Guild Wars 2, ArenaNet’s sequel to Guild Wars has really stood out among the rest because of their innovative ideas: Creating a Dynamic event system that does away with the standard quest and progress playstyle; ditching the holy trinity and allowing all classes to tank, DPS, support, and heal in their own way. These new ideas as well as continuing their no-subscription model has made this game soar to the top of everyone’s lists.

For Gamescom and Pax, they showed off PvP for the first time. Conquest is the game and Khylo is the location. Players battle one another to take over key locations, with the assistance of a trebuchet; the task isn’t easy as players can always bomb the other team out of a control point. Movement and teamwork are key as points are gained by defeating the other team in combat and controlling the points; the first to 500 wins.

Aside from PvP, they have also introduced new areas in PvE for players to explore. Players had the opportunity to experience the Charr starter area and witness the ghosts of Ascalon first hand. Players could also play as the Sylvari, a race of honorable plant humanoids as well as the tiny Asura, a race of very intelligent people in the Sparkfly Den where the Undead are laying siege to the area.
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The Sylvari represent the higher ideal of honor, chivalry, and focus to fighting the Elder Dragons, but they are not without their faults. A few have defected and formed the Nightmare Court including Caithe compatriot Faolain. Believing that Ventari Tablet is perverting the Dream of the Sylvari and that they should do whatever it takes to defeat The Elder Dragons. Akin to Dark Jedi they start off having the tendency to skirt the rules even sometimes breaking them to achieve what they think is right.

The Beginning

In the final article by Ree Soesbee, we learn how the Nightmare Court came to be. The first of the second generation, Cadeyrn born the Cycle of Noon was a natural fighter but throughout his experiences, he questioned the teachings of Ventari and the Pale Tree. It all started when Malomedies was return in a mangled state, a victim of reckless experiments by the Asura, he demanded that they seek revenge for all the pain and suffering that Malomedies was going through. Controversially the Pale Tree intervened and told a Firstborn Sylvari, Trahearne who felt the same way as Cadeyrn to seek peace with the Asura. Cadeyrn was disappointed by Trahearne giving in to the Pale Tree as well as, jealous that it also didn’t speak to him.

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Day 2 comes with Angel Leigh McCoy, one of the writers on the Guild Wars 2 design team to talk with everyone about the beginnings of the Sylvari and goes in-depth about the mysterious plant race.

Sylvari are born from the Pale Tree, a mystical magical tree that provides them with basic knowledge and memories resulting in a very unique birth. They are born in adult form with the first moments of birth being a key moment to their survival as a Sylvari male describes the experience as falling from a very high cliff when they emerge from their pods.

Sylvari Birth

An interesting piece of information as I never really considered being born from a pod to be disorienting and being describe as much of a hazard as childbirth. I wonder if those who succumb to the nightmare had a bad ‘birthing’ experience.

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Arena Net has finally lifted the curtain on the Sylvari redesign starting with a blog entry from Artist Kristen Perry. The Sylvari was designed with three words in mind noble, beautiful, and plant. With that ideal, the initial designs usually weighed towards one end or the other. The initial designs that we seen in-game were definitely very beautiful but it felt very elf like and Anet went to the drawing boards.

The Design Process

Kristen talks about some of the research she did when she started creating the new Sylvari. She found two prevalent concepts painted humans with leaf accessories or just plain outright plant monsters. From the typical elven influenced humanoids that have a coat of green paint for skin, to Dryads that featured bark like skin to differentiate itself from humans and to her it felt a bit like stage make-up. Then dipping into the more monstrous types of creatures where she felt they would lose the beauty part of the Sylvari. Nothing really came together as she wanted to design the Sylvari from the ground up and not create models that the only difference between them and humans were make-up or accessories.

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