I think their tagline about the "cycle renewing" was more about how Soo-Won was the first only dragon and now Aurene is that. There's no more extra dragons, well until Aurene decides to make some in Living World Season 22: The Search for more money.
The next expansion where we go to the underworld and fight demon lords sounds pretty great, and living world season 5's 6 episodes where we went far north, far west and fought the 7th elder dragon was super cool too.
I think you are exactly right. And I think it’s pretty clear from the title of the final mission, too. The world is returning to there being only one dragon filtering magic and Aurene is The Only One. Is it a good choice? Not really. Because that means Aurene is eventually gonna have to figure out how to filter better than her predecessor or make her own children or else she really is just a super powered Glint’s Lucky Child Story Stopgap. But yes, that’s the cycle reborn we’re expected to go with there.
@voltaicbore03 Dude, for real that felt so weird. She was so ominous the whole time and then after the instance in her home she's like "I just wanted to prove how brilliant and independent I am." And I get it was because her sister is empress, so she feels she needs to prove herself, but it was just told so weird lol. I fully expected that she had genuinely configured a way to imprison the Deep Sea Dragon against its will in secret and that she was going to fall to her hubris somehow, but the whole Jade Tech stuff was just so unrelated to the story in the end.
I really liked the tension between Joon and Li, the one prioritising opportunity and the other security. Joon always took our side, believing in us and the good we do for Cantha. But after the reactor, she feels betrayed and is angry at us, maybe reinforced in her beliefs that she has to do everything herself and be strong. There could have been an awesome moment between her and Li then, or a mirrored evolution where Li prioritises saving the Nation and helps us while Joon refuses to cooperate with us. But just when it turns out he was actually right and a foreign Terrorist (Annka) unleashes all kinds of hell on the empire, it turns out he was just a fashist terrorist leader all along, so no need to deal with him being right. That felt a bit disappointing but at the same time I kinda expected it.
@@gewreid5946 I really wanted to connect with Li and hoped the story would go in a way that we could GENUINELY see his point! Like at some point REALLY show the destruction of the aetherblades and the terrible loss it’s had on the canthan people and have people like Rama and Joon, maybe Yao say some line like: “Cantha should have stayed closed,” and go a step further to pain Li the hero for a moment of him repelling the aetherblades and fighting with us to protect Cantha. He could have been a person escorting a lane in the Seitung meta imo. I completely understand the bigot look of Li as a purist but you also have to consider the origin of that thought process as a character. At the end of the day it could be painted in a way that he genuinely believed that closed borders is best because of security then layer the purist ideology on top of that.
The one thing that bothered me is when Marjory and Gorik talk about off screen events with the speakers and brotherhood. I would have loved 2 little missions meeting the clans with respective allies before moving onto Dragons End. I also wish we got to know the Empress more, but my guess is we will get more time with her in the next Living world Story.
@@brinkiTOgo The metas are a part of the story. Aetherblade Revolt for the end of act 1, Kaineng Blackout right before the last instance of act 2, and Gang Wars at the start of act 4 or at the end of it.
Interesting to hear your views on Joon and Li. For most of the story and I did not trust Joon at all. When we visit her lab and have that tour, all I could think of was "Bond Villain" and I was convinced for some time that she would turn out to be a cardboard box baddie with little to interest me. So when she turned out NOT to be a villain, I was actually relieved and happy. I loved the bit at the end of the mission in her mansion when, we having defeated all her high tech security, she is left standing there holding a spanner, looking very vulnerable and almost pathetic. Suddenly I really liked her and knew we could, after all, trust her.
Yeah exactly. Like Li for me definitely felt as a possible villain for me but Joon felt like that even bigger villain. Like i was expecting to have to kill Joon at the end. Strange that WP got the opposite.
Exactly. With Li the point at the end about his dog was to point out that, by all means, they are a regular person. It points out that we expect evil people to be evil with nothing of redeemable qualities. A regular person who engages in evil is more terrifying because those are harder to identify and stop, its like a lot of serial killers in the U.S.
Totally with you on this. I do agree with WP about Li, who felt really straight forward as a black or white character, making him uninteresting. But Joon, for me Joon felt just like the grey character who feels more real. There are a lot of files around the maps talking about how she gives awful working conditions to her workers, and she often sounds so full of herself, that I thought she was shaping up to be a villain. But in the end she was not, and she actually means well, although having those awful characteristics about her.
I feel like all the way back in the beginning anet fumbled finishing Zhaitan, and ever since then have never been able to do elder dragons right because the precedent wasn’t there. I don’t think any elder dragon has been concluded properly except maybe Mordremoth. They have repeatedly been so eager to tie up things that aren’t finished. They’re more impatient than the community when it comes to story.
Dragons being over and them being the makers of the world I’m honestly excited about, interested in actually getting plot points that won’t result in the world or Tyria being fully destroyed.
I too would love a more grounded classic story, without world shattering consequences. This release has really moved the era forward by a ton, being in a fantasized post industrial age. I would love to return to more feudal areas, with a classic Guild Wars 1 feel. Try to return to a story instance like Claw Island, and you'll realise how much ArenaNet has pushed the aesthetics, just by looking at the architecture
I thought the sort of unclear nature of Void works very well with the story and I interpreted it as this: Void is just the prescience of all magic, unfiltered and combined. Soo-Wan traveling through the mists or whatever, found a high concentration of Void magic, and by creating the Elder Dragons, was able to properly sort it into what became Tyria. Void fits well with the season 3 lore of dragons combining magic, and as we killed more, the Void was closer to being reformed through the Elder Dragons. Kralkattorik was essentially a damn close representation of Void because he had the most magic of any Elder Dragon in season 4. Aurene asking “why do they all go mad?” Also fits well, and (as much as I hate to say it) gives a more plausible reason for Primordus and Jormag’s battle at the end of IBS. The prismatic nature of Aurene means she can separate the types of magic without the Void re-emerging. All and all I think it’s a pretty good cop-out, but the constant use of different terms like dragon void, void, corrupted magic and other stuff like that makes it unnecessarily complicated to understand.
I'm actually glad we're done with big godly plot points,I rather have more antagonist like Joko, though maybe I'd like so see Lissa be a new antagonist. Overall the expansion was what I wanted a end to the dragons. Tyria dosent feel smaller to me it feels like we're free to go anywhere now, if anything it feels bigger now.
Yes, I am excited to see where we go next. Since path of fire I have dreaded cantha because I wanted to go somewhere completely new. Places I have always looked on the map and wanted to uncover. WP mentioned that now we are likely to be headed to the mists since Tyria is kind of played out, but I think that would suck. I want to go someplace completely foreign in the world. Stuff that has nothing to do with any of the GW1 stuff. The lore so far takes place in such a small section of the world they could easily throw a dart at the entire world map and make a story
From the story I didn't get Soo-Won as this creation deity, more like a being that was already there when the world was in it's infancy and she influenced it by making her children who then became an integral part of the world. Ankka wasn't really much of an anarchist, as she was a full blown nihilist. It's not just that she despised gods and those who wanted to obtain power, it's that she knew it always ended up badly, so why even bother and why not just let the world end on it's own. What I most dislike about the story is the retcon to make the Deep Sea Dragon, the most mysterious of dragons that we only heard very ominous snippets about, be completely benevolent and her supposed minions, the tentacled horrrors made out of water, aren't actually her minions but something she kept at bay when she was in the Unending Ocean. Remember that concept art of the giant tidal wave with gigantic hydra creatures coming onto Lion's Arch?? That's what I wanted. I hope we still get it and that the separation of the deep sea horrors and the dragon wasn't just a convenient excuse to allow for the current story, but it feels bitter to me. The mystery of DSD just didn't pay off to me.
Same. I perceived her ''creating'' Tyria more as getting rid of the rampant and uncontrolable void magic and seperating the magics of Tyria and thus creating a livable Tyria for mortals. She didn't necesarily create the world, but she made it livable for mortals and made sure magic was controlled (she failed at that though).
While I agree that them showing that Soo-Won is the be all end all “big thing” kind of sucks, and ruins a lot of mystery. I don’t necessarily think it means they have to top the elder dragons by going to the mists or inventing something bigger. I think something that maybe points in the other direction of that is that one NPC that talks about something in the deep that the water dragon was keeping away. Maybe the dragons were keeping much more interesting and evil things at bay, and that’s where they could go next. Which in turn will bring back this mystery feeling.
Was soo-won the creator of the entire world? Going through the story, and seeing all the different diagloue options with her, it seemed like she just created the dragons, not the entire world itself, to help stabilize the magic that was otherwise maintaining the void, so while I guess because she stopped the void from just consuming whatever was created, I don't think she had direct control over all of Tyria, it formed into what it did because the void was no longer constantly consuming itself. I didn't really think any of the mystery of what the rest of the planet might be like was lost from that story, it still can hold many secrets even the dragons didn't know about
The void is where I started getting lost as well. I love it when stories don't necessarily tell me everything and I'm left filling in the blanks about some of the mysteries. It's the pleasure in speculating I s'pose. Not worth much, but I'd have done it so that Soo-Won had been petrified by the Jade Wind and then excavated by Joon and used to power up Cantha. This would explain how we know so little about her, let alone her name. Like imagine learning that the giant pillar inside of New Kaineng is actually the water dragon petrified and hidden in plain sight. Leeched off as a battery to power up the jade tech. The void could be the result of something festering inside as a result of her magic being contained for so long and the her nefarious jade prison holding her captive and dormant. And as the jade tech grows increasingly more unstable and the void activity increasing, to have the jade pillar split open as part of the story or meta. \o/
This is what I suspected was going on with the jade tech. Soylent Green is dragons, basically ... we're using up what is left of the deep sea dragon that got petrified. I would have loved that.
The part seconds before Li betrayed us I had just gotten done thinking "he's a hardass but the world needs some hardasses like him to keep things straight" and then he just turned out to be evil all along. Pretty disappointed in that.
I don't really understand why people take such offense to void magic. We've seen, with every single dragon (besides Zhaitan), some form of corruption. Kralkatorrik's rage was a huge part of this but we constantly see meshing of minions like 'Death Branded Shatterers' that showed the meshing of magic. When you absorb a dragon's magic, and that dragon is the commanding force of a realm you aren't (ie. death magic absorbed by plant dragon), how does it not make sense to come to the idea that this magic entropy would tear the dragons apart? I think it's nitpicky. Addendum: Looking back on the video and your argument, I'll say that I think how the dragonvoid was shown was very weird. How they personified the void, made it some sort of malicious entity as though raw magic in it of itself would want to destroy Tyria was strange. I think if Anet went with the more 'natural universe' definition of entropy, that everything tends towards disorder, it would've been a cleaner explanation. As it stands, instead of sticking with the corruption that occurs with trying to control so many different types of magic (normal entropy), they went with a malicious monster. So I'll go with the conclusion that void as a concept makes sense, how they implemented it as a malicious, new character (The Dragonvoid) was weird.
I agree that making the dragonvoid a character with a personality that we could fight made it weird in the end. It worked so well and was super amazing as just an eerie, undefinable thing messing with reality. Not because it is evil, or has any intent to destroy but precisely because it is magic that lacks all intent. Its chaotic, everchanging, volatile nature makes it incompatible with the order required to maintain a functioning reality.
All energy was one big soup, and apparently cognizant of itself. Kryta is carved out of its body, and it wants that back. Kryta is a cancer and the universe wants to reclaim those cells.
What you said about how good the Ankka story arc was and how the story changed after her death, only confirms again my opinion that Guild Wars 2 is at its best when it deals with "human" antagonists. Or better to say antagonists we can understand, we can reason with. And which are not godlike entities. I liked the White Mantle and Caudecus, I loved Joko and Ankka. And from all the Elder Dragons, I liked Jormag the most because she talked to us. She tried to manipulate. We were able to reason about her motives. She was not just a "natural desaster".
Considering this is a living story, one that has branched ten years, multiple writers (perhaps even writing teams), modes of delivering story, and quality/standard of story delivery, it's pretty impressive that there is satisfaction in the ending at all. Void magic being the handy catch-all for magic and dragon corruption allows them to have a bit of clarity for a conclusion, and also allows them to really tie together some of the dangling plot threads from the previous stories. One thing I think all of this is born from is that it's a good story. End of Dragons feels short narratively in the final act because they normally do, and this is something that Anet have to work on in future, but it's also because if we could have our way as GW2 fans, I wouldn't want that quality of storytelling to end either. It's just so good having content that is consistently exciting and engaging, even if all the story beats don't resonate as satisfyingly as you'd hope. As for the clean break itself, I think they can achieve this whilst still having lingering characters from the Dragon Cycle story. The characters can exist separately of that narrative in the same way presumably that the Commander will - moving onto new things, seeing what the world of Tyria has to offer now that the threat of the Elder Dragons is gone. Aurene still being around is a weird surprise, but I don't think her presence is implicit in her survival. From what I understand, a large part of the dragon cycle is their slumber, right? Now that the magic of Tyria has stabilized, she might enter her own hibernation, which would nix her from the story entirely. EoD is a satisfying story (in my experience, anyways) - and it leaves me very excited for what comes next. I think as well, as with most large content releases, it just reminds you how good this game can be. It was an expansion that made me sit back at the end of it all and say "Thank god we have GW2, this game kicks ass."
While I loved the story until the Jade Sea, I think this expansion has to be followed by news of what is coming next, and soon. The player base is divisive right now, and the turtle being ungated will only heal that so much. We need a bread crumb of direction, if for no other reason, than as a distraction.
How come no one has mentioned the flower merchant in the epilogue? It was such a random character and even to have an achievement tied to it. And this woman claimed to know us through some vague way. And she just so happened to be at the dead end bar. Was this the mysterious S character? Or am I just wishful thinking they still care about that character.
Ankah got crazy because, when the aetherblades were lost in the mists, with no way out, the solution they went for was jumping through the mists and killing themselves in other dimensions repeatedly, till they got their fleet working again. While Mai Trin wasn't able to do it, Ankkah went ahead, loosing a lot of her innocence along the way. Most importantly, she realised how feeble the world is and by jumping through different dimensions, nothing really mattered. That, if nothing matters, it'll be better when it happens quick. It'll be freeing everyone from pain and suffering. Feelings she accoumulated while stuck in the mists, forced to do the things she did. I liked that. What i didn't like, was the fact that they went Scarlet 2.0 on her and gave her too much powers. While the Aurene sucking beam was kinda okay, because Asura, she then went ahead with harnessing and kinda controlling Zaithan Dragon magic, implying the ability to use other dragons as well and kinda using Void Dragon Magic towards the end... Consolidating a bit too much power, for my taste. Even with the Harbinger description, she did it grand scale.
There's curiously more to her story than just that if you read the journals and listen to the audio feed. Some time after the Aetherfleet hid all over Old Kaineng, Ankka got influenced by something. It's left unclear if it was the Void or the sinister presence inside Raisu Palace that keeps creating more Risen, but that led her down the path of using Zhaitan's magic as a harbinger and seemed to accelerate her madness and desire to end it all. Perhaps that's a plot hook that will be addressed in Season 6 once/if we get to explore Raisu Palace and the Risen nest within.
It's so hard to have to keep doing this. When IBS ended I thought "Hey, maybe it'll at least mean EoD will benefit" Now that EoD has ended my thoughts are "Hey, maybe it'll at least mean S6 will benefit" But to be honest I don't believe it
This story just made me really sad if I'm being honest, because it has me questioning their writing abilities. After IBS seeing this just felt like a disservice to the years of setup; you don't just build a story over so much time to break your legs this hard on the landing. I'm REALLY questioning the future of the game's narrative if it's anything like IBS and EoD. Also something funny I realised: You didn't mention Yao during your review. They were one of the most marketed characters during the marketing run for the expac, yet they appear in like, 1.5 chapters total. Such a shame, so weird
ok, about the void they VERY explicitly state that it's a combination of all the dragon magics. They even highlight that the term void is misleading because of that. Which kinda fits in with aurene perfectly. You needed 6 elder dragons because each one was able to filter out one type of magic from the combined dragonvoid, where as aurene being the prismatic dragon can just split it easily.
100% This. The void is pure magic and therefore a chaotic element, not an entropic element of the universe. It cannot follow rules of logic or structure.
Separate thought: I can't BELIEVE they didn't tease whats next in the golden path. There's hints all over the world as you say, but they really needed a "post credits stinger" sort of moment like PoF had with Kralk after you kill Balth. They've had to correct people SO MANY TIMES that this was the end of Gw2 as a game, tell people "THERES MORE COMING" in the dang story.
The same way FFXIV didnt really tease what was post Endwaler, Gw2 doesn't tease what is post EoD, these are conclusions, the next story will setup the conflicts to come.
@@RockandStoneVForKarl Sure, and I get that from a writing standpoint. But from a standpoint where multiple articles have called this the "final expansion" and the subreddit gets the question "is there going to be anything after EoD?" Every day... It would've helped public perception a lot.
@@Zyphent It's not ANets fault that you believe attention seeking Reddit Karma-Farmer. ANet multiple times, very clearly, said that the story will continue after EoD. If you don't believe them, then that's your prerogative. ANet doesn't owe you a written and signed note that there is more story to come. Need it notarized or by court order? What is this foolishness? They said it multiple times, in videos and written. What else should they do? Don't make a fool of yourself please.
@@clarissamarsfiels7961 lol, so aggressive. This isn't reddit. I believe ANet when they say it, my point is there are a great many people who ask the question still, so the message clearly hasn't broken through to the masses. Hell, I know of at least one person who did paid promotion for the game and called it the "final expansion" in their promotion. Obviously I know that's wrong, but you seem to have totally missed the point
I thought the void stuff was a fairly logical place to take the story. While I would have preferred to get more with it, I really liked the eldritch-horror vibe of what we did get with it. However, I am ready to move on from world-ending threats and focus on more domestic, political, character-based stories which is where I think Anet does their best stuff, which this definitely feels like we are moving towards, so overall really positive impressions. Also, that Ankka/Mai cutscene was probably one of the biggest highlights for me, probably the single most point where I was most invested in the story as it was happening.
Agreed. I also personally disagree with people trying to claim the Void is "entropy". The dialogue and story seem to clearly indicate that it is pure magic i.e. absolute chaos. It doesn't follow the rules of logic and structure due to this and is also the source how magic is able to do such amazing things in the GW2 Universe/multiverse.
I missed the part where it was stated that Soo-Won was the mother of all creation. As I understood it she was just mother of all the current dragons. Now Aurene is the only one until there's too much magic for her to handle. Why would they call it a cycle if these were all the dragons that ever were? I'm confused. On Ankka; she really felt like just an edgy asura whose motivations were unclear and was there just to be a one note emo kid doing edgy evil things because she hates authorities and just wants to see the world burn. And then she just dies. The voice actress did a good job but I'm not sure if there's enough character there to really talk about. At least Scarlet's character-arc was somewhat redeemed in the end.
It felt short to me and POF felt longer. For some reason I had the idea in my head that there were 5 chapters like Diablo. It felt like I was on chapter 2 in my head…but then the credits were rolling. I was a bit sad.
Feeling a lot of the same thoughts WP, especially your bits about length of story. It has always felt weird to me in all of the GW2 expansions that if I really pay attention to progressing the story, the entire thing can be completely finished in about 2 - 3 days at a non-rushed pace. That feels incredibly short for the main story, especially when you compare it to other current MMO expansions or GW1 campaigns. It's all just so smushed together into these 5 acts, which sounds like a decent number, but then you look at the fact that the latter half of them only have 3ish story steps each. To me, that's what REALLY makes the expansion feel rushed rather than anything balance or bug related, but you kinda gotta give the company some slack considering the past few years of development struggles. My other big letdown is Soo-Won as a concept in general. The deep sea dragon was set up to be SOOOO COOL from past lore. I always imagined that since each dragon had 2 spheres of influence, the DSD would be the dragon of water and fear/terror with all the talk of "horrors in the depths" pushing out the krait, quaggan, and karka. Then we get.... Mother Soo-Won, who while beautifully modeled, was NOT what they made her out to be all those years ago in the priory library. We never even actually got to see any of her personal minions (unless you count the jade maw, but who knows anymore), just a whole bunch of void corrupted minions of the other 5. As a whole, she really felt shoehorned into the plot because they wanted to wrap up both the elder dragon and "mother" storylines that they forced onto themselves and we don't get the terrifying badass gigantic deep-sea kraken that we always wanted. The expansion is awesome overall, don't get me wrong, but it (along with the Icebrood Saga) have really taught me to temper my expectations with Anet when it comes to story. They are somehow both amazing and terrible at telling their stories at the same time. EDIT: One final thought, I think a major reason that GW2 story suffers a lot of the time is that Anet is so scared to kill off important characters unless it's convenient for them like Eir and Zojja (not dead but may as well be?), whereas they are happy to kill off new interesting characters like Ankka waaaaay too soon. I firmly believe that, AT MINIMUM, Aurene and Taimi should have died in this expac for their own reasons. For this being the massive worldwide apocalyptic event that it was, we got such a simple light hearted happy ending and even a damn proposal immediately afterwords without any need for grieving or mourning. Felt super shallow to me.
I think void magic isn’t just a convenient fit. To my understanding void is a highly volatile combination of all types of magic that is so unstable it breaks reality. Throughout 10 years of this game this has been foreshadowed in both the story and the enemies combining sources of magic (e.g. death branded shatterer). The Dragonvoid on the other hand does feel like a convenient fit and exists just to give us something to fight in the last story mission. I would’ve much preferred them keeping void as a primal substance that corrupts and breaks reality, rather than turning it into the being that is dragonvoid.
I'd like to add to this. Remeber the one statue of Joko that gave us a post imortem message from him? He quite literally describes Soo-Won's story about the creation of the world, followed by a bunch of his lies. Anet hid this in there, ages ago!
The Dragonvoid also describes itself as being Time and Space AND it is described as Entropy. The whole thing about it is that it is everything and nothing. Which, if you have an inkling of understanding about the physics of the Big Bang and the creation of everything, you understand the Voids existence. From it, it created everything. Soo Won was not the creator of everything (I think WP mistook that), but she wanted to control the wild magic into something manageable. So she created the five Elder Dragons. But energy over time becomes dispersed, diluted, disorded, chaotic and useless. That is what entropy is.
@@LetsTakeWalk Don't get me wrong. I like the way the game describes void just like you summarized here. But to me thats the exact strength of the whole void concept; a sort of cosmic force. The dragonvoid being presented as a being with a mind, that is communicating with us, kind of ruins that idea for me. As if gravity is talking to us or something... it just feels off. The whole dragon's end meta storyline could've existed with just the concept of void. For me, the dragonvoid only makes this concept weaker and more confusing. It feels so unnecessary other than giving us something to deal with in the final story instance.
@@farshiverpig4491 I'm not sure the Void and Dragonvoid are quite the same thing. That'll have to be something Anet clarifies if they look at the Void again going forward. But personally I thought the Dragonvoid was basically just corrupted Soo-Won wielding the magic of her children, which when all combined took on a Void state, while the Void itself is just a description of the chaotic state of magic before the Elder Dragons came along.
@@dieselface1 Ah yes. I Kind of assume the void forms into 'the dragonvoid' at the end. Your take on the dragonvoid is interesting though. Personally I assumed we fought the corrupted Soo-Won in the meta, and deal with an ultimate void monster, the dragonstorm, in the story mission. At the start of the story instance you see this orb of void energy which I assume is 'the dragonvoid' which takes the shape each dragon, not just Soo-Won. This was a great spectacle and the lines the dragonvoid was speaking were cool... So I understand why they went for it... but at the same time its also weird and confusing.
Great review. I felt like there was a big arc missing from the story towards the end, where the void would have been looked into and we would have put together the army to take on the last map. Things happen so fast towards the end that it totally took me out of the story.
10:38 Best part about integrating strike missions into the story, is easing the player into the mechanics of the strike mission. The strike mission is harder than the story instance, but the player has already learned most mechanics before entering their first strike mission, which means a lot.
The Soo-Won "God of Creation" thing just bothers the heck out of me. Also that she is the mother of all other Elder Dragons is just.. why ArenaNet, why? So much mystery about where those creatures, who look all vastly different from one another and have close to zero ressemmblance to their mother Soo-Won, is basically gone. She is the highest being we know of in Tyria (except Aurene). The world just got so much smaller and I also do think that this really didn't help the "powerlevel dilemma". This could very well be the beginning of Dragon Ball in Guild Wars 2 - especially when we think about that we have Aurene, a creature with godlike powers, at our command. Where should this feeling of threat come from now? The Void? Maybe Demons? The other gods that left Tyria? We would need something incredibly strong OR cunning to get us to a critical level of concern right now. And I know - it doesn't always have to be a bigger and better enemy to be able to have a good story. But what about the selling point of a future expansion? The biggest, most ICONIC story - no, THE story of Guild Wars 2 has now ended. The Dragons are no more, Tyria is free at last. ArenaNet has to get out the big guns to create interest in another expansion - for current players and new ones alike. I highly doubt that people would pay money for an Aetherblade or Zephyrite Expansion - there has to be something BIG that makes you wanna play the game and experience the story behind it. That always works best with a big bad villain, a truly evil one at best, that we have to unite against and defeat. No space pirate, no anti-dreamer, no "I-dont-want-change-in-politics" kinda guy. I did hope for a little bit more of nostalgia to hit me to be honest. I am sad that we don't hear those iconic soundtracks from Gw1 Factions in certain areas of the game. I know, ArenaNet parted ways with Jeremy Soule and maybe that is the reason why there aren't any old songs that are played. It still disappoints me and is quite ridiculous if you think about it: if you wan't to listen to the "Kurzick Theme" you can visit Lake Doric, an area introduced in Living World where we fight against the White Mantle. It isn't playing in Echowald Forrest though.. All in all this expansion didn't really hit it for me. I am curious what comes next.
The one thing that super bothered me at the end of the story was lack of consequence shown to the players. I was really hoping we would see some major allies die. When the void spreads across the world it suggests mass destruction and death is happening, but it's not shown to us. If lets say Logan, Ivan, Ayumi or others died it would have stuck the landing better.
I don't think that a story need major character deaths to show consequences. This said, I would have loved if we got a couple more missions in the other parts of the world at the end. I would have loved to play Rytlock at the end. Or Braham and Rox. I get why they didn't do it because at the time when shit hit's the fan, we stand basically right there at the endboss. But they could have started this void thing earlier and so it then.
I felt the same way going in to the expansion, but seeing the direction they took and what they did with the characters present, I actually started to feel like if they killed any major players it would have just been for shock value which would have cheapened the overall experience. Sure, they could have written in something reasonable, but with where they went with everything, I think the deaths we got were more than enough.
I really hope the next big story doesn’t have to do with the mists. I want them to take the temperature down and do a more grounded conflict for a bit in a new part of the world now that they’ve covered all the areas from GW1.
There was no Zojja 2/10 😹😹😹 Now seriously, I enjoyed the story and the world very much. But as a gay man I can't help but notice the sheer amount of lgbt folks there and didn't feel like a good thing, felt very artificial. I was actually surprised Rama didn't have a husband like every second guy in Cantha...
Fantastic review WP, can't help but feel we are on the same wavelength about the major beats. EoD is the best expac to date, wish that wasn't such a low bar for them to rise above. Glad the dragon stuff is done so Anet can find inspiration for better stories. They really have moved in the right direction on nearly all fronts, but there is still a ways to go before GW2 is truly delivering on the potential it has had since launch. Distance from this game has helped give perspective. I uninstalled GW2 after IBS and only reinstalled to play EoD. That time away really helped me center my feelings and criticisms for this game. There is a lot to love about it, and plenty to dislike. Every expac I feel that ratio gets better and better. Will baby steps be enough long term? Who knows.
I really wanted to encounter the Jade Empire being completely tyrannical and we having to stage a rebellion that would travel around Cantha all 7 Samurai-like
After finishing the story it took me a while to decide if i liked it. I loved the visuals, how it was presented, enjoyed the maps, and also the fact it took a direction i wasnt expecting. But couldnt place what was wrong until you described the void. Think you nailed the identity of my personal hangups. Was somewhat... unsatisfying (for lack of a better term)
I liked the story overall. I agree it was too short. My biggest gripe was the chapter where we are trying to talk to Joon and we have to fight through her manor, where her traps and armies of jade mechs are trying to literally kill us, and then the ending is literally: "Okay, I changed my mind, lets be friends". I was like, Oh hell no... So yeah, Joon was my least favorite character, but Rama was cool, and the world was fun to explore. I agree, Aanka was a great character. Her staring at the edge of the mists and feeling that heavy nihilism triggers me but it makes for a good villain.
Imagine an alternative End of Dragons where Primordus and Jormag did not die but instead fled to Cantha, leaving a frozen and boiling trail across the sea that we were to follow. Denied entry into Kaineng and threatened as attackers, we learn that there has been an attack on New Kaineng -- Mother. Jormag and Primordus ravage the city, racing to take her magic and wound her in some way that she flees. Since she is mother and apparently able to create new dragons, her would uncontrollably "bleeds" out new manifestations of the other elder dragons (but Soo-Won sized) that terrorize the rest of the Canthan landscapes: With the help of Aurene, we swoop in and take on each of the dragons in Strikes 2.0: - "Zhaitan" taking advantage of the ruins of Old Kaineng. - "Mordremoth" winding through cathedral windows and stone roots of Echovald. - "Kralkatorrik" storming the Shing Jea Monastery. - Primordus/Jormag/Mother all around the Harvest Temple in Dragon's End. As we kill them off, Sio-Won continues to bleed out and eventually die, transferring her magic to Aurene the same(?). That doesn't make room for a lot of the other great stuff we got in EoD, but it was fun to think about how each of the other elder dragons would have appeared on the Canthan maps (or as new, Canthan versions themselves)
This expansion has been very different for me. For the past expansions, I’ve been able to play through it for hours a day; work is now a factor, so I’ve only managed to finish the story recently while exploring along the way. And I was completely blown away. My only qualm has nothing to do with the game itself. My first main was a ranger, and Untamed has been… disappointing. I like playing through expansions using the expac specs, and I think I really struggled with some combat achievements just because of how poor it feels to play. Looking forward to playing through it again on another class!
One inconsistency I picked up on was how kralk's magic allegedly all went into Aurene, and even got purified... and yet it was as if the whole of his magic had returned to the dragonvoid
I absolutely love EOD! Even so, I think you really nail the issue that character stories quite often got in the way of the expansion's storytelling. I love Rytlock and Canach, Gorrik and Taimi, mostly because of how engaging they are, but I've never felt a special attachment to any of the others in our group of "friends." There are just too many of them and it's impossible to give each of them the time to make their characters shine. It doesn't help that I took a hiatus from early on in Season 1 up until the end of it, so I missed out on even meeting them in context, and when I picked back up with Season 2 I was left wondering why I was supposed to care about them. For instance, I sometimes get annoyed when Kasmeer jokingly scolds me because I don't have the emotional connection to her for that to feel good, even after journeying with her in PoF. Worse yet, I always forget Jory and Kasmeer are even a couple because from Season 2 onward their relationship is only ever mentioned in passing, and not very often at that. So I honestly grew impatient with how mushy and deep the two of them got throughout EOD, distracting from the more interesting narrative of Cantha and the DSD, and I really didn't feel the big emotional payoff I was clearly supposed to in the epilogue. It's unfortunate, since I know there are a lot in the community who love them, but because Season 1 isn't accessible and I can't actually establish the emotional connections, I'm continually left feeling like I'm missing out on something I should feel deeply about. While I was looking forward to the epilogue after the final battle, a story beat that was used really well in PoF for character focus, I felt very underwhelmed, and a little guilty that I did.
@WoodenPotatoes I’m mostly of the same mind as you with End of Dragons. I was also so excited to see Primordus get his own story. I played GW1 from launch and as a GW1 fan, I was mostly invested in Jormag, Kralkatorrik, and most importantly, Primordus, because they’re who we were hinted about. Primordus was a story 12 years in the making and they flushed him down the drain! I figured it might be redeemable for me if EoD was fantastic enough, so I saved hope for that, because throughout GW2, the two dragons I’ve been most excited for were Primordus, and… The Deep Sea Dragon! I loved the idea of that Cthulhu, in the depths, style dragon. I patiently waited years for that story, however that’s not the direction they went with. This mother/serpent dragon/Kuunavang-was-also-a-dragon-champion route is also really cool, but it’s not what I was hoping for, so it doesn’t quite redeem Primordus treatment for me. I was also excited to go back to the beautiful Jade Sea and get hit with tons of nostalgia, but… The Jade Sea is hideous now imo and the only map we got in it is focused on the mega and not the lore. Now I’m here thinking about other story beats that rubbed me the wrong way. Like Balthazar all of the sudden not caring about humanity? Which made no sense. Then is killing him to prevent him from killing Kralk, when we turned around and did that even though the status quo hadn’t really changed much the next season… As a GW1 fan, I’m very bitter about the treatment of some of the GW1 lore. I still wish they had implemented some version of FoW, and they still could, but that seems unlikely to me. I’m rambling at this point, sorry. Back to my original point. I am also bothered by their decisions, and I hated the end of IBS, but I do think they felt like they HAD to go the way they did. I think Jormag and Primordus were always supposed to kill each other. We saw that they were each other’s weaknesses back in season 3. This was always the plan. I also think Soo-wan was always planned to be “Mother.” That’s why we never saw her minions, because she was good. And I think what happened was, NCSoft, or some higher ups at Anet looked at the game and decided that the elder dragon story was holding them back from not just new stories and characters, but also from reaching out to new players. The game has steadily decreased in players over time, and I think with the layoffs and then having spent a decade on this story, they decide they HAD to end of now for the good of the game, and their company, and since they wanted to do it in a hurry, they didn’t change their original plan, so Jormag and Primordus killed each other without Primordus getting the time he deserved, and EoD had to kill Soo-wan so they could move on. Was this the right move…? Personally I say no. This ostrisized the long time fans such as myself, and they don’t really appeal the game to new players very well, so I think it mostly hurt them in the long run. I know I sound like I hate EoD and GW2 but I promise I don’t. There were so many beautiful parts to EoD, and I love Tyria so very much, in both games. But that makes all this that much more frustrating. Because it’s a year later and I’ve played EoD now, and I still feel the same way you said you felt right after Champions released. With this studio shifting their direction so much between both games and never fully delivering, what’s to make me decide to get invested in another game, should they ever do that? Sadly, I don’t trust them as a studio anymore. They don’t stick to anything long enough to fully see it through, in either game, and their dwindling player base reflects that. Sorry for the downer comment and the novel. I loved the video and I agreed with you that EoD did many things right. It was a really enjoyable time and I’m still enjoying playing the game now.
Bit late of a comment on a year+ old review, but I'm surprised you hadn't mentioned the emptiness feel of all the end of dragons zones. I hear people constantly talk about this, how lifeless the maps feel, even though there is a ton of content to be consumed in them! Out of ALL the maps in Guild Wars 2, these are the ones I spent the longest time in and I had an absolute blast. The fact that you didn't mention it either makes me think part of the community just rushed through it and didn't stop to appreciate all the details the devs put into these maps. There really is a lot of content in each of the maps, but you have to be willing to give each map a fair chance.
I think Joon was a great character as well, at least I was suspecting of her being evil until the mansion instance where we find out her motivations. She does fall in a bit in the trope the genius with all the answers, similar to how Taimi was in LS3 but overall she was great I feel. Aside from her genius, I find her a very believable character. She has a family! She has history with a lot of the characters from Cantha, she seems rooted in the world in a way few characters are in Gw2.
I feel like the void as described is actually a pretty interesting idea after thinking idea. It as described represents the union of everything. how in a sense the world wants to return to a unified state. And how the more different types of magic you filter the closer you get to this idea yourself.
I too sorta liked this idea - Void is the natural state of the magic and we're wielding its component parts. There's some interesting stuff to play with here that probably won't get touched again. My only real hope is that void remains one force of many in the universe, I think its a bit doom-and-gloom to say all these past things were void - it certainly doesn't need to be the case.
On the topic of the meaning of "The cycle is reborn" here's my interpretation. Before EoD, Tyria did not properly understand what the dragon cycle really was. We thought it was just the rise and slumber of elder dragons. Instead we discover that it is the cycle of corruption and replacement of a "Mother" i.e. Soo-Won. In this sense, "the cycle is reborn" means that the next Mother (Aurene) has taken Soo-Won's role, and in so doing completed the previous dragon cycle. It may be that just like Soo-Won, Aurene will discover she is not truly immune to the effects of magic and may face inevitable replacement. What this means is that with the corrupting and destabilising nature of the void, Aurene is doomed to suffer the same fate as Soo-Won but that won't be in the commander's lifetime (Aurene even implies something along these lines). While we are confronted with a sense of futility over the void's eternal nature, we can still take comfort in the fact that Tyria's magical instability will no longer be a problem for the commander's Tyria. With this, the cycle is reborn.
4:42 I actually hate that mention of Zojja. I was furious, almost INSULTED when Taimi literlly says "I don't even know where Zojja is" - Because since the fall of Primordus Zojja has ZERO stakes in the story of this franchise. And ANet knows it, they just don't have the balls to let her die. ANet didn't have her there when Balthazar tried to wake Primordus, the Nemesis of the Asuran race, in Season 3. ANet didn't have her there against Kralkatorrik, the original Nemesis of Destiny's Edge, in Path of Fire and Season 4. ANet didn't have her there in the clash of Jormag and Primordus in the IBS. There is NO REASON left for her to be in this story anymore... And NOW... *NOW* they mention her? Acknowledging her existence for the first time in almost *5 YEARS* and not even bring her in to WITNESS the fall of the last Elder Dragon. And on top of all of that HER CLOSEST STUDENT doesn't even KNOW where she is??? I wouldn't even be mad if she said "Zojja is still in medical care" or even "Zojja passed away two months ago". But THIS was one of the WORST parts of this entire expansion. And before anyone comes at me with the old argument about her voice talent: NO! I understood it in HoT, but if they wanted her back after *OVER 6 YEARS* they'd have recast her and be done with it. They've done it before (with the Commander no less) they can do it with Zojja.
Got to agree with your sentiment here. When I heard that line early on I was convinced Zojja was going to make an appearance in the expac. At this point I could see her coming back as an Antagonist. As you say, there’s no other relevant story for her to come back to, unless she is the story. We get wind of a signal tied to Zojja from a point on Tyria we’ve never been to. Plus some backstory that she went missing etc etc.
@@Aztec2250 What irks me about the whole Zojja thing is that she's neither alive nor dead at this point - she's just a name. And a character doesn't even have to be in the game to "be alive" they can make short stories and blogposts on the home page to tell us what's going on. But no. There's nothing. Even if they bring her back they will have to give a *MASSIVE* load of exposition as to what happened in the literal YEARS that passed since we pried her from that pod. Just "I was in a coma and now I'm suddenly evil *because **_void_* " is not going to cut it.
I must say I find it funny because I thought Minister Li was going to be the reluctant ally where him and the commander put aside their differences and Joon was gonna turn out to be a power hungry villain. That scene taking the elevator up to the top of min sec I was fully expecting to see Joon there turn on us because of what happened with the water dragon. It turned into a bit of a plot twist for me. It really is interesting how different people can see things so differently probably due to past experiences etc.
The conclusion is exactly the new starting point that, as you realized in the last year, was what they were aiming for. The fact that Aurene is still there and the Void "could" come maybe back doesn't change that. You maybe wanted Aurene out, I wouldn't, I would actually have been mad at the "she has gone mad so we had to kill her" route, which is a pretty stupid plot device that other games like WoW used over and over again, and at the end is just annoying to all those who actually liked that character and does nothing fundamentally interesting to the others. Yes, they keep Aurene alive and the Void "potentially" still there, but they basically repeat it OVER AND OVER in the epilogue that now every character and the world can take a new road, that's it. It's also roughly the same thing FFXIV did with their latest expansion, for similar reasons. The parallels between the two, btw, keep growing: in many ways, while playing EoD, I honestly thought Anet was trying to learn something from FFXIV here and there...
I was surprised it made me feel...not a lot. I played since the beginning, had lots of breaks lately...but i wanted to finish the story. What really is not working for me (besides you just feel the change in writers and direction and i dont think there has been a "plan" in the long run for this) is that i dont feel connected to the other NPCs. they had their moments, but i feel like all the development has been hinted but not really explored. They dont took time for it. They are there to give me quests and tell me where to go, what to do, screw up again and again so i can fight more mobs to stretch the time i have to spend on a quest. The rest is kinda flat and just wont work for me anymore. 'Also way too less time with Soo-Won to feel anything about her passing. It felt quite interesting and good until like Mai-Trin´s End. After that it felt rushed for me and left me with a "meh" Feeling.
Another beat that didn't satisfy me was the pay off on the trailer voiced by Kasmeer with the "this is not the country we thought it was, they don't trust us" etc. It feels like we aren't really ever on shaky ground with the Empress. We meet her once and she doesn't even feel very intimidating. She just asks what you're doing, you tell her, and she's like, oh ok.
Re: the void, I think it's really important that we don't dwell on the name and, thus, what it means in other settings. This isn't emptiness, but rather primal, chaotic magic. Maybe the concept will be broadened later, but I think it's important for our perspectives on what's happened and our speculation on what's to come that we keep in mind that this is "GW void" and only that. Damn, it lights my imagination on fire, though, that a fundamental part of nature is fundamentally flawed and at odds with the rest of reality. Perhaps this is true in all realms, and worlds without Elder Dragon inevitably break. Maybe that's why the Six fled their previous home, seeking a world with magic that works. Perhaps they lingered on Tyria because they thought it safe, unaware of the Elder Dragons and their effect on the world. Oh, the possibilities!
I don't think the void is a part of reality that is fundamentally flawed, to me it felt more that in its raw from it's just uncompatible with the stability required for a coherent reality with things living in it. For me the Void was just wild, uncontrolled magic. Change without purpose or guidance, the sum of all possibilities. It is the energy that enables creation and magic when filtered and controlled but if left to its own devices it's just too random to enable something as complex and fragile as life.
To me, the ending honestly had a note of Finality to it that I never had with any other Guild Wars. Which worries me a bit, because it feels not only like the end of the Dragon Saga, but the end of the Guild Wars 2 stories as a whole. Everything is done, and even our companions have moved on and done their own things. Jory and Kasmeer are married, Gorrik joined Jory and Ivan in making a detective agency, Rytlock has moved on to politics, Canach is doing rich person things, Rox has a boyfriend, Braham is coping with what he did, Taimi is helping in Cantha, and even Logan has retired to a seaside vacation home. Everyone is done with adventures and moved on, and the Commander likely has hung up his cap as well. Everything's... over. Truthfully, I would not be upset if this was actually the end of major stories for Guild Wars. Their main story is done, they've wrapped it up, and to me it feels like if they start pushing more stuff out... then they may be starting to jump the shark a bit, pushing beyond what they needed to tell. Stories have their end, and sad as it is I think Guild Wars 2's story is over.
You mention the strikes and mechanics, but wanna say, you can still alt-tab in most boss fights and your npc will eventually kill everything, in order to skip as much story as possible I just start conversations or fights, alt-tab for awhile, tab back in and boom done, is great that NPC's help. When I arrived at Kaineng city on my Skimmer as I Dumped the NPC into the water, I got to the first fight, alt tabbed, forgot about the game playing btd6, alt tabbed back and had my jade bot, quite convenient.
I really enjoyed the epilogue in the tavern. I wore my Common Clothing outfit and soaked it in a bit. I even talked to Frostbite over in the corner. Regarding what comes next now that the dragons are out of the way... Perhaps in the next expansion they will finally introduce a new race(s), where new players can start off with a character that knows nothing about the story thus far and levels up quickly in their starting area. Something like the pandas in WoW.
It's a cycle because it started with 1 dragon (Soo-Won) and ended with 1 dragon (Aurene) and it's a cycle reborn because they're not the same fucking dragon.
What I found crushing about the end of the story is the loss of all that Soo-won knew. How many cycles have there been? What did she know about the ancient peoples of Tyria? How did the Six change things with their arrival? What did Soo-won know about the true nature of magic that they didn't, and why didn't they seek each other out? What existed before Soo-won? If magic is so fundamentally flawed that reality doesn't work without something to filter it, what even was reality before Soo-won began filtering it, and can we truly do no better than depending on filters that are alive and have emotions and agency?
Coming late to this, but I wanted to vent somewhere :) So for the past 10 years we've been killing Elder Dragons. Soo-Won, must have known, but was just chilling in Cantha, like just send us a mail or something and tell us to stop, use telepathy or whatever. Also we have an incredibly difficult time killing most of the Elder Dragons, raising armies of all sentient races across continents and fulfiling ancient prophesies, but Anka, just comes and wrecks the CREATOR OF ALL ELDER DRAGONS AND OUR UNIVERSE, with amazing ease cause she has a special little cannon. Last part of my internet rant, for a big part of the story, while reality is on the brink of fading away and the whole world getting destroyed, us, the commander who has participated in the killing of many Elder Dragons, have turned to a goddamn errand boy for bureaucrats! There are many many things that I liked, but this is a rant, so I only mention the stuff that annoyed me the most
Main criticism of the Voice Acting, too many of the same / similar voice in proximity of each other. I know they want to have big names, but anyone who plays games with members of the Critical Role cast for example can clearly tell when it’s one of those VA's. Kind of like back in Icebrood when you would hear Brahams voice actor then as you stroll away you immediately have a dominant dialogue from unnamed Charr that clearly has the same voice actor doing a negligibly different Voice. My main issue with Annka was just that she was Scarlet but empty instead of Joker styled insane. She basically reminded me of Owlman from the DC comics where he is like “Oh nothing really matters so let’s just destroy all the Multiverse in one go”. Design wise I did like her though. My major minor gripe would be the last segment when you are being encouraged by your allies and going back through previous stories. This was a perfect opportunity to let us interact with the uncorrupted minds of the Elder Dragons, an opportunity for us to hear Zhaitans voice (Poor Zhaitan will forever be trapped stuck to that Tower in Orr and I hate it), an opportunity to fill in some gaps. Did the cleansing ritual perform on Glint for example tie in? How do the Human Gods tie into what Soo-Won told us? There is still plenty to room to speculate, as for your upset with Void, you could kind of say that before with “The Mists”. The one biggest thing I’ve got out of this expansion, we have now visited all the GW1 main civilisations now. OK we won’t move on straight away, but we can have a season now where we do clean up, we can have some slice of life. For the first time in a good while we don’t have to rush straight into a high stakes story, we can actually enjoy the calm. GW2 for the longest time has been this constant increasing pressure and while I know some people won’t want slice of life, I genuinely think the characters themselves deserve it. So, in the next season I’d like to see this happening as signs of what we are going into next get set up, or as we investigate some remaining GW mysteries that have been left as far back as GW1. I am also curious to see how they begin to distance us from Aurene given they may wish to add more races and set up for a new Campaign where the main character doesn’t HAVE to be the Commander. I will say this WP, Aurene going crazy would be very boring to me. To me she was just having fun and chuckling at the idea of how ignorant some individuals are. As for why she can filter the magic, I'm hoping it tied to the idea that the ritual performed on Glint somehow affected her offspring. Though in all honesty I don’t see this ever getting explored.
I was surprised with Minister Li and Joon i was thinking that Joon will be that perfect looking character and at the end it will be revealed that she is a villain and we will convince Minister Li that we are on their side and he will reveal that he is good he just wasn't trusting us because he was fooled by Joon then after they showed that mai trin was revenant and had scarlet with her controlling her i thought that maybe we will see scarlet as a big bad again but NO it was just so simple i couldn't believe that they wrote it like this so somehow it was plot twist for me that these characters were not hiding anything.
What I don't get and what I'm kinda mad about, because this "we don't care about our world anymore, only about characters" destroyed GW2 for me is, that why TF they don't just move on to a Singleplayer Project, where they can live out their artistic endeavour for creating their dream characters and place them in some generic fantasy setting, which doesn't really matter. I would see the writing team would do a good job programming a dating sim. This is not said with ill intent, dating sims have their own nice community and they have the potential to become popular among these people. They would be happy creating what they want and their fanbase would be happy with the dating sims they could produce. From an MMO POV: like you said, the characters are blunt. For some they may be interesting and quirky and this is why they like them, but also for me they're a boring and kinda annoing nuisance. I would have love to known more about the world and its Lore. The characters should just be nice details in an MMO, not their main focus point.
About the void: When it was first introduced I also thought: Oh some super weird magic stuff or: o.k. that happens when you mix all the magic together. But then it became sentient and talked to us? Why would it want to destroy the world? And about Ankka: I think the mists just completly changed her. The one audio where she mentioned killing her self (anf others) over and over again in order to get the material.
I dislike how they rushed the whole dragon story. They could've just "paused" dragon story and focused on different things. How? It doesn't matter, they can come up with a hundred different things.
However good or bad void is I wouldn't worry about it much going forward. Your thesis was that they are rushing through ending dragons because they are done with dragons. By association I think they are done with dragon magic too. Aurene even tells us in the epilogue that Void isn't going to be a problem for a long time. That's probably why they also info dumped us instead of dragging out the mystery because it's not one they are going to want to revisit much. I do see a lot of players wanting to retcon "everything" into void magic but let's not blame Anet as long as they don't go there. So far it's only been deployed in limited ways. For instance, the kind of "corruption" that Void is has nothing to do with Orrian corruption, i.e. Zhaitan's influence, or what Glint was cleansed of that made her Kralkatorrik's slave. The dragons have been keeping magic pure and distinct until we started killing them; this is what introduced specifically void corruption, the vine/deathtouched destroyers and such, and the madness of LS4 Kralk, and Primordus and Jormag going to war instead of playing nice. The dragons have never been nice to mortals but that does not make them "mad" in the sense that we saw in LS3 and beyond after the dead ED's magic was intermixing. Void is also a bit "easier" to understand through the lens of some East Asian philosophy like Daoism and Buddhism, which probably was some influence with them revealing it in Cantha. Void (or rather in these philosophies, Nothingness) is not just entropy and chaos, it is also pure potentiality (which makes your contrasts with the mists a bit weird.) Potentiality becomes actuality by taking a limited and determinite form; you have to become SOMEthing rather than EVERYthing; what is formless takes on form to become a distinct thing. It's a matter of carving a piece out of that primal everything that forms emerge. (As Daoism is happy to state, how the hollow rooms of a house is what makes a house useful, instead of a solid pile of bricks.) In this case the six elder dragons separate and deliniate void magic into distinct and pure domains, and all of Tyria slowly comes into being from that differentiation. So it is only entropy from the standpoint of creation returning to its original state, which is undifferentiated, it's everything at once, and it can once again take on limitations and order to become specific things. (Annka also stated as much; she expected creation to restart itself at some point after Tyria was engulfed in Void; don't let the Thermodynamics idea of entropy confuse this!) I don't know that they expressed it clearly enough in EoD but as far back as LS4 Aurene has been hailed as the "prismatic" dragon, and Kralk said that is what made Aurene different. A prism takes white light, which is a mixture of all visible light, and divides it up into a spectrum. The implication is that Aurene can take mixed (including void) dragon magic and separate it into its distinct, pure components. The magic could still travel together if it does so in paralell, just as we see with a rainbow being a band of different colors. Soo-Won as the mother of dragons also has some ability to purify and therefore separate void magic (she had to in order to create the other EDs), but isn't as strong at it due to being "attuned to water" and had to create the other EDs to help her. The epilogue also suggests that Aurene needed to absorb Soo-Won's magical essence at her death in order to be able to fully see the ley-lines, and I would surmise that is also what enables her to get a better handle on void. Each dragon she's been consuming has attuning her to more of the types of magic and Soo-Won completes the pallette. It's presented super hastily but I think the logic is all there at least.
I think you have been spot in with your analysis. And thats not even getting into metas or builds, nerfs etc.. i personally feel its just two seperate teams that have done this story when the game first started all tbe way up to this point. I mean the delivery in terms of cool cinematics or that blend us into the dream state aurene was in point was really cool.. but i felt they were simply rushing it for rushing it's sake.
I am not satisfied with how End of Dragons concluded the dragon storyline, but I can sympathize with the writers being exhausted with this story arc that is over a decade old. But I AM satisfied that the dragon story arc is finally over and we can move on to different stories FINALLY.
One thing I don't understand about Soo-Won is that in the beginning, she was able to deal with all of the void energy just fine and split it into the six Elder Dragons, but at the end of the story, it's like poison to her which controls her mind. Why didn't it control her in the beginning?
She was never really able to completely deal with it all alone. Because of that she created the other five older dragons and shared her power with them for a better balance. She didn't split the void but herself in the other dragons. And now with only 1/6 of her previous powers she is no longer able to confront the void.
@@zcar6557 I'm pretty sure she laid an egg for each Elder Dragon. In the cave beneath Dragon's End she talks about how she nursed them as they were all babies. It doesn't sound much different from when Glint created Aurene.
After the Jormag and Primordius incident, I legit quit the game. Was playing since GW prophecies, but yeah it was too much. I didn't even get EoD, after waiting for cantha for SO many years. Now, I don't even want to get there. And hearing that they basically threw some big lore stuff out the window got me like "Yep, I'm done with this lore" :( Especially after having experienced what I consider to be my best gaming experience in my entire life on another game. Still, I love watching your content WP, and I'm still looking forward to your adventures in Tyria. Maybe one day, maybe, I'll come back. Hope you are doing great man, big cheers and keep up with the good content
I always hoped they would portray the Elder Dragons as essentially what happened when Tyrian evolution gave birth to a magical apex predator. So essentially dragons popped up naturally but eventually became so tapped into magic that some of them consumed so much that they became as powerful as Elder Dragons, becoming addicted and then insane (like we saw when ordinary mortals were exposed to too much magic in Bloodstone Fen). You can still slot Soo-Won and even the Void right after that (concentrating so much magic and corrupting it would have caused the Void to surface on Tyria. Soo-Won, realising the danger would then have taken similar action to what we saw in EoD). It also allows for other Elder Dragons we know nothing about to have already been killed in the ancient past (for example there is an orb in Orr that looks like the hearts of Elder Dragons we have seen in other areas of the game). And that just adds even more mystery to the world, giving it an iceberg like feel. As if so much has happened that we could never even know it all. But that means we can never stop discovering more.
In regards to Ice Brood Saga, I thought it was great up until the very last scene in the last part, the battle was epic and really climatic, but the way they did the tail end of things was just. . . there. I feel like putting a little more effort into the presentation of that part and putting a little more story into it could have saved it.
It makes me so happy that this game is getting some much deserved love again. I can't wait to check all of this out for myself, once i can get back to work irl and can afford the xpac.
One of the theories for possible future of "dragons" storyline I have is that ... dragons aren't dead. Not really. We see in the EoD's final battles that some aspects of EDs exist in void relatively independently. There is another big clue in HoT from Trahearne where he says that Mordremoth can be reborn in him if we let him live. That is the finale, and I honestly baffled that people forget that so easily. One of the areas of Mordremoth is mind. Guess who else was affected by Mordremoth's mindthing? Logan. But I think we can with relative confidence say that Logan is ok. Who else? Zojja. Where is she? Who the f knows. Mord lives??? Moving on. Zhaitan. I mean... is shooting the "undead" dragon with cannons enough to reaally kill it? Always seemed iffy to me. We also have Z's minions acting in Kaineng spreading what seems to be Zhaitan's corruption (might be handvawed into void thing though). For Primordus we have Braham. He can finally be turned into villain. And killed (doubt it :) ) For Jormag we have Bangar Ruinbringer. I think it would be really interesting to have his personality completely replaced by Jormag's. Kinda hammer in how hopelessly stupid his aspirations were. For deep sea dragon we have deep sea monster to explore (I like to think that Soo-Won was ashamed of her "failed" child so she was jailing them and did not want to remember about them during EoD story). The only one that I think can't be brought back is Kralk. But we have his shinier replacement in Aurene so there's that. p.s.: would be good to gather evidence and post longpost about dragons on reddit or forums but I'm too lazy now)
I loved the presentation of it all, and agree with you on almost all of your points. In super intrigued to see what they do next. Is it time for a gw2 mysteries / lore / unfinished stories deep dive to speculate what's next? On a side note: for some reason I thought Navan was Lyssa in disguise. I'm sure there was a moment in one of the dialogues she has where I thought she was talking about Balthazar. But guess I was wrong.
I haven't seen Li as a villain at all until he was revealed to be the Purist leader. From what we've seen of him until our fight he only came across to me as a guy who wants to do his job. It seems to me that Cantha was neither looking for establishing a new connection with Tyria nor had any need for it whatsoever, it's clearly in the top 2 of the most advanced known civilizations. For us to engage the openning of their borders is not some objective good and a definite sign of progress, and by the same token if a canthan citizen is not posivive about foreigners being introduced to his country it doesn't make him de facto evil.
Gonna make comments as the video goes :) In terms of length this felt the shortest, I used only my skimmer for travelling but I think it was because there was no necessity for masteries, I would just kinda keep going cuz I can't play a lot with work. With Soo-won being the creator I thought it implied soo won spawned from the void, but I also feel like if we actually saw soo won's strength instead of her just instantly getting merked by annka. I completely agree with your disconnect with the void, I feel like it's had the same issue with jormag where were presented with this smart and conscious evil antimagic but we just quickly hit it with the power of aurene so nothing really validates their strength. Aurene being completely fine with all the dragon magic and not having any issues with the craziness also makes the elder dragons seem weaker, I would've loved if we had to slap her around maybe Completely agree about the characters, you're almost always at a point where you can always tell what their thinking. Rytlock automatically telling us he was gonna sit this one out made me so annoyed, I feel like he would've been jealous of the aetherblade fight. (which unfortunately was the highlight for me) In terms of the story being too reliant on dragons and past history, I have to say what's the point in investing in a story that people know has brushed off it's core story. Maybe it's because I'm a lore nerd but I don't understand why someone would want to join an MMO that failed to deliver half of its core concept story
Really interesting and eye opening experience listening to this. The issue you have with the story's focus is the same issue I have with a series called Euphoria. However, I really liked the focus in EoD. So at the end of the discussion I think it truly is an issue of relatability to the art.
I do agree about almost everything with you. The only difference is, I guess, that I liked the soap opera thing at the end of the story, like the dragon's watch it's not only a bunch of characters going around beating down things but a group of people, spending their time together and having a meaningful connection between them. Honestly, I would have seen more of that soap jam in the past cause it helps a lot to build connections to those NPCs who are supposed to be your friends. Now I want the studios to make a short cutscene with drunk Kasmeer doing the impression of the queen. And my commander could be slightly disappointed because she didn't got invited at alcoholic nights. But yeah, about the rest I do agree 100% with you.
For your notes on content amount, WP- I am a casual player who played through End of Dragons as often as I could since launch (which has been roughly once a week) and I just finished the story this week. So personally the level of content was dang near perfect, if not almost too much, because I was able to finish it before the next release date, but I didn't have any time to run side achievements.
i think if they do more with this itll be a re-imurgence of the old gods - possibly starting with krytan gods as they fled because of the dragons and now that they are gone the gods can return to a tyria that doesnt need or potentially even respect them like they used to
part of the reason the expansions are short is because they Sonic'd themselves design wise having to take into account gliding and the various mount types. The other MMOs do not give you ground mounts that move at the speed of Sonic or allow you to fly in new zones without first clearing the new story. End of Dragons does not place a barrier on anything you have already unlocked. And by technicality if the game is your active MMORPG the living story episodes after they are finished put it at about the length and asking price of most of the competition.
Arrgghhh can't wait to comeback to this, I've only just made it to dragon's end! It's been torturous seeing all the livestreams but slowly catching up can't wait to hear your thoughts, so far so many dots are being joined together
Awesome review, I totally agree that some story beats are being rushed. In my view, the entire 'cycle is reborn' line refers to the Elder dragons being put to sleep and awaken causing chaos on the world has now ended. I do see this as an end to the OG elder dragons and Aurene being a new 'type' of dragon will most likely result to other conflict, as you mentioned something to do with the Mists and now the Void magic. I always had a sense that we'll be heading towards the mists at this pace.
Great video! I just finished EoD. I resonate with you where I felt the stories and plots are so rushed. I wished they would slow down and spend more time to explain Soo-Won, Dragon Cycle, New cycle, Void, etc I thought Void manifested itself since Seasion 3, at least that's how I view/rationalise this. Void is the raw, chaotic magic, where Soo-Won had to split them up into multiple spectrums, like light to rainbow colours, to control it. Hence, she created the elder dragons to contain and store each aspect of Void. As each elder dragon dies, the merging to each magic since Season 3 creates the progression for Void to manifest itself. We first saw this on Season 3 Rising Flame, where Zaitan, Mordremoth and Primodius magic mixed together. We saw the new creations and a glimp of Void on the island. Then we reach Season 4, where the mix of magics drove Kralkatorrik mad. I wish they drew a link from here to Void, or many they just assume we can draw our own conclusion? While writing up through this theory, I just realised that, Could Anet be playing with the word 'prism', where spliting/filtering the light into different colours (rainbow)? Could a prismatic dragon (Aurene) able to split/filter the Void into different aspect naturally? Hence Aurene is not affected by Void? Shes anti Void, hence she's the only Elder Dragon we need? No more cycle? I think Soo-Wan was just a creator of Elder Dragons to contain the Void Magic. I didn't read or get any vibe that she's the 'Mother of all creation'. Is there a section of lore i missed?
Dude, I've commented on another video that Gorrik is my favorite character, and EoD further cemented that for me. I love the way he expressed his rage, he keeps up with the entomology stuff, and his whole detective arc lol. His voice actor is so good, and I like how the voice actor looks nothing like you'd imagine he would based on Gorrik.
WP, this journey wouldn't be the same without you. We've been privileged to have essentially a dedicated community historian with someone who can offer critical narrative critique. Guild war's story has always been somewhat weak but it's redeeming to a long time fan to have your commentary.
Maybe I didn't pay enough attention, but I didn't get the impression that soo-won was a creation god. I guess it depends on how you interpret what the void is...
After you complete Dragon's End meta event (successfully) there is a corner in the map that opens where you can go to listed to aurene and soo-won talk about things. there is achievement to listed to all the conversation bits there even. In those conversations Soo-Won basically confirms that reality was all void original and it was her that decided to bring order into chaos creating this reality. (And that she "created" other EDs to help with task of managing different magics)
@@MehrumesDagon I only saw the first of those convos. She says something similar before that as well, only it wasn't clear to me at that time that she meant it literally in a "I created the world" kind of way. Not necessarily at least.
I'm not sure but I don't recall Soo-Won ever stating that she created Tyria, just tried to bring balance to magic, first on her own and then by having children to help her do it. She did say that she had been there since the beginning for sure but I'm not sure she really ever claimed to be the one who made anything aside from her own children.
Hi WP, I listened to your EoD story review while at work. I would agree with a lot of it. What I would like to delve into unpacking and speculating on is Anet's new void magic concept and how they may have sowed the seeds of it much earlier on in previous content patches and story bits. I believe they have seeded the concept of void all the way back in the Deepstone(Deldrimor Ruins) fractal and Sunqua Peak Fractal(specifically the CM fight part 2, though I don't yet have any ideas formed how that fits in with my theories yet), and possibly elsewhere that I can't think of right now or I'm likely unaware of. In this fractal i think all the black magic is actually void magic, and that it is connected to the ancient spider gods such as Arachnia. Another idea I am considering is that this fractal is actually a manifestation of echoes of events that have not yet come to pass. I base this on the Jade Maw that was added in Dragon's End. An open world event that was preceded by a fractal. Obviously its slightly different in its setting from the fractal but mechanically it is extremely similar. I suggesting that, as fractals have been used in the past to look backwards into past events, Anet is sneakily using them to allow us to possibly peak forward into possible future threads of events. In Deepstone the characters speak about a guild, in GW2 there's only 2 notable guilds at all relevant in the story; Destiny's Edge(which is done) and Dragon's Watch which is stated in the EoD epilogue in Deadend Tavern that it will continue on with us, possibly under another name since dragons will no longer be a viable focus of the guild. I'm thinking these characters are from a distant future version of Dragon's Watch. Would like to know your thoughts.
Not gonna lie, I actually hated Joon as a character. She is built up to be like that super intelligent scientist that basically more or less singlehandidly pushed forward science of an entire nation and has like all those great plans for the future. And then when we are visiting her dragon facility and it is clear that something from outside is interfereing with her control followed by Soo Won being released and the laboratory being ruined she immediatly jumps to us being the bad guy. She never once thinks about "Hey maybe that were those Aetherblades which have recently been attacking my other stuff and seem interested in my dragon". No she just immediatly wants to murder us without a slight of reason. Honestly if I had the choice I would have just not workd with here and found another Deus Ex Machina to stop the Dragon. (The amount of them just laying around in the story recently can't make it that hard to find a fitting one). And yes .. she was the only character i did not talk to in the epilouge .. i am petty like that ....
![Holy Crap I Finished The Story | Path of Fire Lore, Reactions & Initial Thoughts [ HEAVY SPOILERS]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/dxVC9j_2UaA/mqdefault.jpg)
I think their tagline about the "cycle renewing" was more about how Soo-Won was the first only dragon and now Aurene is that. There's no more extra dragons, well until Aurene decides to make some in Living World Season 22: The Search for more money.
I can't wait for Gw5. Zojja finally shows up with her brain in a Golem
The next expansion where we go to the underworld and fight demon lords sounds pretty great, and living world season 5's 6 episodes where we went far north, far west and fought the 7th elder dragon was super cool too.
I think you are spot on on this. The cycle will be reborn, when aurene explodes into the newer and more badasser dragons we fight in gw3.
GW2: Breeding Dragons 😂
I think you are exactly right. And I think it’s pretty clear from the title of the final mission, too. The world is returning to there being only one dragon filtering magic and Aurene is The Only One.
Is it a good choice? Not really. Because that means Aurene is eventually gonna have to figure out how to filter better than her predecessor or make her own children or else she really is just a super powered Glint’s Lucky Child Story Stopgap. But yes, that’s the cycle reborn we’re expected to go with there.
Tbh I didn’t trust Joon at any part of the story. I always thought she’d stab us in the back so I was surprised in the end.
THIS. I thought I was the only one who felt this. She was so suspicious to me.
@voltaicbore03 Certified woman moment
@voltaicbore03 Dude, for real that felt so weird. She was so ominous the whole time and then after the instance in her home she's like "I just wanted to prove how brilliant and independent I am." And I get it was because her sister is empress, so she feels she needs to prove herself, but it was just told so weird lol. I fully expected that she had genuinely configured a way to imprison the Deep Sea Dragon against its will in secret and that she was going to fall to her hubris somehow, but the whole Jade Tech stuff was just so unrelated to the story in the end.
I really liked the tension between Joon and Li, the one prioritising opportunity and the other security. Joon always took our side, believing in us and the good we do for Cantha. But after the reactor, she feels betrayed and is angry at us, maybe reinforced in her beliefs that she has to do everything herself and be strong.
There could have been an awesome moment between her and Li then, or a mirrored evolution where Li prioritises saving the Nation and helps us while Joon refuses to cooperate with us.
But just when it turns out he was actually right and a foreign Terrorist (Annka) unleashes all kinds of hell on the empire, it turns out he was just a fashist terrorist leader all along, so no need to deal with him being right.
That felt a bit disappointing but at the same time I kinda expected it.
@@gewreid5946 I really wanted to connect with Li and hoped the story would go in a way that we could GENUINELY see his point! Like at some point REALLY show the destruction of the aetherblades and the terrible loss it’s had on the canthan people and have people like Rama and Joon, maybe Yao say some line like: “Cantha should have stayed closed,” and go a step further to pain Li the hero for a moment of him repelling the aetherblades and fighting with us to protect Cantha. He could have been a person escorting a lane in the Seitung meta imo. I completely understand the bigot look of Li as a purist but you also have to consider the origin of that thought process as a character. At the end of the day it could be painted in a way that he genuinely believed that closed borders is best because of security then layer the purist ideology on top of that.
The one thing that bothered me is when Marjory and Gorik talk about off screen events with the speakers and brotherhood. I would have loved 2 little missions meeting the clans with respective allies before moving onto Dragons End. I also wish we got to know the Empress more, but my guess is we will get more time with her in the next Living world Story.
@Yhorm Yeah, I got serious HoT vibes from that, like when Duchess Crysanthea is suddenly there helping us defeat Mordy
I think that happens mostly in the meta, they kind of team up at the end of that where Ayumi get's them to work together.
True. I was totally confused and thought I missed a good part of the story.
@@brinkiTOgo The metas are a part of the story. Aetherblade Revolt for the end of act 1, Kaineng Blackout right before the last instance of act 2, and Gang Wars at the start of act 4 or at the end of it.
@@VarjoPira Yes, I know and I played them all. But it felt weird nontheless
Interesting to hear your views on Joon and Li. For most of the story and I did not trust Joon at all. When we visit her lab and have that tour, all I could think of was "Bond Villain" and I was convinced for some time that she would turn out to be a cardboard box baddie with little to interest me. So when she turned out NOT to be a villain, I was actually relieved and happy. I loved the bit at the end of the mission in her mansion when, we having defeated all her high tech security, she is left standing there holding a spanner, looking very vulnerable and almost pathetic. Suddenly I really liked her and knew we could, after all, trust her.
Yeah exactly. Like Li for me definitely felt as a possible villain for me but Joon felt like that even bigger villain. Like i was expecting to have to kill Joon at the end. Strange that WP got the opposite.
Exactly. With Li the point at the end about his dog was to point out that, by all means, they are a regular person. It points out that we expect evil people to be evil with nothing of redeemable qualities. A regular person who engages in evil is more terrifying because those are harder to identify and stop, its like a lot of serial killers in the U.S.
Totally with you on this. I do agree with WP about Li, who felt really straight forward as a black or white character, making him uninteresting. But Joon, for me Joon felt just like the grey character who feels more real. There are a lot of files around the maps talking about how she gives awful working conditions to her workers, and she often sounds so full of herself, that I thought she was shaping up to be a villain. But in the end she was not, and she actually means well, although having those awful characteristics about her.
I feel like all the way back in the beginning anet fumbled finishing Zhaitan, and ever since then have never been able to do elder dragons right because the precedent wasn’t there. I don’t think any elder dragon has been concluded properly except maybe Mordremoth. They have repeatedly been so eager to tie up things that aren’t finished. They’re more impatient than the community when it comes to story.
Dragons being over and them being the makers of the world I’m honestly excited about, interested in actually getting plot points that won’t result in the world or Tyria being fully destroyed.
I too would love a more grounded classic story, without world shattering consequences. This release has really moved the era forward by a ton, being in a fantasized post industrial age. I would love to return to more feudal areas, with a classic Guild Wars 1 feel.
Try to return to a story instance like Claw Island, and you'll realise how much ArenaNet has pushed the aesthetics, just by looking at the architecture
I thought the sort of unclear nature of Void works very well with the story and I interpreted it as this: Void is just the prescience of all magic, unfiltered and combined. Soo-Wan traveling through the mists or whatever, found a high concentration of Void magic, and by creating the Elder Dragons, was able to properly sort it into what became Tyria. Void fits well with the season 3 lore of dragons combining magic, and as we killed more, the Void was closer to being reformed through the Elder Dragons. Kralkattorik was essentially a damn close representation of Void because he had the most magic of any Elder Dragon in season 4. Aurene asking “why do they all go mad?” Also fits well, and (as much as I hate to say it) gives a more plausible reason for Primordus and Jormag’s battle at the end of IBS. The prismatic nature of Aurene means she can separate the types of magic without the Void re-emerging. All and all I think it’s a pretty good cop-out, but the constant use of different terms like dragon void, void, corrupted magic and other stuff like that makes it unnecessarily complicated to understand.
I'm actually glad we're done with big godly plot points,I rather have more antagonist like Joko, though maybe I'd like so see Lissa be a new antagonist. Overall the expansion was what I wanted a end to the dragons. Tyria dosent feel smaller to me it feels like we're free to go anywhere now, if anything it feels bigger now.
Lyssa definitely is on the table, there were even more hints towards her in the expansion.
yes someone that understands it. Honestly WP is absolutely wrong on that aspect. We are now more free then every to have more down to earth stories.
@@Argol228 I don't think WP "doesn't get it", he just has different preferences when it comes to the level of storytelling in rpgs.
"I'm actually glad we're done with big godly plot points"
"maybe I'd like so see Lissa be a new antagonist"
Ehm...
Yes, I am excited to see where we go next. Since path of fire I have dreaded cantha because I wanted to go somewhere completely new. Places I have always looked on the map and wanted to uncover.
WP mentioned that now we are likely to be headed to the mists since Tyria is kind of played out, but I think that would suck. I want to go someplace completely foreign in the world. Stuff that has nothing to do with any of the GW1 stuff.
The lore so far takes place in such a small section of the world they could easily throw a dart at the entire world map and make a story
From the story I didn't get Soo-Won as this creation deity, more like a being that was already there when the world was in it's infancy and she influenced it by making her children who then became an integral part of the world.
Ankka wasn't really much of an anarchist, as she was a full blown nihilist. It's not just that she despised gods and those who wanted to obtain power, it's that she knew it always ended up badly, so why even bother and why not just let the world end on it's own.
What I most dislike about the story is the retcon to make the Deep Sea Dragon, the most mysterious of dragons that we only heard very ominous snippets about, be completely benevolent and her supposed minions, the tentacled horrrors made out of water, aren't actually her minions but something she kept at bay when she was in the Unending Ocean. Remember that concept art of the giant tidal wave with gigantic hydra creatures coming onto Lion's Arch?? That's what I wanted. I hope we still get it and that the separation of the deep sea horrors and the dragon wasn't just a convenient excuse to allow for the current story, but it feels bitter to me. The mystery of DSD just didn't pay off to me.
Same. I perceived her ''creating'' Tyria more as getting rid of the rampant and uncontrolable void magic and seperating the magics of Tyria and thus creating a livable Tyria for mortals. She didn't necesarily create the world, but she made it livable for mortals and made sure magic was controlled (she failed at that though).
I also thought Tyria already existed and then Soo-wan came. And I agree with you. I loved the water horro more we got and then lost this expansion.
While I agree that them showing that Soo-Won is the be all end all “big thing” kind of sucks, and ruins a lot of mystery. I don’t necessarily think it means they have to top the elder dragons by going to the mists or inventing something bigger.
I think something that maybe points in the other direction of that is that one NPC that talks about something in the deep that the water dragon was keeping away. Maybe the dragons were keeping much more interesting and evil things at bay, and that’s where they could go next. Which in turn will bring back this mystery feeling.
Was soo-won the creator of the entire world? Going through the story, and seeing all the different diagloue options with her, it seemed like she just created the dragons, not the entire world itself, to help stabilize the magic that was otherwise maintaining the void, so while I guess because she stopped the void from just consuming whatever was created, I don't think she had direct control over all of Tyria, it formed into what it did because the void was no longer constantly consuming itself. I didn't really think any of the mystery of what the rest of the planet might be like was lost from that story, it still can hold many secrets even the dragons didn't know about
The void is where I started getting lost as well. I love it when stories don't necessarily tell me everything and I'm left filling in the blanks about some of the mysteries. It's the pleasure in speculating I s'pose.
Not worth much, but I'd have done it so that Soo-Won had been petrified by the Jade Wind and then excavated by Joon and used to power up Cantha. This would explain how we know so little about her, let alone her name. Like imagine learning that the giant pillar inside of New Kaineng is actually the water dragon petrified and hidden in plain sight. Leeched off as a battery to power up the jade tech. The void could be the result of something festering inside as a result of her magic being contained for so long and the her nefarious jade prison holding her captive and dormant. And as the jade tech grows increasingly more unstable and the void activity increasing, to have the jade pillar split open as part of the story or meta. \o/
This is what I suspected was going on with the jade tech. Soylent Green is dragons, basically ... we're using up what is left of the deep sea dragon that got petrified. I would have loved that.
The part seconds before Li betrayed us I had just gotten done thinking "he's a hardass but the world needs some hardasses like him to keep things straight" and then he just turned out to be evil all along. Pretty disappointed in that.
I don't really understand why people take such offense to void magic. We've seen, with every single dragon (besides Zhaitan), some form of corruption. Kralkatorrik's rage was a huge part of this but we constantly see meshing of minions like 'Death Branded Shatterers' that showed the meshing of magic. When you absorb a dragon's magic, and that dragon is the commanding force of a realm you aren't (ie. death magic absorbed by plant dragon), how does it not make sense to come to the idea that this magic entropy would tear the dragons apart? I think it's nitpicky.
Addendum: Looking back on the video and your argument, I'll say that I think how the dragonvoid was shown was very weird. How they personified the void, made it some sort of malicious entity as though raw magic in it of itself would want to destroy Tyria was strange. I think if Anet went with the more 'natural universe' definition of entropy, that everything tends towards disorder, it would've been a cleaner explanation. As it stands, instead of sticking with the corruption that occurs with trying to control so many different types of magic (normal entropy), they went with a malicious monster. So I'll go with the conclusion that void as a concept makes sense, how they implemented it as a malicious, new character (The Dragonvoid) was weird.
I agree that making the dragonvoid a character with a personality that we could fight made it weird in the end.
It worked so well and was super amazing as just an eerie, undefinable thing messing with reality.
Not because it is evil, or has any intent to destroy but precisely because it is magic that lacks all intent. Its chaotic, everchanging, volatile nature makes it incompatible with the order required to maintain a functioning reality.
All energy was one big soup, and apparently cognizant of itself. Kryta is carved out of its body, and it wants that back. Kryta is a cancer and the universe wants to reclaim those cells.
What you said about how good the Ankka story arc was and how the story changed after her death, only confirms again my opinion that Guild Wars 2 is at its best when it deals with "human" antagonists. Or better to say antagonists we can understand, we can reason with. And which are not godlike entities. I liked the White Mantle and Caudecus, I loved Joko and Ankka. And from all the Elder Dragons, I liked Jormag the most because she talked to us. She tried to manipulate. We were able to reason about her motives. She was not just a "natural desaster".
Considering this is a living story, one that has branched ten years, multiple writers (perhaps even writing teams), modes of delivering story, and quality/standard of story delivery, it's pretty impressive that there is satisfaction in the ending at all. Void magic being the handy catch-all for magic and dragon corruption allows them to have a bit of clarity for a conclusion, and also allows them to really tie together some of the dangling plot threads from the previous stories.
One thing I think all of this is born from is that it's a good story. End of Dragons feels short narratively in the final act because they normally do, and this is something that Anet have to work on in future, but it's also because if we could have our way as GW2 fans, I wouldn't want that quality of storytelling to end either. It's just so good having content that is consistently exciting and engaging, even if all the story beats don't resonate as satisfyingly as you'd hope.
As for the clean break itself, I think they can achieve this whilst still having lingering characters from the Dragon Cycle story. The characters can exist separately of that narrative in the same way presumably that the Commander will - moving onto new things, seeing what the world of Tyria has to offer now that the threat of the Elder Dragons is gone. Aurene still being around is a weird surprise, but I don't think her presence is implicit in her survival. From what I understand, a large part of the dragon cycle is their slumber, right? Now that the magic of Tyria has stabilized, she might enter her own hibernation, which would nix her from the story entirely.
EoD is a satisfying story (in my experience, anyways) - and it leaves me very excited for what comes next. I think as well, as with most large content releases, it just reminds you how good this game can be. It was an expansion that made me sit back at the end of it all and say "Thank god we have GW2, this game kicks ass."
While I loved the story until the Jade Sea, I think this expansion has to be followed by news of what is coming next, and soon. The player base is divisive right now, and the turtle being ungated will only heal that so much. We need a bread crumb of direction, if for no other reason, than as a distraction.
How come no one has mentioned the flower merchant in the epilogue? It was such a random character and even to have an achievement tied to it. And this woman claimed to know us through some vague way. And she just so happened to be at the dead end bar. Was this the mysterious S character? Or am I just wishful thinking they still care about that character.
Ankah got crazy because, when the aetherblades were lost in the mists, with no way out, the solution they went for was jumping through the mists and killing themselves in other dimensions repeatedly, till they got their fleet working again.
While Mai Trin wasn't able to do it, Ankkah went ahead, loosing a lot of her innocence along the way.
Most importantly, she realised how feeble the world is and by jumping through different dimensions, nothing really mattered.
That, if nothing matters, it'll be better when it happens quick.
It'll be freeing everyone from pain and suffering.
Feelings she accoumulated while stuck in the mists, forced to do the things she did.
I liked that.
What i didn't like, was the fact that they went Scarlet 2.0 on her and gave her too much powers. While the Aurene sucking beam was kinda okay, because Asura, she then went ahead with harnessing and kinda controlling Zaithan Dragon magic, implying the ability to use other dragons as well and kinda using Void Dragon Magic towards the end...
Consolidating a bit too much power, for my taste. Even with the Harbinger description, she did it grand scale.
There's curiously more to her story than just that if you read the journals and listen to the audio feed. Some time after the Aetherfleet hid all over Old Kaineng, Ankka got influenced by something. It's left unclear if it was the Void or the sinister presence inside Raisu Palace that keeps creating more Risen, but that led her down the path of using Zhaitan's magic as a harbinger and seemed to accelerate her madness and desire to end it all. Perhaps that's a plot hook that will be addressed in Season 6 once/if we get to explore Raisu Palace and the Risen nest within.
It's so hard to have to keep doing this.
When IBS ended I thought "Hey, maybe it'll at least mean EoD will benefit"
Now that EoD has ended my thoughts are "Hey, maybe it'll at least mean S6 will benefit"
But to be honest I don't believe it
This story just made me really sad if I'm being honest, because it has me questioning their writing abilities.
After IBS seeing this just felt like a disservice to the years of setup; you don't just build a story over so much time to break your legs this hard on the landing. I'm REALLY questioning the future of the game's narrative if it's anything like IBS and EoD.
Also something funny I realised: You didn't mention Yao during your review. They were one of the most marketed characters during the marketing run for the expac, yet they appear in like, 1.5 chapters total.
Such a shame, so weird
ok, about the void they VERY explicitly state that it's a combination of all the dragon magics. They even highlight that the term void is misleading because of that.
Which kinda fits in with aurene perfectly. You needed 6 elder dragons because each one was able to filter out one type of magic from the combined dragonvoid, where as aurene being the prismatic dragon can just split it easily.
THANK YOU! I'm glad someone on here actually paid attention, lol.
100% This. The void is pure magic and therefore a chaotic element, not an entropic element of the universe. It cannot follow rules of logic or structure.
Separate thought: I can't BELIEVE they didn't tease whats next in the golden path. There's hints all over the world as you say, but they really needed a "post credits stinger" sort of moment like PoF had with Kralk after you kill Balth. They've had to correct people SO MANY TIMES that this was the end of Gw2 as a game, tell people "THERES MORE COMING" in the dang story.
The same way FFXIV didnt really tease what was post Endwaler, Gw2 doesn't tease what is post EoD, these are conclusions, the next story will setup the conflicts to come.
@@RockandStoneVForKarl Sure, and I get that from a writing standpoint. But from a standpoint where multiple articles have called this the "final expansion" and the subreddit gets the question "is there going to be anything after EoD?" Every day... It would've helped public perception a lot.
@@Zyphent It's not ANets fault that you believe attention seeking Reddit Karma-Farmer. ANet multiple times, very clearly, said that the story will continue after EoD. If you don't believe them, then that's your prerogative. ANet doesn't owe you a written and signed note that there is more story to come. Need it notarized or by court order? What is this foolishness? They said it multiple times, in videos and written. What else should they do? Don't make a fool of yourself please.
@@clarissamarsfiels7961 lol, so aggressive. This isn't reddit. I believe ANet when they say it, my point is there are a great many people who ask the question still, so the message clearly hasn't broken through to the masses. Hell, I know of at least one person who did paid promotion for the game and called it the "final expansion" in their promotion. Obviously I know that's wrong, but you seem to have totally missed the point
I half-hope that Living World Season 6 starts with Ankka flying out of the mists shouting "COMMANDER, I TOLD YOU WE NEED TO RESET."
I thought the void stuff was a fairly logical place to take the story. While I would have preferred to get more with it, I really liked the eldritch-horror vibe of what we did get with it. However, I am ready to move on from world-ending threats and focus on more domestic, political, character-based stories which is where I think Anet does their best stuff, which this definitely feels like we are moving towards, so overall really positive impressions. Also, that Ankka/Mai cutscene was probably one of the biggest highlights for me, probably the single most point where I was most invested in the story as it was happening.
Agreed. I also personally disagree with people trying to claim the Void is "entropy". The dialogue and story seem to clearly indicate that it is pure magic i.e. absolute chaos. It doesn't follow the rules of logic and structure due to this and is also the source how magic is able to do such amazing things in the GW2 Universe/multiverse.
I missed the part where it was stated that Soo-Won was the mother of all creation. As I understood it she was just mother of all the current dragons. Now Aurene is the only one until there's too much magic for her to handle.
Why would they call it a cycle if these were all the dragons that ever were? I'm confused.
On Ankka; she really felt like just an edgy asura whose motivations were unclear and was there just to be a one note emo kid doing edgy evil things because she hates authorities and just wants to see the world burn. And then she just dies. The voice actress did a good job but I'm not sure if there's enough character there to really talk about.
At least Scarlet's character-arc was somewhat redeemed in the end.
It felt short to me and POF felt longer.
For some reason I had the idea in my head that there were 5 chapters like Diablo. It felt like I was on chapter 2 in my head…but then the credits were rolling. I was a bit sad.
Feeling a lot of the same thoughts WP, especially your bits about length of story. It has always felt weird to me in all of the GW2 expansions that if I really pay attention to progressing the story, the entire thing can be completely finished in about 2 - 3 days at a non-rushed pace. That feels incredibly short for the main story, especially when you compare it to other current MMO expansions or GW1 campaigns. It's all just so smushed together into these 5 acts, which sounds like a decent number, but then you look at the fact that the latter half of them only have 3ish story steps each. To me, that's what REALLY makes the expansion feel rushed rather than anything balance or bug related, but you kinda gotta give the company some slack considering the past few years of development struggles.
My other big letdown is Soo-Won as a concept in general. The deep sea dragon was set up to be SOOOO COOL from past lore. I always imagined that since each dragon had 2 spheres of influence, the DSD would be the dragon of water and fear/terror with all the talk of "horrors in the depths" pushing out the krait, quaggan, and karka. Then we get.... Mother Soo-Won, who while beautifully modeled, was NOT what they made her out to be all those years ago in the priory library. We never even actually got to see any of her personal minions (unless you count the jade maw, but who knows anymore), just a whole bunch of void corrupted minions of the other 5. As a whole, she really felt shoehorned into the plot because they wanted to wrap up both the elder dragon and "mother" storylines that they forced onto themselves and we don't get the terrifying badass gigantic deep-sea kraken that we always wanted.
The expansion is awesome overall, don't get me wrong, but it (along with the Icebrood Saga) have really taught me to temper my expectations with Anet when it comes to story. They are somehow both amazing and terrible at telling their stories at the same time.
EDIT: One final thought, I think a major reason that GW2 story suffers a lot of the time is that Anet is so scared to kill off important characters unless it's convenient for them like Eir and Zojja (not dead but may as well be?), whereas they are happy to kill off new interesting characters like Ankka waaaaay too soon. I firmly believe that, AT MINIMUM, Aurene and Taimi should have died in this expac for their own reasons. For this being the massive worldwide apocalyptic event that it was, we got such a simple light hearted happy ending and even a damn proposal immediately afterwords without any need for grieving or mourning. Felt super shallow to me.
I think void magic isn’t just a convenient fit. To my understanding void is a highly volatile combination of all types of magic that is so unstable it breaks reality. Throughout 10 years of this game this has been foreshadowed in both the story and the enemies combining sources of magic (e.g. death branded shatterer). The Dragonvoid on the other hand does feel like a convenient fit and exists just to give us something to fight in the last story mission. I would’ve much preferred them keeping void as a primal substance that corrupts and breaks reality, rather than turning it into the being that is dragonvoid.
I'd like to add to this. Remeber the one statue of Joko that gave us a post imortem message from him? He quite literally describes Soo-Won's story about the creation of the world, followed by a bunch of his lies. Anet hid this in there, ages ago!
The Dragonvoid also describes itself as being Time and Space AND it is described as Entropy. The whole thing about it is that it is everything and nothing. Which, if you have an inkling of understanding about the physics of the Big Bang and the creation of everything, you understand the Voids existence. From it, it created everything. Soo Won was not the creator of everything (I think WP mistook that), but she wanted to control the wild magic into something manageable. So she created the five Elder Dragons. But energy over time becomes dispersed, diluted, disorded, chaotic and useless. That is what entropy is.
@@LetsTakeWalk Don't get me wrong. I like the way the game describes void just like you summarized here. But to me thats the exact strength of the whole void concept; a sort of cosmic force. The dragonvoid being presented as a being with a mind, that is communicating with us, kind of ruins that idea for me. As if gravity is talking to us or something... it just feels off. The whole dragon's end meta storyline could've existed with just the concept of void. For me, the dragonvoid only makes this concept weaker and more confusing. It feels so unnecessary other than giving us something to deal with in the final story instance.
@@farshiverpig4491 I'm not sure the Void and Dragonvoid are quite the same thing. That'll have to be something Anet clarifies if they look at the Void again going forward. But personally I thought the Dragonvoid was basically just corrupted Soo-Won wielding the magic of her children, which when all combined took on a Void state, while the Void itself is just a description of the chaotic state of magic before the Elder Dragons came along.
@@dieselface1 Ah yes. I Kind of assume the void forms into 'the dragonvoid' at the end. Your take on the dragonvoid is interesting though. Personally I assumed we fought the corrupted Soo-Won in the meta, and deal with an ultimate void monster, the dragonstorm, in the story mission. At the start of the story instance you see this orb of void energy which I assume is 'the dragonvoid' which takes the shape each dragon, not just Soo-Won. This was a great spectacle and the lines the dragonvoid was speaking were cool... So I understand why they went for it... but at the same time its also weird and confusing.
Great review. I felt like there was a big arc missing from the story towards the end, where the void would have been looked into and we would have put together the army to take on the last map. Things happen so fast towards the end that it totally took me out of the story.
10:38 Best part about integrating strike missions into the story, is easing the player into the mechanics of the strike mission. The strike mission is harder than the story instance, but the player has already learned most mechanics before entering their first strike mission, which means a lot.
The Soo-Won "God of Creation" thing just bothers the heck out of me. Also that she is the mother of all other Elder Dragons is just.. why ArenaNet, why? So much mystery about where those creatures, who look all vastly different from one another and have close to zero ressemmblance to their mother Soo-Won, is basically gone. She is the highest being we know of in Tyria (except Aurene). The world just got so much smaller and I also do think that this really didn't help the "powerlevel dilemma".
This could very well be the beginning of Dragon Ball in Guild Wars 2 - especially when we think about that we have Aurene, a creature with godlike powers, at our command.
Where should this feeling of threat come from now? The Void? Maybe Demons? The other gods that left Tyria? We would need something incredibly strong OR cunning to get us to a critical level of concern right now. And I know - it doesn't always have to be a bigger and better enemy to be able to have a good story.
But what about the selling point of a future expansion? The biggest, most ICONIC story - no, THE story of Guild Wars 2 has now ended. The Dragons are no more, Tyria is free at last.
ArenaNet has to get out the big guns to create interest in another expansion - for current players and new ones alike. I highly doubt that people would pay money for an Aetherblade or Zephyrite Expansion - there has to be something BIG that makes you wanna play the game and experience the story behind it. That always works best with a big bad villain, a truly evil one at best, that we have to unite against and defeat. No space pirate, no anti-dreamer, no "I-dont-want-change-in-politics" kinda guy.
I did hope for a little bit more of nostalgia to hit me to be honest. I am sad that we don't hear those iconic soundtracks from Gw1 Factions in certain areas of the game. I know, ArenaNet parted ways with Jeremy Soule and maybe that is the reason why there aren't any old songs that are played. It still disappoints me and is quite ridiculous if you think about it: if you wan't to listen to the "Kurzick Theme" you can visit Lake Doric, an area introduced in Living World where we fight against the White Mantle. It isn't playing in Echowald Forrest though..
All in all this expansion didn't really hit it for me. I am curious what comes next.
The one thing that super bothered me at the end of the story was lack of consequence shown to the players. I was really hoping we would see some major allies die. When the void spreads across the world it suggests mass destruction and death is happening, but it's not shown to us. If lets say Logan, Ivan, Ayumi or others died it would have stuck the landing better.
I don't think that a story need major character deaths to show consequences. This said, I would have loved if we got a couple more missions in the other parts of the world at the end. I would have loved to play Rytlock at the end. Or Braham and Rox. I get why they didn't do it because at the time when shit hit's the fan, we stand basically right there at the endboss. But they could have started this void thing earlier and so it then.
I felt the same way going in to the expansion, but seeing the direction they took and what they did with the characters present, I actually started to feel like if they killed any major players it would have just been for shock value which would have cheapened the overall experience. Sure, they could have written in something reasonable, but with where they went with everything, I think the deaths we got were more than enough.
I really hope the next big story doesn’t have to do with the mists. I want them to take the temperature down and do a more grounded conflict for a bit in a new part of the world now that they’ve covered all the areas from GW1.
I just wanna stop seeing so many damn blurry spots on the world map.
There was no Zojja 2/10 😹😹😹 Now seriously, I enjoyed the story and the world very much. But as a gay man I can't help but notice the sheer amount of lgbt folks there and didn't feel like a good thing, felt very artificial. I was actually surprised Rama didn't have a husband like every second guy in Cantha...
Fantastic review WP, can't help but feel we are on the same wavelength about the major beats. EoD is the best expac to date, wish that wasn't such a low bar for them to rise above. Glad the dragon stuff is done so Anet can find inspiration for better stories. They really have moved in the right direction on nearly all fronts, but there is still a ways to go before GW2 is truly delivering on the potential it has had since launch. Distance from this game has helped give perspective. I uninstalled GW2 after IBS and only reinstalled to play EoD. That time away really helped me center my feelings and criticisms for this game. There is a lot to love about it, and plenty to dislike. Every expac I feel that ratio gets better and better. Will baby steps be enough long term? Who knows.
I really wanted to encounter the Jade Empire being completely tyrannical and we having to stage a rebellion that would travel around Cantha all 7 Samurai-like
@@FatalFist I don't know, that sounds a bit too similar to what we did in Elona.
After finishing the story it took me a while to decide if i liked it. I loved the visuals, how it was presented, enjoyed the maps, and also the fact it took a direction i wasnt expecting. But couldnt place what was wrong until you described the void. Think you nailed the identity of my personal hangups. Was somewhat... unsatisfying (for lack of a better term)
I liked the story overall. I agree it was too short. My biggest gripe was the chapter where we are trying to talk to Joon and we have to fight through her manor, where her traps and armies of jade mechs are trying to literally kill us, and then the ending is literally: "Okay, I changed my mind, lets be friends". I was like, Oh hell no... So yeah, Joon was my least favorite character, but Rama was cool, and the world was fun to explore. I agree, Aanka was a great character. Her staring at the edge of the mists and feeling that heavy nihilism triggers me but it makes for a good villain.
Imagine an alternative End of Dragons where Primordus and Jormag did not die but instead fled to Cantha, leaving a frozen and boiling trail across the sea that we were to follow.
Denied entry into Kaineng and threatened as attackers, we learn that there has been an attack on New Kaineng -- Mother. Jormag and Primordus ravage the city, racing to take her magic and wound her in some way that she flees. Since she is mother and apparently able to create new dragons, her would uncontrollably "bleeds" out new manifestations of the other elder dragons (but Soo-Won sized) that terrorize the rest of the Canthan landscapes:
With the help of Aurene, we swoop in and take on each of the dragons in Strikes 2.0:
- "Zhaitan" taking advantage of the ruins of Old Kaineng.
- "Mordremoth" winding through cathedral windows and stone roots of Echovald.
- "Kralkatorrik" storming the Shing Jea Monastery.
- Primordus/Jormag/Mother all around the Harvest Temple in Dragon's End.
As we kill them off, Sio-Won continues to bleed out and eventually die, transferring her magic to Aurene the same(?).
That doesn't make room for a lot of the other great stuff we got in EoD, but it was fun to think about how each of the other elder dragons would have appeared on the Canthan maps (or as new, Canthan versions themselves)
This expansion has been very different for me. For the past expansions, I’ve been able to play through it for hours a day; work is now a factor, so I’ve only managed to finish the story recently while exploring along the way. And I was completely blown away.
My only qualm has nothing to do with the game itself. My first main was a ranger, and Untamed has been… disappointing. I like playing through expansions using the expac specs, and I think I really struggled with some combat achievements just because of how poor it feels to play. Looking forward to playing through it again on another class!
One inconsistency I picked up on was how kralk's magic allegedly all went into Aurene, and even got purified... and yet it was as if the whole of his magic had returned to the dragonvoid
I've been waiting for this video since I finished the story on the weekend. Highly anticipated!
I absolutely love EOD! Even so, I think you really nail the issue that character stories quite often got in the way of the expansion's storytelling. I love Rytlock and Canach, Gorrik and Taimi, mostly because of how engaging they are, but I've never felt a special attachment to any of the others in our group of "friends." There are just too many of them and it's impossible to give each of them the time to make their characters shine. It doesn't help that I took a hiatus from early on in Season 1 up until the end of it, so I missed out on even meeting them in context, and when I picked back up with Season 2 I was left wondering why I was supposed to care about them. For instance, I sometimes get annoyed when Kasmeer jokingly scolds me because I don't have the emotional connection to her for that to feel good, even after journeying with her in PoF. Worse yet, I always forget Jory and Kasmeer are even a couple because from Season 2 onward their relationship is only ever mentioned in passing, and not very often at that. So I honestly grew impatient with how mushy and deep the two of them got throughout EOD, distracting from the more interesting narrative of Cantha and the DSD, and I really didn't feel the big emotional payoff I was clearly supposed to in the epilogue. It's unfortunate, since I know there are a lot in the community who love them, but because Season 1 isn't accessible and I can't actually establish the emotional connections, I'm continually left feeling like I'm missing out on something I should feel deeply about. While I was looking forward to the epilogue after the final battle, a story beat that was used really well in PoF for character focus, I felt very underwhelmed, and a little guilty that I did.
@WoodenPotatoes I’m mostly of the same mind as you with End of Dragons. I was also so excited to see Primordus get his own story. I played GW1 from launch and as a GW1 fan, I was mostly invested in Jormag, Kralkatorrik, and most importantly, Primordus, because they’re who we were hinted about. Primordus was a story 12 years in the making and they flushed him down the drain! I figured it might be redeemable for me if EoD was fantastic enough, so I saved hope for that, because throughout GW2, the two dragons I’ve been most excited for were Primordus, and…
The Deep Sea Dragon! I loved the idea of that Cthulhu, in the depths, style dragon. I patiently waited years for that story, however that’s not the direction they went with. This mother/serpent dragon/Kuunavang-was-also-a-dragon-champion route is also really cool, but it’s not what I was hoping for, so it doesn’t quite redeem Primordus treatment for me.
I was also excited to go back to the beautiful Jade Sea and get hit with tons of nostalgia, but…
The Jade Sea is hideous now imo and the only map we got in it is focused on the mega and not the lore.
Now I’m here thinking about other story beats that rubbed me the wrong way. Like Balthazar all of the sudden not caring about humanity? Which made no sense. Then is killing him to prevent him from killing Kralk, when we turned around and did that even though the status quo hadn’t really changed much the next season…
As a GW1 fan, I’m very bitter about the treatment of some of the GW1 lore. I still wish they had implemented some version of FoW, and they still could, but that seems unlikely to me.
I’m rambling at this point, sorry. Back to my original point. I am also bothered by their decisions, and I hated the end of IBS, but I do think they felt like they HAD to go the way they did. I think Jormag and Primordus were always supposed to kill each other. We saw that they were each other’s weaknesses back in season 3. This was always the plan. I also think Soo-wan was always planned to be “Mother.” That’s why we never saw her minions, because she was good. And I think what happened was, NCSoft, or some higher ups at Anet looked at the game and decided that the elder dragon story was holding them back from not just new stories and characters, but also from reaching out to new players. The game has steadily decreased in players over time, and I think with the layoffs and then having spent a decade on this story, they decide they HAD to end of now for the good of the game, and their company, and since they wanted to do it in a hurry, they didn’t change their original plan, so Jormag and Primordus killed each other without Primordus getting the time he deserved, and EoD had to kill Soo-wan so they could move on. Was this the right move…?
Personally I say no. This ostrisized the long time fans such as myself, and they don’t really appeal the game to new players very well, so I think it mostly hurt them in the long run.
I know I sound like I hate EoD and GW2 but I promise I don’t. There were so many beautiful parts to EoD, and I love Tyria so very much, in both games. But that makes all this that much more frustrating. Because it’s a year later and I’ve played EoD now, and I still feel the same way you said you felt right after Champions released. With this studio shifting their direction so much between both games and never fully delivering, what’s to make me decide to get invested in another game, should they ever do that? Sadly, I don’t trust them as a studio anymore. They don’t stick to anything long enough to fully see it through, in either game, and their dwindling player base reflects that.
Sorry for the downer comment and the novel. I loved the video and I agreed with you that EoD did many things right. It was a really enjoyable time and I’m still enjoying playing the game now.
Bit late of a comment on a year+ old review, but I'm surprised you hadn't mentioned the emptiness feel of all the end of dragons zones. I hear people constantly talk about this, how lifeless the maps feel, even though there is a ton of content to be consumed in them! Out of ALL the maps in Guild Wars 2, these are the ones I spent the longest time in and I had an absolute blast. The fact that you didn't mention it either makes me think part of the community just rushed through it and didn't stop to appreciate all the details the devs put into these maps. There really is a lot of content in each of the maps, but you have to be willing to give each map a fair chance.
They didn't say that Soo-wan created Tyria, they said she was the origin of magic there
I think Joon was a great character as well, at least I was suspecting of her being evil until the mansion instance where we find out her motivations. She does fall in a bit in the trope the genius with all the answers, similar to how Taimi was in LS3 but overall she was great I feel. Aside from her genius, I find her a very believable character. She has a family! She has history with a lot of the characters from Cantha, she seems rooted in the world in a way few characters are in Gw2.
I feel like the void as described is actually a pretty interesting idea after thinking idea. It as described represents the union of everything. how in a sense the world wants to return to a unified state. And how the more different types of magic you filter the closer you get to this idea yourself.
I too sorta liked this idea - Void is the natural state of the magic and we're wielding its component parts. There's some interesting stuff to play with here that probably won't get touched again. My only real hope is that void remains one force of many in the universe, I think its a bit doom-and-gloom to say all these past things were void - it certainly doesn't need to be the case.
On the topic of the meaning of "The cycle is reborn" here's my interpretation.
Before EoD, Tyria did not properly understand what the dragon cycle really was. We thought it was just the rise and slumber of elder dragons. Instead we discover that it is the cycle of corruption and replacement of a "Mother" i.e. Soo-Won. In this sense, "the cycle is reborn" means that the next Mother (Aurene) has taken Soo-Won's role, and in so doing completed the previous dragon cycle.
It may be that just like Soo-Won, Aurene will discover she is not truly immune to the effects of magic and may face inevitable replacement. What this means is that with the corrupting and destabilising nature of the void, Aurene is doomed to suffer the same fate as Soo-Won but that won't be in the commander's lifetime (Aurene even implies something along these lines). While we are confronted with a sense of futility over the void's eternal nature, we can still take comfort in the fact that Tyria's magical instability will no longer be a problem for the commander's Tyria. With this, the cycle is reborn.
the cycle reaborn maybe means, at the star there was only one Dargon Soo won and now tis only Aurene left too
4:42 I actually hate that mention of Zojja. I was furious, almost INSULTED when Taimi literlly says "I don't even know where Zojja is" - Because since the fall of Primordus Zojja has ZERO stakes in the story of this franchise. And ANet knows it, they just don't have the balls to let her die.
ANet didn't have her there when Balthazar tried to wake Primordus, the Nemesis of the Asuran race, in Season 3.
ANet didn't have her there against Kralkatorrik, the original Nemesis of Destiny's Edge, in Path of Fire and Season 4.
ANet didn't have her there in the clash of Jormag and Primordus in the IBS.
There is NO REASON left for her to be in this story anymore...
And NOW... *NOW* they mention her? Acknowledging her existence for the first time in almost *5 YEARS* and not even bring her in to WITNESS the fall of the last Elder Dragon.
And on top of all of that HER CLOSEST STUDENT doesn't even KNOW where she is??? I wouldn't even be mad if she said "Zojja is still in medical care" or even "Zojja passed away two months ago". But THIS was one of the WORST parts of this entire expansion.
And before anyone comes at me with the old argument about her voice talent: NO! I understood it in HoT, but if they wanted her back after *OVER 6 YEARS* they'd have recast her and be done with it. They've done it before (with the Commander no less) they can do it with Zojja.
Got to agree with your sentiment here. When I heard that line early on I was convinced Zojja was going to make an appearance in the expac.
At this point I could see her coming back as an Antagonist. As you say, there’s no other relevant story for her to come back to, unless she is the story.
We get wind of a signal tied to Zojja from a point on Tyria we’ve never been to. Plus some backstory that she went missing etc etc.
@@Aztec2250 What irks me about the whole Zojja thing is that she's neither alive nor dead at this point - she's just a name. And a character doesn't even have to be in the game to "be alive" they can make short stories and blogposts on the home page to tell us what's going on. But no. There's nothing.
Even if they bring her back they will have to give a *MASSIVE* load of exposition as to what happened in the literal YEARS that passed since we pried her from that pod. Just "I was in a coma and now I'm suddenly evil *because **_void_* " is not going to cut it.
I must say I find it funny because I thought Minister Li was going to be the reluctant ally where him and the commander put aside their differences and Joon was gonna turn out to be a power hungry villain. That scene taking the elevator up to the top of min sec I was fully expecting to see Joon there turn on us because of what happened with the water dragon.
It turned into a bit of a plot twist for me. It really is interesting how different people can see things so differently probably due to past experiences etc.
Nothing has changed man.. game was ahead of its time in 2012 but now its been stuck in 2015 for 7 years
My question whose answer maybe I missed, is where did that extractor thing come from? Seems super powerful, like where was that for the other dragons?
The conclusion is exactly the new starting point that, as you realized in the last year, was what they were aiming for. The fact that Aurene is still there and the Void "could" come maybe back doesn't change that. You maybe wanted Aurene out, I wouldn't, I would actually have been mad at the "she has gone mad so we had to kill her" route, which is a pretty stupid plot device that other games like WoW used over and over again, and at the end is just annoying to all those who actually liked that character and does nothing fundamentally interesting to the others.
Yes, they keep Aurene alive and the Void "potentially" still there, but they basically repeat it OVER AND OVER in the epilogue that now every character and the world can take a new road, that's it. It's also roughly the same thing FFXIV did with their latest expansion, for similar reasons. The parallels between the two, btw, keep growing: in many ways, while playing EoD, I honestly thought Anet was trying to learn something from FFXIV here and there...
I was surprised it made me feel...not a lot. I played since the beginning, had lots of breaks lately...but i wanted to finish the story. What really is not working for me (besides you just feel the change in writers and direction and i dont think there has been a "plan" in the long run for this) is that i dont feel connected to the other NPCs. they had their moments, but i feel like all the development has been hinted but not really explored. They dont took time for it. They are there to give me quests and tell me where to go, what to do, screw up again and again so i can fight more mobs to stretch the time i have to spend on a quest. The rest is kinda flat and just wont work for me anymore. 'Also way too less time with Soo-Won to feel anything about her passing. It felt quite interesting and good until like Mai-Trin´s End. After that it felt rushed for me and left me with a "meh" Feeling.
Another beat that didn't satisfy me was the pay off on the trailer voiced by Kasmeer with the "this is not the country we thought it was, they don't trust us" etc. It feels like we aren't really ever on shaky ground with the Empress. We meet her once and she doesn't even feel very intimidating. She just asks what you're doing, you tell her, and she's like, oh ok.
Re: the void, I think it's really important that we don't dwell on the name and, thus, what it means in other settings. This isn't emptiness, but rather primal, chaotic magic. Maybe the concept will be broadened later, but I think it's important for our perspectives on what's happened and our speculation on what's to come that we keep in mind that this is "GW void" and only that. Damn, it lights my imagination on fire, though, that a fundamental part of nature is fundamentally flawed and at odds with the rest of reality. Perhaps this is true in all realms, and worlds without Elder Dragon inevitably break. Maybe that's why the Six fled their previous home, seeking a world with magic that works. Perhaps they lingered on Tyria because they thought it safe, unaware of the Elder Dragons and their effect on the world. Oh, the possibilities!
I don't think the void is a part of reality that is fundamentally flawed, to me it felt more that in its raw from it's just uncompatible with the stability required for a coherent reality with things living in it.
For me the Void was just wild, uncontrolled magic. Change without purpose or guidance, the sum of all possibilities.
It is the energy that enables creation and magic when filtered and controlled but if left to its own devices it's just too random to enable something as complex and fragile as life.
they couldn't call it Chaos cause thats a main enemy in Final Fantasy lol
I figured it is because mesmers have chaos magic already and it's not quite as messed up.
To me, the ending honestly had a note of Finality to it that I never had with any other Guild Wars. Which worries me a bit, because it feels not only like the end of the Dragon Saga, but the end of the Guild Wars 2 stories as a whole. Everything is done, and even our companions have moved on and done their own things. Jory and Kasmeer are married, Gorrik joined Jory and Ivan in making a detective agency, Rytlock has moved on to politics, Canach is doing rich person things, Rox has a boyfriend, Braham is coping with what he did, Taimi is helping in Cantha, and even Logan has retired to a seaside vacation home. Everyone is done with adventures and moved on, and the Commander likely has hung up his cap as well. Everything's... over.
Truthfully, I would not be upset if this was actually the end of major stories for Guild Wars. Their main story is done, they've wrapped it up, and to me it feels like if they start pushing more stuff out... then they may be starting to jump the shark a bit, pushing beyond what they needed to tell. Stories have their end, and sad as it is I think Guild Wars 2's story is over.
You mention the strikes and mechanics, but wanna say, you can still alt-tab in most boss fights and your npc will eventually kill everything, in order to skip as much story as possible I just start conversations or fights, alt-tab for awhile, tab back in and boom done, is great that NPC's help. When I arrived at Kaineng city on my Skimmer as I Dumped the NPC into the water, I got to the first fight, alt tabbed, forgot about the game playing btd6, alt tabbed back and had my jade bot, quite convenient.
I really enjoyed the epilogue in the tavern. I wore my Common Clothing outfit and soaked it in a bit. I even talked to Frostbite over in the corner.
Regarding what comes next now that the dragons are out of the way... Perhaps in the next expansion they will finally introduce a new race(s), where new players can start off with a character that knows nothing about the story thus far and levels up quickly in their starting area. Something like the pandas in WoW.
It's a cycle because it started with 1 dragon (Soo-Won) and ended with 1 dragon (Aurene) and it's a cycle reborn because they're not the same fucking dragon.
What I found crushing about the end of the story is the loss of all that Soo-won knew. How many cycles have there been? What did she know about the ancient peoples of Tyria? How did the Six change things with their arrival? What did Soo-won know about the true nature of magic that they didn't, and why didn't they seek each other out? What existed before Soo-won? If magic is so fundamentally flawed that reality doesn't work without something to filter it, what even was reality before Soo-won began filtering it, and can we truly do no better than depending on filters that are alive and have emotions and agency?
Coming late to this, but I wanted to vent somewhere :) So for the past 10 years we've been killing Elder Dragons. Soo-Won, must have known, but was just chilling in Cantha, like just send us a mail or something and tell us to stop, use telepathy or whatever. Also we have an incredibly difficult time killing most of the Elder Dragons, raising armies of all sentient races across continents and fulfiling ancient prophesies, but Anka, just comes and wrecks the CREATOR OF ALL ELDER DRAGONS AND OUR UNIVERSE, with amazing ease cause she has a special little cannon.
Last part of my internet rant, for a big part of the story, while reality is on the brink of fading away and the whole world getting destroyed, us, the commander who has participated in the killing of many Elder Dragons, have turned to a goddamn errand boy for bureaucrats!
There are many many things that I liked, but this is a rant, so I only mention the stuff that annoyed me the most
Main criticism of the Voice Acting, too many of the same / similar voice in proximity of each other. I know they want to have big names, but anyone who plays games with members of the Critical Role cast for example can clearly tell when it’s one of those VA's. Kind of like back in Icebrood when you would hear Brahams voice actor then as you stroll away you immediately have a dominant dialogue from unnamed Charr that clearly has the same voice actor doing a negligibly different Voice.
My main issue with Annka was just that she was Scarlet but empty instead of Joker styled insane. She basically reminded me of Owlman from the DC comics where he is like “Oh nothing really matters so let’s just destroy all the Multiverse in one go”. Design wise I did like her though.
My major minor gripe would be the last segment when you are being encouraged by your allies and going back through previous stories. This was a perfect opportunity to let us interact with the uncorrupted minds of the Elder Dragons, an opportunity for us to hear Zhaitans voice (Poor Zhaitan will forever be trapped stuck to that Tower in Orr and I hate it), an opportunity to fill in some gaps. Did the cleansing ritual perform on Glint for example tie in? How do the Human Gods tie into what Soo-Won told us? There is still plenty to room to speculate, as for your upset with Void, you could kind of say that before with “The Mists”.
The one biggest thing I’ve got out of this expansion, we have now visited all the GW1 main civilisations now. OK we won’t move on straight away, but we can have a season now where we do clean up, we can have some slice of life. For the first time in a good while we don’t have to rush straight into a high stakes story, we can actually enjoy the calm. GW2 for the longest time has been this constant increasing pressure and while I know some people won’t want slice of life, I genuinely think the characters themselves deserve it. So, in the next season I’d like to see this happening as signs of what we are going into next get set up, or as we investigate some remaining GW mysteries that have been left as far back as GW1. I am also curious to see how they begin to distance us from Aurene given they may wish to add more races and set up for a new Campaign where the main character doesn’t HAVE to be the Commander.
I will say this WP, Aurene going crazy would be very boring to me. To me she was just having fun and chuckling at the idea of how ignorant some individuals are. As for why she can filter the magic, I'm hoping it tied to the idea that the ritual performed on Glint somehow affected her offspring. Though in all honesty I don’t see this ever getting explored.
I was surprised with Minister Li and Joon i was thinking that Joon will be that perfect looking character and at the end it will be revealed that she is a villain and we will convince Minister Li that we are on their side and he will reveal that he is good he just wasn't trusting us because he was fooled by Joon then after they showed that mai trin was revenant and had scarlet with her controlling her i thought that maybe we will see scarlet as a big bad again but NO it was just so simple i couldn't believe that they wrote it like this so somehow it was plot twist for me that these characters were not hiding anything.
What I don't get and what I'm kinda mad about, because this "we don't care about our world anymore, only about characters" destroyed GW2 for me is, that why TF they don't just move on to a Singleplayer Project, where they can live out their artistic endeavour for creating their dream characters and place them in some generic fantasy setting, which doesn't really matter. I would see the writing team would do a good job programming a dating sim. This is not said with ill intent, dating sims have their own nice community and they have the potential to become popular among these people. They would be happy creating what they want and their fanbase would be happy with the dating sims they could produce.
From an MMO POV: like you said, the characters are blunt. For some they may be interesting and quirky and this is why they like them, but also for me they're a boring and kinda annoing nuisance. I would have love to known more about the world and its Lore. The characters should just be nice details in an MMO, not their main focus point.
About the void:
When it was first introduced I also thought: Oh some super weird magic stuff or: o.k. that happens when you mix all the magic together.
But then it became sentient and talked to us? Why would it want to destroy the world?
And about Ankka: I think the mists just completly changed her. The one audio where she mentioned killing her self (anf others) over and over again in order to get the material.
Would love to see a map comparison between factions and EoD and any poi that are similar, how they have changed etc.
I dislike how they rushed the whole dragon story. They could've just "paused" dragon story and focused on different things. How? It doesn't matter, they can come up with a hundred different things.
However good or bad void is I wouldn't worry about it much going forward. Your thesis was that they are rushing through ending dragons because they are done with dragons. By association I think they are done with dragon magic too. Aurene even tells us in the epilogue that Void isn't going to be a problem for a long time. That's probably why they also info dumped us instead of dragging out the mystery because it's not one they are going to want to revisit much.
I do see a lot of players wanting to retcon "everything" into void magic but let's not blame Anet as long as they don't go there. So far it's only been deployed in limited ways. For instance, the kind of "corruption" that Void is has nothing to do with Orrian corruption, i.e. Zhaitan's influence, or what Glint was cleansed of that made her Kralkatorrik's slave. The dragons have been keeping magic pure and distinct until we started killing them; this is what introduced specifically void corruption, the vine/deathtouched destroyers and such, and the madness of LS4 Kralk, and Primordus and Jormag going to war instead of playing nice. The dragons have never been nice to mortals but that does not make them "mad" in the sense that we saw in LS3 and beyond after the dead ED's magic was intermixing.
Void is also a bit "easier" to understand through the lens of some East Asian philosophy like Daoism and Buddhism, which probably was some influence with them revealing it in Cantha. Void (or rather in these philosophies, Nothingness) is not just entropy and chaos, it is also pure potentiality (which makes your contrasts with the mists a bit weird.) Potentiality becomes actuality by taking a limited and determinite form; you have to become SOMEthing rather than EVERYthing; what is formless takes on form to become a distinct thing. It's a matter of carving a piece out of that primal everything that forms emerge. (As Daoism is happy to state, how the hollow rooms of a house is what makes a house useful, instead of a solid pile of bricks.) In this case the six elder dragons separate and deliniate void magic into distinct and pure domains, and all of Tyria slowly comes into being from that differentiation. So it is only entropy from the standpoint of creation returning to its original state, which is undifferentiated, it's everything at once, and it can once again take on limitations and order to become specific things. (Annka also stated as much; she expected creation to restart itself at some point after Tyria was engulfed in Void; don't let the Thermodynamics idea of entropy confuse this!)
I don't know that they expressed it clearly enough in EoD but as far back as LS4 Aurene has been hailed as the "prismatic" dragon, and Kralk said that is what made Aurene different. A prism takes white light, which is a mixture of all visible light, and divides it up into a spectrum. The implication is that Aurene can take mixed (including void) dragon magic and separate it into its distinct, pure components. The magic could still travel together if it does so in paralell, just as we see with a rainbow being a band of different colors. Soo-Won as the mother of dragons also has some ability to purify and therefore separate void magic (she had to in order to create the other EDs), but isn't as strong at it due to being "attuned to water" and had to create the other EDs to help her. The epilogue also suggests that Aurene needed to absorb Soo-Won's magical essence at her death in order to be able to fully see the ley-lines, and I would surmise that is also what enables her to get a better handle on void. Each dragon she's been consuming has attuning her to more of the types of magic and Soo-Won completes the pallette. It's presented super hastily but I think the logic is all there at least.
I think you have been spot in with your analysis. And thats not even getting into metas or builds, nerfs etc.. i personally feel its just two seperate teams that have done this story when the game first started all tbe way up to this point. I mean the delivery in terms of cool cinematics or that blend us into the dream state aurene was in point was really cool.. but i felt they were simply rushing it for rushing it's sake.
I am not satisfied with how End of Dragons concluded the dragon storyline, but I can sympathize with the writers being exhausted with this story arc that is over a decade old. But I AM satisfied that the dragon story arc is finally over and we can move on to different stories FINALLY.
Thanks for playing End of Dragons so I don't have to. I quit GW2 in Path of Fire.
One thing I don't understand about Soo-Won is that in the beginning, she was able to deal with all of the void energy just fine and split it into the six Elder Dragons, but at the end of the story, it's like poison to her which controls her mind. Why didn't it control her in the beginning?
She was never really able to completely deal with it all alone. Because of that she created the other five older dragons and shared her power with them for a better balance. She didn't split the void but herself in the other dragons. And now with only 1/6 of her previous powers she is no longer able to confront the void.
@@zcar6557 I'm pretty sure she laid an egg for each Elder Dragon. In the cave beneath Dragon's End she talks about how she nursed them as they were all babies. It doesn't sound much different from when Glint created Aurene.
@@Forty2de Yes, that is true. But still, she splitted her powers to the other 5
After the Jormag and Primordius incident, I legit quit the game. Was playing since GW prophecies, but yeah it was too much. I didn't even get EoD, after waiting for cantha for SO many years. Now, I don't even want to get there. And hearing that they basically threw some big lore stuff out the window got me like "Yep, I'm done with this lore" :( Especially after having experienced what I consider to be my best gaming experience in my entire life on another game. Still, I love watching your content WP, and I'm still looking forward to your adventures in Tyria. Maybe one day, maybe, I'll come back.
Hope you are doing great man, big cheers and keep up with the good content
Good to hear from you man, really!
@@WoodenPotatoes And glad to still you going big on the good content
I always hoped they would portray the Elder Dragons as essentially what happened when Tyrian evolution gave birth to a magical apex predator. So essentially dragons popped up naturally but eventually became so tapped into magic that some of them consumed so much that they became as powerful as Elder Dragons, becoming addicted and then insane (like we saw when ordinary mortals were exposed to too much magic in Bloodstone Fen). You can still slot Soo-Won and even the Void right after that (concentrating so much magic and corrupting it would have caused the Void to surface on Tyria. Soo-Won, realising the danger would then have taken similar action to what we saw in EoD). It also allows for other Elder Dragons we know nothing about to have already been killed in the ancient past (for example there is an orb in Orr that looks like the hearts of Elder Dragons we have seen in other areas of the game). And that just adds even more mystery to the world, giving it an iceberg like feel. As if so much has happened that we could never even know it all. But that means we can never stop discovering more.
In regards to Ice Brood Saga, I thought it was great up until the very last scene in the last part, the battle was epic and really climatic, but the way they did the tail end of things was just. . . there. I feel like putting a little more effort into the presentation of that part and putting a little more story into it could have saved it.
It makes me so happy that this game is getting some much deserved love again. I can't wait to check all of this out for myself, once i can get back to work irl and can afford the xpac.
One of the theories for possible future of "dragons" storyline I have is that ... dragons aren't dead. Not really. We see in the EoD's final battles that some aspects of EDs exist in void relatively independently.
There is another big clue in HoT from Trahearne where he says that Mordremoth can be reborn in him if we let him live. That is the finale, and I honestly baffled that people forget that so easily. One of the areas of Mordremoth is mind.
Guess who else was affected by Mordremoth's mindthing? Logan. But I think we can with relative confidence say that Logan is ok.
Who else? Zojja. Where is she? Who the f knows. Mord lives???
Moving on. Zhaitan. I mean... is shooting the "undead" dragon with cannons enough to reaally kill it? Always seemed iffy to me. We also have Z's minions acting in Kaineng spreading what seems to be Zhaitan's corruption (might be handvawed into void thing though).
For Primordus we have Braham. He can finally be turned into villain. And killed (doubt it :) )
For Jormag we have Bangar Ruinbringer. I think it would be really interesting to have his personality completely replaced by Jormag's. Kinda hammer in how hopelessly stupid his aspirations were.
For deep sea dragon we have deep sea monster to explore (I like to think that Soo-Won was ashamed of her "failed" child so she was jailing them and did not want to remember about them during EoD story).
The only one that I think can't be brought back is Kralk. But we have his shinier replacement in Aurene so there's that.
p.s.: would be good to gather evidence and post longpost about dragons on reddit or forums but I'm too lazy now)
I loved the presentation of it all, and agree with you on almost all of your points. In super intrigued to see what they do next. Is it time for a gw2 mysteries / lore / unfinished stories deep dive to speculate what's next?
On a side note: for some reason I thought Navan was Lyssa in disguise. I'm sure there was a moment in one of the dialogues she has where I thought she was talking about Balthazar. But guess I was wrong.
I haven't seen Li as a villain at all until he was revealed to be the Purist leader. From what we've seen of him until our fight he only came across to me as a guy who wants to do his job. It seems to me that Cantha was neither looking for establishing a new connection with Tyria nor had any need for it whatsoever, it's clearly in the top 2 of the most advanced known civilizations. For us to engage the openning of their borders is not some objective good and a definite sign of progress, and by the same token if a canthan citizen is not posivive about foreigners being introduced to his country it doesn't make him de facto evil.
I think Anet might want to copy ESO expansion concept where each expansion is its own story and they don't overlap.
Gonna make comments as the video goes :)
In terms of length this felt the shortest, I used only my skimmer for travelling but I think it was because there was no necessity for masteries, I would just kinda keep going cuz I can't play a lot with work.
With Soo-won being the creator I thought it implied soo won spawned from the void, but I also feel like if we actually saw soo won's strength instead of her just instantly getting merked by annka.
I completely agree with your disconnect with the void, I feel like it's had the same issue with jormag where were presented with this smart and conscious evil antimagic but we just quickly hit it with the power of aurene so nothing really validates their strength. Aurene being completely fine with all the dragon magic and not having any issues with the craziness also makes the elder dragons seem weaker, I would've loved if we had to slap her around maybe
Completely agree about the characters, you're almost always at a point where you can always tell what their thinking. Rytlock automatically telling us he was gonna sit this one out made me so annoyed, I feel like he would've been jealous of the aetherblade fight. (which unfortunately was the highlight for me)
In terms of the story being too reliant on dragons and past history, I have to say what's the point in investing in a story that people know has brushed off it's core story. Maybe it's because I'm a lore nerd but I don't understand why someone would want to join an MMO that failed to deliver half of its core concept story
Really interesting and eye opening experience listening to this. The issue you have with the story's focus is the same issue I have with a series called Euphoria. However, I really liked the focus in EoD. So at the end of the discussion I think it truly is an issue of relatability to the art.
I do agree about almost everything with you.
The only difference is, I guess, that I liked the soap opera thing at the end of the story, like the dragon's watch it's not only a bunch of characters going around beating down things but a group of people, spending their time together and having a meaningful connection between them.
Honestly, I would have seen more of that soap jam in the past cause it helps a lot to build connections to those NPCs who are supposed to be your friends.
Now I want the studios to make a short cutscene with drunk Kasmeer doing the impression of the queen.
And my commander could be slightly disappointed because she didn't got invited at alcoholic nights.
But yeah, about the rest I do agree 100% with you.
For your notes on content amount, WP- I am a casual player who played through End of Dragons as often as I could since launch (which has been roughly once a week) and I just finished the story this week. So personally the level of content was dang near perfect, if not almost too much, because I was able to finish it before the next release date, but I didn't have any time to run side achievements.
i think if they do more with this itll be a re-imurgence of the old gods - possibly starting with krytan gods as they fled because of the dragons and now that they are gone the gods can return to a tyria that doesnt need or potentially even respect them like they used to
part of the reason the expansions are short is because they Sonic'd themselves design wise having to take into account gliding and the various mount types. The other MMOs do not give you ground mounts that move at the speed of Sonic or allow you to fly in new zones without first clearing the new story. End of Dragons does not place a barrier on anything you have already unlocked. And by technicality if the game is your active MMORPG the living story episodes after they are finished put it at about the length and asking price of most of the competition.
Arrgghhh can't wait to comeback to this, I've only just made it to dragon's end! It's been torturous seeing all the livestreams but slowly catching up can't wait to hear your thoughts, so far so many dots are being joined together
Awesome review, I totally agree that some story beats are being rushed. In my view, the entire 'cycle is reborn' line refers to the Elder dragons being put to sleep and awaken causing chaos on the world has now ended. I do see this as an end to the OG elder dragons and Aurene being a new 'type' of dragon will most likely result to other conflict, as you mentioned something to do with the Mists and now the Void magic. I always had a sense that we'll be heading towards the mists at this pace.
Great video! I just finished EoD. I resonate with you where I felt the stories and plots are so rushed. I wished they would slow down and spend more time to explain Soo-Won, Dragon Cycle, New cycle, Void, etc
I thought Void manifested itself since Seasion 3, at least that's how I view/rationalise this.
Void is the raw, chaotic magic, where Soo-Won had to split them up into multiple spectrums, like light to rainbow colours, to control it. Hence, she created the elder dragons to contain and store each aspect of Void. As each elder dragon dies, the merging to each magic since Season 3 creates the progression for Void to manifest itself.
We first saw this on Season 3 Rising Flame, where Zaitan, Mordremoth and Primodius magic mixed together. We saw the new creations and a glimp of Void on the island. Then we reach Season 4, where the mix of magics drove Kralkatorrik mad. I wish they drew a link from here to Void, or many they just assume we can draw our own conclusion?
While writing up through this theory, I just realised that, Could Anet be playing with the word 'prism', where spliting/filtering the light into different colours (rainbow)?
Could a prismatic dragon (Aurene) able to split/filter the Void into different aspect naturally? Hence Aurene is not affected by Void? Shes anti Void, hence she's the only Elder Dragon we need? No more cycle?
I think Soo-Wan was just a creator of Elder Dragons to contain the Void Magic. I didn't read or get any vibe that she's the 'Mother of all creation'. Is there a section of lore i missed?
Dude, I've commented on another video that Gorrik is my favorite character, and EoD further cemented that for me. I love the way he expressed his rage, he keeps up with the entomology stuff, and his whole detective arc lol. His voice actor is so good, and I like how the voice actor looks nothing like you'd imagine he would based on Gorrik.
He's just so delightfully unfiltered
WP, this journey wouldn't be the same without you. We've been privileged to have essentially a dedicated community historian with someone who can offer critical narrative critique. Guild war's story has always been somewhat weak but it's redeeming to a long time fan to have your commentary.
I really like the annotations of this video. Very helpful to be able to find the different parts of it.
(jk love the content WP)
Maybe I didn't pay enough attention, but I didn't get the impression that soo-won was a creation god. I guess it depends on how you interpret what the void is...
After you complete Dragon's End meta event (successfully) there is a corner in the map that opens where you can go to listed to aurene and soo-won talk about things. there is achievement to listed to all the conversation bits there even.
In those conversations Soo-Won basically confirms that reality was all void original and it was her that decided to bring order into chaos creating this reality. (And that she "created" other EDs to help with task of managing different magics)
@@MehrumesDagon I only saw the first of those convos. She says something similar before that as well, only it wasn't clear to me at that time that she meant it literally in a "I created the world" kind of way. Not necessarily at least.
So E is funding the detective agency still. Whoever it is, they had better live in the Wizard's Tower and have a fish tank full of Largos.
It feels like I went through the whole story and all i got was a lesbian wedding =)
I'm not sure but I don't recall Soo-Won ever stating that she created Tyria, just tried to bring balance to magic, first on her own and then by having children to help her do it. She did say that she had been there since the beginning for sure but I'm not sure she really ever claimed to be the one who made anything aside from her own children.
Hi WP, I listened to your EoD story review while at work. I would agree with a lot of it.
What I would like to delve into unpacking and speculating on is Anet's new void magic concept and how they may have sowed the seeds of it much earlier on in previous content patches and story bits. I believe they have seeded the concept of void all the way back in the Deepstone(Deldrimor Ruins) fractal and Sunqua Peak Fractal(specifically the CM fight part 2, though I don't yet have any ideas formed how that fits in with my theories yet), and possibly elsewhere that I can't think of right now or I'm likely unaware of. In this fractal i think all the black magic is actually void magic, and that it is connected to the ancient spider gods such as Arachnia.
Another idea I am considering is that this fractal is actually a manifestation of echoes of events that have not yet come to pass. I base this on the Jade Maw that was added in Dragon's End. An open world event that was preceded by a fractal. Obviously its slightly different in its setting from the fractal but mechanically it is extremely similar. I suggesting that, as fractals have been used in the past to look backwards into past events, Anet is sneakily using them to allow us to possibly peak forward into possible future threads of events. In Deepstone the characters speak about a guild, in GW2 there's only 2 notable guilds at all relevant in the story; Destiny's Edge(which is done) and Dragon's Watch which is stated in the EoD epilogue in Deadend Tavern that it will continue on with us, possibly under another name since dragons will no longer be a viable focus of the guild. I'm thinking these characters are from a distant future version of Dragon's Watch.
Would like to know your thoughts.
Not gonna lie, I actually hated Joon as a character. She is built up to be like that super intelligent scientist that basically more or less singlehandidly pushed forward science of an entire nation and has like all those great plans for the future. And then when we are visiting her dragon facility and it is clear that something from outside is interfereing with her control followed by Soo Won being released and the laboratory being ruined she immediatly jumps to us being the bad guy. She never once thinks about "Hey maybe that were those Aetherblades which have recently been attacking my other stuff and seem interested in my dragon". No she just immediatly wants to murder us without a slight of reason. Honestly if I had the choice I would have just not workd with here and found another Deus Ex Machina to stop the Dragon. (The amount of them just laying around in the story recently can't make it that hard to find a fitting one). And yes .. she was the only character i did not talk to in the epilouge .. i am petty like that ....