DOTA 2 HERO LORE - THE TALES OF GONDAR THE
BOUNTY HUNTER
What is it about them? What is it that makes
these people killing for money so cool? Stranger
from oddworld, boba fett from star wars, zoro
from one piece, django and the man with no
name from spaghetti westerns - and this is
only to name a few from the top of my dome.
Everytime theres a bounty hunter character
in a franchise, theres just something about
them that is so… alluring. The mystery around
their origin, their melancholy mixed with
stoicicm, the deep, raspy voice of few words.
And Gondar the bounty hunter from the dota
universe is no exception.
He is playable in all 3 games set in the dota
universe, and as such his story is rich and
his adventures plenty, and they intertwine
with a lot of other heroes. We are going to
talk about all of it, from his dota 2 cosmetic
items, to artifact and underlords, but before
that lets quickly summarize who he is and
the origin of the character.
In dota 2, we learn that nobody knows exactly
who he is and how he was raised. Neither does
anyone know what he is. We, from observation
and careful examination of his forehead wrinkles
though, know that he is very likely an anthropomorphic
sphynx cat. If you wanna know more about other
furry humanoid heroes click the top right
corner. Some say he was abandoned as a kit,
which im guessing is short for kitten, and
the abandonment as a child made him have to
learn to hunt just to survive. There is also
a rumor that he was raised in a guild of thieves,
and trained by them to be stealthy, quick
and deadly. Another tale of his origin, which
in my opinion seems the most propable, is
that he was an orphan of war taken in by the
great soruq the hunter. And the weird language
gondar speaks sometimes, is likely the same
language he learned from Soruq to enchant
his weapons. Gondar would be raised into a
talented, capable bounty hunter as his disciple,
eventually reaching a terror-inducing legendary
status. As long as you pay enough, gondar
can track down and bring you ANYONE, dead
or alive. Though due to fame, he now thinks
prestige matters more than price. That being
said, gondars prices are so high that he makes
the same amount of money from one hunt, as
others can barely fathom to make in a life
time.
In artifact, he is hunting one particular
bounty, which is on dark willows head. I will
come back to this. In underlords, all we know
is o’nia the banished merchant from revtel
who may become a playable underlord in the
future, is relieved that as long as she pays
enough, gondars loyalty is guaranteed. We
also know from dota 2 and artifact, that he
likes to bet at the courier races of white
spire. He apparently cheats though. White
spire is where the underlords are battling
to take mama eebs place as the new lord of
the city.
Another thing to know about bounty, is that
he doesnt care about good or evil. Hes not
like the anti-hero type of bounty hunter that
hunts down bad people in specific, and behind
the facade of being a cold killer, there is
a heart and morals. Gondar will just hunt
whoever for the right price - even if its
someone good. Or at least, if there ever was
any good in him, the evil in the world has
suffocated all of it. He does not hide the
fact that he is cruel, and takes pleasure
in his work. He also respects shady characters,
like for example kwerthias. The king of slom
was known to be evil, and if my theory is
correct, the king of slom and kwerthias from
artifact are one and the same. That means
that bounty liking the merchant king, tells
us how bad gondar is - rather than how good
kwerthias is. Check my beastmaster video for
my theory about the king.
In dota 1 he has the model and dialogue of
the warcraft character akama. He is a draenei,
who similarily to dota 2 gondar, has an unknown
past. Its rumored he learned his exceptional
skills from a ninja, and his single motivator
for hunting bounties is the money. Dota 2
bounty is almost literally the same, except
with more story added.
Gondar has a few pop culture references in
his voice lines, like for example "No job
is too big, no fee is too big." from ghost
busters, "Dead or Alive you're coming with
me." From robocop, and "You can run but you
can't hide." from the movie Liar Liar.
Gondars design is very inspired by the spaghetti
western aesthetic, and he even has a set called
“hunter with no name”, which is a reference
to the iconic clint eastwood character man
with no name. But we learn that he is of an
unknown kind - likely meaning that hes from
far away. This combined with the name of some
of his abilities, like for example jinada
and shuriken, makes me think that his design
is also a homage to samurai films. Cowboy
meets shogun. Old samurai and italian western
films were very inspired by eachother, and
for some reason they just work and have similar
energy. If you like “the seven samurai”
from 1954, chances are youre probably also
going to like “the magnificent seven”
from 1960. Just look at tarantinos kill bill
for example, which definitely deliberately
mixes cowboy american culture with japanese
culture. Both in the story, characters, music
and setting. I dont know for sure if this
is the intention with dota 2s bounty hunter,
but its just such a classic, tasteful combination
that i dont believe its a coincidence. But
enough trivia, lets get back to his lore.
Before gondar became a bigboy celebrity, when
he was still learning from his master, soruq
the hunter, the two of them plus a second
disciple forged a sacred trust between one
another. Though no matter how close the three
were at the time, eventually the second disciple
betrayed them, and stole soruqs secrets to
share with the army of the infidel. One rumor
about bountys past we learn from his bio,
is that he was the one who took down soruq
the hunter - but this second disciple story
heavily implies that it was him who got their
master killed - not gondar. Because gondar
got enraged by the betrayal, and put aside
the bounty hunting to instead join the infidel
army so he could get revenge on the second
disciple.
Another one of his early mentors, was Tybara,
the master of single-strike execution. She
was an infamous hunter, who many favored if
they needed someone brought back alive, ironically
enough.
Other characters gondar respects in dota 2,
is “hunty” heroes like tidehunter, sniper
and drow, “Tidehunter, let us hunt together.”
and invisibility heroes like mirana, templar
assassin, nyx assassin, and of course, riki.
Especially riki. “Rikimaru, I didn't see
you join us.” “Riki, let's sneak up on
them together.” Riki and bounty seem to
have a rivalry between them, and they may
have had an unpleasant relationship in the
past. “Riki, I've always known you were
a backstabber.”
Of the many bounties he has tracked, some
are more legendary than others. We learn from
his dota bio that he tracked down the mad
tyrant king goff, who had gone into hiding,
and that he captured the legendary thief white
cape of highseat. These characters and places
may or may not be loosely inspired by joffrey
baratheon and highgarden of the a song of
ice and fire universe. Or game of thrones,
as the television series is called. He also
killed the crimson cut-throat, as requested
by the family of the criminals victims. This
was one of his most difficult jobs.
The desert biome is one gondar frequents,
and particularily the kingdom Qaldin. Qaldin
is in the scintillant waste, where a djinn
turned the sentient sands into sand king.
Bounty hunter may have killed a djinn. The
Qaldin assassins is an elusive faction, and
only the best of the best hunters can hope
to own their prestigous, luxurious black blades.
Gondar of course owns a set. Pangolier has
also been to qaldin, and likes their food.
Bounty hunter is part of the pangolin guild,
who hunts down pangolins for their valuable
scales. The brass herald of iron fog in particular,
may have requested gondar to specifically
hunt down pangolier. “I hope the Brass Herald
paid you enough to die.” To the west of
the scintilliant waste, the desert that contains
qaldin, you find the desert of misrule, where
lina was sent when her parents couldnt handle
her. To the far east though, there is an incredibly
hot place where both Lina and bounty hunter
has been. The people there worship the solar
goddess, which may be also tied to mirana.
Then theres the whole dark willow and meepo
ordeal, in revtel. Basically, dark willows
father is lord sunbreeze, who is one of the
three mighty merchant kings of revtel. Kwerthias
of slom, the brass herald of iron fog, and
lord sunbreeze who is presumably the leader
of the fairies. Bounty hunter loves working
with them, because the morals are so loose
in revtel, and theres a lot of money flowing
around. “Revtel is my favorite place to
do business. The morals are lose, but their
contracts are fair; whenever I took a job
from The Brass Herald, Lord Sunbreeze, or
Kwerthias I knew they'd make good. Kwerthias...
ya know, as a general rule you don't make
too many friends in my line of work but...
he was one of the good ones. I'm sorry he's
dead.” Mireska grew up in royalty, but didnt
like it. So she rebelled, stole her fathers
heirloom, and burned his estate down. For
this reason, lord sunbreeze hired bounty to
track her down. “I'm never going back to
Revtel, Gondar. Try to force me, and you're
a dead man.” “Lord Sunbreeze is willing
to pay handsomely to anyone who was able to
return his daughter to him alive... which
is somewhat unfortunate because 'Dead' is
significantly easier for me. Oh well, the
customer is always right. Looks like it's
time to hunt a fairy.” And judging by one
Artifact card art, he succeeded in capturing
her. But we dont have any evidence that he
has actually successfully delivered her to
her father. In fact, dark willows dota 2 voice
lines which refer to the artifact events in
past tense, suggest that she is free, and
doesnt mention anything about returning to
her father. So how did she escape? Well, every
shady character seems to know the meepos.
Gondar and them have worked together in the
past, “Hey Hunter! I took care of that thing
for ya.” And they are good friends with
dark willow. But in artifact, their story
is that they have a lot of debt and angry,
powerful people hunting them down for money
they owe, so to try and solve that they want
to save dark willow. So the plan is to wait
until bounty hunter captures her, then free
her, and then she will somehow help them.
The outcome of this is uncertain, but my current
theory is that gondar successfully captures
mireska, but then before he can deliver her
to her father, meepo saves her, and maybe
they even solve meepos problems. But this
would be a huge issue for bountys character,
as he prides himself in never missing a mark,
and the fact that theres no job he cant complete.
So thats it for gondar the bounty hunter,
and his fabled life. I love his aesthetic,
as it makes me nostalgic about strangers wrath.
I cant wait for snapfire to come out, to see
what she may add to his lore as well - if
they are connected at all. Thank you so much
for watching, and i hope to see you around!
PEACEEE
