Kralkatorrik’s Powers (Spoilers)

[Pax.3548]

I think joko's defeat involves dealing with his inmortality, which, I assume, is of magical nature, my solution? beat him, tie him up and then throw him to a dragon's maws to be digested, or something among those lines.

[Konig Des Todes.2086]

> @Athrenn.9468 said:

> The execution has been quite lacking so far, but that might be because they only just hired an editor for Living World and nobody was specifically in charge of managing pacing and continuity. Judging by Daybreak's surprisingly good structure, that might be all they really needed from the start.

 

To be fair, Out of the Shadows was a surprisingly good structure, the only bad part was that it had to play cover up for HoT's pathetic handling of Caithe, answer a question left by HoT (Pale Tree state), and that the Commander for some reason though Caudecus absorbed the Bloodstone magic despite Canach outright stating that Caudecus and his men arrived in the area after the explosion.

 

And that last thing kind of feels like how the Commander reacts to Joko. "I left Joko imprisoned by magic empowered by Balthazar's will so that guy who put a bounty on me cannot possibly be Joko." -hears Joko's voice over communicator- "JOKO IS BACK WTF!?!"

 

> @"Sajuuk Khar.1509" said:

> The giant laser was never Zhaitan's weakness, let alone his main weakness. Zhaitan's weakness was the fact we killed his eyes, killed his mouths, cleansed the source, and destroyed his armies, greatly liming the amount of power he could take in. Which resulted in him being basically anemic by the time we fought him. The laser was just a big gun we used to shoot at him.

 

Zhaitan didn't "have a weakness". We did weaken him by starving him, yes, though it's more accurate to say we prevented him from getting stronger, but that wasn't "his weakness".

 

Furthermore, the laser and canons were indeed empowered by Gorr's research. as well as Kudu's from CoE story (which @"Athrenn.9468" didn't mention), and were designed to be anti-risen magic. They were more of a weakness than starving Zhaitan of new magic.

 

> @"Sajuuk Khar.1509" said:

> The difference is that Zhaitan was unique among the Elder Dragons(that we have seen) in that he had specially designed Eye and Mouth minions, which allowed him greater control over his armies, and greater means to eat magic, without having to actually BE THERE, then the other Elder Dragons did. It isn't that you just killed his minions, it's that you killed unique minions, only he had, that served a vital function in keeping him functioning, gave him a unique advantage of mobility, and also served as a weakness as, once killed, he was unable to really do much of anything.

 

All dragon minions can eat magic, technically. The Elder Dragons do not need to be there personally. Same with knowing what their minions know. The Mouth's unique attribute was that he could easily consume magical artifacts, and the Eyes unique attribute was that it allowed direct visuals for Zhaitan.

 

Killing the Eyes blinded Zhaitan a bit, but wouldn't weaken him any more than the other Elder Dragons; and killing the Mouths wouldn't starve Zhaitan so much as reduce intake of magic.

 

On top of killing the Eyes and Mouth, we had also taken the five temples (which was feeding magic to Zhaitan), blocked shipments of corpses that expanded risen army, and most importantly had the Blue Orb powering every Pact camp in Orr to prevent further risen creations and had Gorr's research of poisoning magic of dragon minions.

 

The Glory of Tyria itself had three weapons. The Mega-LIT cannon which was based off of the laser during Tequatl fight empowered by Kudu's research from CoE obtained by Zojja, the grappling hooks (which did the most damage) which are *never once mentioned*, and the canons which seem to be utilizing Gorr's research as its core.

 

Other than Gorr's and Kudu's research which gave us the finishing blow against Zhaitan, and the Blue Orb, there was an additional attribute that served to Zhaitan's defeat: when the Bloodstone was divided, the gods siphoned magic off of Zhaitan to empower it. In other words, Zhaitan was drained of magic (thus strength) while asleep. This made him innately weaker than the other Elder Dragons since magic quantities = power levels.

 

Basically, if Zhaitan was killed by his unique weakness, his unique weakness was "stomach pumping, followed by being starved, followed by food poisoning" not "being blinded and starved".

[Athrenn.9468]

You know, if Konig had written the personal story (or at least edited it during production) it would have probably flowed better and had enough dramatic build-up to the Zhaitan fight that I wouldn't have even noticed how boring it was to press [1] on the airship cannons while he dies in slow motion like an interactive cutscene. I honestly think that all of that information stated above should have been conveyed in the core plotline so that you didn't _need_ to dig through so many sources just for all of it to make sense. The story should be self-contained so that if you want to sit through a nice story you can just play through the PS and be content with that. Then if you really want to delve deeper into the side plots, you can play through them at your leisure and see the story from different angles. Warden Amala's backstory fractal is a good example of how this should be done. It's extraneous information to the main story but adds another layer to it that creates the illusion of depth.

[Aaron Ansari.1604]

> @Tamias.7059 said:

> > @Athrenn.9468 said:

> > @"Aaron Ansari.1604"

> >

> > That is unfortunately true for the GW2 story so far, and something I've always regretted. Taking a trip down memory lane, many of the major big bad deaths we've seen in the story have involved McGuffins introduced moments before their deaths—being handed the silver bullet instead of discovering it ourselves, if you will.

> >

> > Zhaitan: Zojja's dragonslaying laser gun was foreshadowed by Professor Gorr early on, then forgotten until an airship flew onto the scene with a giant version of the device which happened to be Zhaitan's main weakness. What's worse, this foreshadowing could be completely missed if you never played the asura storyline or chose a different branching path in the Pact story. For many players, the resolution would have come out of left field.

> >

> > Mordremoth: The Commander realized only moments before entering Mordremoth's mind that Trahearne was the one person who could grant them access through the Dream, which nobody quite understood at the time. Nor was it understood that his mind was his only weakness, only that the Novans did some research that said, "All dragons have a weakness." Then they pulled that answer out of thin air.

> >

> > Lazarus: Introduced to us minutes before his death, the sword that killed him was also handed to us halfway through the episode. We were also told shortly before the final fight that we, the Commander, were Chosen... Which was the only reason we could see Lazarus. Of course, in GW1 you needed to be both Chosen and Ascended. What happened to that?

> >

> > Balthazar: Magic sword, literally handed to us during the final mission by Rytlock who said, "Of course... It all makes sense now. Only this special sword can defeat Balthazar. Why's that? Grr... Later, cub."

> >

> > The execution has been quite lacking so far, but that might be because they only just hired an editor for Living World and nobody was specifically in charge of managing pacing and continuity. Judging by Daybreak's surprisingly good structure, that might be all they really needed from the start.

>

> See, I enjoyed Daybreak, but I still have my reservations on the direction of the story, especially when it comes to differing approaches between PoF and LWS4. In PoF, the first thing we hear when we get into Vabbi is about how integrated into peoples' lives the Awakened are, and that things won't be as easy as just getting rid of Joko. In Daybreak, we don't really get that complicated picture at all, we just have Nightfalll Mk. II.

 

I don't think the picture has changed at all, but the Commander _is_ coming at it from a wildly different angle. The majority of people we meet on Istan are ardent proponents of Joko's regime, same as in Vabbi. Palawadan is the second-largest, and easily densest, inhabited area we've seen in Elona, and it's chock full of Praising Joko. It's just that all of those loyalists suddenly have red names instead of green. We've gone from mutual cooperation to trying to kill each other on sight, probably because of that bounty that keeps coming up. It's an abrupt shift, and I wish there was some acknowledgement that a shift had occurred (what happened to the Order of Shadows objecting to outright rebellion?), but I don't see any inconsistency in the backdrop itself.

 

EDIT: Well, that's not entirely true. I think it's bizarre that the Astralarium is, comparatively, so much freer than Vehtendi. The place is in spitting distance of Mordant Crescent HQ, but it seems like almost all of those books we pick up are from beyond the boundaries of Joko's kingdom, and we suddenly have Priory scholars on a casual visit? Yes, there are inspections and raids, and the implication that the scholars are risking their lives, but what we saw in Vabbi was the Awakened running the academic institution directly. From the examples we've seen, there simply shouldn't have been an opportunity for the kind of quiet defiance going on.

[Tyson.5160]

In terms of the Elder Dragons, it seems that their strengths are a double edge sword and also serve as their weakness. Mordremoth’s command over mind was also his down fall. Kralkatorrik has impenetrable skin unless it’s his own blood or own energy. Zhaitan’s strength was his ability to produce minions quickly, as stated several times in the personal story, with each battle Zhaitan’s army grows. His strength being his minions is also his weakness. If the Shatterer dies what does it do to Kralkatorrik, nothing. He might lose a strategic advantage, but nothing happens to the Elder Dragon. Same with Mordremoth, killing his minions over all does not harm Mordremoth, yet killing certain Zhaitan minions hurts Zhaitan, blinds Zhaitan, starves Zhaitan.

[Sajuuk Khar.1509]

> @Athrenn.9468 said:

> You know, if Konig had written the personal story (or at least edited it during production) it would have probably flowed better and had enough dramatic build-up to the Zhaitan fight that I wouldn't have even noticed how boring it was to press [1] on the airship cannons while he dies in slow motion like an interactive cutscene. I honestly think that all of that information stated above should have been conveyed in the core plotline so that you didn't _need_ to dig through so many sources just for all of it to make sense. The story should be self-contained so that if you want to sit through a nice story you can just play through the PS and be content with that. Then if you really want to delve deeper into the side plots, you can play through them at your leisure and see the story from different angles. Warden Amala's backstory fractal is a good example of how this should be done. It's extraneous information to the main story but adds another layer to it that creates the illusion of depth.

Most all of that stuff was relayed in the MQ. They constantly go on throughout the Orr questline how all these little things we are doing, such as killing eyes and mouths, destroying his corpse ship, taking the temples, cleansing the source, etc, etc, are weakening Zhaitan.

[Tyson.5160]

The funny thing is Anet has reminded us that Mordremoth weakness is mind. It would be nice if I get told us in a living story patch what Zhaitan’s weakness is so we can put this to rest.

[Tyson.5160]

To get back on topic, I was in Bitterfrost Frontier yesterday and the main meta started. It mentioned that Jormag summoned a blizzard to expel Koda’s Flame. I wonder if Kralkatorrik’s new ability to create Brandstorms is trait from Jormag.

[Konig Des Todes.2086]

> @"Aaron Ansari.1604" said:

> I don't think the picture has changed at all, but the Commander _is_ coming at it from a wildly different angle. The majority of people we meet on Istan are ardent proponents of Joko's regime, same as in Vabbi. Palawadan is the second-largest, and easily densest, inhabited area we've seen in Elona, and it's chock full of Praising Joko. It's just that all of those loyalists suddenly have red names instead of green. We've gone from mutual cooperation to trying to kill each other on sight, probably because of that bounty that keeps coming up. It's an abrupt shift, and I wish there was some acknowledgement that a shift had occurred (what happened to the Order of Shadows objecting to outright rebellion?), but I don't see any inconsistency in the backdrop itself.

 

Regarding the Order of Shadows: the lore scavenger hunt achievement for The Desolation's reward does mention that there's a second Order of Whispers group in southern Elona, which are more actively opposed to the Order of Shadows, so it's likely that the Order of Shadows has more limited activity in Istan (we only see three agents in all of Istan after all - the ferryman, the bounty board agent, and Kito).

 

> @"Aaron Ansari.1604" said:

> EDIT: Well, that's not entirely true. I think it's bizarre that the Astralarium is, comparatively, so much freer than Vehtendi. The place is in spitting distance of Mordant Crescent HQ, but it seems like almost all of those books we pick up are from beyond the boundaries of Joko's kingdom, and we suddenly have Priory scholars on a casual visit? Yes, there are inspections and raids, and the implication that the scholars are risking their lives, but what we saw in Vabbi was the Awakened running the academic institution directly. From the examples we've seen, there simply shouldn't have been an opportunity for the kind of quiet defiance going on.

 

I think this part is due to Istan being a vassal thus has a few more "freedoms" (in that the Awakened weren't ordered to keep a direct eye on all activities) than Vabbi.

 

Plus there's the fact that the war with Balthazar had drained Awakened numbers, which we see most plainly in Vabbi, which in turn means that there are fewer Awakened to go about overseeing things like places of learning.

[Aaron Ansari.1604]

> @"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:

> > @"Aaron Ansari.1604" said:

> > I don't think the picture has changed at all, but the Commander _is_ coming at it from a wildly different angle. The majority of people we meet on Istan are ardent proponents of Joko's regime, same as in Vabbi. Palawadan is the second-largest, and easily densest, inhabited area we've seen in Elona, and it's chock full of Praising Joko. It's just that all of those loyalists suddenly have red names instead of green. We've gone from mutual cooperation to trying to kill each other on sight, probably because of that bounty that keeps coming up. It's an abrupt shift, and I wish there was some acknowledgement that a shift had occurred (what happened to the Order of Shadows objecting to outright rebellion?), but I don't see any inconsistency in the backdrop itself.

>

> Regarding the Order of Shadows: the lore scavenger hunt achievement for The Desolation's reward does mention that there's a second Order of Whispers group in southern Elona, which are more actively opposed to the Order of Shadows, so it's likely that the Order of Shadows has more limited activity in Istan (we only see three agents in all of Istan after all - the ferryman, the bounty board agent, and Kito).

>

Kito's actually the one I'm referring to. We left the decision of what kind of distraction would get us out of the Great Hall in his hands, and he opted for a direct frontal assault by the new Sunspears.

 

It's not automatically inconsistent- maybe Kito's setting us up to fail, maybe the Order feels that the widespread unrest means that Joko can now be removed without everything falling apart, maybe they were only ever buying time until they'd groomed Kossan to step up and unite Elona, or maybe it was the previous success of our fake Sunspear uprising in the face of Kito's doubts that won him around- but regardless, it was surely worth a line or two to address what had changed since "_It's risky...very risky. Be careful, Commander—your next death could be your last._"

[Konig Des Todes.2086]

It's also probable that the Order of Shadows are not united in their opinion on how to manage things. In the Chantry of Shadows, there's dialogue that lists three individuals are important figures (Zula, Issa, and Kito) who are oddly spread out. We don't see any other Order of Shadows agent acting so strongly to support the people like Kito. Kito may be in more favor of overthrowing Joko than the rest of the Order of Shadows. And it wouldn't be surprising for the Order of Shadows to be divided since they themselves are a division of opinion.

 

But then again, it's said that the Order of Shadows often work both sides of the playing field in order to maintain that status quo. Kito might be bringing Sunspears to help the Commander, while another agent could be preparing Palawadan for the assault by the Sunspears.