Guild Wars Lore - Dont you guys think its rich?

Dont know if the thread is misplaced, but, in retrospective of all the expansions, new quests that have been added, and everything in between, I must say, Guild Wars lore has transformed into something very... deep.
I read every quest discription, and the manuals (Oh I loved GW1 manuals, very Lore rich) and I love fantasy worlds created by games, that have rich lores (Elder Scrolls for example), and I like how most things fit together, even by knowing that AreaNet probably didnt think about most details in ahead. (I doubt they planned about Shiro and Lich being a 6th Fallen god generals).
And I love how we are suddendly getting details about most races.

Anyway, what are your opinions about it? How do you feel towards the lore? Do you like it? Could it be better? Is it very generic? Would you like to see Guild Wars lore being expanded in other ways (Books for example).

Discuss?

One of the main reasons I love Guild Wars, though I just started a few months back. The story, setting, etc is Awesome.

That's incredibly ironic, considering that the name of the game itself is a retcon (i.e. lore previously stated but changed). "Guild Wars" is an obscure event in Ascalon history. How much do you know about that, really?

There's a lot about the cultures of the Kurzicks and the Luxons in the Factions manual, but none of that was ever utilized.

If Guild Wars is "lore-rich," World of Warcraft must be a lore monarchy.

But Warcraft franchise is old. When World of Warcraft came, it was already lore-rich.

But Guild Wars, is not even 2 years old. Impressive in my opinion. (The "PvE" Guild Wars story thing, I always saw it as an excuse for the name. To me, Guild Wars name was always about the GvG side of the game ;D)

I love the GW lore, and it's amazing how much detail they put into it in such a short amount of time. I also love how in later chapters they manage to tie up loose ends and such.

I would love books for GW. Again, following in the footsteps of WarCraft (not the evil WoW, but the strategy games), books would add to the story. Perhaps books that are prequels to Prophecies are a good idea, and would shed light on Orr, the Guild Wars, and more. Books could even further bridge the gap between GW:EN and GW2 lore-wise.

I agree with Arkanius, though. A fair bit of WoW's lore was leftover from WC1-3. WoW doesn't even have a story, really. No missions or anything. It just is your standard open MMORPG with no real goal, and it slaps on the lore of its awesome predecessors (WC3 + TFT FTW!), meanwhile it personally, IMO, is inferior lore-wise to the older games. That, of course, may simply be because of Blizzard becoming rich and powerful and evil and, blah blah blah.

I have a friend who plays GW, and I was really shocked to learn he never reads quest descriptions or anything lore/story-related. Know how much I want to strangle him? A lot...

I think there's place for a lot of interesting lore, but GW hasn't taken the time (yet) to type out some of it.

Gw has a huge amount of lore, there a Huge amount ingame from the quests, missions and talking to npcs. Theres quite a large amount in the manuals also and ontop of that there is the short stories Anet made about the Travels of Cynn, Devona, Aiden and Mhenlo (including the one from the lore booklet with prophecies)

Yes I actually liked to read those stories (at Guildwars.com site and at the manual).
I would love if they would do those types of stories to expand the Lore. Yes a prequel to Prophecies in that way (Talking about THE Guild Wars) would be lovely dont you guys think?

I suspect that they did have the general story arc planned out.

ANet would have known that they needed to link the campaign bosses in some manner, so I feel a plan was made fairly early. But, there is also an "organic" feel to the story line so maybe there was a mix of planning and on-the-fly creation.

One thing that probably impacted things was the overwhelming popularity of the game's PvE. I see evidence that they had originally intended the game to be PvP centered, although this is something ANet generally steers away from addressing because some players get their bloomers all twisted up about the PvE/PvP thing.

But, game designers go where the players are, and most of the game's players were interested in PvE. The lore had to "catch up". If things had been different and PvP had been the undeniable thing attracting the majority of players, we could have very well had a "Guild versus Guild" based story line similar to Factions but earlier on and not pinned to the backside of that campaign. The Factions Campaign, in many ways appears to be a time of growing pains for the game...it was trying to go in 2 directions and possibly falling short in the attempt.

I'd like to hear about the genesis and evolution of things from the devs, it would be very interesting to me.

True. I would like to hear from them in this subject.

Personally i dont think they had the storyline planned the whole way through, although its possible they did it doesnt seem like they did. I believe Prophecies storyline was conceived totally on its own, the 2nd team who did factions simple made a new story in a new land and then someone at Anet had the bright idea of combining the story lines by the way of Abaddon and his corruptions.

The lore and the stories are great fun as long as you don't think to much about it really. I think Anet just make up the lore up as they go along, if you think about it some of the thing that happened or about to happen in the future are not making any sense at all.

Just wait til GW:EN come out, and see how mess up GW's lore will get.

Maybe GW:EoN will introduce magically powered time travel, and thus explain the strangeness of some of the events in the trilogy.

I think a lot of the Lore seems...strange because of the manner ANet had to tie it all in together. Think about it: each chapter takes place in a slightly different time period, yet we have travelers from different Campaigns getting in the mix fairly willy nilly.

Linear Mission progression can also make for some apparent inconsistencies that IMO often get in the way of the story.

This is why, from a story telling standpoint, a meta-story that can be touched upon at any point in a persistent world is best. But, an individual's actions within the story is best told via instancing.

I know what you mean Kul For me, I was thinking more about those new races that Anet is putting in the game, I mean where the hell are they come from? They just suddenly show up and want a piece of the pie? Well at least Anet didn't take Wow's route:
A suit: "Um,...I want a new race in wow, but how?"
B suit: "Oh! I know let make them crash landed in,..get this,..... a spaceship!!"
A suit: "Far out dude!, lets do lunch!"

Then again looking at the Asura, I can't be to sure.

Well, I can see how the Dwarves can receive widened roles in the story from what has already been established.

And, I concede that there's room for one or 2 more north/mountain/subterranean based races that heretofore have been virtually unknown to humans.

As for Charr, there is a lot that can be explored, I see a culture ruled by a cruel religious order, perhaps there are "free" or rebel Charr somewhere; or maybe all Charr will remain enemies and never be friendly to humans.

The true stroke of genius about GW:EoN in my mind is that ANet is going to link all 3 campaigns geographically via a large subterranean labyrinth.

This does a lot of things:

-obviously, expands content in a fairly big way from what I've read.

-doesn't spread out the player population as much, existing population centers will probably remain mostly unchanged.

-refreshens old areas and entices people to adopt campaigns that they do not own.

-perhaps, will help round out lore "rough spots"

-brings closure to the story arc that a single campaign ending couldn't do

Gwen appears to be 9-ish in pre-searing, maybe 11 tops. (She looks like a 6 year old unless you examine her face closely) Then post is two years later, let's in this case say Gwen is 10. Now she's 12 in Post. In GW:EN, she'll be, at the minimum, 19? 18?

So yeah. Either a magical time warp occurs to Gwen, or the expansion is in the future.

I CAN IMAGINE IT ALREADY!

When your character enters a GW:EN area, their skin is edited to make them look older. Men will grow beards in GW:EN areas and women's skin won't be as smooth as a baby's bottom.

GW:EN's story as cited from various sources:

Act 1: Takes place underground. You help the dwarves, erm, do stuff. Perhaps while adventuring you learn of the Great Destroyer's return.

Act 2: Takes you to the Charr homeland (Charr), far Shiverpeaks (Norn), and the Tarnished Coast (Asura) south of Maguuma. Perhaps you go to these places to rally the aid of these three races, and get them to team up with humanity.

Act 3: A-la the nightelf campaign in WC3, everybody teams up to obliterate the Great Destroyer once and for all.

So if Gwen is 12 in pre, nightfall is 3 years after ch1 & 2 and GW:EN at least will be a couple of years after NF so we're looking a 17-18 yr old Gwen. No time travel for you, Mr J Fox!

Now, now! she can't legally adventure until she is 21, or 18 with parental consent, so, see we still have a dilemma!

But, I was only half serious about the time travel thing and wasn't even thinking about Gwen as being a reason/facet of it.

I was making commentary on the relatively disjointed nature of the entire trilogy when experienced by a player that owns all 3 chapters. But, part of this is because I am used to persistent worlds in online games.

It's all the difference between being the hero/in a small band of heroes or being a foot soldier in a grand epic struggle between good and evil.

Story telling in persistent worlds tends to treat the player character as a small cog in the big machine and in instanced story telling the player character progresses to center stage of the world's struggle for survival.

Each approach has its own unique benefits and weaknesses.

And, it's why I am doubly excited about Guild Wars 2 blending the two approaches. Tailor made quests for the player hero needs instancing but real world vitality and epic backgrounds need persistent worlds. I think they can be blended and ANet has a great chance of pulling it off.

The lore will be the richer for it.

Guys! I have more info on Gwen's age!

Due to HM farming being rigged for 55 monks and SS necros only, I recently made a necro. In pre, while adventuring with Gwen, I heard her say something. I don't recall it specifically, but she said her father died when she was seven.

So, at the least, she is probably eight.

Gwen's father died as I just said, and her mom can be found in the UW (probably flattened into a quarter inch pancake). I think she ran away on her own, or maybe the Charr captured her but then some mysterious people killed them and took her in.

Maybe the Asurans took her in? The broken flute is in Ascalon, the tattered cape [formerly] in Kryta. If she travelled in that direction (the flower in Elona could be a red herring - what if she just dropped it by accident into the ocean and it washed up there or something?), she may be at the Tarnished Coast.

The underground labyrinth that links Cantha with the Shiverpeaks is not new, and was referred to by the dredge, who are supposed to have fled slavery by the stonesummit via the said underground tunnel maze.