Full Guild Wars 2 Icebrood Saga Story Summary & Analysis

[Music] [Applause] well well well how did we get here normally i only do pvp or world versus world content but i'm also a massive role player so i'm looking for that immersive experience that comes from the world created by a combination of all game modes that includes a story content which may only represent a small portion of my play time then i might as well go over it to help others understand what makes a good story so this is going to be a full guild wars 2 ice boot saga story analysis and review lots of people have been criticizing the iceberg saga without experiencing the whole thing as it was intended and of course there are some valid concerns in how you experience a story rather than the hindsight of the entire design so i wanted to go back and replay the story episodes of the iceberg saga to see what it is actually like as a whole and give a realistic review of their experience not just their design also it's important to remember that episodic versus expansion content design is a huge trade-off here experiencing this entire saga over a year of time isn't really conducive to understanding a coherent story i get that and it's one of the main problems with the living world or episodic structure however i will be doing my review based on the final release product as a whole that i replay once again obviously that is going to make my review a little bit more favorable than if i had just played the last episode and decided to remember what happened a year ago but i think that this is the best way to do it because someone coming to the game fresh can experience the chronological story at their own pace i will be reviewing each episode mostly based on the story not so much the replayability or rewards but what kind of message it sends how it is presented the art and the usage of the medium as a video game in other words how they use the gameplay to tell the story because that becomes part of the presentation method if it wasn't already clear by now this is going to be completely spoiler filled so if you care about that thing this is your only warning so let's get to the real content by starting out with the title you read a book you start with the title the ice brood saga at first it looks pretty straight forward identifying the enemies you'll be facing in the story but also identifies the main characters of the story the ice brood are obviously the servants of jormag but brood also means offspring so an ice brewed could be a child with a cold or neglected relationship with its parents which is going to be a major theme of the story as we learn early on in the prologue episode so there's a blurring of lines here between allies and enemies also brood can mean to have recurring thoughts about something upsetting you can have a regret that you brood over and regrets and doubts are going to be a major theme in this saga so pay attention to that and let's get into the scenes the prologue episode takes place in grothmar valley it is bound by blood and the story starts with an invitation to a celebration of crowd kotori's defeat because this happens technically right after season four of the living world and that means that we've killed kralkatorek irene has accepted all of his energies and whatever that means so we go to this party and the char legions are celebrating crowley taurek's defeat in grothmar valley and after realizing many other high-profile characters who were invited such as bram erison ritlock brimstone it becomes clear that this is more politics than party immediately there is an awkwardness between precious stoneglow one of the blood legion officers and ritlock brimstone especially when talking about ryland's ryland steelcatcher which we learn is because they are his parents however the average player may not at this time know how the char family works essentially as achar you are born and then you're taken away from your parents and raised by one of the legions blood ash or iron and your family becomes your war band not your parents and over the course of the story you'll hear the conflict that this creates between characters just by the words they use to describe relationships these differences in cultures and the values of their cultures comes off just by words and often characters will give off a certain tone by which word they use for example traditionally char would call their offspring cubs and their mother a damn and their father a sire this is merely for identification purposes as there's really no obligation to that relationship you'll see the conflict this creates throughout when the characters correct each other by saying no it's not your son it's your cup to remind them of traditional char values and to focus on the good of the legions not of their offspring so over the voice comms during the episode you hear bram and rylan having drinks and getting to know each other and there's a clear distinction between the norn and char made here with how they talk about their family char are detached from their families and their names depend on the warband for example ryland steelcatcher and ritlock brimstone no one would really know they're related by their names norn on the other hand have family names such as airson or george's daughter that make their relationships and values very clear but the char have more of a sense of community than the norn rylan later hears about bram's former guild and bram says he doesn't know about them anymore the norn may have more of a tie to their family but they tend to be loners out in the shiverpeaks staying in small groups holbrak is the one place where some loose form of community can be found so you can tell that the identity theme is going to be played with in terms of trade-offs of valuing one over the other it is definitely a good start here because it shows that the story has a moral to it even as humans we differ culturally on the spectrum with some valuing family more than others and others valuing professional success it has potential for some meaningful discussion but the execution isn't amazing while the dialogue itself between ryland and bram feels natural and not like it's forcing the racial lore down your throat it is done through the voice comms which many players will miss because it's all happening when you're doing miscellaneous events and tasks i think i've had like 12 so far sometimes you can trigger multiple dialogues at once or you may be in combat and you can't hear or focus on the dialogue that's happening if there could be a way to get this dialogue more focused while also maintaining that feeling of being at a celebration where everyone is doing their own thing it'd be better but that may limit the pacing so early in the plot which is also important the most important thing in the story is the conflict so getting that out faster than laying out the lore may take precedence so the actual conflict comes from the character bangar ruinbringer the blood legion imperator who at first seems good by reuniting the big four char legions by accepting the flame legion back into their company you'll hear some female flame legion char can be heard talking about how they joined the military the flame legion previously forbid their women from it it's definitely an interesting parallel and generally i'm turned off by dialogue that is too overtly preachy in its progressive ideologies but i think that in this instance it's well done because which characters hold which ideologies is much more meaningful than just a disembodied voice because the people of tyria believe that bangar is benevolent in his progressive motions but really he has sinister intentions of manipulating his legions it takes a more nuanced stance on the extent which we should give power to people claiming benevolence anyways this political stunt is just a ploy for vanguard to gather as many charred together to try to convert them with his propaganda to be part of his renegade char army it turns out that he does not believe in a symbiotic society but rather he has an old hatred for the other races that you can feel when he asserts the superiority of the char and reminds us that years ago the char used to be hunted by humans for their horns and hides he was after all one of the imperators who opposed the ebonhock treaty while he is stuck in his old ways and disregards new information that might convince him to be more accepting he isn't put in the best situation to do so and i like how vanguard is not portrayed as purely evil but rather as misinformed because it helps to make more meaningful conflicts later on he knows irene was used by the pact to battle kralketorek and is afraid of the other races using arena as a weapon to gain power over the char irene shows up before and during the ceremony purifying all of the branded areas into her more light crystallized form even though irene's crystals look much less threatening than the harsh branded crystals vanguard interprets it as a threat rather than a cleansing of the land because irene is the scion of glint who was the scion of crocotoric there's a good reason to doubt the intentions of irene and whether she is on their side or could eventually become corrupted and go mad just like krakatorik if you've played guild wars 1 eye of the north you may remember the huge bone structure south of dumor shrine that was crocotoric after he rose he left a massive valley which you can explore in guild wars 2 grothmar valley called the crowlketorex emergence zone but irene has already been here by the time we arrive and instead of it being branded it's all been glazed over by irene's more pretty feminine crystals it represents a replacement of crowd katoric rather than his departure as one threat leaves another one emerges since irene absorbed all of his magic she has become much stronger and at any point could potentially become corrupted by it there is that idea that power corrupts and even if you go in with good intentions once you get that taste of power you become corrupted so banggar uses propaganda and bullying to build his army and many char are willing to join him because they love to fight it is not only their instinct to kill but their entire society is built around it like the ancient spartans they are taken from their families to join the military and learn to obey orders even when they wish to rise in ranks killing the current holder of the position you want is a legitimate protocol go ahead be imperative all you gotta do is rip out my throat don't want it don't want anything from you rylan the young and talented but impressionable char from the blood legion joins vanguard's renegades looking to prove himself he gets bram drunk and over the comms we hear bram gets beaten up in a drunken brawl and when he wakes up in his jail cell his mother's bow is missing the one that was supposed to be able to slay jormag so now bangar has the bow intended to slay jormag and he heads into the shipper peaks with his renegades in order to tame jormack to use as their own elder dragon we spy on him during their secret meeting but we aren't able to stop rylan because of the storm and the bridge being blown but there is an important choice made here ritlock wants to chase after ryland but crusher stops him because the ice construct could come down from the mountains and hurt the cubs behind us hella mental that's that's an ice controller who cares we gotta go after ryland and bangor gridlock if that thing gets down to the keep and the barrage krisha holds a more char-like reaction care for the community rather than your specific family meanwhile ritlock has a more human or even norn-like reaction to save his cub first this is a meaningful moment because the trade-off of familial identity or communal values is put into one choice and while it may not be that black and white it shows the progression of ritlock with his distance from the char and his interactions with logan and the other humans to make him regret not knowing more about his cub we escape and meet up with all the imperators of each legion making it very clear to all char that this is a very dangerous turning point this episode's story overall was a subtle but clear introduction to the conflicts we'll be facing there's also a really good interaction between conflicts here ritlock and kresha have their past conflict of coming to terms with their family troubles but because ryland is taken away by the global conflict of vanguard's race for arms they have to chase after him when they finally get to him they are given more conflicts to deal with such as save more younglings by preventing the ice construct from reaching the farrar or save your youngling who may not be as much of a value to the legion as many of the cubs but to them it is the story here is actually so good but unfortunately the moment is ruined by the fact that all this dialogue happening between cretia and ritlock actually occurs while you're fighting the ice construct it makes a dialogue hard to pay attention to and doesn't really give you that vivid image of what the threat actually is the ice construct looks rather immobile and while they did mention this earlier on the story it doesn't feel like the ferrara of cubs are in danger down the mountain i think this instance would be much more powerful to the story if they actually showed you the cubs or the ice construct in close proximity to the farrar or place where the other char would be in danger that way you really get the feeling that you made a choice to save them instead of save rylan from vanguard it could have even been designed so that you have two fights with the ice construct the first one sets up the danger and then a cut scene that very vividly puts ryland or the cubs both on screen sort of like the trolley problem and then you continue to fight the ice construct which means you've chosen to save the cubs as it is now the story doesn't really convey the conflicts as importantly as they should be even though they appear to be written as such the gameplay all throughout the episode was interesting because it changed up the usual feel of just killing mobs all of the festival events you could do were a nice change of pace and made it feel like a celebration which really immersed you in the entire scenario doing the shooting range the demolition derby and the cooking event were pretty fun and even after completing their achievements i wasn't really bored of them the torch relay and the ooze pit i wasn't really a fan of there were some cool rpg elements where dialogue options gave you a different approach but the main gameplay in this episode was the introduction of strike missions and while it is nice in theory to provide players an intermediate place between fractals and raids this didn't really hit that for me shiverpeak pass is definitely questionable in terms of difficulty scaling this one had a cool little jumping puzzle to get to the boss which i wish others had but then the boss itself is way too tuned down and all of the mechanics are ignorable as far as the art of this episode the environments are always wonderfully done in guild wars 2 but they even made a metal band concert with char as an event with fully composed metal songs it definitely added to the episode's flavor and was useful in foreshadowing later events because the minister of morale was using the ban to spread vanguard's propaganda all in all the episode gives a lot of char lore that feels meaningful to the plot but i did not like the use of the voice comms as a storytelling device and wish that the final instance had emphasized what it needed to for me to really feel what the conflicts were i'll give the prologue an 8 out of 10. next is the episode 1 whisper in the dark which takes place in biora marches so the next episode begins with a voice comms once again not a fan of it but it helps to speed up the pace of the story to prevent it from dragging on compared to getting a male every once in a while and having to run back and forth to get dialogue anyways we get the voice comm from almora soul keeper the leader of the vigil she sounds very strange so we naturally go to check it out at the jorah keep in biora marches and it appears to be empty because of a sons of svanir raid the staging of the scene is well done to create that foreboding mood of a murder mystery if you've ever had your house broken into before coming home to see the front door broken and left open immediately makes you feel uneasy but also curious the first gate into jorah's keep has that same feeling to it with it being slightly unhinged then when you get into the keep the only thing that moves is the snow entering the barracks we find all of the vigil members killed and bram identifies one of his guild members among the dead then because of some unexplained magic from a raven lens were able to see visions of what happened following the visions from raven we look for almora and javi whose bodies were not found all the while a voice is whispering to us some questionable things like to stop looking for the survivors you can't help your tracks here they lost someone take it javi got away or they yeah maybe javi got away as a silvari character you describe the feeling as something similar to that of mordremos whisper which is a nice touch i always love when my character's identity makes a difference or gives me specific dialogue so it ends up that jormag is whispering to us and trying to manipulate us the main theme of this episode is regrets because jormag takes advantage of people's regrets and uses those to make them seek power and eventually turn to the sons of svanir jormag shows marjorie her dead sister belinda who she couldn't save from a mordrem attack and bram his father who he couldn't be there for one interesting parallel here is between banggar and the dragons he seeks to use graham's bow to take over jormag and use her as his weapon just like krakatorik became mad with his power so too does banggar as the blood legion imperator and just like jormag uses her voice to manipulate and recruit to her forces vanguard also manipulates and uses propaganda to recruit for his renegade army while you should ideally respect someone's words for what they are you also can't ignore their context and when intentions are unclear you need to be careful with how much you believe i know this blew over a lot of people's heads because i've seen many comments criticizing jormack's character and how the dragons shouldn't be our friends that's because she's trying to manipulate and lie while getting as much out of everyone as she can i guess that means jormack's character was well done because it successfully mind controlled them one thing is for sure jormag's intentions are still unknown to us and you as the player are left in doubt which helps you connect with the characters who are also having doubts ritlock and kresha even get into an argument about how ritlock doesn't want to leave rylan but then cretia blames him for having already left for a human sword referring to sohathan so we go looking out into the woods for almora and javi but learned that it was bram's guild mates who had turned to jormag and slaughtered the vigil and captured their allies once again bram is struck by the regret of leaving his guild mates allowing them to succumb to jormag's influence we eventually find and kill his guild mates and save javi but have to go looking for almora still thing is she's already dead within dark rhymed elves when we find almora's body javi is rather composed considering javi was basically almora's second in command for this mission it was a bit weird she doesn't even shed a tear seemed a bit off to me instead she gave a generic monologue about how almora deserved better i mean i'm not asking that we all drop everything and perform her funeral rights in the middle of the plot but we don't even carry almora's body back to the keep we just leave it there to rot i mean i guess the vigil will come pick it up later but it just adds to that feeling of irreverence out of all the main characters in the iceberg saga it feels like javi is the least developed character because this was her chance to do that she talks about how almora was the only one who saw her who she was and not as who her ancestors were because she was descended from jorah she probably had a lot of privileges and not many opportunities to prove herself rather than just being given everything for her fame but we aren't really shown how privileged she was through the story we're just told it we don't really see how much almora meant to javi or rather how almora's death affects her at all the only potential character progression we see from javi is when jormag whispers to her that she is the great granddaughter of spawner who was one of the first to be turned by jormag and from who the sons of swanier are named after she doubts her purpose until we remind her that her familial name is not savannair it is jorah here we see that trade-off of identity if you are expected to do what your predecessors have done you've got a lot less freedom so while the norn may not have an obligation to a war band or a legion they do to a family so we're going to see this a little bit later on with bram as well but yeah basically other than that javi is now the leader of the vigil because larynthia is away she's a young leader and has a lot to prove and a lot of space to grow but so far hasn't done much and now that we have two of the raven lens thingies that we snatched from almora's corpse we can enter the raven sanctum and find the framier of jormag the leader of the sons of svanir to me the raven lenses didn't really make much sense it felt like they were just an arbitrary plot device that never really was explained but anyways now that we're in the raven sanctum there is a dark maze where you the player now get bombarded by the guilt of jormag's whispers and regrets this is clearly where the name whisper in the dark comes from you hear voices of writ lock cretia and javi blaming the commander for making things worse being selfish and requiring everyone to sacrifice themselves for the pact there is also a general untrustworthiness of the player character because slaying dragons hasn't necessarily been a purely benevolent endeavor in fact as a dragon champion we may be doing all of this to empower our dragon with the magic of the fallen dragons i like the self-introspection and doubt towards the commander because it makes the player feel like more of a character in the story rather than just an observer who has some generic role in being the most agreeable perspective that you usually get with most dialogue it kind of reminds me of the whole killing elder dragons is a bad idea plot and really makes you question whether what you are doing is right this fits in well with the current situation because there are multiple trials inside the raven sanctum where the raven spirit asks you to make a difficult choice one of the dilemmas is choosing between a young prince or an old queen if you let the old queen die then the young prince may be unfit to rule the kingdom but if you let the young prince die there will be no heir once the old queen eventually dies of natural causes there is no right answer but which one you choose says a lot about your identity or views each one has trade-offs and it's supposed to make you regret your choice to teach you a valuable experience just like all the other characters choices they may regret them but there was a trade-off you didn't just gain nothing that is one thing that i really want to commend about this episode how it makes you doubt and rethink your actions there was a lot of bad design like almora's death being undervalued by javi the raven lenses having no explanation and how lacking in plot this episode is compared to the others but it still really nailed this one part which works out really well because this is the episode about the raven spirit who represents wisdom and perspective for difficult choices you really can't know which one will be better because you'll never see the other the trade-offs of making a decision cause us to doubt ourselves but in the end they teach us and help us grow the past is part of your identity and should be considered experiences you learn from especially when it's regarding your family who you can always choose these regrets may be impossible to overcome so you'll live with them the rest of your life it's a very powerful message that we'll definitely see returning in the story then we finally get to the frannier of jormag and take him out after which jormag takes control of his dead body and makes him speak to us telling us that we will need joramag's help because we have a common goal and that she will be waiting commander about what jormag said we're not gonna take it seriously right right the art in this episode is nothing too special other than the first murder scene and the use of the lip syncing with the dead body of the franier the gameplay and the story portions is actually pretty non-existent you just mainly listen to the dialogue and then have a boss battle at the end the map itself has one of the more boring meta events and the light puzzles they added weren't really puzzled so much as just click on a mirror until it reflects and then follow it they did expand on the strike missions by adding three new ones the bone skinner freynia of jormag and the coden duo however all three of these are mostly dps golems who sit in the middle of a circular room most of them feel like a low budget raid boss that isn't tuned to level 80 players and doesn't teach you anything except to stack together and there were many opportunities for character progression that just didn't happen like an integral character dying we're not going to take that seriously right right but anyway all that being said i'm going to give episode 1 a 4 out of 10. it is very meh except for the raven spirit immersion which most players won't even care about episode two is the shadow in the ice in western biora marches episode two begins with us chasing graham into the western bureau marches he apparently has learned that the voices we've been hearing are enabled by drakkar who is underneath the lake we visit a coden camp where we free reitlock and krisha ritlock goes on about how they have to hurry to save rylan but once again cretia maintains her more char-like approach of letting the grown cub fend for itself the code have warned us about ritlock saying that he really wants something which makes him vulnerable to jormag and that his voice may no longer be his own this sets up ritlock to be a dangerous character because he could succumb to jormag's whispers and it helps the many conflicts interact with each other again the more issues one character has to deal with personally the harder it is for them to resist the more global conflict also one distinction here is that jormag turns instead of takes she uses her manipulation to gain allies willingly rather than by sheer force if you desire power jormag will give it and you will give yourself to joramag obviously the sons of svanir and the ice brood will destroy the things you care about to whittle your sanity down and make you more likely to want jormag's help but in the end it is more of a gas lighting than a seizure mordremoth did mind control the silvari but that was more forceful than coercion zaitan took control of dead bodies who couldn't say no kraal khatorik used a carpet bombing strategy to brand his followers it's definitely a more personified approach that lets the elder dragon become more of a character than just a force of nature it was really awkward when we went inside krakatorik's mouth and all the late energies showed us his inner thoughts and without any prior characterization the thing he says is mommy it definitely seemed a bit forced to put some characterization in like that personally i'd prefer the dragons to remain as forces of nature that create the sudden conflicts that pressure the actual characters like ryland and bram to make difficult choices and then develop those characters instead jormag is well done though so i don't mind the characterization at all that being said bram gets the focus of the episode from here we tell javi to distract your car by leading a direct assault which becomes a pretty fun meta event with a challenging boss while we go around convincing the wolf spirit and other lost spirits of the wild such as the eagle wolverine and ox to help us fight dracar we go around doing basically fetch quests to gain the trust of the spirits of the wild it's definitely a low point in the gameplay especially the eagle trial and then the spirits tried to poke bram at his weak points arguing with him why he isn't worthy and he has to accept his faults when they tell him he tries too hard to prove himself you know the whole thing about bram being the norn of prophecy because he splintered jormag's tooth with his mother's bow and therefore he is destined to defeat jormag that kinda got to his head but of course the dialogue between bram and the spirits overlaps with the voice comms of ritlock and cretia and you can't understand either of them talking over each other better hurry this is only gonna get worse the last episode was more about raven and this one is more about wolf spirit which is closely tied to bram and his character so it makes sense that this is bram's episode after his wake-up call we take the spirits of the wild to fight drakkar but the whispers get worse and ritlock and krisha discuss whether we the commander would kill ryland if it were necessary to the pact which really makes ritlock reconsider his loyalty while chasing down drakar crecius suggests that ritlock used sohothan to burn down the ice which is a really vivid representation of the trade-offs i talked about earlier before krisha was blaming ritlock for leaving for that sword and now she has the idea to use it to help them they did of course have a quick discussion over voice comms about whether they trust the commander we 1v2 ritlock and cretia while bram summons the spirits to kill drakkar but then the whisper of jormack comes out of drakkar's body and speaks to us giving us more doubts about why brim has the support of the wolf spirit but can't become the wolf but when banggar and rylan roll up trying to start a fight bram does become the wolf to protect us from them because wolf spirit is the embodiment of loyalty if you've ever heard the phrase man's best friend that is what wolves or dogs are it represents bram's ability to overcome his reaction to flee from tough situations which he has many regrets of and to stay and fight for us also irene mentions when bram gets back that he has his hair again way back in heart of thorns when his mother died he shaved his hair off often when characters cut their hair in a story it represents the end of an era some sort of change internally to us that meant a lot of moody bran moments but now that his hair is back it symbolizes his overcoming the instinct to flee and his acceptance of his mother's death he isn't running away from the fight or from his past anymore in other words he lost his father he lost his mother he lost his guild and he's not going to lose any more ritlock once again has to choose the pact over his son by helping us and letting rylan get away and then oren guides us to the eye of the north where we are told that vanguard took credit for killing dracar and has rallied even more char to his army by convincing them that he can take out jormag i don't know about this one it seemed like a huge leap in the plot just to explain things by you got knocked out by banggar of course there needed to be a reason to have conflicts present themselves by having vanguard and rylan show up and to have bram save the day to show his progression and then let them escape to set up the future conflict of the war with the legions but to me it just felt a little bit weird that we were so out of control of the situation overall this episode's story was a step up from the previous episode but it felt super slow because of the fetch quests you had to run around getting the coden to trust you by doing events then you had to go around getting the spirits to trust you by doing events then you had to stop your car's barrier by looking for idols also the events which were supposed to scale up and become more challenging was marketed as some sort of replayable content but never actually ended up working like that so the gameplay of the main story was pretty lackluster but the whisper of drawer mag strike mission which was added this patch is by far the best strike mission because it teaches you interesting mechanics and positioning the dracar world boss was a good addition and i love how if you fail the meta event everyone gets mind controlled and becomes hostile to each other i believe the only other place in pve where you can kill other players is in the final instance of hot if one of the players is a sylvari who gets mind controlled this is like the open world version of that and i love this not because i'm a pvp or who loves killing pve ears using their open world builds but because i always thought that there should be more competitiveness in guild wars 2 to add more meaningful interactions another cool thing is the new tech they came out with to show depth in the ice after all it is called a shadow in the ice one thing i really like is that anet always keeps innovating their environment building and visual storytelling which is something that can be used in the future they added more light puzzles which weren't that interesting to do more than once but at least they felt a little bit more like puzzles this episode overall i'd give this episode a 5 out of 10 because i like seeing the code of lore throughout the map and the optional books bram and the char had some decent character progression and they added very repeatable content with whisper of joramag and jakkar despite there being a lackluster gameplay experience but that's not to say that the episode is bad it's just that if i give the episode too high of a mark then that's saying that it's one of the better episodes of the saga and i don't think that that's the case visions of the past was not really a fully fledged episode but it added two main instances which you access through the scrying pool that horrene tells us to look through oren tells us that people who align themselves with elder dragons eventually bring disaster and quickly corrects herself saying she is the exception but doesn't tell us why remember the reluctance that banggar had for oreem well may not be as wrong as we thought the scrying pool as a storytelling device is basically seeing through the eyes of another character which has to be used sparingly because if you overdo it it can become stale and confusing on which timelines are in however it isn't overdone here you get the perspective of ryland and the steel warband as they travel west through the shiverpeaks you get a better idea of the innocence that rylan has just trying to prove himself and it helps to personify the characters we are calling villains now the first instance is forging steel a strike mission escort which is actually pretty fun with many diverse ways of engaging in the content you can go to a vantage point and pick up a sniper rifle or you can go inside the tank and use ammunition or you can just kill things the old-fashioned way with your class skills i've run this instance quite a few times and despite its length it can be pretty fun and has some decent replayability then there is the dark rhyme delves instance which is much more story based and shows some back and forth between vanguard and ryland ryland is looking to prove himself but also differentiate himself from his father even though he still has that rebellious nature that ritlock has there's definitely a lot in common between them that they don't even know about he wants to sound like he's a good soldier by following orders because he has yet to prove himself they talk about what it means to be a dragon champion and vanguard shows his major misinterpretation of the relationship between a dragon and a champion because he thinks he can control jormag they find almora who escape the sons of swanier so this is happening roughly around episode 1 and agree to help her for now but she and vanguard get into an argument that reveals that they both had a son ajax who died in battle supporting the renegades almora blames banggar for setting him to the dark side with his endless hate against the humans there's a recurring drama between char parents where they have regrets about their children because of this instinctual connection that comes in conflict with the traditional char values of being raised in a war band rather than a family once again the trade-offs theme comes up here char don't usually influence their children much but for whatever reason vanguard had influenced ajax whether it was through genetics or through interactions it becomes a negative influence banggar and almora get so hated that they get into a physical fight and ryland looking to rise up in the ranks follows orders reluctantly bangor tries to mislead ryland saying she's lost her mind and calling her a gladium a betrayer of the char just because she supports the treaty with the humans and joined the pact when ordered to finish off almora rylan hesitates and vanguard does it himself disappointed he says that ryland is not too different from his sire ritlock after all once again we can make a parallel between characters here javi who rises through the ranks of the vigil and struggles with her legacy as a descendant of jorah and svaner can be compared to ryland who also wants to rise up in ranks but instead of by following the legacy of his sire he separates himself from it here the traditional char values are at odds with doing the right thing and while rylan doesn't kill almora himself he still crosses the point of no return by being complicit there were many chances for his parents to save him but they chose not to influence him and do what was right instead the story and parallels of ajax heavily foreshadow rylan's future here and i would say this is one of the most important scenes in ryland's character progression which makes the entire vision very meaningful for a small mini episode the gameplay and story were pretty good the dark rhyme delves instance even had some optional exploration to give you even more dwarven lore and it kind of felt like the bonus mission packs from guild wars 1 which were very good additions to the story i'll give visions of the past a 7 out of 10. episode 3 no quarter takes place in drizzlewood coast first of all the original release of this in the next episode did not have voice acting due to the pandemic and they couldn't get their voice actors in the studio so for many people the story was hard to follow at first not only does it become harder to follow text without audio but without voice acting you don't get the same meaning out of the dialogue playing through this again with voice acting definitely helps and i suggest you do that episode 3 is a return to the politics and charge storyline we saw in the prologue and starts with a summit between the dominion which are vanguards renegades led by ryland's warband and then there are the united char legions with malice smoter and ephraim we see the effects of war on the char leaders because smoter who was once seen as the more reasonable imperator and a good candidate for conor becomes cruel especially with his treatment of the deserters who upon being caught are executed mid-camp the harsh conditions of an outnumbered war and more fair weather soldiers leaving the ranks as they become more and more outnumbered make it an easy choice for the legion deserters and another problem is the propaganda broadcasted through speakers similarly to jormag's whispers the dominion begins resorting to dirty and sneaky tactics just like joramag to win the war and you'll also see the effect of the war on ryland ryland is insulted by logan's arrival at the summit because they invited a human so rylan turns down any further negotiations showing a clear turn in his character he's become a lot more influenced by vanguard's racism and propaganda the last time we saw him was in dracar's cave so technically before then was the dark rhyme delve scene where he disappoints banggar when he refuses to kill almora so basically he's been through a lot since then after failing to come to a resolution with the dominion you discuss the logistics of war with the commanders having to choose between a strong front line or trying to combat their deception similarly with mesmers basically both sides are going to be doing whatever they can to win even if it's not going to be upholding their integrity none of the options you pick really matter but it gives interesting dialogue then we go out to regain our foothold on the map which mechanically is supposed to feel like a world versus world map but in pve the landscapes are diverse from lush forests to rocky mountains to clear water coasts to frozen tundras sort of like the diverse biomes in a worldly world map so to me it definitely does feel like that roaming around the map is immersive as there are plenty of events that make it feel like a battlefield we eventually find out the secret place where ryland's warband meets up we sneak in and capture one of his warband members as hostage at this point in the story smoter asks you to build an unidentifiable weapon without explaining why and then tells you to throw the grenade down a pipe which ends up being a fully staffed unarmed research bunker smoter is not only killing helpless char but telling us not to ask questions basically stooping as low as the enemy even malice has double agents among the dominion which questions her loyalty to the legions it is a bit of a drastic change from smoter's normal behavior in the prologue for him to get this deranged but it has been a while since we last saw him and war changes people when ephraim greets glory the flame legion imperator is looking like the most trustworthy char leader you know there are some problems in the legions there's constant questions of whether the ends justify the means the goal is the survival of the char but to reunite the char there must be bloodshed the commander says it isn't winning if you become monsters in the process which very concisely sums up one side of the argument we hold a second negotiation with ryland this time with a hostage as a bargaining chip yes we've also resorted to holding hostages however smoter who is unhappy with how the negotiations are going kills the hostage and rylan goes off on him because that's one of ryland's war band members but krisha puts up a flame barrier to protect smoter once again proving where her priorities and values are even though smoter probably doesn't deserve it after pursuing ryland we find that not only has he set up an ambush for us but it's composed of the frost legion which are the dominion forces converted into jormag's abominations just like the sons of swanier at this point smoter's actions aren't looking that bad in comparison we fight the legion led by bangar's minister of morale who we met in the prologue they were the one telling the metal band what lyrics to use and now they're the ones spewing propaganda through speakers in drizzlewood she has also taken jormag's gift like when a public figure gets the vaccine to convince other people it's safe and works we escape and regroup after killing virenia the minister of morale and being overwhelmed by the sheer size of the frost legion overall the story does a really good job of creating that morally gray area where no one is the good guy in the war there is no right or wrong there is only a victor it shows how far the dominion is willing to go to win by sacrificing basically their free will to become minions of jormag and it also shows how far we're willing to go as well on the legion side when the commander says we don't want to become monsters just killing innocent people the gameplay of the map is really fun and even progressing the meta event is very engaging the new strike mission cold war is a bit different it's just fighting waves and waves of frost legion it gets kind of spammy after a few minutes so it's not one of my favorites the map is very diverse and allows you so many different environments to fight on but otherwise you know it's pretty standard overall i give it a 7 out of 10 because this episode does the best at setting up the scene you feel immersed in the war you know what is going on because the plot creates ambiguity not confusion so while it is one of the simpler stories told in the saga and much of the storytelling in this episode is done through the setting it does a great job at that episode for jormag rising takes place in the northern half of drizzlewood coast we start out learning that the ice preventing us from heading to the northern drizzlewood has receded allowing us to make a base camp further north the imperators begin deciding their next plan of attack from a cave behind enemy lines you learn that the frost citadel where vanguard's forces are is also on top of an old norn burial site so the main conflict at the moment is between smoter who wants to blast through the front gate using his cannons and bram who wants to figure out how to open the door to the burial which just so happens to be a back entrance to the frost citadel obviously it makes sense because jormag would want to be where the spirits of the wild are because they want to be feasting on that energy and after we put jormag to sleep this is probably where they went like in episode 2 the western bureau marches where javi's frontal attack on drakkar is the meta event for the open world players and the side mission to go underneath the ice is the personal story mission in this episode it follows a similar pattern with the personal story following graham through the back entrance and the open world meta event storms the frost citadel with the legions all of a sudden in revenge of his fallen comrades rylan ambushes our base camp and snipes smoter in the head all right commander what do you think i think we what is what ryland we've got every exit covered drop your weapons you dropped yours this isn't a negotiation commander get down money incoming head on the swivel they're everywhere push them back we can't let them take the cam after all smoter was the one who killed the prisoner and made rylan go off it is quite ironic though seeing as his title is smoter the unflinching if he would have flinched he may have lived his death is also very underplayed of course they don't have time to grieve because they need to act quickly it feels like they've forgotten how he was a good imperator until he went a bit crazy his death does serve the purpose of making it feel like there really are casualties and consequences in the war and it pressures the legions further but still to me it feels like his death could have been more meaningful i'm pretty sure a lot of people don't even know that smoter has died because i didn't know the first time when i didn't have the voice acting ephraim the flame legion imperator is placed in charge of the iron legion and the meta event follows ephraim's assault on the citadel while the main story follows bram i like how this gives the player the feeling of choice they can decide that they want to go through the front door which means they do the meta event or they can continue their story and choose the back entrance this is the kind of good design we need more of in mmorpgs it adds back that feeling of an rpg even though the genre has clearly moved away from player choice and is usually more on rails that feeling of choice is necessary and in this case it not only allows you to choose but it doesn't necessarily lock you out of seeing the other options which is what many people like to get the spirits to let bram in and take out targets for malice we have to go on a quest around northern drizzlewood the area is very well done just like southern drizzle would but there are less events that make it feel like a raging battlefield and more like you're behind enemy lines which while it may be less fun than southern drizzlewood it seems more appropriate though i do have to say walking into any of the dominion camps in northern drizzlewood and just taking out the entire place just feels so badass that's something that is really hard to do in a game that gives you so many goals that you feel like you need to be working on them all the time wanting to do something for fun yeah i know what an indulgence so that is definitely something that i liked to get the spirit statues for bram you have to do a few mini games which for wolverine and ox were fun for the first few times but the eagle spirit quest was rather boring i feel like being able to fly is ruined by the fact that we have mounds where normally this eagle quest would be cool to see the view from above anyone with a flying mount gets a better experience of that by themselves i think mounts should be much more restricted like only the base pof mounts can be used in an area at first so raptor bunny skimmer jackal and that way players actually have to interact with the terrain rather than just fly over it then after they complete the meta achievement for that map they can gain access to all of their mounds in that area i don't know if that's the best idea because players can choose to limit their freedom to enjoy it more but at the end of the day you won't if you have the option to optimize the fun out of it it would also give more reason for players to do achievements what do you guys think should mounts be restricted leave a comment below anyways we go through the back door with bram cretia and ritlock and you will see pipes running through the citadel it's jormag's blood they're using to convert frost legion members we confront vanguard and rylan in the resting place of jormag vanguard reveals his true intentions to basically rule over everything using the spirits of the wild to awaken jormag i think banggar originally didn't have these intentions he most likely did think that irene was a threat but ended up wanting more and more power once he was corrupted by it rylan makes it clear that vanguard lied about using the bow as a tool to convince not to actually use it to hurt and tame jormag and rylan joins forces with us to take out banggar but in doing so he uses the spirits to awaken jormag because he wishes not to use jormag but to serve jormag as her champion he wants to become part of something greater and become more powerful jormag wakes up and turns vanguard into a frost legion but calls him her voice not her champion because you cannot deceive the deceiver jormag knew banggar's intentions but ryland who we pushed to the edge by killing all of his warband members his regrets about his parents and of course his moral compass is confused by every side of this war-performing questionable acts he truly wants to accept joramag's gift and become her champion so in a way it is our fault that ryland chose jormac if you think about all the terrible things both sides were doing to each other it's hard to want to be on either side so rylan chooses option 3 and then he and joramik disappear often to the mists seeing a full elder dragon on the screen is always a big event as it is hard to design such a massive thing we are left with banggar who we cage up and over time you are able to hear extra conversations between him and other characters which give us better perspectives on everything that's going on during a conversation about ryland vanguard tells us that they both heard the whispers of jormag but rylan never spoke about them as if he was convinced of what jormag wanted already irene is troubled by a disturbance in the ley lines as we know taimi's machine had put jormag and primordus to sleep together using their energies to cancel each other out now that jormag has awakened so too does primordus that is the reason that jormag didn't kill us she wants to use ryland to improve her army strategy and use us to weaken her enemy primordus this episode is like the revelation of all the events leading up to now and by design it sort of is supposed to be more meaningful but unlike prior episodes there's really nothing that sticks out to me as it was poorly done other than smoder's death everything feels realistic to me and makes sense so really the fact that i have nothing to say about it means that it's just perfectly done and i wouldn't do it any differently overall i give the episode an 8 out of 10 it answered and proposed new questions and added on to the already good drizzle wood coast episode no new strike missions which i didn't mind but the open world meta event is well designed and interactive going through the frost doodle you get to see the conversion process fight a claw of jormag and get some really good loot it's quite an iconic episode because it's the first time we see jormag in the entire game one thing to think about here is what jormag's champions are they are usually high ranking dragon minions that have more control of their minds but have more powers from their respective dragon every dragon has multiple champions so jormag had the claws of joramag the champions from bitter frost frontier svanier drakkar kralkotork generally did not like humanoids so he chose beasts and dragons as his champions such as ogres the shatterer and glenn who betrayed him mordremoth had many plant-based champions like divine wrath octavines and even sylvari such as foulin and scarlett breyer zaitan had mainly orient humans from the cataclysm but also some dragons like taquadle and abominations made up of corpses irene has the commander and keith so far as her champions so you can see here a parallel between aureen and jormag because their champions choose them while the other dragons their champions aren't chosen they're just kind of forced into servitude then there's primordus he only chooses brainless destroyers as his champions that he's made out of rock and magma until episode 5 the finale champions the episode begins with a visit to ratasoom because taimi is getting readings from her scanner on a bunch of destroyer attacks the asuran arcane council also allow ryland to negotiate a treaty with the pact and jormag's frost legion because they both have a common goal to fight primordus of course the asura feel more of a threat from primordus and so does the rest of the world bram is put under a lot of stress by this because it goes against his prophecy either jormag dies or he does or at least that's what he keeps telling himself but when bram tries to warn everyone of jormag's deceit they all push back saying primordus is the more immediate threat wait you're okay with this alliance if it means stopping primordus you're not just an elder dragon is an elder dragon jorman can't be taken life jormag's not the one pinging my instrument come on but the obvious ploy by jormag is to make it seem like she isn't a threat so they will help her take out primordus and then once primordus is out of the picture jormag has no weakness just like mordremoth's weakness was his mind and crowlcottwix was orin primortus and jormag are each other's weakness this was well known and set up in season 3 years ago so there is a great balancing act going on primordus is stronger than jormag and the asura even considered increasing jormag's power to compete but jormag isn't going to be forthcoming with her power levels she's going to pretend she is weaker than we think so she can kill primordus and survive then she has freedom bram keeps getting lots of messages from his environment and as destroyers are popping up everywhere around the world he gets this feeling of where they are i'm not really sure what the explanation of this ever is at this point we go to many of the zones of tyria trying to defend against primordus's destroyers and this is done through the dragon response missions this is a huge topic that i made a whole video on and i'll link that below but i'll tldr it they reused old maps like gandaran fields kaladin forest and made them look like they were destroyed by the dragon minions then we fight off waves of destroyers and then a final destroyer champion at the end during the constant fighting there's dialogue that goes on and it helps to further develop characters like javi marjorie kanak and give lore about many of the races like tengu dwarves and koden i genuinely liked drms as a game mode because it offered more diverse gameplay options than strike missions had a little bit more exploration to them and drm's or at least their structure alleviates the issue of story told over long periods of time the thing is the iceberg saga took place over a year and within that time there's maybe 10 hours or more of purely story content the rest is through the games systems and replayable content so over that time period people forget what happened and they think the story doesn't make sense but it does if you follow it from the beginning but since it's episodic content it's hard to do that now when the story is in places that you constantly return to or that have some replayability or reward to them people keep getting exposed to that story and remember it even if you just have to repeat an instance a couple times to get an achievement it's more likely you will remember it if it's too repetitive though some voice lines can become tainted it's like those older games where if you died to a boss you had to listen to their entire dialogue again and you eventually memorized it there are interesting character dynamics shown through the drms javi struggles with decision-making when allotting forces at the ascalonian settlement while marjorie is trying to save everyone because her past regret of not being able to save someone keith and rylan discussed the differences between irene and jormag and their relationship as champions kresha is hesitant to enter ebonhawk a city that has never had a char imperator inside it before this brings up a lot of interesting character developments and interactions but obviously there are issues with dialogue that happens mid combat because you miss a lot of it so timing is very important for the dialogue for example during the escort missions they place the dialogue in between packs of enemies or during the preparation to the fight but still most people probably have their settings to not have the dialogue that loud during a fight i know a lot of people thought that these were lazy reuses of old maps but to me it helped to feel that the entirety of tyria is under attack and how all the races were banding together for this threat it feels like guild wars 1 missions where you had a clear objective or challenge to overcome which also had meaningful story built into the gameplay obviously there can be a lot improved with drm but i hope that going forward arena uses this approach or structure more to make the story more engaging also i'm not a fan of going to a new map every episode arbitrarily so it was nice to dial that back naturally we want to explore so much more of tyria but it should be for a good reason by now rylan has betrayed the treaty because he got what he wanted knowledge on primordus and how to strengthen jormag however the drms where we fight the frost legion are the result of an objective for ryland he performs experiments to learn more about primordus he attempts to corrupt spirits of the wild to empower jormag and he even tries to get inside the dominion of winds for whatever reason meanwhile primordus is just attacking everywhere mindlessly bram's prophecy conflicts with the new powers of jormag and he confers with the spirits of the wild to join him in becoming primordus's champion to balance out the power it's a good match because primordus is the mindless dragon and bram is the dumb norn we're told this by irene who didn't try to stop bram which further questions irene's motives remember when she said that those who become connected to elder dragons end up in destruction except for her of course i mean if she knew that why would she let bram go ahead with this she basically is sacrificing bram which is fine by me but she pretends that she is such a good dragon who could do no harm meanwhile she's looking to sacrifice bram so that she can balance out the twin dragon's powers so they can kill each other and she can suck up all their power seems good to me right right i like how it keeps the potential for irene to become a villain later but allows the plot to stay focused by giving irene benefit of the doubt jormag even has some conversations with aureen where irene tries to take the moral high ground telling jormag she should care about the fate of though she's frozen meanwhile she's sending bram to his doom if i haven't already made it clear i'm having major second thoughts about irene and thinking vanguard is maybe more justified than he seemed at first finally we are revealed the true motive of jormag it's that being connected to primordus who over all these years is unable to speak with jormag at her level of intelligence she's gone mad just like krakatorik because she has no one to give her stimulating conversation and of course she wants to feed on magic seems a bit shallow not that interesting but i mean i guess it makes sense finally we decide to lure the two dragons together because the longer bram is a champion the further gone he will become because dragons are attracted to magic are made of magic and magical ley lines are basically light we can use irene the dragon of prismatic light to be able to manipulate that energy i don't really understand how it works either but basically we use aurena's bait and we get both dragons to kill each other by very closely balancing their power and then irene sucks it all up right right we arrive at the place where we'll make the dragons fight and it's actually anvil rock for those of you who were disappointed that dwarves did not get enough attention in this episode this is actually something meaningful because if anvil rock is a massive ley line it suggests the validity of the dwarven belief that their race was forged on the anvil-shaped mountain because of the inherently magical environment the destroyers are already in the area rampaging mindlessly around when ryland arrives with the frost legion an important thing to notice here is that they arrive through the mists just like when drormag and rylan disappeared from the frost citadel they can travel through the mists bram arrives with primordus as well and just to appreciate primordus's size he literally tunnels through the entire mountain and makes a cave out of it this also supports the belief that the mountain is magical because he just went where he felt the most magic anyways they get balanced out and then we get a really cool cutscene that shows their sheer scale finally never before have we seen two elder dragons at the same time in one frame there's a flash of light and then they're gone there's some wreckage below and a strained magical source that rises up to the sky and heads south what that direction can mean i honestly don't know but my one suggestion is that it could be that the dragons didn't actually die but went into the mists and that trail of magic is the new ley line being created by their new location who knows it's a very well done instance both ryland and bram have some interesting mechanics when you fight them and dealing with the dragon's attacks meanwhile adds to the cinematic feeling but i think most people will have an issue with the resolution of the dragons taking two of them out in one living world season may feel rushed but honestly the dragons are not the focus of the plot they are the natural conflict that helps to catalyze the actual character conflicts like ryland and bram there was some cool characterization to joramag but we got plenty of that throughout saga primordus is pretty boring he just smashes things i don't think you can say without being disingenuous that primordus was killed off too fast because we've been dealing with him since season 3. in fact we've been fighting his champions since guild wars 1. it's time to move on and i think most people agree that we should move on but they still wanted to get a better closure do you really think that they're gone irene says the magic dispersed quicker than she could control it leads you to believe something else happened but even then the real story is between ryland and his parents we find bram in the wreckage below he's fine probably because the spirits of the wild protected him and the decision to allow bram to live instead of be consumed by primordus changes the whole prophecy theme basically the entire time bram was interpreting his norn of prophecy stuff he kept getting mixed signals as if the prophecy wouldn't happen the way he thought it would for example he thought he would kill jormag using his mother's bow but he lost the bow his guild mates all died which he intended to kill joramag with and he really didn't intend to become primordus's champion when you expect things to happen a certain way and they end up happening entirely different it's because there's more than one way to do it keith's wild hunt was similarly unclear but she pursued her purpose and became a dragon champion the flame seeker prophecies foretold the fall of the lich and the titans which made the mersaut to be the villains when they really were just keeping the titans locked up but the true story ends here with krisha and ritlock finally able to confront ryland their icy brood with no interruptions even though it's over he feels that there's nowhere to return vanguard is dead jormag is gone and his war band is also dead the only place left for him to go is back to the legions with his parents but because he needs to prove himself and he probably will be punished and held back from promotion it will be rough for him his choice fits in perfectly with the traditional char values krisha tells rylan that she is ashamed to have given birth to him and they have a back and forth about how ryland was a privileged cub because of how talented he was and how krisha wasn't she had to work her way up we see why krisha is so hard on him because she didn't have the same opportunities and yet still succeeded at what she believed in we see how the structure of the charred society leads to this tragic event ryland also insults ritlock for not having what it takes to be imperator which isn't far off from ryland's failure showing that they have even more in common except that ryland actually became jormac's champion for a while rylan makes a final attempt at creesh's life and ritlock steps in between and kills ryland with the sword he chose to chase after instead of stay with the legion and his family ritlock says he's sorry as he holds his dead son and then everything goes silent the scene has a lot going on so first rylan keeps talking about ranks in the legions calling cretia vanguard's shadow and ritlock not enough to be an imperator he is so tunnel vision on his profession that he loses sight of any other values he may even have tried to kill krisha because she is the blood legion imperator so that would be him rising in ranks if he returns to the legions his war band is dead so he would be a gladium which is a shameful rank for charr without a war band it means he would need to find a new war band which he would have trouble doing with his reputation the last words of the commander are sometimes there is no right thing which has been the central theme this whole time in the prologue we are shown the trolley problem of choosing between a family or a large community episode 1 the raven trials is the epitome of impossible choices episode 2 is about the harsh conditions everyone is put under to force them to make the decisions to turn to jormag because it is necessary to survive episode 3 is all about moral ambiguity and no side being right in the war episode 4 is the end of that war in which everyone loses because jormag is awoken episode 5 is about bram's determination to do what he is destined to do not because it is the right thing to kill jormag but because it is his legacy left to him by his mother and rylan who was raised by a legion of char to value his rank in his profession is given choices to do the right thing or to do what will help him progress through the ranks it's hard to say any of us wouldn't do the same thing if raised in similar circumstances to become a cold-blooded killer and of course us the pact commander who have been given plenty of warning that killing dragons is potentially bad for the planet or the cause of all this we maybe had to kill primordus and jormag because they were both active but they were active because we threatened vanguar and we threatened vanguard because we had irene and we had a ring because she was the answer to krakatorik and we had to deal with crowd khatorik because balthazar went on a rampage if the causality of all our actions can be traced to an original instance of defying a divine being then i guess it is our fault maybe just like the apple tree that adam and eve ate during the fall of humanity we chose freedom at the cost of our ruin or maybe i'm just looking into this too deeply but anyways i'm gonna give this final episode an eight out of ten it sends the message it intends to send it opens up many more questions and yet it feels complete it introduces great storytelling gameplay methods and while some say it feels rush it seems like they intended this to be the story the entire way through if you pay attention to the signs maybe having the last episode split into mini episodes might have been the result of development constraints but i don't think the actual resolution of the plot with two elder dragons potentially dead or just missing was unforeseen by many as that is what people have been asking for i mean get away from the dragon plot right that's what they wanted and now we can explore something new kind of glad that bram survived and the dragons didn't next i want to see the commander title be given to another character so the player character can develop a different role in the story to give a more unique perspective otherwise i am excited to see where the story goes from here so that concludes my full review of the iceberg saga story there are obviously other important topics to go over in regards to this era of content patches such as a willingness to iterate on content that is already released innovation of game types and storytelling methods and even reward structures that give engaging incentives for replayability but for now we'll keep it to the story if you'd like to support my content you can like my video you can subscribe and you can share the video to your friends and family leave a comment that promotes more discussion and you can also decide to support me using the links in the description below and i will see you guys next time [Music] you

Channel: Vallun

Views: 6,976

Keywords: Full Guild Wars 2 Icebrood Saga Story Summary & Analysis, icebrood saga trailer, guild wars 2 expansion, guild wars 2 living world, champions, ending, finale, episode, icebrood saga story, eye of the north, charr, norn, story summary, story analysis, playthrough, cutscene, chapter, braham eirsson, jhavi jorasdottir, rytlock brimstone, crecia stoneglow, bangar ruinbringer, ryland steelcatcher, aurene, jormag, character, meaning, review

Id: KdEo-DyTSM8

Length: 79min 50sec (4790 seconds)

Published: Fri May 21 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/Galrath91]

The icebrood saga started off so strong, loved the first few eps. Champions was a disappointment though

[u/theblackveil]

I am a recently returned player who never hit 80 before. I understand that, on May 25th, I’ll be able to secure future access to episode 2 stuff just by logging in... but is there any way for me to play through the entirety of the Icebrood Saga? Or have I missed my chance?

Trying to determine if I should hold off on watching this if I can play through the Saga episodes eventually.

Thank you in advance. Really loving the game finally and appreciating the community.

[u/[deleted]]

wow, such an epic analysis.

[u/RazorNion]

So after watching the video, I do agree with most of the points made by Vallun and he does bring up some great points:

1. Jormag is a well written character albeit rushed ending. Throughout the entire IBS story, most of the characters interacting basically succumbed or at least thought to be have possibly been a victim to this the Elder Dragon's traits: Ice and Persuasion. But never before had I seen so much hate which means that Anet had hit it out of the park with the dialogue.This reminds me of the interaction Jack Gleeson, the actor who played King Joffrey in Game of Thrones, had after leaving the show and how he had so much... hatred as well as being mistreated in public for a period of time. Because he played the character so well.
2. The clash of traditions has always been interesting and it's no exception that we got to see this come into play with the Norn around the Prophecy and the Charr and their roots of... "Warband-ism". I'm unsure if this will affect the story post-IBS but I personally hope it's similar to how Sylvari post-HoT had to re-adapt and show that they're free from Mordremoth's chains.
3. Although the conclusion of the latest chapter Champions had an ending that was met with a lot of criticism from the community, does anyone else feel like this... wasn't the actual end? Because we had a Prologue in the beginning introducing Grothmar Valley, I have a raising suspicion that we could possibly be surprised with an Epilogue. (However the only other chapter that had one was post-PoF and that was introducing Kralk as the main focus. Maybe we can expect the same to actually conclude and tie in the end of IBS into the beginning of End of Dragons.)

[u/PitchforksEnthusiast]

DRM happened. It wasnt bad content, I enjoyed them, there were dozens of us, but the story didn't move forward for the most part.

You can also tell that DRM, were well...responsive, a reactionary chain of event whereby things happened already and you, the commander, is only there is clean things up, which is nothing special.

Reminder: Grothmar Valley, Bjora's March, and Drizzlewood Coast happened before DRMs, but is still part of IBS, so what happened ?

DRM's function exists as a means to cut corners, meaning the story started to thin out towards the end because Anet chose to sacrifice it for the sake of developing End of Dragons.

But here is a fact: No matter HOW WELL EoD is, you can NEVER wash out the taste of how the saga ended, they dont seem to understand that at all. The saga, having to do with TWO elder dragons will always, by the sheer importance of the characters, out weight anything EoD will be based on.
Anet has also broke trust with the player base as well, having promised an Xpac level of content with IBS, making this the worst offending event since the HoT drought.
What is even worst, is that we know that they can do better, meaning we're more disappointed than upset.
Anet needs to STOP betting on players returning after a fallout every time something like this happens. There will always be people who will quit permanently. These invisible GW1 player who, by this point havn't return, will NOT be returning. Focus on the here and the now

"Never half ass two things, whole ass one thing"

[u/thatmfbltch]

I think this is cool, thank you!

[u/Azureavocadoe]

There use to be a time when the community use to say “potatoes analysis “ but now in the future we will look forward for vallun’s top tier analysis. The gauntlet has been thrown can WP make a longer analysis than Vallun?