Season 4 Teaser: Observations

I know WP is gonna make a video that will last like 40 mins or so, but I want to share with my observations.

Scarlet Briar and Lion's Arch

First time since her death we got a picture where she dies. Also there is a recap of Lion's Arch destruction.

Why now? Why not before Season 2, but right now? You can think: "just to fill the seconds", but they could have fill them with another pics.

Is there a small sign that we're going to deal with another Scarlet's things? Another Lion's Arch destruction? Is this recap preparing us for something like that? What if the spirit of Scarlet will be released? What if she is the Red Lady? Because Grenth was the one that was keeping eye on the souls and he wasn't giving any justification to leave his realm- the Commander escaped death, but what if when we killed the Eater of Souls we released her? Or what if Dhuum will break out of his prison and use Scarlet as his minion?

Why are people so mad because of Scarlet coming back? I think she was killed too fast, she could have give us more informations and she was very about to do it when Braham interrupted her. She certainly knew about the consequences of Commander's and others' acts- not meant to be bad, but the consequences were and are cataclismic. Taimi had to be introduced as somebody that is crazy about Scarlet and her inventions. and thanks this we could find out that everything has its consequences and we cannot kill whoever we want without consider.

Mordremoth, Pact Fleet destructionWe see Mordremoth that awakes, we see the Pact Fleet destruction and then Eir and Trahearne.

This showed us the problems just after Scarlet's death, the chaos that was created just after her death. The whole Pact was destroyed, Eir and Trahearne are dead.

Why did they show Eir again? I think it is a small hint that Braham will take a part in this Season, also they showed her as she dies- will Braham join her mother: I am 99% sure.

Trahearne's death was the most dramatic thing I've seen in this game. Perhaps he wasn't perfect, but he was always helpful... That's so sad to see this scene again, but well, they'd been showing this scene many times and also today. It just reminds us that everything what had happened had a painful cost.

Aurene- the Key to defeat the Dragons

I think nobody will be surprised with the fact that Aurene will play the biggest role in this Season. She is our last hope to restore the balance. And we have to find her.

Bloodstone and Balthazar

Just a small recap of Season 3' events that we were so close to destroy the whole life, but thanks Taimi and Phlunt we avoid it and we stopped Balthazar in the chimney so we were safe, but Balthazar didn't stop his campaign and so Balthazar tried to kill Kralkatorrik. He died and Kralkatorrik have grown even more powerful. And he seems to fly towards southern Elona- the Land of the Golden Sun.

Also there is a scene that shows Caudecus killing his dauther Demmi- this was meant to show the things that happens when you eat too much bloodstone. ;) I mean what greediness can do to a human. So sad Demmi died.... my favourite character of GW2... :'(

Eye of Janthir

Now I see how the Eye was scared... It's like: "What's happening to me? What the heck is going on? Why I listen to this pest?". I heard a theory that the Commander is supposed to be the Chosen, but I am not sure, anyway that's pretty awesome theory!

Then we see Rytlock and the Commander, people are running and we see a huge boss that's flying towards us. And in the background we see 2 other Branded griffons or something like that- so don't think there was Aurene.

So I hope that the next week's trailer will show us something more about all the things to come in episode 1. Can't wait!

Thanks for your attention. :)

Scarlet is in there because 80% of the video is a quick recap of past events from LS1, LS2, HoT, LS3 and PoF. Not having in her in there based on that wouldn't make any sense

The only thing we can take from the trailer that is new is people fleeing from a city under assault by Kralkatorrik minions, and most of that is implied by the purple miasma. I'm not even sure if it's Amnoon, or something farther south.

Edit: WP has released a video, and it was only 15 minutes long, so you lose that bet, too. :p

@Arden.7480 said:First time since her death we got a picture where she dies. Also there is a recap of Lion's Arch destruction.

Why now? Why not before Season 2, but right now? You can think: "just to fill the seconds", but they could have fill them with another pics.

Not quite.

Season 2 didn't get a recap teaser, Season 3's didn't show Scarlet herself but did show the aftermath of her death and it was doing the same thing as this teaser - just recapping past storylines getting to this point.

This entire teaser was just a recap of "the story so far" just like last time, with 5 seconds of the beginning of the upcoming season.

@Arden.7480 said:Why are people so mad because of Scarlet coming back? I think she was killed too fast, she could have give us more informations and she was very about to do it when Braham interrupted her. She certainly knew about the consequences of Commander's and others' acts- not meant to be bad, but the consequences were and are cataclismic. Taimi had to be introduced as somebody that is crazy about Scarlet and her inventions. and thanks this we could find out that everything has its consequences and we cannot kill whoever we want without consider.

Any "information" she could give is now irrelevant or already known. Her story is done. She was not killed too fast, she was a poor character for a full six months of releases.

@Arden.7480 said:Then we see Rytlock and the Commander, people are running and we see a huge boss that's flying towards us. And in the background we see 2 other Branded griffons or something like that- so don't think there was Aurene.

That's 100% not Aurene. Pause it, and you will see that it is a wyvern model.

This seems to be carrying off immediately after the speech, where we begin to see a storm brewing and purple lightning destroying Amnoon before it cuts to the cinematic.

It feels more like the trailer's showing all the losses that have been suffered through so far. I don't think the intent is "Hey this is all relevant to upcoming plot" so much as "Look at all the people who have died and the mayhem that's happened-- prepare for some more!"

I'll be really surprised if the city that is attacked is not Amnoon.First, if it was further south there would be Awakened around, no?Second, it has pyramids and even the floating platforms that contain the coins during Casino Blitz.Third at the moment you see Rytlock is more than clear that's the bridge you cross to reach Amnoon for the first time.It won't make any sense at all if the trailer happens further south, that's 100% Amnoon

@Konig Des Todes.2086 said:

@Arden.7480 said:First time since her death we got a picture where she dies. Also there is a recap of Lion's Arch destruction.

Why now? Why not before Season 2, but right now? You can think: "just to fill the seconds", but they could have fill them with another pics.

@Arden.7480 said:Why are people so mad because of Scarlet coming back? I think she was killed too fast, she could have give us more informations and she was very about to do it when Braham interrupted her. She certainly knew about the consequences of Commander's and others' acts- not meant to be bad, but the consequences were and are cataclismic. Taimi had to be introduced as somebody that is crazy about Scarlet and her inventions. and thanks this we could find out that everything has its consequences and we cannot kill whoever we want without consider.

@Arden.7480 said:Then we see Rytlock and the Commander, people are running and we see a huge boss that's flying towards us. And in the background we see 2 other Branded griffons or something like that- so don't think there was Aurene.

That's what I wrote, there is not Aurene, "And in the background we see 2 other Branded griffons or something like that"

When watching the recap I thought and felt more along the lines of arenanet wanting to hit every milestone and pivotal moment from all past story arcs. As such adding Scarlet made absolute sense since she was instrumental in activating Mordremoth and setting in motion the events during and after HoT.

Eir dying had a significant effect on the "party" of the commander, most notably her son Braham. It's quite clear he will be of significance (more or less) in future story episodes. It was also a significant moment overall with one of the main story characters dying. Again, absolutely deserved in a recap.

If I'd have to make a guess, I'd assume Living World Season 4 deals with Kralkatorik and how dragons as a whole might be "dealt" with (pacified, turned, put back to sleep, etc.) with a build up for the next expansion in 1.5 - 2 years. I like the direction of not having dragons as main villains for expansions. It opens up more options as far storytelling goes instead of just:"check, 1 more down, 3 to go."

Huh I messed up something. it's in Amnoon xD

@Rognik.2579 said:The only thing we can take from the trailer that is new is people fleeing from a city under assault by Kralkatorrik minions, and most of that is implied by the purple miasma. I'm not even sure if it's Amnoon, or something farther south.

Edit: WP has released a video, and it was only 15 minutes long, so you lose that bet, too. :p

The purple sky is akin to the orange sky that was often seen in the PoF personal story during Forged assaults.

The City is Amnoon. That likely means we will either see a branded attack via an instance and perhaps a new map west/south or they have found a way to phase things

what remains to know is if the recap is 1-just a filler due to lack of better material, 2-a filler to maximum avoid spoilers because the LS4 will be amazing. 3-the story will now connect all past stuff in a "grand scheme". ofc i suppose it's 1.

Ok, so let's speculate:

The list of the things to come:

1) Amnoon- the attack on the city and glorious victory over Kralkatorrik's army2) Catching up with Caithe and Luminate and talking about what we learned in Kesho also the mission of Aurene to replace Kralkatorrik(?)3) Braham and praying for that he will get normal...4) Rytlock reveals what he saw in the Mists5) The unexpected reveal of somebody in story to make the story more complex, because just chasing after Kralkatorrik and the mission of Aurene to replace the dragon would be a bit underwhelming- Lyssa or Dhuum or Palawa Joko will be revealed.6) The fact that we will finally work as the group is pretty fascinating and I'm looking forward to it, because Season 2 especially was about team working. Pretty exciting.7) More about the Shining Blade. No Anise in story was really weird, or perhaps she was watching us...

Any other ideas?

Yeah, blowing up the planet is not exactly heroic either. But I just can´t stand it that the bad guys often go out free of charge and do horrible things to people from GW1 lately, and the thought to protect elder dragons completely sickens me. Yes, Primordus looked pretty bad when Balthazar had him at the testicles with the machine, and Jormag was portrayed as a creampuff who just can go out any time by accident. Still I can´t stand them and wish them to go away out of the story.

Where did you saw teamwork in ls2 execpt for the last episode? My main impressions from ls2 are a cruel Asura, a naive Caithe and a disillusioned Canach.

@Arden.7480 said:Ok, so let's speculate:

The list of the things to come:

1) Amnoon- the attack on the city and glorious victory over Kralkatorrik's army2) Catching up with Caithe and Luminate and talking about what we learned in Kesho also the mission of Aurene to replace Kralkatorrik(?)3) Braham and praying for that he will get normal...4) Rytlock reveals what he saw in the Mists5) The unexpected reveal of somebody in story to make the story more complex, because just chasing after Kralkatorrik and the mission of Aurene to replace the dragon would be a bit underwhelming- Lyssa or Dhuum or Palawa Joko will be revealed.6) The fact that we will finally work as the group is pretty fascinating and I'm looking forward to it, because Season 2 especially was about team working. Pretty exciting.7) More about the Shining Blade. No Anise in story was really weird, or perhaps she was watching us...

Any other ideas?

1) yes, although I'd hate to see a full victory. The longer the Dragons stay around, the better as far as I am concerned2) possibly yes3) Braham is acting entirely in character for him. Anything else would not be believable for him4) Think they've covered that with Balth. Nothing else is relevant or else he'd be breaking his promise not to withold5) Form suggests yes, but Joko and Kralk are enough material for a Season6) no opinion7) Our initiation was not only one of the worst bits of story writing in the entire game, but I am happy for this to be a forgotten thread forever.

@Randulf.7614 said:

@Arden.7480 said:Ok, so let's speculate:

The list of the things to come:

1) Amnoon- the attack on the city and glorious victory over Kralkatorrik's army2) Catching up with Caithe and Luminate and talking about what we learned in Kesho also the mission of Aurene to replace Kralkatorrik(?)3) Braham and praying for that he will get normal...4) Rytlock reveals what he saw in the Mists5) The unexpected reveal of somebody in story to make the story more complex, because just chasing after Kralkatorrik and the mission of Aurene to replace the dragon would be a bit underwhelming- Lyssa or Dhuum or Palawa Joko will be revealed.6) The fact that we will finally work as the group is pretty fascinating and I'm looking forward to it, because Season 2 especially was about team working. Pretty exciting.7) More about the Shining Blade. No Anise in story was really weird, or perhaps she was watching us...

Any other ideas?

Yes, of course the city will be a bit destructed, but with Awakened and Sunspear it will be a huge victory anyway. Also Rytlock and PC seem to be calm when they see the attack. At least I really hope so. I don't know we will see Kralkatorrik in episode 1 and what we will do when we'll meet him. We don't know where he is, where Aurene is. I'm really curious how ANet handled this chapter and if there is any other thread than Aurene and Kralkatorrik, how will they put this in the 1st episode?

Well he said that the old man was looking just as another spirits in the Mists and he found out that he realized that Balthazar was this guy almost 3 years after that... So he's certainly hiding something if he told us just one thing that he met Glint and this is not the secret that you can keep for 3 years, you see?

Well if S4 will not be complex so they can also do 2 episodes or one and put everything in it. Or if there won't be any other surprising thing to come that would be weird. Anyway I hope ANet will surprise me in a good way. :)

I don't share with your opinion about that One Path Ends (some elements of this episode) was the worst episode, I found it pretty fascinating, but the voice of Livia in the trailer wasn't good... It just spoiled everything... When many of us played ep 6 we were: "heh, Livia, hi", because of this stupid hint in the trailer... And should be like: "Holy cow! Livia! OMG!" if ANet wouldn't have spoiled this voice.

Anyway I think that was really good episode, because I am really fascinated by human story in this game. Also we came back to Orr: so amazing. :)

@Arden.7480 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:

@Arden.7480 said:Ok, so let's speculate:

The list of the things to come:

1) Amnoon- the attack on the city and glorious victory over Kralkatorrik's army2) Catching up with Caithe and Luminate and talking about what we learned in Kesho also the mission of Aurene to replace Kralkatorrik(?)3) Braham and praying for that he will get normal...4) Rytlock reveals what he saw in the Mists5) The unexpected reveal of somebody in story to make the story more complex, because just chasing after Kralkatorrik and the mission of Aurene to replace the dragon would be a bit underwhelming- Lyssa or Dhuum or Palawa Joko will be revealed.6) The fact that we will finally work as the group is pretty fascinating and I'm looking forward to it, because Season 2 especially was about team working. Pretty exciting.7) More about the Shining Blade. No Anise in story was really weird, or perhaps she was watching us...

Any other ideas?

I'd list everything that was wrong about the initiation and how it could have been improved, but what is done is done sadly. We'll have to agree to differ on that one.

I'm confused about your statement on Rytlock being out for 3 years though

@Randulf.7614 said:I'm confused about your statement on Rytlock being out for 3 years though

Arden said Rytlock realized who Balthazar was 3 years after meeting him. Rytlock returned from the Mists in early 1328 AE and PoF was in late 1330 AE. Not exactly 3 years but I'm assuming Arden was counting when Rytlock was in the Mists - since late 1327 - but Rytlock met Balthazar at the end of his trip through the Mists.

However, I don't think there's really anything there either way - Rytlock was there for a few weeks/months at best given that HoT took place about half a week after Season 2 ended (Devs originally said a day after when HoT was revealed but Canach's line about the mordrem invasions further into Tyria suggests a few days even if the commander "never made it back" to Camp Resolve (despite being teleported there after Season 2...)). During those few weeks, he met Glint and was traveling and near the end he had met Balthazar.

There's probably plenty that happened to him, but nothing that is of "plot relevance" - it'd be no different than the Commander talking about fighting through Draconis Mons foes before confronting Balthazar.

Didn't realise so much time had passed, but yeah I'm assuming nothing of plot relevance too

@Konig Des Todes.2086 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:I'm confused about your statement on Rytlock being out for 3 years though

I don't think that's what Arden was getting at. I could be wrong, as always, but it sounded like the upshot is that nothing Rytlock mentioned (meeting Glint, freeing a random stranger) justifies the infuriating degree of secrecy he's been maintaining at every turn. Ergo, something else must've occurred to prompt all the 'later, cub's, which means there's more to his Mists adventure that we haven't heard yet. The argument could also be made that if it wasn't of plot relevance, it would've been against the writers' interests to tease it so heavily. (And then there was the whole bit about the Citadel classifying it all- unless Smodur is making an active attempt to suppress the dissemination of revenants, there's nothing we've heard about that he'd want to keep under wraps.)

All that said, I am wondering if that 'more' isn't just unresolved emotional turmoil regarding the whole meeting Glint bit. ANet has always had a habit of half-implementing narrative and leaving us to fill in the blanks, and what we see at Glint's Lair makes it clear that Rytlock is still affected by that defeat- it was the only moment of pseudo-character development he had this expansion, unless you count letting someone else try out his sword. Having the voice of one of the allies he lost in that battle suddenly riding in his head could easily be something he doesn't care to talk about. Alternatively, it could also be something Glint told him. That's vague enough that it could go almost any direction, but at least some of those directions might include things that Smodur is uncomfortable with.

@Torolan.5816 said:Yeah, blowing up the planet is not exactly heroic either. But I just can´t stand it that the bad guys often go out free of charge and do horrible things to people from GW1 lately, and the thought to protect elder dragons completely sickens me. Yes, Primordus looked pretty bad when Balthazar had him at the testicles with the machine, and Jormag was portrayed as a creampuff who just can go out any time by accident. Still I can´t stand them and wish them to go away out of the story.

Where did you saw teamwork in ls2 execpt for the last episode? My main impressions from ls2 are a cruel Asura, a naive Caithe and a disillusioned Canach.

The whole S2 was about teamworking...

@Aaron Ansari.1604 said:

@Konig Des Todes.2086 said:

@Randulf.7614 said:I'm confused about your statement on Rytlock being out for 3 years though

You got it. :)

" justifies the infuriating degree of secrecy he's been maintaining at every turn." Exactly!

@"Aaron Ansari.1604" said:I don't think that's what Arden was getting at. I could be wrong, as always, but it sounded like the upshot is that nothing Rytlock mentioned (meeting Glint, freeing a random stranger) justifies the infuriating degree of secrecy he's been maintaining at every turn. Ergo, something else must've occurred to prompt all the 'later, cub's, which means there's more to his Mists adventure that we haven't heard yet. The argument could also be made that if it wasn't of plot relevance, it would've been against the writers' interests to tease it so heavily. (And then there was the whole bit about the Citadel classifying it all- unless Smodur is making an active attempt to suppress the dissemination of revenants, there's nothing we've heard about that he'd want to keep under wraps.)

All that said, I am wondering if that 'more' isn't just unresolved emotional turmoil regarding the whole meeting Glint bit. ANet has always had a habit of half-implementing narrative and leaving us to fill in the blanks, and what we see at Glint's Lair makes it clear that Rytlock is still affected by that defeat- it was the only moment of pseudo-character development he had this expansion, unless you count letting someone else try out his sword. Having the voice of one of the allies he lost in that battle suddenly riding in his head could easily be something he doesn't care to talk about. Alternatively, it could also be something Glint told him. That's vague enough that it could go almost any direction, but at least some of those directions might include things that Smodur is uncomfortable with.

Honestly, I'm chalking it up to the typical "bad writing" that we've gotten with things like Caithe in HoT, the Livia reveal, or Balthazar's motivation / personality rewrite.

ArenaNet likely didn't have any clue what they wanted Rytlock to have been doing in the Mists beyond becoming a revenant and managing to find Sohothin, so they kept it secret instead. They likely made the whole "Rytlock met Balthazar" after the fact in reaction to fans wanting to know what the heck happened, given that devs had said they didn't even think of Balthazar being the main villain of S3/PoF until after HoT was written up. So at best they had the idea of "Rytlock unleashed the next plot's foe" but without finalizing who that foe is, they couldn't talk about it. By the time S3 came around they knew the foe, might have figured out Rytlock's involvement and as such wrote up the tribunal trial thing as a way to keep Rytlock from spoiling what would be the mid-PoF reveal of Rytlock being the cause of the issue.

And by the time it came to reveal that "twist" of Rytlock having met Balthazar and freed him, they had to explain his revenant powers as well... which was done in a throw-away line of apparent unimportance (plot-wise).

And in-character, this still works even if it is questionable-in-quality writing, because Rytlock has a VERY long history of not talking about himself. Why does his warband hate him? Where are his warband? How did he get Sohothin in the first place? Who is Rox to him? We still don't know any of that. Out of all members of Destiny's Edge, he's the one we know the least about in all honesty, despite the fact that he's had the most screen time (arguably we know less of Zojja, but she's also had the least amount of screen time of the five).

We're unlikely to ever visit the topic again because he shared something and that'll satiate the Commander and Rox, even if it doesn't the playerbase because while Rytlock did deny talking about it 4 times in 3 year span (twice in HoT, once in S3, once in PoF), it was the players who popularized his lack of talking.

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

Rytlock Brimstone: The citadel wanted a report on my Foefire mission and the... magic. Who am I to deny them a great tale?Commander: AND?Rytlock Brimstone: It's classified, Commander. Sorry.Commander: You've been holding out on me ever since our fight in Maguuma. This is the last time I'll take no for an answer.Rytlock Brimstone: Now I wish I had my blindfold to dab your tears.

So charr do know what's going on, and we don't? Why is it classified? Now not only Rytlock is the one that hides the truth, but possibly the whole Black Citadel.

So Glint and breaking chains of Balthazar wasn't "classified" if he told us.

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