Did Abaddon have a profession following?

He gained Dhumms god of death powers but water still belonged to Abaddon at the time. And as stated there is no sign of Dhumm ever having an element before being overthrown.

As for Chronomancers they probably borrowed from several gods like the Dervish, rather than worshipping one single god.Time Mage is hard to fit into Guild Wars but they probably had healing, speed buffs ect...which can be attributed to any one of the 5 gods. I dont recall artwork for a new god (and i doubt Anet were going to tell us there was actually a 7th god or at least i hope not) but i did see one called "God Monoloth".

As you said theres little info. So little info that we're not even sure they are gods. The Great Destroyer was made out to being some almighty godlike force by the Stone Summit and we all know how that ended up.

To me the Great Dwarf seems more like a powerful dwarf leader that became a little too powerful to just be considered a herioc dwarf. And if he had indeed fought the Great Destroyer once before (and apparantly knew it would return) then that throws my suspicions on his "god" status even further. And Menzies is never stated to be an actual god but i doubt he is just a mortal.

Do you mean this? Titled "God Floating Thing."

Personally, I'm starting to think the Great Destroyer we fought was not the "original" great destroyer, but a misconception of the dwarves (shame on Alkar). Just my personal theory, but I think one of two things, more likely, Abaddon (who's name means Destruction) was the Great Destroyer, and he in fact did return. Or, less likely and more linked to the dwarves, "Dragrimmar" and "Kathandrax" would be Great Dwarf/Great Destroyer, the locations are already opposites of each other, Dragrimmar being ice and Kathandrax being fire. Of course, this would have to go with the names being lost and the belief of the names being said bringing out the end of the world being folklore that was created over time due to the names being lost.

Just my personal theory because if the Ancient Dragons were around before any current race - as we are led to believe - than more than likely, the same would be said for their generals, giving a good prevention of the Great Dwarf and the currently known Great Destroyer having a battle.

Yeah thats the artwork.

And yes i also think there were two Great Destroyers but not in the way of Abaddon being the other - i believe there were two versions, the one the Great Dwarf fought and the one that we fought. Whereas the Dwarves seem to believe its a single entity of pure evil up until the final battle, it became obvious that the Great Destroyer only served as the "hive mind". So if it was Primordus's magic that brought it up once again, it was probably just the second version that took the place of the fallen first. If this is correct we should once again be seeing a Great Destroyer in the future.

This is kinda getting heavely off topic...probably deserves its on thread on "Great Destroyer/Great Dwarf" theories.

Menzies is Balthazar's half brother so he's at least a Demi-God. As for the Great Destroyer/Great Dwarf thing, I thought that the Great Dwarf was sent to defeat the Great Destroyer, like a Dwarven deity taking Dwarven form to fight the menace, i.e the Destroyers. Sorry, my bad, I'll stop going off topic.

Heres the twist. We dont know how the original 5 gods came about. And we know that a god can have his powers taken by a mortal only for the mortal to take the gods place. So imagine if a human managed to defeat a god and take his place. This new god would be known as Balthazar.......if he had a half brother then that half brother would still be human. Its unlikely this is how Balthazar came about but it is ArenaNet directing the story - they like to add twists like this.

So we cant be 100% sure Menzies is a demi god just because Balthazar is a god but when you think about it, you find yourself (or at least i find myself) putting him into the demi god catagory anyway.

The Great Dwarf was supposidly the creator of the Dwarves in Dwarven myths. Somewere down the line he came into contact with the Great Destroyer and defeated it. He wrote the Tome of the Rubicon with the prophecy that the Great Destroyer would return, and in battling it the Dwarves would be forever transformed (of course all of this came true in Eye of the North).

So exactly what he is in terms of a "god status" is unknown. But if the original myth is true then he wasnt just sent to destroy the Great Destroyer.

My own working theory is that the dwarves were made by the gods originally in their stone form as a counter to the Destroyers. The "Great Dwarf" may have been the way the gods (or possibly an individual god such as Balthazar) presented themselves to the dwarves, their leader, or possibly, as Jalis implies in the present day, the hive-consciousness of the stone dwarfs: "We are all the Great Dwarf now."

When the dragons went to sleep, the dwarfs were transformed to flesh and blood and granted the ability to reproduce since such a race would be less susceptible to attrition over the centuries - and may even grow in population - thus increasing the expected numbers of the army resulting from returning the dwarfs to stone.

It's possible that there is an artifact still in the world that could have returned them to flesh and blood, or even that the right ritual with the Hammer of the Great Dwarf could have achieved this. However, since this doesn't seem to have happened before GW2, it is likely that the remaining dwarf population is too small to be viable.

My thought on the matter (and an attempt at dragging the thought process back to the OT,) is that both Dervishes and Paragons are/were the professions of Abaddon. Dervishes and Paragons are native to Elona only. We do not see them (until EotN) anywhere else in Tyria. The lands that are closest historically and ideologically to Abaddon's reign are those of Elona. Fahranur has been discussed many times in this forum as a city devoted to the worship of Abaddon. Abaddon was struck down at the Mouth of Torment, a site that the ancient Elonian city of Morah was built to keep close eye on. While evidence of Abaddon worship has been seen in the other continents, and followers of Abaddon are found everywhere, such as the fortune teller in Cantha, nowhere is his presence most strongly felt than in the lands where he was struck down.

I'm aware that the Para and Derv professions were new items, and they're exclusive to Elona as a gameplay mechanic. It does stand to reason, however, that Elona is a land that is overall devoted to Abaddon, and the two professions exclusive and native to that land were the original devotees of Abaddon.




As an aside, what is with the fetish of spelling Abaddon Abbadon. Is this purposely done by ABBA fans? Curious :-p

I have both counterpoints and counter-counterpoints to that argument...

First counterpoint: We know where the centre of Abaddon-worship was - the Margonites of the Crystal Sea, now known as the Crystal Desert. Technically, this is neither Tyria nor Elona, but straddling the border between the two regions.

Counter-counterpoint: While the centre of Abaddon-worship was in the Crystal Desert, the majority of the opposition to Abaddon was from Tyria. It was King Doric of Ascalon that petitioned for the nerfing of Abaddon's gift, while Arah was the home of three of the gods. It is possible, even likely, that while the centre of Abaddon-worship was in the Crystal Sea, he had more influence in Elona - which was still closer to his own seat of power than Arah - than in Ascalon or Orr.

Second counterpoint: The Nightfall preorder disk actually gives some background lore on Paragons and Dervishes. From this info, Paragons are chosen by the gods - this implies that, regardless of what the statue benefits may be, no god has or has had a special monopoly on Paragons... however, this also means that the chosen of any deity may be a Paragon regardless of that deity's preferred profession. So, Abaddon will have Paragons, but they are not his special profession any more than they are Balthazar's or Dwayna's. Neither are they Kormir's, which perhaps explains why the Facet of Spirit appears as a Dervish when Kormir herself was a Paragon.

The Dervish, on the other hand, is a profession who's origin is known - they appeared during the Shattered Dynasty era, after the fall of the Primeval Kings and well after the fall of Abaddon.

Counter-counterpoint: Yet Abaddon's forces contain a significant number of Dervishes among them, while Assassins and Ritualists are quite rare. It is possible that the appearance of Dervishes was not new, but the revival of an older tradition.

Furthermore, we return to the fact that Kormir's draconic aspect is a Dervish. Why a Dervish, when ANet could have been even lazier and reused the Facet of Elements? Could this be the sign of an older relationship between the Dervish profession and Kormir's portfolio - a portfolio which was, after all, inherited from Abaddon?

LOL, good counter-counter points. =P

Anyway, I dunno if this next point is valid, but, the Envoy, http://wiki.guildwars.com/wiki/Messenger_Vetaura, used scythes in concept artwork , which was before the Nightfall campaign, and a melee AoE proffession, which, amazingly enough, *Cough cough*, I can't find the talk page for, was replaced by Assassins in Factions, leading me to believe that Abaddon and the Dervishes were a set all along and maybe A-net couldn't make both fit into actions so replaced it until they could make it fit in. Also, maybe Vetaura was a Dervish leader and when Abaddon fell the rest of his Dervishes were spared and Vetaura was cursed to become an Envoy as punishment for following (And fighting for?) Abaddon.

I will not argue with draxynnic because those are what I was going to say and more.

So at Nathaniel: while aoe was the original idea for assassins and not chaining. I do not think that Anet planned the dervish for Factions - it is possible. I think the scythe was added for the whole envoy of the dead feel (i.e., death incarnate, grim reaper, shepherd of the dead, all using scythes).

And I think that the influence of that particular envoy also had a scythe.

From my understanding, ANet originally planned out the chapters in trilogies, with the finale of each trilogy wrapping up the 'overplot' of the previous two. So I'd say it's quite likely that the Envoys' designs were influenced by what was being planned for Nightfall.

BIG SPOILER READ THORTH AND KNOW ALL


We know that the fortune teller which maddned Shiro was acctualy a servent of Abaddon. Also the Lich was a servent of Abbadon as well. So draxynnic's point is very valid. Nightfall covered the last two games and ended the story of Tyria for a while.

But, we dont know how the gods were made (being gods and all i wouldent think they would tell) BUT we do know how they came about to Tyria. All you gotta do is hang around pre-searing and read the text of the gods at all there statues.

We also know that when humanity was falling to the strength of other beings, the gods came down, and took the powers away, makeing them only able to use powers from two proffesions.

In the time, the gods made the earth and let it run to its self. Humanity was weakened, since the other races were able to be say Monk, Elementalist and Mesmer at the same time. Im just guessing humans lacked the body and/or spirit power to hold in the power. So the gods made a two proffesion system.

Its pretty much all in the manuals.

But as for the dwarfs, mabey the great dwarf was a envoy himself, so when a dwarf dies, there envoy could be the great dwarf him self.

But as for the gods comeing about, read it up in the pre searing.

What I meant was that the professions wasn't made fully. Afterall, there are evidences of a "Bard" profession that was meant for Factions. So Professions, which probably started out planned, constantly got changed.

Also, the scriptures are at any statue of the gods, and show how they appeared to their chosen to fist give their own magic (not widespread magic), not how they appeared on Tyria (they appeared at least 200 years prior with the Forgotten).

We do not know the status of humanity with magic, just that it caused much war, and Doric pleaded for the removal of magic. Nothing was ever stated about other races except that magic was given to them as well.

You take canon lore (which by the way is up in the Archives that is stickied) and add in unproven thoughts and call it canon.

Magic only became "elemental" when it was split up by the bloodstones after a plea to the gods from King Doric, to weaken it's power. And who was giving out most of that raw magic power, teaching the dark secrets to humans? Abbaddon. So Abbadon is the god of magicians, aka "elementalists", before their powers were split up into the seperate elements. (and he was then banished, etc. etc.)

The non-core professions are really add ons and it frankly doesn't matter which god they end up with. Abbadon was somehow part of the design plans of GW1 as shown by abbadon's mouth, there are 5 gods aligning perfectly with the other professions, abbadon was secretly involved with the 6th one (elementalists) before they likely decided that he wouldn't be part of the prophecies story.

I think you're getting confused between the four elements and the four types of magic seperated by the Bloodstones. Consider that it's still possible to make an Elementalist using all four elements (Master of Magic and Prismatic Armour even encourage it). What the Bloodstones do is enforce the limit of professions to just two, with each bloodstone being tied to a core spellcaster profession. (Ritualists existed before the gift of magic, and therefor would appear to be independant of the Bloodstone. Ranger supernatural powers are typically similar in behaviour to the Ritualists, albeit using nature spirits instead of those of dead ancestors, and are thus also likely independant.)

It's also worth noting that the primary/secondary thing isn't just limited to humanity - everyone is limited to two forms of magic. The warfare Doric sought to stop wasn't human-on-human, it was every-race-on-every-other-race. Seems it didn't stop the fighting itself, but it may have reduced the destruction involved.

That said, it's possible that if he hadn't been banished Abaddon would have given patronage to Elementalists and Dervishes as caster and fighter respectively, in a similar manner to Lyssa giving patronage to both Mesmers and Assassins.

Yeah you're probably right after going back and looking at it... for the longest time I had assumed that Elementalists were once "high" magicians that commanded awesome powers that defied elemental classification. (like, stopping time, turning an ocean into desert, etc.), and this power was diluted into 4 elemental forms via the bloodstone. Monks and necros could be considered "clerics" relying on divine powers instead of mages, while the mesmer is akin to a psionic/psychic type, IE not strictly magic users.

But the manual makes clear that you can still enjoy the same powers, but only by cooperation to get them all together. (smells symbolically of taking the old fighter-rogue-mage triumverate of RPG games, and then dividing the latter into four.) And while you can classify aggression-destruction-preservation-denial as air-fire-earth-water, ele-necro-monk-mesmer is definitely the better fit.

I'll still bet Abbadon or something like him was originally a representative of elementalists, but that clearly changed well before they started publishing game lore like the first manual - and therefore doesn't have much bearing on game lore.

Or there's always alternate theories like the 5 gods being derivative of the 5 colors of Magic: The Gathering, so the 6th ele profession just gets put somewhere inbetween, but I'm sure that kind of thing has been rehashed a million times before.

Dwayna = White
Melandru = Green
Balthazar = Red
Grenth = Black
Lyssa = Blue?

Eh, it works, although a direct translation would give Water and non-lightning Air to Lyssa, and lightning to Balthazar.

Yeah, best not link games to each other. But you can use the background and influence of other games as the background and influence of GW.

I think Elementalists were meant to be a jack-of-all-trades kind of deal, in relation to the gods of course - meaning that they worshiped all 6 gods *then 5*.

Abaddon for Water Magic
Dwayna for Air Magic
Balthazar for Fire Magic
Melandru for Earth Magic
Lyssa for Storage Energy
Grenth/Dhuum because all things eventually die, and when Dhuum was around, I would assume everyone would want to be on his good side to avoid torture.

Just a random through that occured, couldn't it be possible that a profession once existed when Abaddon was around, but was removed due to him being banished?

Yes. The Uber-Mage profession that could wield magic of all four disciplines simultaneously.

Otherwise... Not really. The impression I've always had is that members of a given profession don't have to be followers of the god that patronises that profession... the Charr being possibly the best example, followed by such things as monk followers of Lyssa. So Abaddon being banished doesn't mean the profession is no longer available. It may, however, mean that the profession is suppressed, possibly to be rediscovered later as an 'orphaned' profession...

...just like the Dervish may have, which, as previously noted, explains why Abaddon has dervishes where in generally accepted history the profession wasn't founded until after his imprisonment. It's even possible that the humility of the Dervishes towards the gods initially came from the knowledge that theirs was a profession that had been banned, and they were seeking to appease the Five Gods through their piety.

This got me thinking about something :

1.We know that Dhuum was killed and his port-folio was taken by grenth
2. We know Abbadon was imprisoned in the realm, his portfolio included truth/secret and sea.
3. From what I recall, Grenth is the god of frost, not exactly water.
4. All profession are tied to 1 god(...where to begin) or multiple gods(elementalist, Dervish)
5. Abbadon's port folio included truth, I think a mad souls hint he started like Kormir and later became god of secret (hypocrisy, corruption? I don't know).

The first three facts add up pretty well : what if Abbadon still had control over secret (there is no god of truth before nightfall. or secret god) and sea?
If you consider that Grenth is never explicitely (as far as I know) refered as water god and that water magic is actually more frost than water. Save for a few skill.

About his proffession, it could have disappeared when he was emprisonned, after all, Abbadon started to affect the outside world when his prison started to weaken. His proffession might have been a saillor/hydromancer class. I could think of a jack-of-all trade class that could fight well at sea, heal wound during travel, orientate itself (if that last on makes sense)

On the current classes, I'd go for paragon. They are leader and are close to super-human (I remember reading the elonian saw them as angels in human form, or blessed by the gods). The first follower was a paragon, Varesh "turn" into a spear-weilding margonite. As a (war)leader, the truth/secret portfolio fit well.
About paragons following Balthazar.
What if they were following both in equal measure?
What if the other gods were imitating or slowly taking abbadon's portfolio in his absence : grenth slowly taking water, Dwayna acting as leader/truth, paragon forgetting abbadon for complete Balthazar worship. Actually, paragon as a class under abbadon might have been more politic orriented (not saying that fits well in a game) than in-battle commander

EDIT : I know I am taking random facts to upgrade my theories but :
Ironically, Commander Varesh is somewhat a paragon, uses command-paragon-style skills, accept she follows abbadon. Ironically as an abbadon paragon she is pure order and no fighting (other than the lv30 body swigning spears, margonite status must give extra strenght) basically she lacks the most balthazarian part of paragons but has leader abilities.

Are you referring to the Apostate, who pointed out that there was another god before Abaddon?

Personally, I'm inclined to think that the main part of the portfolio of Abaddon and Kormir is knowledge, and they focussed on different parts. Likewise for water, with Abaddon focussing on the ocean and Grenth on the frozen form of water, but at the time Abaddon was cast down, for some reason they were only able to strip a portion of his power.

The second part makes sense.

Thank for the Apostate, somehow I always forget he exists.
Also, after checking the mad souls' lines :
All of those hint that Kormir shouldn't stay in the Realm of Torment. The first and last ones that Kormir could be tainted by the Realm. The first one even talks about a cycle. The port folio could very well indeed be knowledge, starting as truth and slowly corrupting to secret.

I think the "cycle" part refers to that all of the gods eventually will be killed and replaced. Overall, I think these quotes are meant to mean that Kormir will eventually become corrupted and attack the other gods - as could Grenth, Balthazar, and the others. As draxynnic once hypothesized, This was in response to me stating that over on GWO that people have been thinking Abaddon will return by taking over Kormir. (Thread name is "Abaddon is alive" - it can be found in the second post of the Archives *it's stickied* too busy to look it up now).

The Mad Soul dialogue looks more like random ramblings based on what they saw with Abaddon rather than a hint at the gods becoming corrupted. Infact all of the dialogue seems to point out that becoming a god is a curse rather than a blessing - the opposite to what some "sane" people would think. Razah demonstrates the same path of thinking with a comment about the gods not being able to take part in what they created.

Which actually ties in nicely to my theory - becoming a god is a curse because those that we know of that have supplanted a god (Grenth over Dhuum, Kormir over Abaddon, Abaddon over his predecessor) have, with the possible exception of Abaddon, done so because the previous deity was corrupted and needed to be replaced... and in the case of Abaddon, while we don't know much about his predecessor except that he had one, we do know Abaddon himself became corrupted.

Essentially, if the portfolio is open to be claimed, that's because it has in the past shown that it has the potential to corrupt the one who holds it - those that don't are still in the hands of those that originally held them, unless there were also cases of peaceful hand-offs in power in the past (we really need to get into the other god realms sometime ). Now, it's possible that a suitably strong-willed personality may be able to hold off the corrupting influence indefinitely and break the cycle - but as far as the Mad Soul knows, Kormir is just the next link in the chain.

And, if the possibility of Arachnia being Abaddon's predecessor is true, then his predecessor was evil.

It is also possible that one person may go insane, but not evilly insane. The corruption could be why the other gods have abandoned the world and don't show themselves even in the Rift. And why their avatars - which don't go insane - are what communicate with mortals.

Did Abaddon become corrupted though? if i remember correctly he and the gods had different ways of thinking (Keep magic vs get rid of magic) and in order to put his way of thinking over the other 5, he attacked them directly. That doesnt indicate corruption - all it shows is he was rather angry at his gift being rejected and thought he had a chance to correct this. He then lost the battle and was put away for a thousand years with only revenge in his mind.

So i'm not sure how we all came to the conclusion he was corrupted...it seems more like he was driven to madness by his imprisonment rather than a curse.

That is how we came to corruption. His imprisonment, not prior, did so.

Of course, it is also possible he was "evil" prior to his imprisonment - but that is more on theory than fact, as is him being "angry."

But that defies the point that was being made - that being a god is a curse. Abaddon only got to that stage because of his imprisonment, not due to a curse that he took on from the beginning of his run as a god.

So the theory:
New god -> Eventually becomes corrupted -> Someone supplants said god -> New God -> Repeat cycle

But in Abaddons case it was:

Beat god (Unknown if due to the god being evil or not) -> Abaddon becomes god -> Bloodstone crisis happens -> Gods vs Abaddon -> Imprisonment of Abaddon for 1000 years -> Failed revenge -> New god takes Abaddons place

The translated background lore on Abaddon vs the gods pretty much states that he was angry at their decision. So its not a theory.