The Krait. Savage by Nature or Savage by Reason?

They could be related in a similar manner to how, oh, humans and simians are related.

Which is to say, not necessarily closely enough that one would give the other special treatment, but there may be a common ancestor somewhere.

That said, my gut is telling me that the Krait are probably more likely to be related to the Forgotten. I can't really articulate why it thinks this, but it does. Possibly to do with:

1)The Krait and Forgotten sharing a preference for magic.

2) The mural of a serpent in Ascalon City that was believed to be a Forgotten... that has feathers and, in fact, looks very similar to a Devouss. (The species might be able to grow or not grow feathers according to the environment - certainly, the Forgotten do have flaps on their arms that could potentially have feathers attached to form wings)

3) The possibility that the Krait may be a population that was left behind or cut off and went savage when the Forgotten retreated to the Crystal Desert.

I didn't mean a krewe. A lost tribe of the Asura which split off from the Asura in the Depths a long time ago, because of unknown reasons.

Look, they could've come up there much earlier to build those structures. And the point is: the ruins found in 'O Brave New World' is in an underground cave with only one hole in the ceiling/roof. And we already know the fact that the Asura hate the open skies. Back to my theory. They were the first Asura in the Tarnished Coast and they might have built those pyramids, buildings, walls. And the pyramids found in CTC is the work of the Asura we can find in the present days. After they had been chased off by the Destroyers, they had no other choice but to build their structures and geomystic generators on open terrain, because they didn't find their ancestors' old home for the first time.

One thing is sure, whoever built those pyramids was hit by a catastrophe like I said before. Broken walls, shattered pyramids in deep pits, etc.

I don't know why don't you consider the Quetzal as a candidate. They are like all other Tengu and they can speak the Human language:

There's one big difference from the other Tengu: they were not harassed by other creatures for generations (from what we know) and they had the time to build those pyramids. What's more they are wearing Aztec clothes, so they could be related to the pyramids in form that the buildings are meso-american too.

And please don't treat me like an idiot, I'm only speculating like you guys, and I'm not English, so I can't make myself understood perfectly and that's the reason you sometimes misunderstand me.

There aren't Asuran tribes, ok, not a Krewe, but a small group that came to the surface.

Your theory has been thought by a lot of us, and it's considered the 'easy guess' of all of this. The GWEN Manuscripts clearly states that the Asura 'rebuilt' the ruins where they live now. Those found in the 'O Brave New World' quest are some that they just found, that they didn't 'recicled yet.

And as for your theory that it's more likely that it is Asura because it's in a cavern, well, Vlox's Falls isn't in a Cavern, Rata Sum isn't in a cavern and most of the ruins, bridges and stuff are in open field, directly hit by the sun.

Regarding the CTC, well, my bet is that the outpost was once aboveground.

And as for your idea that the ruins were hit by a catastrophe, it could've been the Cataclysm, as Leon stated, it affected the Tarnished Coast somehow.

Edit:

Krait aren't Tengu, you misunderstood.
And that has been discussed, we can see Quetzal architecture in the Verdant Cascades - no way they built the meso-american ruins.

Just to nitpick, two things:

1. A krewe would be the term of any Asuran group. As far as we know, they don't have any "tribes" or "clans" just one huge population and Krewes.
   
2. The pyramid is tilted, and the hole in the ceiling is roughly the size of said pyramid. It might be possible that just the pyramid fell through, so possible the ruin wasn't completely in the cave.

We see Queztal buildings in Verdant Cascades, they are simple huts made out of leaves and twigs (though they are most likely things from Utopia, as we can also see clothes line with human shaped and sized clothing). I have no idea why that are in Alzcia Tangle, as the two locations of them are in two completely separate areas with a different Tengu Clan between the two groups of Queztal. Something tells me that the Queztal group in the Tarnished Coast (since Verdant Cascades is not in the Tarnished Coast by lore means) must have not originated there, but have gotten there by some means of transportation (possibly through an Asura Gate like we did? Would make sense, especially they used it before the Great Destroyer incident - a group hunting or exploring goes through the gate *curiosity or following the pray* and then can't get back because the Asura start guarding it).

And I didn't mean to treat you like an idiot. But you only did just restate the initial "problem" about the ruins (along with the same models being used in the CTC which can only be Asuran) and you brought up an old theory which I myself agree with - that a group of Asura (wouldn't say tribe, maybe a large krewe) were part of an "explorer" group (or colonization group) and built the ruins in the Tarnished Coast, but eventually died out for some reason (most likely the Krait).

It's possible. Another possibility is that they will actually turn out to be a different tribe, but ANet didn't think it was worth the effort of distinguishing between the Quetzal in the Verdant Cascades and the *whatever* in Alcazia Tangle.

A third possibility is that the Quetzal once occupied a territory somewhere in between (Kryta, perhaps?) and have been displaced, with part of the population moving south and part moving north. The Caromi might have moved in later (possibly being responsible for scattering the Quetzal in the first place) - or maybe the Caromi were the ones who stayed behind and the name change is symbolic of something that happened since. (Maybe the Caromi were enslaved by the early Krytans, and since broke free from their enslavement - the period of enslavement may have caused them to lose the cultural heritage that they had as Quetzal forcing them to rebuild from the ground up. Or maybe 'Caromi', in Tengu, has connotations of determination and not giving up, in contrast to the Quetzal who allowed themselves to be pushed out and scattered.)

A fourth possibility is that the Quetzal are renegades or exiles among the Tengu, so communities of 'Quetzal' may not actually have any ties to one another, but simply appear where groups of exiled Tengu congregate.

Alternatively, it might be that the Tarnished Coast was where the Asura originated, from which they colonised the Depths and eventually abandoned the Coast altogether (whether by choice or forced by some disaster or invasion). When they got forced from the Depths by the Destroyers, they returned to a place where history or legend said they'd lived before (possibly believing that with their technology they'd be able to face whatever caused them to leave, and that it was better to go to a place where they knew Asura had survived in the past rather than going to a random location on the surface), essentially bringing history full circle.

The main problem with all of that is the distinct difference between the two Queztal groups and all others - aside from the bosses (which use two distinct Sensali skins). Caromi are yellow (as are Angchu and some Sensali), Sensali (those that are not the normal yellow) are blackish brown and resemble crows somewhat, Avicara are white, and Queztal are green with various other colors mixed in (like parrots).

I find that... unlikely, but possible. One would think there would be a mention of that - if they knew of the history there - instead, it is said that the ruins were not Asuran in-game and in the article on Asura. So, if those ruins are ancient asuras, there are two things which must be the case:

• The Asura do not know those ruins to be ancient asuran.
• And the event which kicked them into the Depths (forced or voulenteered) had to be a VERY long time ago, so long ago that their entire races' body has adapted to the underground, which (and I may be off) would be several generations if not at least around 500 AE - I would suspect even older, however, possibly around or before the time of the Exodus.

I was certainly thinking sometime at least as far back as the exodus myself.

Possibly, come to think on it, as a result of the fighting that came with the 'gift' of undivided magic.

True, although we don't know enough about Tengu biology to know how significant these differences are.

Unless they can change feather colour by choice (or by dye...) it does, however, suggest that if "Quetzal" does in fact mean something like 'renegade', that said renegade populations have been there for a while and aren't receiving any new exiles. Except, possibly, those bosses you mention.

Although now I've thought of yet another possibility - that the "Quetzal" in Alcazia do call themselves something different, but since they don't put up warning signs, the Asura have just been calling them "Quetzal" because that's the word they associate with Tengu. The weakness of that argument, however, is that Talon would logically be able to correct them.

They moved to protect door of komalie. Almost all prominent Mursaat except Lazarus were there. I do not think ring of fire islands were their homeland. (If yes how they appeared in the jungle where Saul was taken?). Ring of fire was rather the place they protected. There is no food, nothing. So after their defeat in prophecies campaign (in shiverpeaks which they invaded) and ring of fire they might have gone extinct. Which may explain why those ruins were deserted. They just moved with all their troops to ring of fire.

Regarding leaving a given place for no apparent reason I would point to the Maya culture. It is actually not very uncommon for the cultures just to disappear....

Come to think of it, based on what we know of the Mursaat, it wouldn't be too far to say that the race was a hostile and war-like race. We know they have a historic war (Mursaat vs Seer), and we know that it was the players which "nearly wiped out the Mursaat" (based on the Prophecies mission book). So unless that line meant wiped out the Mursaat in the continent of Tyria, that means most of their race were fighters. If that was the case, they wouldn't have need for non-war structures, or so I would think.

If the lines about our characters wiping out the Mursaat did mean the Mursaat on the continent of Tyria, then that means that those in Tyria were the military (or part of), which, again, would mean no non-war structures in Tyria. Thus again supporting against those Tarnished Coast structures as being Mursaat.

Hmm but then how they managed to intercept Saul? Was it just a pure accident? It would be much clearer if action of Sauls story took place somewhere next to Mursaat areas. For me it was like Mursaat were observing what is happening between humans and charr and then decided to intervene. Would they be able to do it if they were solely on ring of fire?
Mursaat could have used tarnished coast as a supply base. Ring of fire does not seem like their home to me since except one tree there is nothing growing there. Of course they could have some homeland somewhere else in the places we do not know yet.

I cannot see how Saul stumbling into a Mursaat City (remember: Saul found the Mursaat, not the other way around) wasn't a pure accident. And I never said anything about the Mursaat being solely on the Ring of Fire. I was actually using that as a con against the earlier theory that the structures in the Tarnished Coast are non-military strutures of the Mursaat by saying they might not even have non-military structures in Tyria.

I still say that the Mursaat either come from the area north of Kryta, or off the map (since the scaling of the world is "bad" - we do not know of the Maguuma/Tarnished Coast would be a 3 weeks carriage ride from Kryta.

That just means that archaeologists haven't pieced together the reason yet.

In fact, I think I remember hearing that the disappearance of the Maya had been solved (or at least that they had some very firm theories). The Hittites pretty much already has - there was a power struggle between the king and the top general, and the civilisation didn't survive the resulting civil war.

The Krait and Hylek must have some sort of truce going on, otherwise the xenophobic Krait would attack the Hylek on sight. If they are able to uphold some sort of pact with another species, it leads me to believe that they are capable of civilized construction of some sort.

Since they are found in areas almost adjacent to ruins, and have no apparent lodgings, it may be that they inhabited those areas once upon a time. I'm not so sure that they specifically built those areas, but since their evolutionary structure is so complex I take it that they have been around for quite some time.

Gah, thought I said that in here, but nah.
I stated in GWO that they must have some sort of 'you don't attack us, we won't attack you' relationship. And we already discussed that they Hyleks may be Krait 'slaves', as their always pushed back when we encounter both Krait and Hylek close to eachother.

The problem that resides there is that the Krait are discribed as:

They haven't - well, at least we don't know of any, and they do attack the Asura in explorables - any 'peace treaty' with the Asura; and have you seen how many Krait exist in Arbor Bay/Magus Stones? I don't have a clue in how did the Asura pushed them back to occupy where they once lived.

One interesting thing here is that when the Krait were first unveiled in an EOTN online preview, the description was exactly the same as it is in the Manuscripts... except that they were located in the Charr Homelands rather than the Tarnished Coast. It's possible that when ANet moved them, they simply changed the location in the description without thinking about whether the rest of the description still fit.

I've just found this in Linsey Murdock's User talk:

The Asuran modification can be seen on one my attached picture.
After all it can be Mursaat, so my first theories were not incorrect.
A highly doubt the Krait could build something like those pyramids. As you've already suggested the Krait have only one form which walks instead of slither: the Krait Necross. (The Arcanoss has legs but, it combines it's movement with its wings.) And they wouldn't build stairs if only one of their brethren/form uses its legs.

As Linsey stated the structures belonged to a civilization. The Krait don't seem to own one. They are just wandering the Tarnished Coast in bands and attacking any other creatures on sight.

The Krait are semi-intelligent, as stated in the Eye of the North Manuscripts. So they wouldn't be able to construct such magnificent pyramids.

IF they would have a civilization, then it could be found west of Magus Stones. And IF they would be well-organized (thus living in some form of society), then they could've eradicated the Asura already. Not just letting them walk around and building magic-sucking generators.

Now, it is clear that the buildings were not built by a "large krewe of Asura" (^^) because this civilization was there before them.

We've never seen Orrian structures, so it's possible that Orr colonized the area many years ago and the pyramids are their leftovers.

And it can be Seer too, because we've never seen Seer structures before. It's possible that their war with the Mursaat was fought on the Tarnished Coast, and the Mursaat have taken over these lands, after they've nearly destroyed the whole Seer civilization.

I'd vote for the Seer or the Mursaat, but it's my opinion.

I think what Linsey meant was that it could be any race's architecture. But of what we know, it's unlikely to be Mursaat - though still plausible.

Though I doubt the structures were built by the Krait, and I think they just occupy them, I wouldn't be so sure that the Necross is the only upright sect of Krait. There could be more "forms" we have not seen.

A civilization is defined in reality by having most, if not all, of a list of things:

• A writing system
• Structures (towns, cities)
• Social classes (slaves and non-slaves would suffice)
• Leadership
• Tools and specialized skills (usually meaning different people having different jobs, like some being farmers, others being blacksmiths, etc. - which also allows the use of less-essential jobs such as scholars)
• A shared religious belief

Of what we know (key word: we don't know everything on the Krait yet), they are semi-sentient at least, they could have social classes (assuming the Hylek are indeed slaves), they have no known leadership or tools, they do have specialized skills (different professions), and no known religious belief.

Therefore, not a civilization.

I'd beg to differ, semi-intelligent doesn't mean incapable of grandiose work.

Not necessarily, though if they had any form of urbanization (towns, cities), they most likely would be found in larger numbers west of Magus Stones, but if they were well-organized, that doesn't mean they'd have eradicated the Asura. It might be that they are less Xenophobic and more territorial. They kill any Asura or other groups in their territory, but avoid or respect those outside their territory. The Stone Summit were (humorously) the same - their "territory" was the Shiverpeaks, they never went outside of the Shiverpeak Mountains as far as we know.

Linsey said "preexisting architecture" not "non-asuran architecture." Could still be from a group of Asura before the current ones who were wiped out through a number of reasons.

I somehow doubt this. If this was the case, we'd most likely see such in Shards of Orr. Also, there is no mention of pyramids in Orrian structures. All we have is "white marble streets" and "spiral towers."

I vote for ancient Asuran, personally. I have a hunch on Seer architecture that we see in game. Though it currently is a "unknown origin" - but there are plausible hints of them being Seer. Though I'm still researching and it would take this thread way off topic, so *hush hush*.

Uhm...care to explain?

I don't think so. Just look at my attached picture. That tower-like stuff is the Asuran modification and the pyramid is what belonged to that civilization. They totally differ.
Now you could argue, that the pyramids are from an earlier age of Asuran architecture, and so that group of Asura built it after they left the other Asura. It's true, that we can find nearly the same structures in CTC, but Erff, from O Brave New world doesn't seem to recognize it and accept it that it was their architecture in the past.
Although, it is possible.

I was just theorizing that they might have colonized the area. And I don't think that it would be the case, but Linsey suggested three possible candidates and I was thinking about their architectures and reasons of how they could be related to the pyramids.

While the designs and decoration of the pyramids are most certainly incapable works of a race of low intelligence, size and simplistic designs we actually see is rather, possible, for decent intelligence. Semi-intelligent usually means almost to human (or common) intelligence standards. Almost, but not there. Thus, structures are easy, cutting blocks are easy, armor, weapons, and clothing are easy, basic designs like what we see (I cannot for the life of me remember the style name) is most possible among a semi-intelligent race.

I do see some differences, but in a place which has no Asuran affect we see those towers. The only thing we know has an Asuran affect upon are the floating generators.

The bold is where the biggest issue comes in. And is the biggest issue with the canon-ness of the structures.

An interesting thing to note: The structures in the depths (aside from in the CTC) are only those which have the more basic designs, the designs of the "towers" (as Thalador pointed out to be different) does not exist in the depths except at the CTC.

I think Linsey didn't suggest them as much as "toss them out there from the top of her head" - for all we know, she could have said druid, dredge, or Margonite, and people would think the same as you say. Point of that being that people take a dev's words for granted even if they were not serious suggestions to answers (those three are the least likely, two of which impossible, possibilities in which we have a lack of definite structures).

We've never directly seen them ingame, but we have hints.

Look in The Guild Wars Manuscripts. In it, on page 38, the history of Orr is told. On page 39 is a piece of art showing a view of Orr from the bottom of the sea. We see gigantic white structures with towers that strech high until obscured by the light of the sun coming through the surface. We see bridges stretching between the towers, and it appears these structures were built into/on top of strange rock structures. These were either caused by the cataclysm or, by the appearance of it being intentional, were just the natural topography of Orr.

It's possible (as all theories are in video game lore) that the ruins on the Tarnished Coast were built by Orrians, but it seems very highly unlikely.