A Kingdom in Despair: Fort Ranik

The ground beneath my feet began to rumble, quietly at first, so quite that you wondered whether you heard it at all. It gathered volume all too soon however, until it was almost deafening. Immense crystals began to fall from the vast blue sky, they looked beautiful from a distance, like blue-green rain. When they began to crash down it was all too apparent that rain, and whatever foul sorcery conjured this, was completely incommensurable. Where rain brought life for crops, these brought only death, chaotic, meaningless, and seemingly without end. The walls of Ascalon, walls that had stood for hundreds of human lifetimes, started to crumble and crack like old dry paper.

A Kingdom in Despair: The Searing

"The last day dawns on the Kingdom of Ascalon. It arrives with no fanfare, no tolling of alarms. Those who will remember, will speak fondly of the warm morning breeze. People carry on with their daily lives, unaware that in a short while . . . Everything they have ever known will come to an end."

Andru Rhaelis

I am Andru Rhaelis, son of Kaileb Rhaelis of Ascalon. I was born in Rin, the capital city of Ascalon but moved to Ascalon City as I grew up. At 16 years of age I joined the Ascalon army, they needed all the help they could get with the heat of the Guild Wars constantly hitting our lands with full force. One of my main tasks was to patrol Ascalon City and the Great Northern Wall to keep any threat from breaching the wall. My parents didn't like the choice I had made and it was worse for them when my twin sister and only other sibling Lania followed in my footsteps and joined the defence force of Ascalon. It was from that point forward that I swore to protect my sister.

The Final Wait

The beta is over and the wait begins, now comes the days where the withdraw from the game starts to feel as if something is missing. Looking on the bright side; we have only 32 days left till the release of the game so it wont be long until we are back in Divinitys Reach checking the trading post for Masterwork items, stood playing with the dyes you have unlocked through unidentified dye loot drops and enjoying the true variety and alive feeling of dynamic events.

The Beta is Almost Here

The wait is almost over, it is a matter of hours before the start of the final Guild War 2 beta weekend event and I'm sure there are there are thousands, hundreds of thousands of players who have their Beta keys. They'll have the client ready, fully updated and be counting down the seconds before the event. Let's have a great time this weekend and attempt to pick up on all of the final issues in order to get the game in the best shape possible before it's release on the 28th (25th for us pre-purchase people).

Lack of Graphics

This post is regarding the major lack of pictures I have used in the blog so far, I want to bring it to life with rich content which will allow readers to engage further with what they are reading. I feel, as a start I will set a rule that every blog post will HAVE to have a picture with a template border I will create for the next blog post. I aim to go back through all of the current posts and add the picture to all of them.

Changes Since Beta Weekend 2

Yesterday, ArenaNet posted a blog containing the new additions and changes since the second beta weekend event. Here is a quick list of the major changes:

• The ability to play as both Asura and Sylvari,
• New explorable map area named "Brisban Wildlands",
• The first mini-game within beta "Keg Brawl",
• All new game element "Vistas",
• New PvP map "Legacy of the Foefire",
• Changes, such as turrets added to World Vs World, and
• Fully open Gem Store (Gems will be refreshed at release).

There is also a reminder that all character data will be deleted before and after this beta. ArenaNet will be streaming gameplay from their channel on Twitch.tv (links below). A final addition I would like to add is that the client that will be used for this beta will be updated further to become the full game so do NOT delete the beta client after this beta as you will have to re-download many of the same files for the full release of the game.

Links;

ArenaNet blog post "What’s New in the Final Guild Wars 2 Beta Weekend Event",
ArenaNet's Twitch.tv channel

Lore: Tyria's History

The old gods had decided it was time. Almost three thousand years before our hero was born, they opened the rift; a magical gate allowing a race of intelligent serpents to reach the lands of Tyria. The serpents were given the task of guiding the many races of the land through this transition of time while the gods continued to create the world. The serpents, now protectors of the land allowed the races of Tyria to enjoy a life without worry. They thrived under the protection of the serpents and learned much valuable knowledge.

The Final Beta Weekend Event Before Release

The Final Beta Weekend has been announced while I was on holiday, it was a good job I had a decent 3G connection, a smartphone and an obsession with checking the official ArenaNet Guild Wars 2 blog on a daily basis. Not only was I happily surprised to hear how close the beta was; I was also massively excited by the announcement that we could play as all five races for the first time within the final beta, what a send-off!

Away on Holiday

Here I am, back from a week's holiday and ready to get on with filling this space with content for all to read. I plan to get all of the lead-up content written and published here before the end of the week, hopefully sooner. I will start by writing the backstory for the character I have created which will contain a (hopefully lore correct) story of the coming of age of "Andru Rhaelis", his introduction to combat and motivation for participating in the story to follow. I'll then be reading around the history of Guild Wars and I'll get a post written on here containing an explanation of the lead-up to the start of the game. Once I've set the scene, so to speak; I will get stuck into the start of the game and the part of the story that sets the ball rolling in Guild Wars, which is the Searing of Ascalon.

And so it Begins

The first areas of the game have been started, information regarding the start of the game for the my character "Andru Rhaelis" has begun. Finally I am able to start getting this blog going. Hopefully it will be a success and people will be able to read the whole Guild Wars story from Prophesies to Eye of the North (And Beyond). Dependant on the success of this blog; I may even start Guild Wars 2 with the same character, this will also allow me to create a personal story for the character within Guild Wars 2.

Apologies for the Delay

Hello again and sorry for the delay in starting the blog. I don't want to give some group of bad excuses but I have been very busy and haven't managed to play Guild Wars and therefore haven't been able to collect the required information in order to post anything on here at all. However, since the release of Guild Wars 2 has been announced as the 28th of August; I have a time limit on this project. The rush begins now, I have till the 25th of August (due to the pre-order 3 day head-start bonus) to get Guild Wars and all it's expansion campaigns done while paying special attention to the story and lore elements.