#1 - Aug. 7, 2013, 4:31 p.m.
Magic!
So the dragons keep the magic balanced in the world according to her. Is that the true point of the dragons?
Angel McCoy Interview
#123 - Sept. 11, 2013, 7:28 p.m.
Hi, everyone. Just wanted to pass on some comments from Angel herself:
Angel McCoy, Narrative DesignerHi, everybody!
I thought I’d drop in under a flag of sincerity and respond to some of the comments I’m seeing here. You all are so passionate about both Guild Wars and GW2 lore: it does my heart good. Thanks for being so completely awesome and for putting so much of yourselves into your discussions of the lore.
To better frame my comments and because many of you aren’t familiar with me: I’ve been working on GW2 for 5 years and 9 months. Prior to my employment, I was a GW player for several years. I did some freelance at that time for ArenaNet to help write a GW atlas that never actually got published, but it meant that I spent a lot of time learning the world. My point is that I love Tyria every bit as much as you do, and I’ve dedicated almost as much time as many of you have to it.
I completely understand the outrage some of you feel, thinking that I’ve retconned things in a vacuum. I’d like to give you some peace of mind. Prior to my sending it off, the interview you read received a thumbs up from Bobby Stein, Ree Soesbee, Jeff Grubb, and Scott McGough. I do not work in a bubble, and if I’m releasing that much lore, then I’m going to do my best to ensure I’m getting it right. And it definitely feels like I’m sticking my neck out in the effort.No pressure. Hehe.
When you are working in a world that is as huge as Tyria and that has had as many lore creators as Tyria has, it can be difficult to make all the pieces fit perfectly together. And yet, we do the best we can.
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So, let me explain where some of these lore decisions came from. They and many others are based on the following needs:
1. The fact that GW2 takes place 250 years in the future after GW.
2. The added complications that come with GW2 being non-human-centric. We’re no longer telling a human story, but a multiracial story, and that means only one of five races have the “gods” as part of their world construct. The lore needs to not only make sense for all races, but actually be relevant to them.
3. We want to evolve the lore, not rewrite it, but not just recycle what was already there either. We want to reveal new layers in the onion and expose secrets that even GW players didn’t know.
————-When you think of the history of Tyria from a non-human standpoint or, broader still, from a pan-racial standpoint, you begin to realize that not everything the people of Tyria believed 250 years ago is actually the whole truth. Just like I was taught in grade school (not quite 250 years ago—hehe) that Christopher Columbus discovered America and Thanksgiving was all about the Pilgrims having turkey dinner with the Native Americans. Just like that, the people of Tyria may have had only a partial or biased view of historic events. Some Tyrian historians might have gotten it wrong. Others might have recorded things in a manner that suited their agenda. Thus, when you quote a scholar from that era, it’s not unlike quoting pre-Socratic scholars in the real world who believed the Earth was flat. At some point, a Durmand Priory scholar or an asuran researcher questioned whether these historians were right or not. Sometimes they were; sometimes they weren’t. Sometimes, they only knew part of the story. We want to give you more of the story.
There is a stream of truth that runs through all previous GW lore, and that stream is what we hope to tap. We are not going to throw away huge bundles of GW lore. Events happened. What you may find evolving, however, are the explanations for why and what exactly did happen. We will NOT handle the lore with cavalier carelessness, I promise you. On the contrary, we spend a great deal of time studying old lore so we can base our expanded lore on it.
Now, let me give you a few confirmations on some of the things you’ve been saying:
> The Seers created the first Bloodstone to set some magic aside during the last rise of the Elder Dragons. They didn’t want to see it all consumed.
> Magic existed long before the first Bloodstone. It has always been a force in the Eternal Alchemy. It was not created by the humans’ gods, no matter what priest or priestess preaches thakittenwas. How you choose to roleplay your character’s beliefs is entirely up to you.
> Humans (including Canthan humans) were brought to Tyria (from…no spoilers!). They are not native to Tyria and did not come with much magic of their own. From a human perspective and oral tradition (that can get warped over time), they say the gods were giving them magic, but the reality was that the dragons had gone back to sleep, and the gods felt it was safe to begin returning magic stored in the Bloodstone to Tyria. The gods (not only Abaddon) “unsealed” the Bloodstone and magic flowed back into the world. Humans and other sentient races of the time began using it.
> Over the course of hundreds of years, wars broke out. King Doric begged the gods to slow the flow of magic back into Tyria and the gods granted his wish by shattering the Bloodstone into pieces and limiting their use. Abaddon was annoyed by this.
For many of us players, it’s only been a couple years since Abaddon’s tantrum, but for Tyrians, it’s been much longer. The gods have been gone. Generations have lived and died. The world’s understanding and control of magic has grown and improved. The understanding of the cosmos (the Eternal Alchemy) has improved. And yet, there’s still so much the people of Tyria don’t know.
250 years ago in our real world, it was 1763. It would be another 12 years before the American Revolution even started. Compare the scientific/medical knowledge and industrial level of the time with how it is today, and you’ll see just how much progress can be made in 250 years. Of course, Tyria hasn’t advanced as quickly as we have. They don’t have cars or Internet or Post-It™ notes. But, their cultures have evolved. They have a greater understanding of how the world works. And, they have better means of communication and travel across long distances. Thus, we can now write more intricate and bigger stories for them.
I wish I could answer each of your questions and concerns, but the reality is that I need to work on the next GW2 Living World release. We’re cruising at 200mph on these releases (to quote Stephen Clarke-Willson).