Dustfinger.9510

One way it would work is if individual words transitioned from high to low frequencies and vice-versa. Then, those with only partial ability to hear the word would hear bits and portions. This could produce a guttural growling, grunting effect as syllables fade in and out in quick succession when applied to the Charrs already rough voices. Some syllables wouldn't be audible at all. In effect, it becomes a natural crypography.

Good on a-net. It was easy for us to assume that common was from humans but a-net deliberately veered away from that common trope as well.

Well, in GW1, norn could only become the Bear. Dunno if this is strict lore or just a case of model limitation though (same would be so for animal forms of the non-Great Spirits). Regardless of animal forms being lore or mechanics though, before Jormag forced the norn south, Bear was the sole Great Spirit - now all four you listed are Great Spirits due to guiding the norn south. So there is reason in lore that makes Bear and the bear form more special than the others. And could be a much larger lore reason than we have confirmed depending on that question about model limitation or lore. Since the arguement is whether Norn are bears, we are looking at the forms Norn takes. Bear spirit is special in chronology. The form isn't, as far as we know. This arguement only solidifies the idea that the bear form comes from the bear spirit. Just like the other forms come from the other great spirits. Rather than due to Norn being bears.

Well, even ignoring the obvious bear form, norn and kodan have very similar beliefs (which is even noted and used as a lead-in for kodan to tell players about the belief of the Southward Claw being the progenator of norn). The fact both norn and kodan have cultural and religious views of the same exact spirits, when all other races don't, is fairly telling. Similarly, both ogres and jotun have a distinct lack of religious beliefs - both are as atheistic as you can get in the setting without going full on antitheist like the charr do. According to Ree, in The Savage Pride of the Jotun,: "The jotun have lost many of the things that once made them great. Their lore is scattered, and much of it lost; any religion, higher learning, or secrets of invention that they once mastered have been eradicated" So we can't really use religion as a disqualifier here since it may well have been the exact same for the Jotun before they lost it. The obvious bear form should be considered if grouped with the obvious snowleapard, raven and wolf form. Nothing we know of in lore makes the bear form any more special than the others.

In Gw1 Ogres were in fact a creature type rather than an individual race like they are in Gw2..Jotun, Yeti's and Ettins were all classed as Ogres back then as well as defined as lesser giants distantly related to Giganticus Lupicus. It's kinda funny that in Gw2 Ogres are considered not only an ancient race now.. but one of thee most ancient of races still alive on Tyria XD Another fun fact is that the names Jotun and Ettin are essentially the same thing as they originate from the same Norse word for Giant, In old Norse that would be jǫtunn, which the jǫ is pronounced kinda like a Y or Eo which is where Eoten came from in old English which today is now Ettin.So despite being two different races in many fantasy games etc they're actually the same thing :) That's pretty interesting. I was (unpleasantly) surprised when I learned a similar situation to goblins and orcs in Tolkiens universe. But, by that time, distinctions had already been broadly made in other media. I'd be very hesitant to consider kodan and jotun/ogres to be related. There's not really any relation between the groups at all, either physically or culturally. Agreed. I'm hestitant to consider any to be related without confirmation or at least a-net leaning more heavily into the fallible evidence. But, tbf: Jotun have about as much in common with Kodan as Norn do. The same evidence of fallible in universe, one sided oral traditionsupports both theories. That oral tradition is either basically correct or incorrect.

Probably not. While Thrulnn does say they were cousins to norn, we cannot be certain the accuracy of his oral tradition history since there's already a couple points of contention and contradiction with what he says about the jotun's fall. Jotun are confirmed by word-of-god to be cousins to ogres, but that's all we know. They're called "lesser giants", and the norn are even shorter so it's hard to consider norn to be... "lesser, lesser giants" I guess? Hmm. The deniability of the oral traditions is definately plausible. Though, I'd hesitate to consider Norn as lesser than lesser giants just becasue they are shorter than Jotun. Norn may just be the smaller end of the lesser giants with Jotun in the middle and Ogres at the larger end. With the reliance on oral traditions to even make a connection between Kodan > Norn and Norn and Jotunn, it seems A-net left their options open. Norn, Jotun, Ogres, Kodan may all be related or none at all or any mix in between.

This is a really good point. ^ It seems A-net wanted a steam punk race but they also didn't want to follow the pack and make it human lead so it was thrown to the Charr.

Pigs have skin similar to humans but Lucks comparison to skinned bears may have been to point out that a Norns looking like human, may be just a Norn looking like a shaved bear. That is, of course, if they meant "shaved" instead of "skinned".

Excellent post. The only contention I'd have is to suggest that fahraras had less do with empathy and more to do with serving the state. Evidence for this would be the fact that biological parents are cut off. A dedicated system of nannies is nice but if the emotional evelopment of children were the priority for the state and culture, the culture probably would have implemented the biological parents into the system as there is a greater chance that biological parents will provide more intimate emotional bonding experience than several strangers who may just see it as a job. In fact, the clues that charr are just really big ol' lovable babies deep down, may actually be an indication that they don't receive much in emotional development. Considering the heavy military theme that pervades the entire Charr society, it seems more likely that the fahrars are modeled after the Spartans and their boot camps schools. Spartans went to bootcamp early in life at age seven, were separated from their parents, and stayed there for years, in order to become better warriors, to better serve the state and community as a whole, rather than prioritizing the emotional development of the child. While Spartan men stayed in the barracks, even after they graduated military school, A-net seems to have differed by making both male and females continuing to live in their barracks. As the fahrar simply becomes it's own military unit, upon graduatation, as a warband. https://hsp3mspartans.weebly.com/social-institutions.html

Interestingly, insectivore teeth work well for both exoskeletons and plants that need to be ripped off structures as we see in marine iguanas that feed primarily on seaweed and algae. Without the existence or canines for a "kill bite", Asura are eligible, early on, to have fed primariliy on either exoskeleton creatures, deep cave plants, or both in any proportion.

Eeeeh.. Their appearance is human-like. Their proportions are generally non human and their strength is described as more then a human of a scaled up size would have. They're as human as giants are.

Hmmm... Would this make Thruln and his ilk also bears?

Tbf: The EU had powers like the Force supernova that allowed a user to rip the entire core out of any star and throw it at another planet

It helps to realize that even top Asuran tech, is ultimately just magictech. The radio might as well just be a magic gem or cowl you talk into for all intents and purposes.

They were "initially" portrayed as elemental, if by such you entirely refer to what basically equates to the blurb on the back of a book, only for this to be proven false by the second chapter of the book. Which is to say, they actually weren't. They were more than "elemental" or "mindless forces of nature" before the end of the personal story - or, really, before the game launched. I used the direct relations, but Aracz is correct in pointing out the Sons of Svanir too, and their interactions with Jormag. And you can't even go by the textbook definition, which I had begun arguing for since I have issues finding the proper words to describe how I interpret "humanizing" a character. Best I could do, would be to say "humanizing is the act of making them relatable". But apparently you're capable of relating to someone who is perfectly fine with wiping out millions for the sake of the species, or something silly like that, so that definition wouldn't even work for you - under that kind of mindset, even Cthulhu that has been brought up would be relatable. thumbsup