I like how important cooperation is to the story.

I feel that ever since Path of Fire there's been an undercurrent of how important cooperation is to Tyria, how relevant it is to survival over competition and war, a belief that resonates quite powerfully with me and one that I don't really see handled well. I'm fascinated by how this is coinciding with The Dragon Prince as I love that show and much of how it is reminds me of Guild Wars 2 and vice versa, which is high praise as I'm quite smitten with it. The writing team is on point currently.

This has always been a the forefront of my mind but what made me really want to talk about it is how the relationship between Logan and Rytlock was handled in Dragonfall vis-a-vis their interactions with Gwen. That was as satisfying as it was cathartic. I've seen hate between the races expressed by the players all too often, it appears to derive from Guild Wars 1 and the inability to detach oneself from a narrative focused only on one perspective and in many cases even tied to feelings of ethno-superiority. I'm not a fan of that. I'm not. It's disquieting and it upsets me.

In fact, I'm not ashamed to admit that I'd become less fond of the human race in Guild Wars 2 because of that loud contingent and how poorly they treated charr players. Often those charr players would be clueless as to what they'd done to merit such an acidic, toxic, acerbic reaction to their choice as they might not have played the original Guild Wars in the first place. It was untenable. It's for that reason I'm glad we're seeing that met head on in Icebrood now and I really hope it's handled well enough to further dismantle this lasting, unnecessary, and unreasonable resentment.

I'd really like to see more examples of cooperation in the face of old rivalries and bigotries. I hung around the Mistwarden(?) camp in Melandru's region of Dragonfall just to hear what new dialogue might occur between Rytlock and Logan. It's honestly exciting to see that they've buried the hatchet and feel that way about one another. It shows a maturity that I wish was more commonplace.

I hope that Icebrood continues to broadcast this message of cooperation as I think it's a very important one. It's made me feel better about the humans in Guild Wars 2 despite how Guild Wars 1 players had made me feel about our species fictional representation prior. It's nice to see that veil of negativity lifted.

More of this please, ArenaNet.