Talk:Bestiary/Archive 1

Archive

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• 2010-2014

I thought this was supposed to be a category, not a page...? --Kyoshi (Talk) 00:51, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Dunno, I like this layout. Could use some cleaning tho. Zolann The Irreverent 01:04, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but then it's not an actual category for identifying the creatures of the game, and it has to be manually edited. Kills the point of categories (and functions built to run with categorical parameters) if you don't use them when it's most optimal. --Kyoshi (Talk) 01:07, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

There's a bit of a discussion about this on the here. In short, like the skills lists on gw1w this page is complimentary to the category - redundant sure but it presents stuff at a glance. Yes, it needs work, but I've got other things to do right now. If you want to help - do the descriptions or find images of centaur and grawl (others?) from the trailers or change the images on the page to tidier, clearer versions - that will help tidy up the page pretty quickly. -- Aspectacle  01:26, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh, I thought this was intended to be the category. Never mind. --Kyoshi (Talk) 06:38, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

I have added this page to the Bestiary category so it becomes easier for someone to go from any given creature page to this article (by moving back through the category tree; since this is the only article in the Bestiary category, hopefully it will be something easy to see).

There's probably a way to make this a DPL based list, in case people would rather have an automated system, but I think that would be a bit too complex to implement, and may become troublesome when we learn enough about GW2 to group some of those into sections. I'm sure poke could do it if people wanted him to, though. Erasculio 09:09, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

DPL? --Kyoshi (Talk) 18:15, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Dynamic Page List or something like that. It is a way you can build a page automatically using categories. If you look at the source of gw1:Air Magic - the skill listing is generated by passing in a category name to a template which automatically generates a list using the contents of the skill infobox. There is no particular reason why we couldn't do that here but for the fact we don't have an standardised way of presenting information on the creature pages yet. -- Aspectacle  21:26, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Oh, that, okay. --Kyoshi (Talk) 00:07, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Out of curiosity, what is the difference between all of the image types such as .jpg, .png, etc.? Taros 02:07, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

They're different file types. :D --Amannelle 02:17, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Generally, .png files will have higher image quality and/or lower file size than comparable .jpg files. As far as "etc" goes: .bmp files are, at least in my experience, very low quality, though I'm not as familiar with that format. .gif files can also be animations, such as those in the skill animations project from GW1W. The rest I'm not familiar with, but it basically comes down to differences in the formats used to save the files. --Kyoshi (Talk) 02:51, 13 May 2010 (UTC)

Troll

Why am i so tempted to put an (internet) troll picture there? O_o--Neil • 08:56, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

Update 6 Dec 10

So I finally got around to updating this. I've added in most things from the Slayer achievement line. I'm still not sure what I should do with things like domestic or environmental creatures like Cows and what have yous or what to do with animals which are charmable or probably charmable (warthog for instance). If anyone has any thoughts on those I'm interested in hearing them.

In other news I do have a picture all prettied up for the kodan entry but the wiki is currently thinking it is corrupt in some way so I'll try that again later. Please ignore the red link for the meantime. -- aspectacle  05:22, 6 December 2010 (UTC)

I'd like to see all selectable creature types go here. Including charmable animal. However, if this is meant to be more of a mechanic page rather than a lore page (most likely), then it should just be the creature type in mechanics.

Though if it becomes the former (a mechanic page), a lore version should be made to include all kinds of species.

P.S. the Devourer image needs to be changed. That's a minion that looks like a devourer. -- Konig/talk 19:12, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "selectable", Konig? Could you clarify for me? I've seen a rabbit killed in a demo video do you have any thoughts on where that would go (if anywhere)?

I'm still in two (or three) minds about what sort of level this is aimed at - I was thinking of being fairly inclusive. I think from a purely mechanical perspective the best listing we have so far is achievements - but I'm not 100% happy with that because it also splits on faction and organisational lines rather than species lines (and possibly isn't inclusive of all interesting species but at this stage it's impossible to tell). So Bandits are listed but it seems humans aren't, and Sons of Svanir and norn and Inquest and asura are the same. But then I can think of cases where the over-arching theme is possibly too general and you might want to split it out - say Undead where you might technically say there are clearly different types which might be worth noting here - the Ascalonian ghosts and Zhaitan's minions - and possibly others.

I know the devourer image is wrong. I've not got around to getting a screen grab of one from the videos. It is time consuming and the image always ends up looking like crap. :) -- aspectacle  21:45, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

I believe Konig points at the Water Bisons, Chickens, etc, in GW1 kind of beasts/animals. Selectable would be a non-scenery bestiary, whereas a lore Bestiary includes all races in the Guild Wars 2 bestiary. - Infinite - talk 22:06, 14 December 2010 (UTC)

By selectable, I mean those which are either able to be selected (highlight and click their names for direct targeting) or killable via AoE. In other words, actual NPCs as opposed to scenic creatures (like the dogs, cats, birds, chickens, fish, etc. of GW1 - note: I would count the shing jea cow as selectable).

As to the second part: I think that we should have both a mechanical and a lore based listing. Which one this would be is up to debate, though I'd prefer this name to be for lore based, and we can have a mechanic based name using the actual terminology of Anet. This page, along with its category, was made to settle the species v. race debate afterall, and not the species v. race v. creature type debate (even though merely using the mechanic name was suggested).

As for the case of "the over-arching theme is possibly too general and you might want to split it out" - I don't think this is necessary. That's more a case of gw1:Affiliation rather than a species/race/creature type. Also, ghosts are not undead (and I'm not sure Zhaitan's minions are "real" undead anyways - I think they're as close to undead as the branded are). -- Konig/talk 01:52, 15 December 2010 (UTC)

(Reset indent) I really liked the update, but this page has been left uncategorized - it was removed from the Bestiary category. Do you people oppose adding that category back? Erasculio 01:29, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Don't know why it was removed. It should be there. -- Konig/talk 02:32, 27 December 2010 (UTC)

Civilization spelled wrong for seer tidbit.. Reez 19:56 29, December 2010 (UTC)

Category tree

In the long discussion about reworking the wiki's entire category tree, it has been noticed that there is a small problem with the Bestiary: the Bestiary category does not follow the Bestiary article, so we have things in one but not in the other. I would like to fix that, with the following ideas:

• The Bestiary article is more important than the Bestiary category; as in, I would rather change the latter than take content from the former.
• We don't need 100% similarity between those two; as in, if we have a Giants category with a Jotun subcategory and an Ogre subcategory (just to give an example), the Bestiary article could have a Jotun entry and an Ogre entry, as opposed to being limited to only a Giant entry.
• We are aiming to document all kinds of creatures in the game in both of those pages (the article itself and the category).

I would like, then, to change the category tree of the Bestiary category so it documents everything in the Bestiary article, even if through the use of subcategories (see the Giant/Jotun example above). I'm rather sure we will only be able to finish the category tree here once the game is released and we know exactly what ArenaNet calls a Giant and a Jotun, for example (since they have different entries at the Slayer achievement), but we could make some changes to the category tree for better consistency.
I'm in doubt about what to do with the "Animals" category, though. I'm not fond of using that kind of real world Biology expression in the wiki (just as we deleted the old Reptiles category), although I'm sure it cannot be completely avoided (we will likely end with a Plants category and an Insects category). But Animals I find somewhat troubling - in the real world people keep forgetting it, but humans are animals (which is a good thing, I would rather be an animal than a fungus or a plant or one of the unicellular beings). We could use the world "animal" in the non scientific meaning of "everything that is an animal other than human beings", but then we would have problems, since lots of things in GW2 look like animals (the Kodan, all insects, centaurs, the list goes on). I would rather keep things in different categories (one for Bats, one for Fish and etc), but that leaves us with the issue of what to do with rabbits and other things which are not Pets, but are also not grouped elsewhere. Erasculio 10:44, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Before you go into a long "let me fix this" discussion, can you point out explicitly what's wrong? For your points:

• Content should be added to the later if they're not matching. Effectively, they should be acting the same, but where Bestiary is a list linking to articles, Category:Bestiary would be a list linking to categories. Their entries should, otherwise, be matching.
• Jotun and ogres may not be giants in GW2. They weren't in GW1, in fact. That example is bad and, imo, any sub-category grouping should wait until we can determine these things in the game.
• Regarding the animal category: That could probably go. Raptor will probably end up in a "dinosaur" category, and warthog... that one's tricky, actually. We cannot truly be certain about that category, but "Category:Animals" usually refers to non-hostile (or non-normally-hostile) creatures or pets. Technically, everything currently in the category:bestiary, except the ED minions, are "animals." So we should think of a new name for that category. In fact, those two could probably go into the bestiary category like Leviathan and Marmox, for now that is. IMO, this is the only thing needed to be discussed. -- Konig/talk 19:39, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Konig, I think you are one of the few people who can manage to sound you are disagreeing with someone when you are actually agreeing with him/her : P Regarding about what is explicitly wrong:

1. The category has an Animals entry which does not exist in the article (I agree with your point about it).
2. The article has a Bat entry which does not exist at the category.
3. The category has a Bosses entry which doesn't exist in the article (and which IMO shouldn't exist in the first place).
4. The category has a Corsair entry that doesn't exist in the article.
5. The article has a Fish entry that doesn't exist in the category.
6. The category has a Ghosts entry that doesn't exist in the article
7. The article has an Insect entry that doesn't exist in the category.
8. The category has a Forgotten entry that doesn't exist in the article.
9. The category has a Minions entry that doesn't exist in the article (and IMO shouldn't exist in the first place, either).
10. The category has a Moa entry that doesn't exist in the article (and IMO should be under pets).
11. The category has a Pets entry that doesn't exist in the article.
12. The category has a Spirits entry that doesn't exist in the article.
13. The article has a Spider entry that doesn't exist in the category (Spider Man would be happy to see how ArenaNet knows spiders are not insects).
14. The category has a Tengu entry that doesn't exist in the article.
15. The article has a Wind Rider entry that doesn't exist in the category.
16. The category has a Worms entry that doesn't exist in the article (and is likely a misspelling of Wurms).

And there are the two other issues: the category has a Dragons entry while the article has an Elder Dragons entry, and both don't have a proper way where to place the Elder Dragons' lieutenants. I would suggest either making a category for them, or a subcategory within the Elder Dragons category, or adding them to the Elder Dragons category directly. Erasculio 01:10, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

"you are one of the few people who can manage to sound you are disagreeing with someone when you are actually agreeing" It's a gift.

Anyways, for #'s 2, 5, 7, 13, and 15, along with Skelks (which you missed): I don't think we have enough information on them to make a page; no page means no category; no category means no sub-category under Bestiary. This will be fixed in time, and doesn't need any changing atm imo.

For #'s 3, 4, 9, and 11: Those are more mechanic things, and such should be removed from Bestiary, as it seems to be going the route of lore (see discussion here), however they have no place to be put for the time being and thus would be left abandoned - something I'd rather not see for now. So unless we go ahead with something akin to gw1:Category:Creature types, we can't do much on that unless we want them abandoned.

For #'s 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, and 16: They should be added.

Addemdum on #'s 6 and 12: These may be the same in-game in GW2, unlike in GW1. In fact, they could be merged right now due to the fact that its only lore articles in them.

For the note on #16: It's not a misspelling of wurm; see gw1:worm. They appear to be "cousin" races, one being large, one being larger. I wouldn't doubt that the "burrower" gw1:Behemoths were directly related to them as well. -- Konig/talk 03:27, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Corsair are members of an organization, ye? Also, bosses would suddenly go where? Pets would suddenly go where? Minions can go under Game Mechanics > Playable Professions > Necromancer > Minions in my proposal. I just need to know where to put bosses and pets, if they can't go in the bestiary. - Infinite - talk 03:41, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Pets, minions, and bosses are mechanics. The actual races of the pets would go into Bestiary; Corsairs are pirates (not really an organization, but indeed a faction), but are not a species/race, which is what the Bestiary is for. Their place in it can be argued for and I am not against, but I'd rather have them placed underneath something like Category:Organizations. At least, for a lore categorizing. For a mechanic categorizing, they'd probably fit more in something akin to gw1:Category:Affiliations. -- Konig/talk 04:09, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Gotcha! - Infinite - talk 04:12, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

EDIT: Moved Bosses into Game Mechanics, Pets are no longer in the bestiary as a category, Minions were also removed and moved under Necromancer and Corsair were put into Organizations, for the time being. Elder Dragons were removed as sub-category and are put into the Lore category. (Remember, they're only sorted this way in my proposal.) - Infinite - talk 04:20, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Why would Elder Dragons be moved into lore? 1) They're beasts, thus bestiary. 2) They're dragons, thus under Category:Dragons. There are more dragons than them (Glint), thus there's a need for the dragon category. Since the Bestiary is a lore categorization of the species (currently, at least), I think that should be a sub-category of Category:Lore, not the Elder Dragons' category. -- Konig/talk 05:42, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Because I forgot to commented on Erasculio's final points earlier: For the dragons bit: If there's a need for a "Dragon" article, then that will probably get added into the Bestiary article, since there is none, there's no need to list it. Not all dragons are Elder Dragons (albeit, the ED entry could probably go on the Bestiary article... but it is helpful to keep it). Regarding lieutenants: I would consider them to be part of the races that the dragons make (e.g., destroyers, branded, icebrood, and undead); for categorizing them, they'd probably go into an as-of-yet-unmade "<species> bosses" category (I personally don't see why there's [[:Category:Dragon bosses]] made atm - I vote for deleting that and removing Dragonspawn and the Shatterer, the later being added to "Category:Branded"). -- Konig/talk 05:46, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

There's still a Dragons bestiary on my proposal, only that category now haa Elder Dragons in it and I don't find it logical to put Elder Dragons as a sub-category to Dragons. Ergo, I kept Dragons in the bestiary and moved Elder Dragons into Lore. I also agree (as per my proposal) to not have any Bosses bestiary. As you said, the Shatterer can go into Branded (for the Bestiary) and can also be classified as a boss within a Bosses category. The difference is, the Bosses category would not be part of the bestiary, but rather in a category such as Game Mechanics. - Infinite - talk 14:32, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Regarding the Bosses and Minions category: we actually have today two categories for entities in the GW2 world, Bestiary and NPCs. The first is classifying beings based on what they are, the second is classifying beings based on what is the role within GW2; so Bob the human armorsmith would go at the Humans category in the Bestiary, but at the (already existing) Armorsmith category in the NPCs category. I would expect, then, Bosses to be a subcategory of the NPCs category, since "boss" is a role within the GW2 world. The same with minions; pets, in other hand, are a different issue. The beings which we currently group as pets should be somewhere in the Bestiary; but where do you people think they should go? We have just (apparently) agreed to not have an Animals category, so we are missing a place where to put bears, moas and etc; I think the best place for pets is to keep them as a category of beings within the Bestiary category. All of those could go into the Game Mechanics category, but then again in theory everything in the wiki mainspace could go into either the Game mechanics category or the Lore category.

...Which is why I would not like to move the Bestiary category into the Lore category. While that would be acceptable under a theorical point of view, I think we have to try to make the category tree simple (when that doesn't cause any issue) and avoid placing important categories hidden within layers and layers of subcategories. The Bestiary is IMO one of the most important categories in the mainspace, so I would expect it (together with the Professions category, by the way) to be a main category within the GW2 category.

Regarding the dragon lieutenants and the dragon categories: that's something a bit hard to discuss without spoiling the book, so I'll hidde the following in white text (highlight for Edge of Destiny spoilers): the thing is, not all champions are the exact same kind of being as their masters' minions. The Dragonspawn, for example, isn't an Icebrood; the easiest way of seeing that is how the Dragonspawn was actually attacked by the Icebrood minions, who were not hostile to each other, as soon as the champion lost its mind control powers; the Dragonspawn also doesn't share some of the Icebrood trais. Likewise, EoD reveals that Glint was Kralkatorrik's champion, yet she was never one of the Branded (who the wiki defines, anyway, as "the creatures that were corrupted by Kralkatorrik's flight south"). That's why I believe we need our own category for the Elder Dragons' lieutenants, instead of keeping them together with their masters' minions. Incidentally, that's also why I don't think we need a Dragons category; the only dragons we know to exist so far in GW2 (Glint, and maybe the Shatterer) were actually champions of the Elder Dragons, not creatures apart from them. Erasculio 15:52, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

I'm fine with putting bosses in the NPC category. Pets are a mechanic to the Ranger profession, ergo they go where they should. We shouldn't scratch an Animal category, just rename it to something more specific. Minions are like pets, a mechanic to Necromancer, ergo, they go there. Game mechanics are game mechanics, so the Professions aren't going anywhere higher up. Bestiary I'd rather see in Lore, as it's a Lore-oriented Bestiary, as per consensus. Also note, I never proposed to make the tree simple; I proposed to re-organize the tree into a shape where it is most logical and non-looping. We already simplified Policies into P&P; which works (for now), but we shouldn't over-simplify the category tree. Bestiary is part of lore (again, as per consensus), whereas professions are part of Game mechanics. They may be extremely important, but they don't reserve themselves their own category in the GW2 category. As per Bestiary, I'm trying to keep it as lore-oriented as possible. I am thinking of putting 2 basic categories on any species: Bestiary type (for instance Bat) and Function type (for instance Boss). In situations, we could even categorize their location, but I find that a step too far personally. Note that a Category is a minor detail and should not be primary reason for moving things. Whether the Bestiary is in Lore or in GW2, few will notice or even care when browsing. - Infinite - talk 16:06, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

(Reset indent) @Infinite: "I don't find it logical to put Elder Dragons as a sub-category to Dragons" I'm sorry, but why? Elder Dragons are dragons.
Regarding pets/animals: I think they should be merged until we can find a better name for the animal category, and the raptor article in the animals category should be moved to Bestiary until we have a better place to place it (like why Leviathan and the other two are there). As for the simplifying bit: I have no complaint about "over-simplifying" so long as things are correctly placed. But I'd keep out of the over-all discussion of that, as it doesn't influence me. And regarding the "putting 2 basic categories on any species" - I'd rather it either be three, or keep Bestiary a mix of lore and mechanics (assuming, of course, there is a slight difference between lore species and their creature type - if there is even such!). Too early to be 100% certain on these things, mind you.
@Erasculio: Regarding the dragons... I haven't read all of EoD so I cannot comment on the Dragonspawn bit, but regarding the rest... it seems logical to have them separate, I suppose. But do note that their not all lieutenants, and the only one called a lieutenant is of the same kind of creature. But I can see the argument of removing the dragon category... but should any other dragon from GW1 return... -- Konig/talk 19:37, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Well, I don't know, just not the Elder Dragon category in the bestiary. The actual Elder Dragons should go in Dragons of course. If my phrasing was unclear, it was not intended that way. - Infinite - talk 22:01, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Just a quick note (it's annoying to edit from cell phone): I'm not sure there was that strong a consensus to keep the Bestiary lore based. At the above section Aspectable mentioned how most entries here were from the Achievement list of creatures... I think that discussion will only really be finished once we figure out all ways in which we will document creatures here, including if we will have a third category for that or not. Happy New Year people : ) Erasculio 22:27, 31 December 2010 (UTC)

Happy New Year to you too, Eras. :)

I don't recall any agreement on this being a lore based listing either. Currently it is a mix of mechanic and lore. I think it would be a more natural fit outside of the lore category, because I think game mechanics will always play a part in how we decide how to group these things. For example, mechanics might help us decide whether worms and wurms should be grouped or not. But I'm not much bothered by the decision either way.

I agree that ranking and boss are mechanical. A branded lieutenant is still a branded.

Pets are interesting and our confusion about their change in mechanics for this game is reflected throughout the pages of creatures which can be pets. Drake is an uncharmable enemy but also a possible ranger ally in Guild Wars 2 - I don't think we've not captured this well yet. In general I think we should add creatures which can be pets to the bestiary. My first instinct is to add at the 12 over-arching pet type level, using mechanics to help guide the simplification of this. However, we've been told that bear as a type holds creatures which are 'bear-like' but not actually bears which could cause such a simplification to be problematic and confusing. In the meantime I will add creatures to the list as per those we have on the pets nav and we can refine the grouping later.

I'll change 'Elder Dragon' to 'Dragon' in the listing. Using Erasculio's listing I'll create pages for the achievement groups which I added to the page and add ghost, tengu, (have they been mentioned in a GW2 context?), spirit, forgotten and various pet types to the page. I'll try to start with everything on the page and then group and cull as we learn more. -- aspectacle  02:50, 4 January 2011 (UTC)

Abilities

Many NPC pages have "abilities" or "special abilities" listed. Is this an official term? Some seem to be actively used skills ("breathes fire"), but others seem to refer to passive abilities ("immune to poison"). What's the difference between the former and a monster skill? Many seem to be shared, so perhaps we should categorize them? Manifold 17:57, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

Technically, they're all akin to player skills, but we are only given descriptions. Skill would probably be better, but ability works too. There pretty much is no difference, except the "ability" is what we see when we click on the name - while monster skills are the actual actions (passive or not).

That is, all abilities are (generic descriptions of) skills, but not all monster skills are abilities. Konig/talk 18:07, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

I'd like to start a page for these, and individual pages for each ability showing which creatures have it and what exactly they mean, among other changes to pages, but it would be nice to know for sure what they're called first. I can't find any official usage of the term, and it's difficult to find if it's commonly accepted by the community, since it's such a generic word. Was it created on the wiki? I guess I'll work in userspace for now, anyway. Manifold 20:43, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

Jellyfish

Do jellyfish need a seperate entry here or are they considered fish? Ee 08:18, 2 April 2012 (UTC)

That'll depend on if they count towards the fish Slayer achievement, but I do believe they are considered fish. Konig/talk 02:33, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

Veterans

Consider this a request for discussion on a proposal to redirect Veteran pages to their base monster type and having any differences documented there. The number of Veteran pages is beginning to exit the 'few' category, and these monsters are by-and-large, from what I've seen, the same as a normal monster. (And even if not, I believe that it'd be more beneficial to document any differences in the base page.) Note that this isn't about deleting pages--the redirects are useful in themselves and maybe also for behind-the-scenes codiness--but more on the side of condensing information (in the same way as I believe the rune and jewel pages are heading). Thoughts? Redshift 10:54, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

What about creatures that are always veterans? Or always champions? Should the actual name you see in-game redirect to something without the title? I'm also very concerned about making it very clear to casual editors which versions appear where, under what circumstances, drop what, etc, so that such research is kept clear and doesn't become jumbled up. Manifold 15:01, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

About the "always veterans/champions" bit - King Adelbern is called as both Champion King Adelbern and King Adelbern - the NPC is given "champion" while in the discussion cinematic he's King Adelbern. We also already have some champions (I think they're champions mechanically at least) with just the root name: The Shatterer and Tequatl the Sunless. It's overall hard to determine the situation for this. I am really just thinking that champion/veteran is Anet's means of replacing the boss aura from GW1 (as I've said elsewhere).

Because of this, I am on the fence on whether they should be divided or not - I don't think category size is enough to merit it, and the boss categories in GW1 got pretty darn huge anyways (especially gw1:Category:Human bosses). So for now, I say "create pages for veterans and champions." We can merge latter on if we deem it necessary. Konig/talk 15:24, 3 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree that research and documentation should be kept clear, but I also do feel that Veteran documentation is simple enough to be considered for being on the base page. So far, I have not seen any creatures that are exclusively Veteran--this question stemmed in part from always seeing both versions. I'd like to reiterate that I'm certainly not against creation of pages for each, as I think that any such pages in either outcome would exist; I was just curious about the approach to content (whether redirect, or short pages that, in my opinion, create twice the amount of space to be maintained). As for Champions, I do feel that a separate page of content is warranted, as they, as Konig pointed out, have a number of distinguishing factors other than a name and greater stats. Redshift 11:52, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Maybe an additional section on each article (like 'Related Traits') named 'Veteran' or 'Champion'. Fictional example: Sea Scorpion > Veteran > +35% health, +20% damage, bleeds. Gnarf 12:13, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Here's what I can figure based on the BWE:

• The order of foe difficulty/ranking is as follows: Regular (no prefix) -> Veteran -> Champion -> <something I haven't seen a name for>
• Not all Veterans, Champions, and the last have prefixes! For instance, Countess Anise appears in game solely as "Anise" at all times but is a Veteran.
• How to tell if something is a veteran, champion, or the third one: Icon! All NPCs have a circular icon next to their name when selected (ally and foe). Veterans have a gold ring around said icon (such as Anise), Champion have a gold ring and two crossed swords, and the third (which I've only seen on Logan and Rytlock thus far) is a purple starburst with two crossed swords. I'm calling it legendary cuz Anet likes that word (what with all the "Legendary <something>" titles in GW1) so it most likely will end up that.
• The only difference I can tell between regular and veteran is slightly higher health, slightly higher damage, and occasionally an additional ability or two (those are fairly rare). Veterans are akin to the random bosses you find in explorable areas in GW1, tending to be around their own kind in a group, or tied to an event (quest). Champions have a hell of a lot higher health, do more damage (significantly but not greatly so unless tied to an event and a lot of folks around), and are almost always tied to dynamic events designed for groups (they may also appear in dungeons and personal stories - I wouldn't doubt it). The third one I don't really know due to it only including Rytlock and Logan from what I can find, and I haven't done enough personal story or any dungeon to see how it is affective - but it should be noted that Rytlock only appears in game as "Rytlock" (no tribune prefix or Brimstone suffix).
• There's another kind of foe - one I'm dubbing "gigantic boss". Thus far, this only includes the norn and charr tutorial end bosses, Shadow Behemoth, and from what I recall it would also include The Shatterer and Tequatl the Sunless. These are bosses which force the screen to back up (side note: the end event to the meta event The Frozen Maw does this too, but you don't actually fight what makes the screen back up :/ ), and along with this the icon for the boss when selecting the foe is not a circle but instead engulfs the health bar's upper part. With these guys you cannot attack the boss directly but must instead attack certain spots (marked with little red corsairs that change to yellow and a different shape when selected). They act like Champions in terms of health, but not really for damage, and with no prefix and having the unique icons it becomes impossible to be certain. Konig/talk 19:57, 29 April 2012 (UTC)

Found an NPC named "Legendary Defender" in WvW with the same icon as Logan and Rytlock (purple starburst with crossed swords). So looks like I was right on that one. Konig/talk 00:10, 30 April 2012 (UTC)

Based on these, do you feel that we could make Veteran pages redirect to the basic monster type? (And good call on the Legendary and spotting of differences.) Redshift 00:06, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Hard to say with it still in progress - with how some named NPCs do have the veteran/champion name, while others dont, it may be that Anet's renaming them to lose their champion/veteran name (for instance Champion Badazar's Champion was, thank Badazar, renamed to simply "Badazar's Champion" but has the icon for champions still). Since this isn't the case for all, and we have cases where at times the title comes and goes, I'm betting that in the end Anet will remove the title "Champion" and whatnot from uniquely named NPCs, leaving it to be figured out via the icon.

In turn, I have not found a single generically named veteran or champion that wasn't called a veteran or champion, and as such I think they're going to remain as such. In the end - no redirects necessary for uniquely named NPCs, while we could very well split the veterans and whatnot. Also, since there are some veterans who are uniquely named, but still with a generic name - e.g., I saw a "Veteran Dolyak Elder" and I haven't seen an Oakheart or Pinesole simply called such, they're all Veterans - I think there would be cases where the redirect would be the sole in-game case of the name rather than what the article would thus be actually named.

TL;DR Need more research, but my speculation is "lorical names=no prefix; generic-sounding names=prefix" (after all, we wouldn't merge gw1:Mursaat Necromancer (boss) into gw1:Mursaat Necromancer). Konig/talk 00:56, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I'm all for documenting things all on a page minus the champion/veteran prefix, even if the monster allways appears with the prefix. I see the prefixes as being just modifiers applied to the base creature, and documenting it would be little different from documenting 'enchanting' weapons in GW1. One page to describe how enchanting items are different, and then a note each time a weapon is or can be enchanting, without stopping to explain 'enchantments cast while using this weapon last 20% longer' each and every time. Do the same for champions and veterans. Torrenal 02:51, 17 June 2012 (UTC)

Level/area documentation

Hello. Though these might be in flux, it seems that creatures are being reused at different levels and in different regions/areas. Though the NPC box is an ideal for a one-off situation, I believe it's going to become a bit unwieldy and inelegant (for example: Ascalonian Fighter). Are there thoughts as to how to more clearly and simply document creature appearances/levels? Should they just be listed in the Known Locations subsection? Should they be listed as a level range (1-48) in the infobox? Should we be documenting the name of the whole region or just the sub-area in the region? Please discuss. Redshift 11:58, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

I completely agree with the infobox not being suitable to detail all possible spawns, and their levels, areas, abilities, events, times, personal story or not, etc. With the whole game scaled to you at level 80 I think people are going to want to know exactly where and when they can find an enemy of a particular level. I like the hierarchic locations section on GW1W, and think that could be adapted here. Manifold 16:10, 7 April 2012 (UTC)

Tengu

I guess we still don't have any official stuff about tengu? edit: I saw there will be some a town where they live Dominion of Winds and that we will be able to see them in maguma, but still no picture about them? Also, why aren't they in the bestiary? --The preceding unsigned comment was added by User:Lytalm (talk).

I think they're not there due to an oversight and should be added. Konig/talk 21:13, 19 April 2012 (UTC)

I agree so I just went ahead and added it. Made up that description so if it needs to be changed feel free. Tried to make it sound like the other descriptions. 04:19, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

I think that the original list just stuck to the monster groupings listed in the Slayer achievements, so yes, definitely room to grow. Thanks for including them. Redshift 10:20, 20 April 2012 (UTC)

Risen

Risen can be found in Kessex Hills, and like undead, can be different races. So far seen krait, asura, and sylvari. When defending a spot in Kessex, friendly NPC's were changed into Risen. They look more like a zombie version of the race than the undead shown under dragons control. Question is if they fall under Undead or not, making their own race tree? Kenrid 21:06, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Risen are Zhaitan's minions. As to their own race... Hard to say. We could put it here regardless of mechanics, as there are some non-risen undead too (and lorically speaking, icebrood and branded can be made from corpses). Konig/talk 21:53, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Being an undead is an attribute, not a race, though that can obviously differ largely from game mechanics point of view. Mediggo 22:05, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Being icebrood is an attribute, same with branded. Fortunately (unfortunately?), this article was designated to denote both lore and mechanical separations, and is not solely about races, I think. Konig/talk 22:14, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Could it be said that all corrupted minions of elder dragons are undead in a sense? They no longer possess qualities that can be considered as "living." Being corrupted effectively kills their "self" in the process, imo. Mediggo 22:19, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree Mediggo, they had to loose self to become the next thing. However, I'm inclined to say that undead as it is currently meant is probably too generic to be on this page. And if there are things called undead in the game it would become to specific to house the ascalon ghosts, and any other random no longer really living thing underneath it. But I think the level this page is aimed at still needs discussion and work. -- aspectacle  23:36, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

From a lore perspective, all risen are (non-conventional) undead (to our current knowledge!), but icebrood and branded can be both environment or living bodies being corrupted, and icebrood can also be non-conventional undead too. Though your argument of killing their "self" delves into whole views of life which are not really objective (when do you die? what is the self?) as those who are living and corrupted have shown to be their self mentally.... but with an added extreme fanaticism that makes them want to follow their respected dragon. Konig/talk 06:45, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

As I understand the lore, I think "thrall" (something fallen completely under the control of a more powerful being) would be a better description of the risen than "undead" (something once living that has died and been brought back to a semblance of life). —Dr Ishmael 14:13, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Technically, it's both. Konig/talk 19:31, 6 May 2012 (UTC)

Move to Species

Wouldn't this page be better named as "Species", like gw1:Species? I don't see how humans can be inside a bestiary, for example.--Lon-ami 15:38, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

To me, bestiary is capable of including more various creature types, especially ghosts, undead and that manner of transformed creatures (being an undead or a ghost is not a race or anything like that, it's a property). For example, branded or icebrood and such transformed creatures are not real "races" but are notably different from their original counterparts. The current "bestiary" also includes very specific individual creatures like the elder dragons or leviathan (which might refer to various large sea creatures instead of a single species) which would be hard to justify as a "race." Mediggo 17:48, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Bestiary was chosen through an extensive discussion as a means to combine what was, in GW1, effectively gw1:Creature type and gw1:Species. In terms of terminology, bestiary is a catalogue of different creatures - from a Tyrian perspective, humans fit that more than charr or asura do (being non-native to the world and all). Konig/talk 18:16, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

Inclusion of minors

I was scanning through Category:NPCs who needs race set and stumbled upon: Flame Legion Effigy, Lone Coyote, and Steam Ogre. I thought perhaps that Effigy, Coyote (or wild dog) and Machine (or GOLEM0 should be included as race? - Endeavor 14:34, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

I don't know what to do with the coyote, but 'Mechanical' or 'Machine' sounds good. This includes Golems, Steam Ogres and stuff. Gnarf 14:37, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

That's what I thought too! Coyote is rather lonely ---lone coyote (anyone? no? ok..) Same with Effigy or no? - Endeavor 14:53, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

The effigy is some kind of golem, so it fits to the mechanical category. Gnarf 14:57, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

Seems reasonable. :) I'll go ahead and include it. Mechanical - Endeavor 14:59, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

I realized that perhaps mechanical should be construct instead. I won't change it because I've already made the edits and I want opinion. Sorry for making the pages only to realize that there is a possibility that it could be different. - Endeavor 15:22, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

Elementals can also be constructs, so that's too general and less defined. Gnarf 15:26, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

Oh ok good. Phew thought I made a major mistake and get senior wikipedians all over my talk page. - Endeavor 15:27, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

I am fairly certain that Golem is its own set already, considering there are dozens of different golems in the game, and that the Steam Ogre (and Steamrider) are part of a completely different group - there is also a Steam Minotaur I saw during the BWE. Charr Effigy can be a number of things, and is fairly unique in the world of guild wars 2 as of what we've seen. Coyote is most likely part of canines. Konig/talk 16:10, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

For the Steamrider, Steam Ogre, and Steam Minotaur they could be placed under mechanical. It's a place to put them; I understand the golem part. The Charr Effigy could be placed (loosely albeit) into mechanical too. - Endeavor 16:14, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

It'd be a temporary name at best, but considering the game's coming out in 20 days (for those who have the headstart), a temporary name isn't that necessary. I think (note: not sure) that the steam creatures are referred to in game as... Steam creatures. So that might end up being their creature type, but again not sure and we probably shouldn't create it until we can go to Lornar's Pass where they're in mass. Konig/talk 16:19, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

You're 100% right. I just rushed the gun. Yeah, I'm excited for GW2, going to go down to Gamestop and get the preorder after work. I work as a DJ so Wikipedia gives me something to do. I'll wait for release to make further changes regarding races. - Endeavor 16:22, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

Sylvari Image

I noticed the Sylvari category has the image from the first artwork released of the Sylvari, which needs an update now that is definitely confirmed on the new appearance. I don't know if anyone is taking care of this or who would need to be told. Just thought I would say something. Gashu 00:07, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

Honestly, what bothers me a bit is that this page's images are mostly a unique image name (being labeled as "File:Bestiary <race>.jpg") instead of just using a pre-existing one which the image is a copy of... Konig/talk 05:01, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

I agree. It's just adding more files. I would try and change them, but I don't really want to step on anyone's toes. Just figured little things like this are easy to clean-up before release. Gashu 19:27, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

Personally, I'm probably going to wait about a month after release before doing anything major. For now, I'll probably just stick to renaming generically-named concept art images to their game name equivalent. But people don't tend to mind stepping on toes to make things better. Konig/talk 19:43, 17 August 2012 (UTC)

Separating playable races

Just a small visual change - how about splitting 5 playable races? That would make them more prominent, since they are "special" in the way that not only can be encountered (Various NPC, Sons of Svanirs, Flame Legion etc) but also can be choosen by a player to be played with.
—Faalagorn☎/✓ 20:05, 27 October 2012 (PDT).

Isn't that what playable races does already? We don't need to make them omgwtfsuperspecial on every instance of naming races. Disagree. Konig/talk 20:18, 27 October 2012 (PDT)

Maybe, but I'd feel it easier to find what I'm looking by separating some parts of the creates, seeing them separated at a quick glance. It also came to my mind that branded, icebrood, undead (risen specifically) and maybe steam creatures and destroyers are special in the way that they previously were a different race before being corrupted (or are assigned to it's non-corrupted equivalents). EDIT: And Ghosts, too. There are non-human ghosts as well.
—Faalagorn☎/✓ 20:27, 27 October 2012 (PDT).

I don't see a need to divide the list at all. If you know what you're searching for, you can search for them specifically (either in the search box or via ctrl+f). Destroyers are made from rock and lava - in mimicry of sentient races. Steam creatures are cyborgs, more or less, from a possible future. However, though they're former living creatures, icebrood, branded, and undead (including risen ofc) are their own "creature type" so to speak - they're no longer considered norn, human, or whatever. Think of it like a mutation. Regardless, mechanically they are of their own "creature type" and not of the other races'. Konig/talk 23:15, 27 October 2012 (PDT)

Missing creatures

There's few types of creatures I encountered that aren't included:

• Lieutenant Dragons, Champions dragons and other minor dragons (including Claw of Jormag, The Shatterer and Tequatl the Sunless)
• Most animals (including small critter - rats, frogs, raccoons, rabbits, deers, owls, ravens, lightning bugs. Salmoons are actually fishes, while Crabs are Shells so, there is no need to include these two) etc as well as bigger ones like dolyaks, moas, siamoths, wolves, lynxes, leopards, hyenas, pigs, boars/warthogs, bears, stags, jellyfishes, hyenas, dogs (like Krytan Drakehound, ...), fern hounds (they might be considered plant though)
• Halloween creatures (while Mummies and skeletons can be considered undead, candy elementals might be considered elementals, then I don't think that plastic spiders should be considered spiders)

—Faalagorn☎/✓ 20:22, 27 October 2012 (PDT).

Halloween creatures don't count as any creature type, at least in terms of the Daily Kill Variety - I was running around in the Labyrinth right after the reset and completed my Daily Kill Count achievement, but still had 0 for Variety. —Dr Ishmael 21:26, 27 October 2012 (PDT)

Dragon champions are icebrood, risen, and branded. "Dragon champion" itself is a title/position - like a military rank.

There really isn't any decent race page for mot of those "critters" - keep in mind that even standard NPCs can be a critter mechanically. When it comes to animals, the creature types I've seen seem to be "bovine/sheep" (dolyak, bull, sheep, ram, etc.), "deer" (deer and doe), and then the pets (bird, moa, boar, canine, feline, fish, jellyfish, shell). Though they aren't the same "species", that's the best we can do for those. I would consider fern hounds plants, despite mechanically being canines (it seems).

Mechanically, as Ishy said, Halloween creatures don't have a creature type, in lore however they're.... constructs I guess? Spirits? Hard to say, tbh. Konig/talk 22:56, 27 October 2012 (PDT)

Has anyone been able to determine what Gravelings fall under? Obviously they resemble skelk in both model and movements, but they don't count as skelk according to slayer achievement from what I've seen. If we determine they're in fact not skelk they need to be on this list, however, if they are, they need to be added to the skelk page. nevermind, they're ghosts apparently, although not sure how that works out :/ 71.68.238.112 18:45, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

Slayer counts affiliation/organization/army (whatever term you want to use) - all dungeons use a single affiliation each. Ascalonian Catacombs is ghosts, Twilight Arbor is Nightmare Court, etc. So their affiliation would be ghost, but their creature type might not be (they're most likely skelk, given their appearance and lore). Konig/talk 21:09, 21 January 2013 (UTC)

I have difficulty accepting that we classify creature based upon an outdated Slayer achievement. If anyone remains from this previous conversation - In the case that we are using the Slayer Achievement then Pocket Raptors couldn't be classified as Raptors as they do not effect the Raptor achievement. The Gravelings themselves are a species of creatures that consume ghosts - why would we classify them in the same "Genus/Species" section as their food source. If there are no arguements - since it appears that Gravelings were moved from the ghost sections already (cannot confirm, I simply do not seem them) I'd like to help out and start cleaning up this page specifically as it seems like a good way to classify data on groups of creatures and possibly even individuals down the line. By this I mean putting in work to create more pages and subpages to this already existing Beastiary - because frankly it appears to be all over the place using two different methods to classify rather than a single unified method.155.91.45.231 08:09, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Related pages

I was going to add "See Also" section to the article, but it seems to do weird things right now. Can someone look at it? There's also a list of pages that are related to the bestiary:

• Playable races
• Racial sympathy
• [[Organization]]s (from Category:Organizations - Bandits (incl. Separatists), Pirates, Inquest, Sons of Svanir and Nightmare Court are all included there)
• Pets
• Animal (though this page is poorly written)
• Monster rank

—Faalagorn☎/✓ 20:38, 27 October 2012 (PDT).

I wouldn't consider racial sympathy to be related at all. Animal is a falsely assumed creature type. Monster rank is also of little relevance. Pets are as well. Organizations, should a page ever be deemable, but that's more of what affiliation would be (as that's the wiki term for it - Category: Organizations was made for lore groups, not mechanical affiliations). Konig/talk 23:00, 27 October 2012 (PDT)

Missing "beasts"?

This page doesn't seem to follow any "pattern", that's why I'm asking before adding these:

• Basilisk (Classified as Drake for ingame purposes, but not a drake)
• Arctodus / Bear / Murellow
• Feline
• Pinipal
• Plated Behemoth
• Siamoth (Or Porcine)

Any ideas?--Lon-ami (talk) 13:02, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

In what sense are Basilisks not drakes? Because they don't have "Drake" in their name? I suspect Behemoths are too. The animals are a difficult case. They don't have any slayer achievement or slaying sigil, but we know there's a few types because of the daily kill variety. There's no official name for any of the groups, but they are often collectively called animals. Don't Dolyak belong to the same group as rams?

More broadly, the list seems to be purely biological, as there's no Nightmare Court or Inquest. If we're going to list Mursaat and Seers, we might as well list Human Gods, Spirits of the Wild, gargoyles, and every other unseen race. Manifold 16:46, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

Personally, I don't understand what is the current purpose. It's a strange mix of slayer achievements and whatever. I think the best route would be a species/organizations classification, covering the enemies by what makes them special, and not achievements or races, which is just confusing.--Lon-ami (talk) 21:07, 27 August 2013 (UTC)

As suggested, I took a "common-sense" approach (excluding organizations such as the Inquest, bandits, Flame Legion etc., since they are just special cases of species that are already listed), listing by (lore) species rather than the race in a technical sense, but Konig didn't like it so I guess we're stuck with the way it is. --Santax (talk · contribs) 00:26, 6 April 2014 (UTC)