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They did my girl wrong... [BIG SPOILERS]


Knuckle Joe.7408

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What's up with the death of Almorra... that was a disgrace. Though a secondary, supporting character, Almorra has been with us since the beginning. She was far more important than other NPCs, yet some others like useless Eir at least have one last cinematic. She founded the vigil, she survived Kral's rise FFS, and you kill her off-screen just like that. Incredibly disssapointed and TBH kinda angry. So much potential wasted.

EDIT: Just noticed I posted this in lore. My bad lsot track of the subforum I was in, if a mod feels like this should be in general disc. please move!

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TBH, Almorra's story was done. There was only downhill for this character from here the moment of Kralkatorrik's death.

  1. Any plot she got involved in with would feel like she was forced in for the sake of having a familiar side character.
  2. Any direction where she retired wouldn't make sense because she's 1) charr, and 2) Vigil. Neither likes retirement, and old gladium charr even actively go on a "Last Patrol" (or w/e they call it) where they literally walk until they find enemies to fight until death while all alone. Taking a desk job also doesn't fit her.
  3. Any direction where she dies in any form will feel like she was killed off for the sake of drama because she's just too badass to die to anything but maybe an Elder Dragon personally delivering the final blow - but in this situation, we would then have a repeat of a) Eir (forced death because we were "too far" despite that making no sense mechanically); b) Trahearne (becoming corrupted and killing them); c) Blish (we abandon them to hold off something when we didn't need to); or d) what we got.
  4. Or perhaps worse, she gets the Zojja treatment and is just never, ever, mentioned again. Despite being a prominent figure.

In all honesty, Almorra should have died during War Eternal, in a manner where her actions personally crippled Kralkatorrik allowing us to deliver that finishing blow. There was just no way it could be done well after War Eternal.

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Her death was fine. Her arc was done and a lonely death in the mountains - whilst a somewhat overused fantasy trope - fitted extremely well with the brooding atmosphere. The reactions to her were perhaps a little more muted, however that’s kinda to be expected given the interacting NPCs were norn and charr.

One of the few things I didn’t feel they got wrong in the episode

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@Konig Des Todes.2086 said:TBH, Almorra's story was done. There was only downhill for this character from here the moment of Kralkatorrik's death.

Honestly, I wonder if there was a way to end her story that didn't result in any complaining, besides something related to Kralkatorrik's final battle.

If Bangar is the one who buried her, that's at least an interesting final act between the two.

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@"Konig Des Todes.2086" said:

  1. Or perhaps worse, she gets the Zojja treatment and is just never, ever, mentioned again. Despite being a prominent figure.

Pretty much in agreement with the post made by Konig but I'm highlighting this part of the post because if we're gonna talk about characters who were done wrong in the story, Zojja would be high on that list (I'd put her at top spot but I'll admit to being super-biased, heh). There's still no definitive conclusion about her status and all we have is a bunch of second-hand information/hearsay because the PC hasn't seen her since Bitter Harvest.

Almorra at least had her story concluded in this episode.

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NGL, when I heard her at the start of EP1, I thought she was dead. Then I recalled the prologue, and how she was practically speed running through Grothmar Valley to get to vigil keep.

Moral of the day: Speedrunning RPG's isn't great for one's health. Maybe if she stuck around for the balad of SOULKEEPER, she could have avoided a bad end...

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I have no problem with her dying, it's just the way she died and the fact that it was offscreen, this felt more fitting for a novel/book death, but here you got a visual medium, and killing her offscreen just like that, despite being such an interesting character, was really dissapointing. she dedicated her life to fight elder dragons, and she should have died gloriously against an elder dragon itself, maybe Kralk like Konig said. It just feels incredibly lazy/dissapointing.

I dunno about everyone but I've been expecting Almorra to go toe to toe with an elder dragon, or at least a very powerful champion of one, and die in the process, but nah, the founder of the vigil, arguably one of, if not the best Charr fighter, killed and left to freeze in some random corner.

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Copy from another post concerning the same topic:

No one is talking about sharing memories about her, just ranting about how she died. If you really like your character, you would honor his/her memory.

I think that was a brutal death, and shows that you just won't get death according to your deeds, so it broke some stupid habit of writers that would make the whole episode just to kill a character for the sake of honorable death...

So happy they broke this trope.

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@"Arden.7480" said:Copy from another post concerning the same topic:

No one is talking about sharing memories about her, just ranting about how she died. If you really like your character, you would honor his/her memory.

I think that was a brutal death, and shows that you just won't get death according to your deeds, so it broke some stupid habit of writers that would make the whole episode just to kill a character for the sake of honorable death...

So happy they broke this trope.

By the description of her wounds, it sounded to me like the boneskinner killed her, and somebody else (Bangar?) buried her out of respect and to protect her body from the elements.

But as said, how could they end her story and make people happy? (quoting what I said from a chat I'm in).

"I'm with one guy(Konig), her story kinda finished with Kralk's death, and since she can't retire.. what else was there for her?And what ending could she get post Kralk that would make people happy?A valiant last stand like Forgal to let us escape? Staying back like Blish and dying when perhaps she didn't need to? Getting a desk job? Disappearing off-screen due to injuries and never coming back?Sadly, not every hero gets a heroic ending."

If we found her wounded, she'd get sent back to Jora's Keep (or on a flight south if they don't trust Blood Legion entirely atm) and probably sit out the rest of the episode, or a few episodes. If they showed her fighting off hordes of Svanir and falling, it'd be heroic, but would it work? If she held the line so we could escape, what are we fleeing from? And why would a single Charr hold it back long enough?

I mean hell, the two converted guildmates of Braham outright say "Your general has killed her last dragon." When asked what they did to Almorra after Jhavi tried to escape.

Not all heroes get Heroic deaths. Not everybody is surrounded by friends and family.

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such is life, Almorra of course didn't deserve it, but I know it's cliche, but life is brutal. As I said life will not grant you a warrior death because you were someone great.

This episode was so mature with Almorra's death, taking responsibility by reckless Braham, choosing something that may as well turn all bad while passing the Raven's trials, and then this weird cinematic with persuasion of Jormag.

It's all very interesting and so mature.

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I have to admit I didn't even understand how she died, who killed her and who burried her.It is implied she was killed by Sons of Svanir and burried by Bangar, but it's all up in the air.

But the biggest issue I have with this is if she has been dead "for some time" then how long was Jhavi actually in that cave? Timeline seems to be a bit off

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To be honest ...I had no idea who Almorra was. I've played every episode and expansion and I understand from discussions I've seen that she was important but...well, I just don't remember her. Maybe I'm just a very aloof pact commander and don't bother to remember the names or faces of allies and subordinates. But then again, I never asked to be pact commander. I was just a guy, trying to make his way in the world, maybe selling some Hirathi trinkets on the side. I'm no leader, no hero. I never asked to lead an army and kill dragons and gods and dead dudes who wear a lot of jewellery. I should be in a tavern somewhere getting drunk and listening to other guys telling tales of killing dragons... uh, what was I saying. Right. Sorry about Almorra. She sounds like she was a nice person. I'll avenge her or something.

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@flog.3485 said:Tin foil hat theory: what if it was Jhavi who buried almorra ?

Then she would have known. Or are you implying that Jhavi is a sleeper agent, somehow making her way up to Darkrime Delves and back south with zero visible tracks, and that Torrin and Olar were willing sacrificial pawns? Because that seems... unlikely. And stupidly convoluted - e.g., something they'd claim only if they decided to turn Jhavi into a sleeper after writing and releasing this episode.

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@"flog.3485" said:Tin foil hat theory: what if it was Jhavi who buried almorra ?

Will fall in a various "loops" of plot twists into a plot twists. first which intention? to make everyone think was Bangar did it?Also certain roles leaves some 'footprints', Jhavi doesnt seem designed to be some sort of "infiltrator".

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@Konig Des Todes.2086 said:

@flog.3485 said:Tin foil hat theory: what if it was Jhavi who buried almorra ?

Then she would have known. Or are you implying that Jhavi is a sleeper agent, somehow making her way up to Darkrime Delves and back south with zero visible tracks, and that Torrin and Olar were willing sacrificial pawns? Because that seems... unlikely. And stupidly convoluted - e.g., something they'd claim only if they decided to turn Jhavi into a sleeper after writing and releasing this episode.

Well I just wanted to say that we don’t know what almorra being dead “for quite some time” really means. And that it would be in the best interest of Jormag to have a sleeper agent close to the commanders’ circle of trust.Torrin and Olar don’t need to know everything, they are just fanatics that would be replaced by two another fanatics.

But I agree with you, it seems highly unlikely.

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@"VAHNeunzehnsechundsiebzig.3618" said:I actually liked the way Almorra died (or at least as we assume she died). Like a lot of soldiers die. Miserable and alone.

Heroic deaths make great legends. But miserable deaths are the kickers that go straight for the gut. So I liked it. Did she deserve such an end? No. And because of it it was a good end.

I'm 100% in agreement with this. What many call more "fitting" ends are from our heroic-death-expectations built on how the genre treats characters we consider significant. Death doesn't give a kitten about our tropes, and I think Almorra's passing became that much more memorable this way.

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With all due respect, I don't get you people. Why would you want a real life, soldier's, "boring" death in a fantasy story? There was so much potential to be taken with Almorra, something worth remembering, something that made you say WOW, I dunno. This "natural" soldier's death feels like an excuse to do less work. Like I said, it's just how in GoT we all had this expectation of a beloved character, the Black Fish, putting up a great fight, only to be killed offscreen.

Perhaps the death wouldn't be so bad if we didn't just show up and welp, that's it for the Vigil's founder. Maybe an eulogy with a nice cinematic (hopefully we get that in next chapter). I DUNNO, anything but just her model lazily thrown there in that random spot.

The entire history of Almorra has been fighting dragons, I was expecting her to die a glorious death fighting dragons because this is a cinematic, fantasy tale, not a history textbook.

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Tragedy's a form of pay-off in its own right, and while I don't feel they delivered on that particularly well with Almorra, I do see why they would go for it. (Especially when heroes failing to meet the expectations placed on them, and grappling with the resulting disappointment and scorn, seems like it's going to be something of a theme this season- Braham, Rytlock, even Bangar have had varying degrees of it just in the first two releases.)

And, speaking for myself? This was quite a bit more memorable than most of the heroic deaths ANet has thrown at us. The obviously off voice com, spending a whole episode trying to catch up with her and figure out what was up with it, finding out that she was dead before we even arrived and that another entity entirely had spoken through her corpse without our knowing... again, there are places where the delivery failed the concept, but what they pulled off is still going to stick with me longer than, say, what happened to Trahearne.

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