now that he's dead for good (probably) also I'm half expecting the order of shadows to turn out to be evil or something and take advantage of the power vacuum he leaves behind.

> >

> > I kinda suspect this as well given how shady ( no pun intended) some of the large letter collections regarding the OoS.

> >

> Did we ever find out what happened to Joko’s Wurm general? I noticed we faught Olgi as a Legendary bounty.

>

 

Isn't the wurm general the one we fought in the instance before Joko? Or was that a different general? I can't remember them too well.

 

 

Charr car for sure.

 

Rolling devil or whatever. A few other mobs that could be added in from Heart of Thorns as mount skins but they seem to not want to deviate too much from the original mount. I was really excited for some wacky mount skins but we just keep getting dozens of really similar looking mounts with slightly different patterns and a few flashier ones. I really love the Goat springer, the orca skimmer, the fox, the husky, the lion, and the reforged jackal. But by now I'm really surprised they haven't added a golem springer or a wyvern/dragon griffon, or a flying disk for a skimmer, or awakened abomination or something for raptor.

 

But yeah, if they did decide to deviate at some point I would love a charr car, rolling devl, a hamster ball with skritt in it and a little junky chariot, a regal looking scarab skin, or a choya.

 

There's so much they could do with some of these mounts in terms of skins and I don't know what's holding them back. I don't know if it's because they're spacing them out so they can put more unique ones behind gamble bundles with 6 other skins that are just slight pattern changes, if it's the remodeling of certain skins and making sure they're animated correctly that causes them to not want to deviate too much. It certainly can't be the immersion given that we're riding around on animals made of stars.

 

I'd take a dozen less random glider skins for more unique mount skins. Given how many of the foxes I've seen running around, there is obviously a great market for them. They could probably fund an expansion with the amount of people that would buy a dragon griffon skin, Aurene or not. lol And in the case of an Aurene mount skin, they could do a Shatter, Teq, Mordremoth shadow of the dragon-style skin ontop of that. So much potential and so much money to be made.

 

> @"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:

> In the final mission, Joko makes a comment about "breaking out the crystal". It's a very heavy indication that all the illusions were set up utilizing this crystal of undescribed nature, and that he had intentionally left the skill signet ring for the Commander to find (if you hit the lasers ~10 times, Joko gets annoyed with the PC and tells players that "it's not hard, I gave you a magical ring, use it!").

>

> Joko is not a mesmer in disguise. And he himself never uses mesmer abilities. He uses a powerful magical artifact to utilize spells outside his repertoire. His reanimation scene kind of proves that he's no god as well. He's a full out lich that simply cannot die by normal means, and he can empower himself through lifestealing capabilities (when he kills one of his Awakened).

>

> > @"Knuckle Joe.7408" said:

> > The speech at the end, just before "Joko" was killed, doesn't seem like hhow Joko would talk as well, there's no reason to beleive Joko has been around so much time as to see elder dragons rise and fall over and over again (there are no ancient records on Joko at all), or to know what happens when you kill dragons (unless of course it was LYSSA herself talking), and when he said "they should be grateful I lured you to me" could that be Lyssa talking about the other human gods?

>

> Joko has a LONG history of lying, and one of those lines fed constantly to Elonians is that he has been around forever, since the dawn of time, and is the maker of gods and commander of dragons. So you really find it weird that Joko proclaims to have seen the Elder Dragons rise and fall?

>

> And while there are no records of Joko pre-700 AE, there are also no clear indication of how old he is, or what he knows. Joko's kingdom since the beignning was on the border of Forgotten space. He's had 500+ years to learn about the nature of the Elder Dragons. And he may not even be only 500 years old but much older - while unlikely, it's impossible to know.

>

> Besides, in [another message from him](

) to his loyalists, which he records in the chance he dies, and admits as much in the recording, which he makes as the Commander is raiding Gandara, he makes a comment about how the "fig leaf" was in style when he first died. Suggesting that was as old as the basic hunter-gatherer primitiveness of whatever species he comes from (humans? mursaat? something else that's now extinct?). While that particular message feels rife with lies, his words during his final speech to the Commander seem different in tone than his other tauntings and proclamations of falsehood; this suggests that he wasn't lying (completely) to the Commander.

>

> And the "they" in that line was 100% referring to the mortals of the world. Context is everything.

>

> > @"Mickey Frogeater.1470" said:

> > Palawa Ignaceous Joko's name is suspicious too... Too fiery... Canach suggests that Balthazar's Magic is influencing Aurene and we all know Balthazar decapitated his father. I suspect Palawa Joko is said father thus explaining why Balthazar went to him. Dhuum was unkillable and had to be sealed away indicating that the original Gods are unkillable unlike their usurpers.

>

> Dhuum is never said to be unkillable. It was merely said that Grenth (and later, the GW1 PC and Reapers, and later the GW2 raiders, Reapers, and Desmina) are incapable of such. This merely means that Dhuum is stronger than Grenth in the ways of death mastery. This says nothing about the other gods, especially since Abaddon's predecessor seems to be dead (as well as any other unstated predecessor besides Dhuum). We don't even know for a fact that Dhuum is an original god, despite your outright proclamation of such (nor do we have any indication that Balthazar's father was ever divine or demi-divine).

>

> And there's nothing all that odd with Joko's middle name being Ignacious. Not every name must have some special meaning.

 

First off, I don't know where you're getting the crystal he uses for illusions from. I immediately thought he was just referring to fine dinner ware like he's hosting a party. lol

 

And secondly, I don't think the name Ignaceous is odd, but I think the fact that we never knew it until this episode is odd. I think it's odd that an ego-maniac with 100 different titles wouldn't have ever mentioned his name before now and with the emphasis he used while saying it. It could be that he didn't see it as important and just wanted to say, "they will all love ME, first name middle name, last name" with this tone that before he became what he is his name meant nothing and finally will, or it could be that it's a clue as to who or what he really is.

 

For a little while I entertained the idea that he was a Djinn, and I liked the idea someone had of him being a Mursaat or a seer. But this idea of him being Balth's father is pretty interesting. If all his rambling is true about watching the elder dragons come and go and the gods weren't here that far back for the previous dragon rise, then that timing wouldn't really add up would it?

 

I definitely didn't get the impression that it was his typical gloating, and the bit he mentions about his immortality being extremely understated definitely seemed like major foreshadowing, even with Aurene taking a bite out of him. He may not come back or possess Aurene, but I think that statement of his immortality is going to have a lot more meaning later on, perhaps in finding out his origin or what he really is.

 

Then again, he may just be a perma-gone egomaniac lich that got eradicated from the story to move back to Kralk with no further mention of him and no explanation of his backstory or origin.

 

Whichever way they go, I'm not upset about how Joko "died" and I didn't want it to be a season-long battle anyway, but I will be highly disappointed if this is the complete end of his plot and we learn nothing about his origin and history or the "truth." I think if we don't get that in an episode, we should at least explore this subject material in current events. Whether it's random collection achievements in hidden areas, Istan-library style diary pages we can find throughout the world, or a vision Aurene shows us now that she's absorbed Joko into her self.

 

As I commented in another thread, I think I saw silhouettes of spirits in the blue flame surrounding her while she's eating him. Soul magic of some kind perhaps?

 

 

But I have a feeling that it's nothing as sinister as her being possessed, if anything I think we will have a vision in the next episode. Something Aurene shows us after she absorbs Joko, perhaps a flashback of Joko during the previous dragon rise he says he was there for, or his background and real identity, or something that will help us in the fight against Kralk.

 

I get what people are saying about what Canach said, but I'm not reading into it. We haven't really seen her behave differently. She's a teenage dragon developing her own personality. We don't really know what she wants or who she is, and I feel like we've been connected with her as her champion so we would be pretty aware if she were gravely ill. I also feel like Canach's speech was more meant to show the reaction of someone who is also technically the spawn of an elder dragon. He comments on her being the granddaughter of Kralk, but he is technically a child of Mordremoth, or a child of the pale tree which is the child of mordremoth.

 

Who knows though. I really have a strong feeling we're going to get an interesting cinematic or one of those artsy Rhytlock in the mists visual style from an Aurene vision.

 

Edit* I would LOVE if we got something like this during the mid-3-4-5-18 month wait for the next episode as a current event. Something as a teaser and perhaps have it set in some updated instanced version of her egg chamber that doesn't necessarily require Heart of Thorns.

No, he does bug out and disappear sometimes. He disappeared and didn't respawn for me right after he reawkaned the fallen or whatever. I killed them and it just kept spawning beetles. Restarted that checkpoint in the instance and it worked fine.

> @"Hesacon.8735" said:

> We got some extra Zhaitan lore in LW3 episode 6 when the Risen became Unchained. This episode does a similar thing to the Awakened, and it's likely not the end of Joko's story, even if it is the end of Joko.

 

Would be interesting if the awakened became the leaders of the unchained and it all just became this giant army of undead that we somehow convince to fight with us against something in the future.