#almorra

Favourite genre of ocs: OCs little accidents babies

-deep breath-

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH

For half an hour

My voice is gone.

Absolutely the difference between people who relate to Trahearne and people who don’t is LONELINESS, and being the weird kid, and being quiet and nerdy. But mostly loneliness. Normal people (as far as I know, since I’m not) are not super lonely. They have friends and acquaintances and such, even if they don’t see them super often or only online.

And, side note, not being able to see and interact with people (as during COVID lockdowns) is DIFFERENT from not having those people to exist in the first place. And a huge chunk of people I think don’t understand that. Like, in my personal life I have the opposite of those things. I have a huge family (eight siblings) and we all live in the same house (it is a big house, don’t worry), so I have PLENTY of actual human interaction and contact and talking to people and living my life, and lockdown couldn’t take that away.

Anyway: being on good terms and friendly with your family, that’s great and all, but there’s something… necessary about outside friendship. It’s a real problem when there’s no one OUTSIDE your family you can be friends with. No one you can be sure cares about you. And you’re trying to find friends, but, again, you’re also naturally the weird kid and also absolutely nerdy, and no one is quite sure what to make of you, and so you never do make any friends.

Enter Trahearne, who has that same situation, and is also, by the dictates of the story he’s in, your best friend.

I latched on to Trahearne initially because he died and because I had to kill him, which was horrible for me even though I couldn’t remember why I cared about him at the time. I knew the story said he was my friend and we’d spent the whole time trying to rescue him, and now I had to kill him, and that was Very Bad.

But I think I CONTINUED to obsess over him because, once I looked into the story as a whole, I related to him so hard. Yeah, he’s supposed to be your best friend, that’s his role in the story, you couldn’t not be his friend, but... if you distance yourself and say the Commander is just simply a faceless character, not your own self, and reframe it as reading a book where you’re purely an outside observer - Trahearne is still a compelling character to people who are truly lonely because he’s lonely, and for a lot of the same reasons, too, in a way that’s widely relatable to people who are lonely.

And his story arc about finding friendship and finally accomplishing his goals in life and even achieving more than he’d ever dreamed of, and finally dying for those people he’d come to care about - THAT’S relatable. That’s so fiercely something I want to happen to ME. That’s wish fulfilment right there. That’s living the dream. That’s skipping the lonely part and setting the story at the time where you finally find friendship.

And then you remember that, actually, he ALSO spent a full twenty-five years of loneliness first that the story never really bothers to explain, but that’s because - well, because the story says “he was alone for twenty-five years” and then it moves on so fast because you’re supposed to fill in the blank with your OWN experience. You’re supposed to relate to him SO much because the story is essentially saying “imagine yourself, all lonely, and then THIS happens” and it’s amazing? It’s what you’ve always wished for? And what’s not to like? I would love to have Trahearne’s situation, to have a real-life friend that I honestly cared about so much I’d die for, because I know - since I’m also the Commander - that the feeling is reciprocated. That relationship is almost a closed circuit in your head.

But also, the way the story gets you to relate to Trahearne so that it can build on your own experience that way? Leaving his past a blank slate so you can relate to him as hard as you need to? That’s - I mean that should be the high aim of all literature, honestly. To say “imagine yourself, in this particular area of life, and now imagine this new development!” This is my new philosophy: Literature is supposed to be fan-fiction of real life. And good literature can be fan-fiction of the life of anyone in the target audience (or broader), and the only requirement is that you suspend your disbelief in the details. It’s the feelings that really count, and in order to have those you need relatability.

But what if you DON’T have relatability? What if you’re not the target audience? What happens when you’re NOT a lonely person? You have friends, you have a social life, you’re fine. Trahearne then becomes offensive to you, because the story is treating him like he’s supposed to be you - like you’re supposed to relate to him, and you DON’T, and there’s this jarring disconnect, and you can’t even begin to comprehend why the story is treating him as someone who’s so important. And if you’re only playing for the story, well then, you leave, because it’s not your thing. But if you’re here for the game and the min-maxing and stats, and you’re playing the story for achieves, levels, and loot, well, you’re stuck, and you’re bitter, and now you’re a hater.

And that’s really the real tragedy here - not that Trahearne’s fate was shaped by haters, but that Trahearne’s fate was shaped by people for whom his story was not even intended in the first place. If the story was aimed at you and you hated it, that’s one thing; another thing entirely to count the opinion of people who are forced to be here as valid.

The story is and should be for the people who want to be here. In fact, everything should be only for the people who want to be there. I mean it’s even the philosophy behind our entire government - that in order to be valid you need the consent of the governed. I could write a whole essay on why school shouldn’t be mandatory, because if you don’t want to be there you won’t learn anything. The people who don’t want to be there shouldn’t shape the thing they’re part of.

The thing should be shaped by the people it’s designed for, otherwise you’ll get the people it’s designed for - the target audience, the marketing demographic, etc - you’ll get them up in arms and hating you, and nobody wants that. Everyone should be working towards peace. But that’s what we see with the GW2 fandom and Anet - the people who don’t want to be in the story complaining, and Anet listening to them and changing it, and the people who really care - the people for whom Trahearne’s story was written - WE are hurt.

I could do some meta-analysis on how this is a - to borrow a phrase from another fandom - another turning of the Wheel, that we’re lonely, that we’re the overlooked ones, the ignored ones, and we had this beautiful story lovingly crafted for us, knowing we’re quiet and don’t talk much and aren’t that confident talking in front of people - but now even that is yanked out of our hands by the people who manage to be louder, talk more and better and are good at enthusiastically expressing how much they care about everyone - except us lonely folks.

But - back to Trahearne - the story leaves out his backstory because that’s the key. All you need to know is that he was lonely. If there was more details we wouldn’t be able to relate so much. And yet, because we relate so hard, we desperately need and yearn for that very backstory. We want even further validation, because Anet has proven they know us extremely well, and we trust they’ll continue to deliver. Usually fans would get this fulfilment from sequels, but Trahearne is dead so there is no more going forward, only back. But his story is sort of dependent on that blank slate, so there really is nowhere else to go with him unless he comes back, and maybe that’s why nobody writes fic about Trahearne’s past, only about him not dying, or coming back - because his unexplored backstory is the cornerstone of the reason we care in the first place.

I used to be afraid that once I’d played all the missions Trahearne was in (back before I’d done all the sylvari missions) that I’d lose my obsession over him, that I’d stop caring because there was nothing more to learn. I’ve since found there was no danger of that, but it may have stemmed from the fact that, for me who mains a human character, playing the sylvari missions was delving into his backstory. And it was; but not too much. You gotta hand it to Anet, they’re good at this. I surrender my emotions to them every time I step into a story mission. I have to trust they’ll take care of my emotions properly.

Anet did everything so perfectly with Trahearne, coaxing you into trusting them, that not only was his death a shock, it was a betrayal of that trust. It wasn’t only that his death was wrong, it was that it was done so poorly, which again would be the subject of another post. His death wasn’t the problem.

I remember one day I logged in to play a story mission and I said to myself “I know I’m putting my emotions in Anet’s hands with this one” and that very mission was Darkrime Delves (I didn’t know that ahead of time) and it was a rollercoaster, it was brilliant, it was amazing; it brought me close to the edge of panic I’d once felt for Trahearne, and threaded through it all the knowledge Almorra was dying whether I did it or not, they had me fight it out, gave me the opportunity to die rather than kill my leader (but then, hey, you gotta come back and finish the fight - ) and then I didn’t have to kill her after all, Bangar came and killed her and stole all that anger and fear and terror and pointed it all at himself like a spotlight. It was a BRILLIANT handling of my emotions, an amazing catharsis for Trahearne’s death. And Trahearne’s death was just. hi. you win. you gotta kill him now and it was short and brutal and they didn’t even TRY. The dying isn’t the bad part (although I will hate Bangar until the end of my days). It’s how the dying is handled. I hate Bangar for Almorra’s death, but who do I hate for Trahearne’s death? Not Mordremoth. Not myself. No, Anet bears the full brunt of my anger for Trahearne’s death, because as the storytellers THEY were at fault for how it was handled.

--

Thank you friend! @moonlit-grove

Unfortunately I can not add read more's anymore so here you go.

Rosalus on Almorra

The start of their relationship was harsh. Rosalus was among the founders of the Vigil and he was not very happy to leave the leading position to her. Particularily because he used to be not very fond of being told what to do.

Though when the moment presented itself, she showed him off and proved once and for all to him that her experience from being raised into military among the Charr, made her a better leading candidate. (Until the Lion's Arch catastrophy)

She offered him the spot as her second, which he denied and suggested Laranthir whom he had known for a while by that point in time. However the cherry was gladly working under them.

However after the ordeal with the attack on LA and Trahearne stripping the order leaders of their authority to give orders in his name, he had lost quite a bit of respect. If the pact had not helped defend LA, a lot more people could have died than already did.

In the end, she was far from a bad person. Sometimes she.. was too focused on something she wanted, to notice something she was needed for.

Rosalus on Malyck

Rosalus was stationed in the Grove, when he was approached by firstborn Trahearne who had some concerning news. Being happy to get away from persuading saplings all day, he made his way to check on the rumors of the so called harbinger.

The moment he met Malyck, he felt something. He absolutely didn't know what but something.

And that something ended up becoming love. Which he only realized after Malyck was saved and bid his goodbye to find his own family.

After a stern talking-to from his friend Naomh and a letter to Laranthir stating he will be gone for a while, he set out to find the foreign Sylvari.

Something inside him told him to be there. Maybe a wyld hunt, maybe just intuition. They don't really know, but they don't care anymore either.

Rosalus loves Malyck. Deeply. He adores and cherishes him even if it can get a little unnerving at times when he's having trouble with understanding. But he's learning fast, so that was part of the past quite quickly, even though it still happens occasionally.

Oleander on Sariel

The short answer? He hates her.

The long one? He hates her with a passion. For causing his count so much trouble and headaches. And for being a pain in the ass in general.

Ooh, thank you! I put a lot of thought into them, thanks for noticing!

As for Laranthir, I'll admit I hadn't considered him for a study before because his story (he wants to find love) is so minimal AND severely underdeveloped. Also, aside from AB, I haven't played the HoT metas nearly enough to know his storyline there (if any; I don't know).

However, my personal opinion of Laranthir is very positive: he was a close enough friend to Almorra to help her out after she lost her warband, which is a definite plus in my opinion, and devoted enough to stick with her for the next decade as her Grand Warmaster (basically a career choice on his part).

If you're looking for good Laranthir content, I highly recommend @draw-you-coward's stories about his Vigil Commander, Roza, whom Laranthir basically one-on-one mentored for a while. He's excellently characterized and there's even a piece about him during IBS. (I also talked about him a bit in my 'I built it with my tears' alternate timeline idea in my Order mentor/Forgal post, if you haven't seen it yet.)

Speaking of what Laranthir's up to in IBS - and knowing that you're interested - I might do a study on him if we ever find out what he WAS doing during that time (personally, I hope he comes back and finally gets the ball rolling on murdering Bangar brutally, he's starting to feel like our last hope...) - that stuff is bound to give him some good character development.

hiding face in neck

👁👄👁  youre giving me an excuse to clean and publish this thing i had in my drafts heehoo

[set during vigil era]

~*~

Laranthir is back. He is back, and Roza’s days will be filled with sunlight once more.

“You’re going to trip,” Almorra tells him as they rush—walk, at a normal pace—to the courtyard. Roza, for the first time in his short but predominantly prudent life, ignores her.

Laranthir is there, patting down his horse—so they do exist—and chatting amiably with the stable hand. He brightens when he notices them, and Roza nearly glows a blushing lavender in the middle of the wretched day.

“He missed you,” is the first thing Almorra says when they reach him, unexpectedly.

Roza flushes, mortified. Laranthir, however, laughs, and smiles such a sweet smile it nearly banishes the crawling hunger in his stomach. (He has been waiting to have dinner until Laranthir’s return. He cannot it eat by himself—he would not defile their sacred ritual.)

“I missed him too,” Laranthir says warmly, his eyes too earnest—and Roza has done nothing to deserve this golden man. Nothing. Laranthir reaches forwards for—an embrace—which is. Which is.

Roza squeezes tightly, clinging hard enough to feel the life of Laranthir’s body, to smell the cedar permeating his armour. He has missed this, this warmth, so dearly. This past week he has been but a whisper without words to fill him out, a ghost without the lively, bloody beat of flesh. He presses his face into Laranthir’s neck, willing him shield him from the rest of the miserable world. He will not… tell him where his thoughts went to rot. Not now.

Laranthir seems to sense it regardless, because he tips Roza’s head with a hand at his cheek to see him better, and his eyes are full of worry. Later, Roza tries to convey. I will tell you. I do not want to ruin this moment.

“You're scheduled to meet with me this evening, I think,” Laranthir says, and if it is a lie it is one Roza is grateful for. “For now, I need some help getting things sorted. Come.”

“You can start by telling me your report.” Almorra crosses her arms. “Things went to hell without you, so it had better be good.”

Laranthir laughs, and Almorra bares that fanged smile of hers, and Roza wants another hug. But he does not ask for it, and instead obediently takes Laranthir’s things and falls into step behind him. Here, in this small, temporary space, he is safe. He is wanted.