LS4 -- Asurans? + Review

With respect to all the armies that came (Minus Norn "I'll never understand the Norn" - Ogden), the few Asuran researchers we see around and Taimi & Co, I have a question that seems to be a strange plot hole?

Where was the Asuran army? They have defensive Peacemakers, they have offensive squads and armies as far back as EOTN; they are the race that provides portals, and of the 5 playable races, they are the strongest magic users and the smartest. We've likely seen 3x the amount of Awakened Inquest/Normal Inquest by this point to normal Asuran fighters. Has the race effectively been villainized?

Where are my cocky little Canach conversing buddies?

Side notes--Killing off Joko with Aurene was ok, though the dialogue from the character himself wasn't always. He became less serious and a joker all too fast, especially compared to his maniacal (racist) dialogue in Nightfall against centaurs, as one comparison. Though the sinister part of his dialogue, was good, I thought.

I'd give a 10/10 on improvement of cut-scenes. Some of the more lengthy Ghost scenes, Scarab-plague scenes, were excellent and what I've been expecting for years. Keep 'em coming.

In terms of soundtracks, I noticed that there are motif's being used more often in reflective story sections, as well as to signal the end, so to speak. They blend much more effectively nowadays, an obvious comparison being the scene with Trahearne and cleansing the Orrian city to a piano instrumental of 'Fear not this night'. My only complaint to the latter scene, was that the soundtrack was dominating the sensory experience, which seems to have be echoed over at Anet.

Well, it's not just about the asurans. Except maybe for the charrs, troops from the vilain factions are far more numerous, powerful, well equipped and gifted with elite fighters than the regular armies. It's not just GW2 though. In almost any RPG you are supposed to side with a faction, you're actually going to face armies alone.

That's why i loved the Pact so much. We were the leader of an army and this army was actually there in Orr and maguma, fighting and doing significant things. That's the way it should be. But unfortunately, it began a bit messy now.

So, to answer the question: asura have an army. They have peacemakers and lots of Golem. It's just that, for gameplay reasons, all the fighters and the invincible golems you see will be Inquest. Almost any time the asuras create a powerful weapon, it turned against us (just look at P.O.X, N.O.X and R.O.X in GW1, one of the many reasons why I hate Joko). Fear not, shall we go o war against Rata Sum, you'll find it full of elite peacemakers in exo-suit, golem with weapons of mass destruction and sci-fi turrets that can shot you in a blink. But as long as they are our allies, they will stand there and be weaks. That's RPG.If Inquest were indeed more powerful than the asuran army, they would have taken control of the asuran society a long time ago. Of course, there s the theory that it is already the case in secrecy, which would explain both their power and Zojja's absence.

Side notes

I'm a bit disappointed with the soundtrack for this episode. For such an oponent as Palawa Joko, I really expected something that would stand out more.

It's not their fight. Asura don't really follow a singular leader and convincing the entire council of helping would be a thing of weeks, if not months and even then it's not guaranteed they would even do anything unless they were already involved.

The Inquest is undoubtedly huge though

@Lametoile.7394 said:

So, to answer the question: asura have an army. They have peacemakers and lots of Golem. It's just that, for gameplay reasons, all the fighters and the invincible golems you see will be Inquest. Almost any time the asuras create a powerful weapon, it turned against us (just look at P.O.X, N.O.X and R.O.X in GW1, one of the many reasons why I hate Joko). Fear not, shall we go o war against Rata Sum, you'll find it full of elite peacemakers in exo-suit, golem with weapons of mass destruction and sci-fi turrets that can shot you in a blink. But as long as they are our allies, they will stand there and be weaks. That's RPG.

The peacemakers are the defensive Asuran army. But we didn't even see them.What you mention here, more specifically, all the fighters being Inquest in conjunction with a lack of an Asuran army fighting on our side, makes them stand out as villains, which shouldn't really be the case. It's just oddly unmentioned or not discussed in any dialogue.

The armies that were present in Ep 3, were Charr, small Human force (plot device), Sylvari, Primeval Ghosts and the Commander's squad. Norn don't follow the norms which has been long established. I don't see any reason for there to be NO Asuran armies or allied golems though?

So I realize the researchers act as an army when convenient, it just is not unified / centralized.

But this creates a very convenient balance, between the "species" in Tyria, as a technologically advanced race, would be a very disproportionate force if they acted as one nation, which would create another plot hole that would ppl ask "because they do not dominate everything?";

@"ugrakarma.9416" said:So I realize the researchers act as an army when convenient, it just is not unified / centralized.

But this creates a very convenient balance, between the "species" in Tyria, as a technologically advanced race, would be a very disproportionate force if they acted as one nation, which would create another plot hole that would ppl ask "because they do not dominate everything?";

But they have dominated everything in some sense. Their culture surplanted all others in terms of travel and access and practically made Tyria what it is in GW2. In the earliest story segments, the Asura are again villainized by capturing the first Sylvari, and not one of them showing particular remorse.Seems really strange that one of their Colleges weren't involved in any of the portal dialogues, especially with Phlunt and given his suspicions of Taimi hiding information, though we can shrug this off with him being "up to no good". But also having no army/response from the Arcane Council, even with Councillor Yahk there.

Welcome to RPGs, where we might hear mentions of powerful armies from our allies, yet never see them even if our enemies are launching literal Armageddon on us.

@Animism.7530 said:The armies that were present in Ep 3, were Charr, small Human force (plot device), Sylvari, Primeval Ghosts and the Commander's squad. Norn don't follow the norms which has been long established. I don't see any reason for there to be NO Asuran armies or allied golems though?

You forget all those armies were recruited locally. There's really just not enough asura in elona for them to field any kind of army. There's a couple of priory researchers, a few friends of Gorrik and Blish who tagged along with us, Taimi, and that's about it.The only asura in Elona in any significant numbers are the inquest and the majority of the inquest in Elona have either been awakened, or fled to other secret bases.

Regarding the Peacemakers- bear in mind that they're not an army. They're police, and even in that role, asuran society as a whole considers them deplorably incompetent. Barring the scattered spellcasters who pursue magic of their own initiative, the asura are a race who've deferred the entirety of their combat capacity to golems, and even more crucially, they're a race that hasn't fought a military conflict in over two hundred years. They don't have an army, and they haven't needed one, either.

They were also the only race out of the five whose leadership didn't back the Orders before and during the Zhaitan campaign. If they didn't pay any mind to the undead menace on their doorstep, why would they be any more proactive against the one a continent away?

Other than that, though, RainyDay hit it on the nose. The only forces who were drawn from outside the Elona-Desert region were the shapers Canach conjured up from who-knows-where and a couple independent krewes of asura. The only reason we had a charr force was because there happened to be friendly charr established in Elona; that wasn't the case for norn, asura, or sylvari.

Like the norn, the asura are very individualistic and small-cluster groups. Though they, unlike norn, do accept a "central government" they do not function as a proper nation as we recognize such today.

The only asura involved with the events in Elona are Taimi and the Inquest, and very few non-Inquest will work to help out the Inquest in their projects gone awry. Joko himself barely had any threat to them, just a handful of patrols in the "invasions", and just like we see no asura, we see no charr from the High Legions (Dragon's Watch excluded). And aside from Faren, we don't even see Krytans involved, or norn beyond Braham. Because of the combination of distance plus involvement importance.

It would have been nice to have a more climactic ending with a proper Tyria versus Elona showdown, but ArenaNet doesn't consider an immortal lich that's a fan-favorite to be a big enough threat for more than 3 episodes of a LW season.

I'll believe Asura are the strongest magic users when one mind reads a dragon, until then the best Sorcerers are still firmly in the human camp.

Golems are neat though, so they got that.

@"Loesh.4697" said:I'll believe Asura are the strongest magic users when one mind reads a dragon, until then the best Sorcerers are still firmly in the human camp.

Golems are neat though, so they got that.

Not necessarily the "strongest" but they know how magic works on a fundamental level more than any of the other races, essentially dissecting it down to a science.

It's how they make all their technology.

@Eekasqueak.7850 said:

@"Loesh.4697" said:I'll believe Asura are the strongest magic users when one mind reads a dragon, until then the best Sorcerers are still firmly in the human camp.

Golems are neat though, so they got that.

That i'll agree with, where humans do a lot of the rite and ritual which much of the mystecism I always viewed Asura as mastering practical application.

@Eekasqueak.7850 said:

@"Loesh.4697" said:I'll believe Asura are the strongest magic users when one mind reads a dragon, until then the best Sorcerers are still firmly in the human camp.

Golems are neat though, so they got that.

I wouldn't say asura know more, per se. In Sea of Sorrows, a human elementalistic is explaining how to use magic to an asura (Macha), despite said asura being a well established mesmer. And Macha learns from the human.

So it's more of a different approach resulting in learning different things, rather than learning more (or the same and then some).

@Konig Des Todes.2086 said:

@Eekasqueak.7850 said:

@"Loesh.4697" said:I'll believe Asura are the strongest magic users when one mind reads a dragon, until then the best Sorcerers are still firmly in the human camp.

Golems are neat though, so they got that.

That sounds like an isolated case and them using two different kinds of magic muddies it further. There's a difference between using and understanding too.

It's like comparing a fighter pilot to the people who built the plane, one knows how to use it while the other knows how the whole thing works better.

The asura have their peacemakers, which are a defensive force to keep order in their cities and laboratories and wildlife out of these places.Were someone to declare war on Rata Sum and the high council, the asura would rely on their golems to do the heavy lifting, while they themselves do sabotage, surgical strikes, hit and run tactics, massive bombardments at range, anything that prevents the usually stronger opponent from reaching the asura.When they have to occupy a place, the occupation force will likely consist of five golems for every asura.Another issue is that each asura lost, places a toll on their society. If the asura fight, they will attempt to win as quickly as possible, in order to minimize the strain on their economy.But their preferred method of fighting is to avoid the risk and hire mercenaries. Why risk your life, or your golems, when there are Bookah, who can do the job?Rata Sum maintains good diplomatic relations with both Kryta and the Legions, so the largest powers in their vicinity are likely allied with them. Aside from those, there are pirates, mercenaries, guilds, adventurers and explorers. Any one of those can be hired to defend the asura, while they concentrate on defending their core territories in the Maguuma Jungle. The inquest is the exception to this rule, since their goal is world domination, while the rest of the asura are content with world hegemony and the adoration of all other races.

If you want armies of all races to unite against a common enemy, just play the base story against Zhaitan. Roam through Orr and find multiple fighters of all races, charr war machines, asuran golems and and and...Run the meta-events of HoT and you'll see some more of that.

However, the fact that the commander was just one tiny cog in a huge army didn't sit well with many players. I kinda share the sentiment that the writing didn't give enough credit to the player, often I felt more like an intern being introduced to specialists, instead of being a special unit myself. Still...the tiny "Dragons Watch" guild with Deus Ex Taimi to root up the next plot device doesn't sit well with me either. In my opinion the pact should have a come-back, with the commander and Dragons Watch cooperating with them.

@"tekfan.3179" said:If you want armies of all races to unite against a common enemy, just play the base story against Zhaitan. Roam through Orr and find multiple fighters of all races, charr war machines, asuran golems and and and...Run the meta-events of HoT and you'll see some more of that.

However, the fact that the commander was just one tiny cog in a huge army didn't sit well with many players. I kinda share the sentiment that the writing didn't give enough credit to the player, often I felt more like an intern being introduced to specialists, instead of being a special unit myself. Still...the tiny "Dragons Watch" guild with Deus Ex Taimi to root up the next plot device doesn't sit well with me either. In my opinion the pact should have a come-back, with the commander and Dragons Watch cooperating with them.I hope that we can work with the pact in the future, not as a direct member, but we can gather intelligence, take down special targets, take Aurene to the magical energies for cleanup, and be helpful in the defense of tyria, without getting in the way.

Pact Marshall Thackeray is a good partner to work with, so I'm pretty confident that the pact will prove itself. Their main task has likely shifted towards the defense of Tyria from dragon minions, though. They are likely needed to help out against Kralkatorrik's minions north of the Crystal desert, as the brand might still be dangerous for Ebonhawke. Still, I hope we can get Logan to speak with us through the communicator.

The only reason there was a separate human group was due to the danger of a human-targeted infection. The other groups weren't organized by race, but by place of origin.

• The pact, which includes all races.
• The Olmakhan, which is a local group directly threatened.
• The ghost army, which happens to be ex-human by location.
• The Sunspears & Gendarran group, human by location and locally threatened.
• And of course, Taimi Incorporated Patented Techology™, including Blish's portal device Gorrik's anti-scarab research, and Taimi + Scruffy 2.0.

If the battle was against Primordius instead, then we'd see the various Rata Suman factions, the pack, maybe the Inquest, maybe the Dwarves. If it were against Jormag, we'd see various Shiverpeaks factions.

It's simply an accident of the story being told in the Crystal Desert that we see any racial component at all in this fight.

@"ugrakarma.9416" said:So I realize the researchers act as an army when convenient, it just is not unified / centralized.

But this creates a very convenient balance, between the "species" in Tyria, as a technologically advanced race, would be a very disproportionate force if they acted as one nation, which would create another plot hole that would ppl ask "because they do not dominate everything?";

Asura are not aggressive, because they can't be.

They babble a lot. But their golems aren't really impressive, compared to Kryta's watchwork knights. Even less compared to charr war machines.

Even more worrisome from the asura point of view: their peacekeepers are used to police things and is utterly dependent on golems. Kryta on the other hand has used combined forces (in a sense) for ages. They don't need mechanical contraptions. Nice to have to bolster numbers, but necessary? In a pinch? No. Kryta's armies have used magic in the past. Eles to move ships and supplies, to block artillery and set the enemy on fire. Mesmers for battlefield communication, creating confusion and plain old attacks. Necromancers as hard to stop attack machines. And then they have their normal soldiers. And normal engines, from catapults to cannons.The reason why Kryta is in a bad shape in GW2 is because of treachery. Without some certain Minister's actions, neither the centaurs nor the bandits would have got into that good position.

Look at the fights in Sea of Sorrow, or Riona taking down a golem without breaking into a sweat in Ghosts of Ascalon.

So, Kryta is not to be hassled with, lets go after the charr! They are big kittens! What could go wrong? Well, apart from asura being morsel sized - everything. If a single human can take down a golem without much trouble, what do you think an angry charr would do with it? And that is before the introduction of long range artillery, siege devourers (remember asura being morsel sized? Yeah...), charr tanks, fast charr attack buggies, charr short range artillery and those blood legion maniacs. This is... not looking too well.

That leaves us with sylvari and norn. Do I really need to spell out, why it might be a bad idea to attack Norn? Who live in mountains? You know, the area most unsuitable for golems? Who are even stronger than charr? And can squish whole asuran squads under their shapely feet? Before they turn to bears and worse?

Ok, asura expansionism has to look somewhere else. Sylvari it is! With their plant based mortars they can sprout everywhere, their strangling vines, their golem immobilizing strangling vines... their... good camouflage in the jungle.. yeah.. hm.. does not look like a juicy target either.

So asura are pretty much not existant as a military power. Neither are sylvari or norn. But each faction is strong enough to fend off an asuran attack. Humans and charr are too busy to care - and why shouldn't they? Sylvari and asura live in Maguuma, where nobody else wants to live. Norn live in the Shiverpeaks - no sensible being would do that either.

See? Lots of good reasons why a) asura have to behave and b) everybody else does not see a reason to go after another factions throat. With the exception of humans and charr - and that seems to be over anyway.

@"VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.3618" said:or Riona taking down a golem without breaking into a sweat in Ghosts of Ascalon... If a single human can take down a golem without much trouble, what do you think an angry charr would do with it?

To be fair, the golem in question was a hasty improv job, misproportioned, fragile, and partially made of wood. The human equivalent would be a levied farmer who'd never faced a combat situation before, not a trained soldier in fighting trim like Riona. Other golems make a much more respectable showing of themselves- to note the other extreme, in that same book, one manages to simultaneously disperse every ghost in Ascalon City.

That said, I do agree that they make for a problematic military force. They're only as good as their programming, which is typically... less than flexible. The piloted versions get around that, but Rata Sum couldn't muster enough trained pilots to operate anything near an army's worth.

she attacked the weak spots every asuran golem has. So its construction does not matter much. Besides, just look at the golems. Slow, very few attacks, all of them easily avoided. Even if they had some amazing attacks, they would still be slow - and as such easy targets for charr/human/sylvari artillery or norn belching.

She attacked the crystals at the joints, yes, but her major blow was against a fragile pane that the average golem does not have, but that this one was stuck with directly due to the slipshod nature of its construction. Even so, that is not a feat that your average human is necessarily capable of; Dougal specifically appreciates the level of skill she displays.

As for attacks, even the average golem swings about as quickly as a human warrior using a heavy weapon, and the offense-styled ones almost all have a rapid-fire barrage attack on top of that. By the time you get up to the largest experimental Inquest models, you can add in what amount to machine guns and lasers.

Slow and plodding, I will happily grant. But then, so are charr tanks or human siege engines.

the golem was described to be designed for speed - and a golem that immobilized because of shattered joints is a golem out of combat.

And charr tanks are not necessarily slow. There is the buggy that is pretty fast for example.

Those 'rapid fire barrages' - good thing the human armies at least have eles to block those. So no luck there. And then we have the pretty fast moving clockwork watchknights.

So no, the asura are in no position to pose a threat to anyone.

I'd put golems above watch work knights, they're more reliable, easier to mass produce and more versatile with the amount of models they come in. Megalasers are Asuran too and the biggest firepower we've seen. They're not even 'slow' unless you're talking the bog standard mark 1 series. Humanity is probably the second weakest military power after Sylvari right now, there's also the fact that Asura have gates everywhere and control enough of them they could drop a battalion of siege golems on any given capital. Only the inquest cares about conquest though, most Asura only care about the pursuit of discovery.