[Spoilers] The Dragons' Weakness Speculation

Interesting are we being set up for a massive failure and redemption arc? Taimi fails with a wrong theory, marjorie fails in being betrayed by laz, braham fails in a foolheaded rush at jormag, rhytlok fails by being secrative, kasmeer fails to be in the story, and our charecter fails by turning away from the pact and allowing it to fail? As innocents die around us all we are then forced to confeont our failures and admit we are not infallible and fight back

I wish I could upvote you to the top of this subreddit. Unfortunately I lack a few hundred accounts and whatever bot is needed to do so x'D

In all seriousness, I entirely agree with you on the whole magic negating part. It's nothing new, and it should be developed in a more subtle way than "Fire vs Ice hurr durr".

Unfortunately... That's probably what we're gonna get. Lore wise, our standing makes sense. But we're at a minority here, buddy. Surface plotline (ie: current events, what's happening right now) is always gonna be prioritized over the background lore making sense. In a perfect world we'd have both but... Sigh.

All that to say, I don't think they're gonna set up Taimi for failure or, more importantly, step back from the easy to understand "Fire vs Ice" thing that'll move the plot forward without too much ambiguity.

Unfortunately.

PS: Now I don't know about the whole Divine Magic part, it's as good a theory as any. But there's definitely a LOT of room in the lore to write ANYTHING in that's a bit more subtle and implemented in the lore than "Jormag used Water Gun, it's super effective!"

Of course if the whole fire and ice are antithesis of each other it means there can't be one dragon at the end with all the types.

It would also be odd there being only one opposed pair of energies.

In the end I think taimi's theory well be both right and wrong. I think it won't be the actual weakness but more a tool that will let us negate the extreme temperatures to have a chance at striking at the actual weakness

People are forgetting what the dragons represent.

Primordus is not the "dragon of fire" and Jormag is not the "dragon of ice", they may appear as such, but magic is not pokemon.

Zhaitan rose corpses, as a dragon of death, or rather, undeath. Mordremoth corrupted the minds of Sylvari and other creatures via telepathy.

Zhaitan's weakness was attacking it with machines - something which it cannot raise from the dead. Mordremoth's weakness was attacking its mind directly - being concious of the fact he used that to create his army, where he can't use it to defend himself.

Primordus creates his army out of solid rock, Destroyers aren't biological creatures. Jormag corrupts the minds of Norn to worship Svanir (and elementals who already had form before being touched by Jormag's influence), it is different from both Mordremoth and Kralkatorrik who create mindless servants telepathically/parasitically that act as a hivemind, Sons of Svanir appear to be single-minded yet unquestionably obedient.

Edit: While I can't guarantee what their weaknesses will be, it sounds to me like Primordius would falter to a head-on attack, destroying the very earth that destroyers are formed from, or fighting primordus in a location where he cannot use the terrain for his army. Jormag would need to be separated from his followers, or have his ice elementals weakened. Fire certainly would help against Jormag, but I doubt we could say the same for Primordus.

Perhaps Taimi's plan will work against Jormag, and Braham's plan would work against Primordus, but the drama that's been whipped up is pushing people's plans in opposite directions.

Thinking in terms of timelines and also realistically how long an MMO can go on for... you're probably onto something. This is probably not going to a "one dragon versus another" expansion coming next.

There are presumably five more episodes if they go to eight again, so 10-15 more months minimum before the next expansion comes out.

Combine that with the (possibly fake) leaks of project papaya which pointed to a Crystal Desert expansion, which means it's unlikely related to any specific dragon.

I'm guessing...

1 episode devoted to Kralkatorrik, branded west of Ebonhawke.
1 episode devoted to the Krait spires under the ocean, and Steve.

2 episodes devoted to Mursaat / Mantle and rise of Lazarus. Janthir Bay is a known hotbed for Mantle and so presumably is one of the unknown bloodstone locations. Bloodstone Caverns in the Shiverpeaks is another known bloodstone. Supposing Lazarus will show up in both of these locations for a repeat of Bloodstone Fen, with him absorbing bloodstone blasts.

Which leaves one more episode, where I begin the crazy speculation as usual.

1 conclusion episode in Abaddon's Mouth (final Bloodstone). Ember Bay's name is not centered so I'm guessing there will be an episode north including this area.

So what's on the plate:

• Possible Crystal Desert expansion.
• Margonites wrote about 'The All' and some omen about killing dragons and the world tipping.
• Margonites have a long history about travelling to the Crystal Desert and later to the underworld.
• Strange current events to do with being stuck in time and souls getting displaced when there are high concentrations of magic.

So my guess is the conclusion episode will involve Lazarus dying in Abaddon's Mouth. Either:

• He betrays us, we kill him, his magic gets absorbed into the bloodstone which attracts the remaining dragons and a major time-breaking soul-displacing shitstorm that messes up a big part of the world and wipes them all out. Or...
• He actually is a good guy, and in an ironic twist of fate he convinces Caudecus and the White Mantle to sacrifice him on the bloodstone, causing all the dragons to converge and kill each other over it (along with Caudecus and most of the Mantle) but again mess things up in a huge way.

And in either case, the world starts tipping into "The Void" (Time distortion? Loose souls?) and we start retracing the Margonites' steps through the Unending Ocean and Crystal Desert to find out if they know how to fix it.

Remember that it doesn't have to be so simple as fire <-> ice. The chak organ filters death magic out of ley-line magic so the chak can consume it. It's utterly imaginable that, in a natural environment, Jormag and Primordus can't hurt each other simply because they got a natural defence, like an own version of a chak organ.

Only if distilled and pitted around such a defence against a dragon, it could become an actual weapon. Like having an animal with resistance to a specific poison. Instead of feeding the toxin to it, you concentrate the poison and inject it, and boom, it kills the poor critter.

Idk man, i kinda hope the fire and ice thing happens. From that you'll get a lot of water, and with all the magic getting released, our boy Scuba Steve is gonna be freakin amped up.

Zhaitan wasn't just "the undead-raising dracolich": his sphere of influence extended to "shadows". Zhaitan first acted by throwing seeds of discord at the other races to test the waters, and he didn't always raise mindless mooks (Kellach and Ferghus come to mind, as does the Mesmer Elite). He at times absolutely used subterfuge, but it was when bodies started piling up that he began throwing masses of mooks at the Pact.

Mordremoth adopted elements of Zhaitan as his magic was consumed, but for the most part he still relied on his Mordrem and the hivemind established.

Yes, I hope beating Primordius and Jormag isn't as simple as throwing the other element at them. Maybe attacking their secondary spheres (Destruction, Loyalty) might do the job better: stopping Primordius without destruction, turning the Sons of Svanir away from Jormag...

My only problem with Taimi's theory is how she put it, she says:

Not directly, of course. But using their magic against them.

This means WE are going to use Dragon's magic against a Dragon. WE are going to handle this magic. WE are going to tap it and throw it to the Dragon. If Dragons are sponges and when we use magic they can filter out what they don't need and get stronger with everything else, doesn't that mean that you can be possibly FEEDING those two big baddies at the same time with their own magic?!

This is a BAD IDEA. I've seen and played enough Dragonlance to know where this will lead. Like you said, we never did things by putting more Dragon Magic.

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Eternal fire burns eternal fire: Fire cannot burn if it has nothing to burn.

Eye of the storm: Blood and spine.

Hearts and minds: Turn slaves into allies.

The former two can be found in Edge of Destiny, while the latter is clearly stated in the last moments of HoT. The dragons' and their minions' weaknesses have always been found where they are strongest. While there's no single, definitive soft point in Zhaitan's army or itself, reducing its strongest capability - taking apart its capacity of creating and maintaining its army and magic power - proved sufficient tactic.

Shadow of the Dragon was encountered during a time when Mordremoth had already absorbed some of Zhaitan's magic: The sphere of shadow/dark. It seems logical (and lucky) that the dragon champion and its servants were defeated with Divine Fire? :P

Interesting thoughts. If we are already seeing the magics of life and death from Mordremoth and Zhaitan being used in conjunction with one another, maybe the same principles will apply to fire and ice. Instead of cancelling each other out they will somehow fuse together, sort of like the Molten Alliance.

How cool would a dragon of fire and ice be? Primormag, Jormordus... ehh maybe not.

Personal view is that the Gods are the elder dragons of their world.

Therefore, them having similar areas of the magic spectrum may be able to counter that of the dragons.

every time i see people talking about fire and ice my brain goes YOU COME ON LIKE A FLAME & THEN YOU TUUURN A COLD SHOOOULDER

it's pavlovian.

I always thought that the dragon's weakness is the opposite of it's main domain.

Zhaitan is death & shadow, and I think everyone remembers we defeated Zhaitan with a giant laser. Laser is basically a bunch of bright light. Light defeats shadow.

Mordremoth was Mind & plant. Well fire burns wood, so here you go, his minions were scared of the divine fire. (And during Mouth of Mordremoth fight we use bombs to nuke him - again fire).

• Dispatching his mind.

I can only guess that Jormag's weakness is fire, cause fire melts ice.

And Primordus' weakness is either water or ice (well ice melts and becomes water so..)

In that case Primordus might kill Jormag, and they both die. Or Jormag dies and Bubbles comes to finish Primordus off.

No idea for Kralk. What can counteract storms and crystals? O_o

And DSD we know nothing about again. Water is closely tied to healing in this game though. Perhaps he is some sort of invulnerable self-healing dragon, lol. Who knows.

I think the taimi angle is going to blow up and teach her a dose of humility, and teach us to not always trust the first option.

Negating the magic of the Elder Dragons is, in fact, something we've already seen done. Something we've already seen happen several times, and it was never done by "apply more dragon magic to it".

Late to the party, but we've absolutely seen dragon magic negated by other dragon magic: The Sylvari are incorruptible by any other dragon and through the use of their magic, Zhaitan's magic in the source of Orr was removed.