# Forum > Gaming > Gaming (Other) >  The Elder Scrolls: The XVII Princes of Oblivion

## Mark Hall

Welcome, one and all, to the latest thread for us to discuss, debate, and rag on our favorite series of Bethesda RPGs!


Previous threads:
Who's excited for Skyrim?Skyrim II: A Dragon A Day Keeps The Draugr At Bay.Skyrim III: Get rich selling protective knee gear!Skyrim IV: OblivionSkyrim V: SkyrimSkyrim Thread VI: Dov Riders, AWAY!The Elder Scrolls VII: Do you believe in mod?The Elder Scrolls: By the VIII DivinesIt's the IX Divines You milk drinker!The Elder Scrolls X:  Thalmor Or LessWouldn't Want to Be ElsweyerTwelve Worlds of CreationThe Elder Scrolls XIII: Born Under a Certain SignThe Elder Scrolls XIV: Good? Bad? I'm the one with the Thu'um!The Elder Scrolls XV: This is my Thu'um stick!The Elder Scrolls XVI: Sworn to Carry Your Burdens

*Handy things For Skyrim*:
Official forums
Perk calculator
Some things you need to know about Skyrim
The Wiki


Have at it!

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

Carrying on from the last thread...




> Whirlwind Sprint is there to allow you to carry 75,000 pounds of crap out of every dungeon.


Absolutely this. Horses are good for this too, pity they die so easily.  :Small Frown: 

For Elder Scrolls 6 I hope we get a 'summon horse' spell in the vanilla game.

----------


## halfeye

> For Elder Scrolls 6 I hope we get a 'summon horse' spell in the vanilla game.


That reminds me, is there a bound bow spell? There are bound swords and I think spears, but if the book for bows exists, what's his name in Whiterun doesn't have it.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> That reminds me, is there a bound bow spell? There are bound swords and I think spears, but if the book for bows exists, what's his name in Whiterun doesn't have it.


*checks* The wiki says there is, but it's Adept level so it might not be showing up if you're low level.

----------


## Taevyr

There's an adept-level Bound Bow with Bound arrows included, a novice Bound Sword, and an apprentice Bound Battleaxe spell in the base game, if I remember correctly. One of the expansions (Dawnguard, I think) adds a novice Bound Dagger as well.

Had a conjurer/illusionist that exclusively used bound weaponry, and that bow's probably the best one in the game when you add in the bound weapon perks.

----------


## Rynjin

I believe you can only get Bound Bow from a specific bandit camp or something.

Looking into it, no apparently there is a guaranteed drop in Fort Amol (which is where I typically get it), but a few merchants do sell it: Calcelmo (Markarth), Phinis Gestor (Mage's College), and Falion (Morthal).

----------


## Arutema

> I believe you can only get Bound Bow from a specific bandit camp or something.
> 
> Looking into it, no apparently there is a guaranteed drop in Fort Amol (which is where I typically get it), but a few merchants do sell it: Calcelmo (Markarth), Phinis Gestor (Mage's College), and Falion (Morthal).


IIRC, as it's an Adept-level spell, they'll only sell it once you hit 40 in conjuration though.

----------


## Lurkmoar

You can find a Bound Bow Book in a Fort Amol. It's on the top most level, hidden in a bucket, under a lamp.

----------


## Triaxx

I was very surprised to learn the various court mages actually had specialties. And yes I'll agree the mechanics get samey but they're easily nodded. And the same for exploration. I want to give beyond Skyrim Bruma a shot sometime along with Wyrmstooth which is supposed to be amazing.

----------


## DigoDragon

One of the mods I'm trying out adds khajiit children to the caravans, and it's adorable watching one of those little ankle-biters chase down a bandit.  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Rater202

> One of the mods I'm trying out adds khajiit children to the caravans, and it's adorable watching one of those little ankle-biters chase down a bandit.


Aww.

There really should be more children in Skyrim...

At the very least, more variety in the models used for children. I'm pretty sure there's only one boy and one girl model.

----------


## mjp1050

> At the very least, more variety in the models used for children. I'm pretty sure there's only one boy and one girl model.


Aaah, the perks of 8 gigabytes of storage on DVDs. 

The Xbox 360 did a lot of great things, but this one did not age well.

----------


## Silverraptor

> Carrying on from the last thread...
> 
> 
> 
> Absolutely this. Horses are good for this too, pity they die so easily. 
> 
> For Elder Scrolls 6 I hope we get a 'summon horse' spell in the vanilla game.


Also me at the end of last thread.




> Yes there is. Back when I didn't know what dwarven stuff was good for smelting down into dwarven ingots (And back where dwarven bows only cost the dwarven ingots and no iron) I would dive into a lot of dwarven ruins, mainly the southern mountains below riften. Turns out, it doesn't matter how encumbered you are, you can still sprint across the landscape as a werewolf. So I would Whirlwind sprint through the dungeon until I was able to get out from my spelunking. Then I would leave, turn into a werewolf, and sprint across the landscape ignoring everything that came for me. And strangely, in mountain pass that is south of the throat of the world, there was a ranger?/hunter? that had a horse camping out there. Well I killed him early on as a werewolf and he did not respawn, but it was always around that time my werewolf time ran out and I turned back to normal. And wouldn't you know it, but horses also can sprint still despite how encumbered you were. So I ended up stealing his horse and riding the second half back to whiterun. And then when I dismounted at the gates of whiterun, the horse would turn around and walk back to the same place, so it worked out great for me!

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Aww.
> 
> There really should be more children in Skyrim...
> 
> At the very least, more variety in the models used for children. I'm pretty sure there's only one boy and one girl model.


Second this. And more detailed ones. They all look like Attack of the Dough-faced Oblivion NPCs as-is.

And while were on the subject, more variety for the monster models too. Its weird that all the bandits have a variety of hair color, hair styles, and facial markings, but all the wolves, trolls, etc. are clones of one another. If you see a wolf with a different color of fur its because its a different species of wolf.

----------


## Fyraltari

I wouldn't mind non-human children too.

----------


## Triaxx

100% not what Dragonborn means.

----------


## Keltest

I'd like to see some more non-human children just so the cultures are forced to actually accommodate them. cough orcs cough.

----------


## Lurkmoar

TES 6 question:

Would you like to see Attributes back, keep it like the Perk system in Skyrim or Hybridize it?

I don't miss Speed from Oblivion for instance when I played a heavy Orc warrior...

----------


## Mark Hall

> Absolutely this. Horses are good for this too, pity they die so easily.


Arvak is the GOAT.

----------


## Glimbur

> TES 6 question:
> 
> Would you like to see Attributes back, keep it like the Perk system in Skyrim or Hybridize it?
> 
> I don't miss Speed from Oblivion for instance when I played a heavy Orc warrior...


Not gonna lie, it was annoying trying to maximize my gains to attributes in Morrowind. The Perk system works ok, but it does mean characters are a bit more same-y.  Not sure how you thread the needle between the two, I would keep the perks + hp/stamina/magic approach Skyrim has. Good enough.

----------


## Keltest

I'd like to see attributes back, but with a better system for increasing them.

----------


## Rater202

> TES 6 question:
> 
> Would you like to see Attributes back, keep it like the Perk system in Skyrim or Hybridize it?
> 
> I don't miss Speed from Oblivion for instance when I played a heavy Orc warrior...


Honestly, I woulnd't mind doing something similar to what they did in Fallout 4.

Just... List out the various skills and put a huge list of perks under each one. Every time you level up you can boost a skill or take a perk, you get XP for killing enemies, exploring the world, completing quests, crafting stuff(with Skyrim's level of focus in crafting, not FO4's) and so on.

And the level cap is nonexistent or so high that if you _wanted to_, you could eventually become a master of everything, but encounters are scaled so that you don't _have_ to.

I'm not sure how Health, Magicka, and Stamina would be handled under this system... Maybe make them "skills" with their own set of perks? Or tie them to the total score of the "warrior," "mage," and "thief" skills respectively.

----------


## Vinyadan

I kinda liked the perk system in Skyrim, but I think that certain skills really need to work some other way. Smithing in particular was just grinding. I think that such skills shouldn't be actual 1-100 skills, but instead just perk trees, maybe with a charlevel-dependent unlocking system (you need to have reached a certain level to unlock e.g. steel armour).

 I think that it would be good also because you don't need to craft that many weapons and armour parts for yourself. When you get a perk, you improve what you have or create something new and that's it for a few levels, instead of creating hundreds of daggers (which I guess you could still do, for example for trading, but you wouldn't _need_ to).

----------


## factotum

> The Perk system works ok, but it does mean characters are a bit more same-y.


I wouldn't say that. A character built as a stealth archer will play significantly differently from one built as a two-handed berserker even with the perk system as is. If there's an issue it's that combat in Skyrim really isn't complex enough to make a huge variety of characters--it comes down to archery, magery or swordery (yes, I know that's not a word!). That, plus things like the entire Lockpicking skill tree being largely useless, reduces the variety somewhat.

----------


## Rater202

> instead of creating hundreds of daggers


For my smithing characters it was rings.

I would join the Companions, then run off and explore in certain areas a couple of quests to get the transmutation spell and unlock a couple of gold, silver, and iron mines on the map.

I'd fast travel, fill my inventory with various ores, transmute them till all I had was gold, then forge gold rings and sell them to every merchant who'd by them from me. If I raised any given involved skill enough to level up, I'd immediately run for Kodlack and spend money on Blackmsith training till either I hit my training limit for that level.

Then wait until the mines respawned and start again.

I also did the quests to join the Orc Strongholds and cleared got the one with the Ebony mine on my map so once I got to Blacksmithing 100 I could easily forge and upgrade a set of Deadric Armor.

Nothng makes you feel as invincible as running around with a maxed-out armor ranking and the best possible unenchanted weapon for your preferred fighting style when the NPC enemies are still using iron.

----------


## halfeye

> TES 6 question:
> 
> Would you like to see Attributes back, keep it like the Perk system in Skyrim or Hybridize it?
> 
> I don't miss Speed from Oblivion for instance when I played a heavy Orc warrior...


The thing I most miss from Oblivion is spellcasting. In Skyrim you need a free hand, and there's only one light spell  which doesn't last long (there's that cast a ball of light thing, but it lasts about the same time, and you still need a free hand), so you are forever changing weapons to get a free hand, casting light, changing back to the bow (obviously), running out of light, swapping weapons and so on. In Oblivion, you had a cast spell key, it didn't matter whether you had a hand free, and there were five light spells, the first was awful, but the last really lit things up, lasted for a useful length of time and you didn't need to change weapons to cast it again. Changing weapons to heal yourself is also a big drag for me.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> I'd fast travel, fill my inventory with various ores, transmute them till all I had was gold, then forge gold rings and sell them to every merchant who'd by them from me. If I raised any given involved skill enough to level up, I'd immediately run for Kodlack and spend money on Blackmsith training till either I hit my training limit for that level.


I think you meant Eorlund, Kodlak is the faction leader, not the master blacksmith. 

My favorite place to get iron early game is Halted Steam Camp and Embershard Mine. Fairly close to Whiterun, and it's easy to get Breezehome unless you're doing a no-dragon run. Actually, you could... forgot you just need to return the Dragonstone, not clear the tower.

----------


## Keltest

> The thing I most miss from Oblivion is spellcasting. In Skyrim you need a free hand, and there's only one light spell  which doesn't last long (there's that cast a ball of light thing, but it lasts about the same time, and you still need a free hand), so you are forever changing weapons to get a free hand, casting light, changing back to the bow (obviously), running out of light, swapping weapons and so on. In Oblivion, you had a cast spell key, it didn't matter whether you had a hand free, and there were five light spells, the first was awful, but the last really lit things up, lasted for a useful length of time and you didn't need to change weapons to cast it again. Changing weapons to heal yourself is also a big drag for me.


Agreed. I could handle it being like Morrowind where you can switch between an active spell set and an active weapon set with a single button pretty handily. But the favorites menu is just too cumbersome i think to have weapons and shouts and spells all on it at once.

----------


## Rater202

> I think you meant Eorlund, Kodlak is the faction leader, not the master blacksmith. 
> 
> My favorite place to get iron early game is Halted Steam Camp and Embershard Mine. Fairly close to Whiterun, and it's easy to get Breezehome unless you're doing a no-dragon run. Actually, you could... forgot you just need to return the Dragonstone, not clear the tower.


Yeah, Eorlund,.

It's been a while since I've actually played.

----------


## halfeye

> Agreed. I could handle it being like Morrowind where you can switch between an active spell set and an active weapon set with a single button pretty handily. But the favorites menu is just too cumbersome i think to have weapons and shouts and spells all on it at once.


Favourites? That reminds me, I hate it when the draguar (Deathlords?) disarm you and when you pick the weapon up again, it's gone from your favourites menu, and you have to set it up again. The spells business is still more annoying though, because it happens more often.

----------


## Vinyadan

> The thing I most miss from Oblivion is spellcasting. In Skyrim you need a free hand, and there's only one light spell  which doesn't last long (there's that cast a ball of light thing, but it lasts about the same time, and you still need a free hand), so you are forever changing weapons to get a free hand, casting light, changing back to the bow (obviously), running out of light, swapping weapons and so on. In Oblivion, you had a cast spell key, it didn't matter whether you had a hand free, and there were five light spells, the first was awful, but the last really lit things up, lasted for a useful length of time and you didn't need to change weapons to cast it again. Changing weapons to heal yourself is also a big drag for me.


A problem with Oblivion spells I have noticed when trying to pick it up again was that you could spend fights just blocking with your shield while you waited for magicka to load, because spells were so effective that swords felt like a waste of time. It isn't a fun way of fighting.

Spells on self, however, could really use such a system. I think they didn't really remove it, as much as moved it to dragon shouts.

I actually modded the Skyrim on-self light spell to last something like 10 minutes. It costs much more magicka to cast, but I did it at high levels, so it's OK. It wasn't really a choice, I generally didn't bother with light sources, but they became necessary after installing a realistic lighting mod, and I really like the results.

----------


## Resileaf

> I wouldn't say that. A character built as a stealth archer will play significantly differently from one built as a two-handed berserker even with the perk system as is. If there's an issue it's that combat in Skyrim really isn't complex enough to make a huge variety of characters--it comes down to archery, magery or swordery (yes, I know that's not a word!). That, plus things like the entire Lockpicking skill tree being largely useless, reduces the variety somewhat.


Until you start playing all your characters as a stealth archer because it's that effective.  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Caelestion

> Agreed. I could handle it being like Morrowind where you can switch between an active spell set and an active weapon set with a single button pretty handily. But the favorites menu is just too cumbersome i think to have weapons and shouts and spells all on it at once.


The Customised Favourites Menu mod was a godsend for that.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> TES 6 question:
> 
> Would you like to see Attributes back, keep it like the Perk system in Skyrim or Hybridize it?
> 
> I don't miss Speed from Oblivion for instance when I played a heavy Orc warrior...


I guess I dont really have a strong opinion here one way or another, as long as they make it fairly intuitive and hard to screw oneself over by accident. (Screwing oneself over on purpose is fine.  :Small Tongue: )

Something Id like to see is the armor categories from ESO - so Light, Medium and Heavy instead of just Light and Heavy, and Light armor is clothes, robes, or the equivalent. My inner min-maxer screams loudly when my character runs around Skyrim in robes, because I dont get any XP for that.  :Small Tongue:  Also if I find some really cool clothes, I cant improve them like I can armor. Or make them myself.

Cant decide if dyes would be worth having in the single player or not.  :Small Confused:  If ESO taught me anything its that dyes are inclined to be buggy and inconsistent, and probably wont add enough to the game to balance that out.




> Favourites? That reminds me, I hate it when the draguar (Deathlords?) disarm you and when you pick the weapon up again, it's gone from your favourites menu, and you have to set it up again.


I forgot this happened.  :Small Yuk:  Yes, this is terrible and I hope it goes away forever in Elder Scrolls 6.

----------


## Rynjin

Bring back stats, conglomerate them down so they're a bit more streamlined.

You could easily make the stats Strength, Endurance, Agility, and Magic without losing much. Str affects melee damage, Agi affects ranged damage, Endurance HP and Stamina, and Magic is the "master magic" stat with MP, MP recharge, and spell damage.

No more "your statups are based on what skills you leveled to hit this level", just give some raw stat boosts every level; maybe a pool of 5 points you can allocate however, or the ability to raise a score by 3, a score by 2, and a score by 1.

Keep perks, make them more interesting. You don't need 5 perks that make your spells cheaper. You don't need any dedicated perks that make your spells and weapons stronger, now that stats are back. Focus on new capabilities.

For the love of all I hold dear, please don't make it like Fallout 4, which has one of the worst leveling systems I've ever seen.

----------


## veti

> Second this. And more detailed ones. They all look like Attack of the Dough-faced Oblivion NPCs as-is.
> 
> And while were on the subject, more variety for the monster models too. Its weird that all the bandits have a variety of hair color, hair styles, and facial markings


There are a variety of children mods, but one thing they don't do is vary their ages. It's odd that all children in Skyrim are exactly the same age. 

I've also got a mod to vary the bandits (purely cosmetically) a bit, after noticing how many of them shared the same face, with just variations in complexion and hair. 




> The thing I most miss from Oblivion is spellcasting.


Yep, spellcasting is the one area where I'll concede Skyrim was actually worse than Oblivion. I've tried any number of mods to fix it, but none seems very satisfactory. Anyone know of a mod for spellcasting while wielding a two handed weapon that actually works? 




> Something Id like to see is the armor categories from ESO - so Light, Medium and Heavy instead of just Light and Heavy, and Light armor is clothes, robes, or the equivalent. My inner min-maxer screams loudly when my character runs around Skyrim in robes, because I dont get any XP for that.


Also known as "the armour categories from Morrowind, including unarmoured". 

The trend from ESIII to ESV was relentless simplification, each one dropping a bunch of useful (or at least colourful) skills and spell effects and weapons and categories... But it's been such a long gap, now, that it's just possible (I think) that trend won't necessarily continue into ESVI.




> For the love of all I hold dear, please don't make it like Fallout 4, which has one of the worst leveling systems I've ever seen.


Second this. FO4 has the distinction of being the only Bethesda game I've proactively deleted from my system.

----------


## Triaxx

The only thing I know of that does that is Apocalypse letting you convert a single spell into a power. But only one spell at a time. And not all spells work correctly as powers.

----------


## Mark Hall

> The trend from ESIII to ESV was relentless simplification, each one dropping a bunch of useful (or at least colourful) skills and spell effects and weapons and categories... But it's been such a long gap, now, that it's just possible (I think) that trend won't necessarily continue into ESVI.


From Daggerfall on, really. In addition to the language skills that got left in Daggerfall, Morrowind lost Backstabbing, Climbing, Critical Strike, Etiquette (mixed with Streetwise into Speechcraft), Jumping (mixed with Running and Swimming into Athletics), Medical, and Thaumaturgy... so down 11 skills, 20 if you count languages.

Oblivion lost Medium Armor, Spear, Axe, Enchant, and Unarmored. Long Blade and Short blade combined. Six skills down.

Skyrim lost Athletics, Acrobatics, Mercantile (combined with Speechcraft to make Speech), and Mysticism, but regained Enchanting. Net three skills down (not counting the change from Blade and Blunt to One-Handed and Two-Handed; net wash).

Of all of them? I miss Climbing. Run around Daggerfall for a while. You can CLIMB almost EVERYWHERE. I don't know if it's a Daggerfall Unity thing or not, but I got to where I could jump off something and grab onto a wall and start climbing. It was AMAZING.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> There are a variety of children mods, but one thing they don't do is vary their ages. It's odd that all children in Skyrim are exactly the same age.


Ooo, good point. There aren't any infants or (visibly) pregnant ladies.




> Also known as "the armour categories from Morrowind, including unarmoured".


That reminds me: I'd like to see Hand-to-hand return. I want to be able to leave all my gear at the door, and still be able to rip my way out of whatever lousy situation I ended up in if I build my character right.

Also throwing items. We haven't had throwing stars since Morrowind.  :Small Frown:  




> Of all of them? I miss Climbing. Run around Daggerfall for a while. You can CLIMB almost EVERYWHERE. I don't know if it's a Daggerfall Unity thing or not, but I got to where I could jump off something and grab onto a wall and start climbing. It was AMAZING.


I haven't played Daggerfall, but I would like to see Climbing too. It opens up lots of possibilities for getting into and out of places, and seems like a very thiefy skill to have.

----------


## Misery Esquire

> Jumping (mixed with Running and Swimming into Athletics)
> ...
> Of all of them? I miss Climbing. Run around Daggerfall for a while. You can CLIMB almost EVERYWHERE. I don't know if it's a Daggerfall Unity thing or not, but I got to where I could jump off something and grab onto a wall and start climbing. It was AMAZING.


Well, sort of. Acrobatics determines jump height, Athletics influences movement speed and therefore impacts jump speed.

...
Climbing everywhere would be neat, but in terms of (unlikely) old features returning the one I'd like is open box cities.

No more loading doors to enter cities, please. And once you do so it returns the option for Levitation (and climbing) because people won't get/see into low res unloaded areas just by moving up and down.

----------


## Vinyadan

Casting while wielding weapons:

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mod...ab=description

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mod...ab=description

----------


## Rynjin

SE also has The Wizard Warrior which is a significantly more advanced version of those older mods. It can take a bit of getting used to to make it work, because it's kind of complex, but it offers a ton of options.

----------


## veti

> Casting while wielding weapons:
> 
> https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mod...ab=description
> 
> https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mod...ab=description


Warrior Magic is an example of a mod that tries to do the right thing, but doesn't actually work that well. I've been trying it for the past couple of weeks - it's hit and miss whether a spell gets cast at all, and when it does, there's sometimes a significant delay before it takes effect. Particularly if cast during combat, which oddly enough is when the delay tends to matter most...




> SE also has The Wizard Warrior which is a significantly more advanced version of those older mods.


Warrior Magic is pretty new - first uploaded Jan 2020, updated June 2021. I looked at The Wizard Warrior page and I couldn't really understand what it was trying to tell me, but maybe I should give the mod a try. Thanks.

----------


## Aeson

Personally, I would prefer for attributes and derived attributes to return, but for the attribute growth system I would rather have a system similar to the one in Dungeon Siege, where attributes essentially gain experience and level up based on what skills you use, or perhaps even a system where your attributes are set at character creation and don't change except as a result of magic or disease.

Also, speaking of derived attributes, it slightly bothers me that health is the only one where history matters. Fatigue and magicka only care about your current attribute scores, but health is determined by what your initial Strength and Endurance scores were as well as what your Endurance scores have been at every level since the first.

----------


## veti

I'd be quite happy to lose "attributes" entirely, including health, stamina and magicka. Replace them with a status system where you can be "fresh", "ready", "winded", "tired", "exhausted" etc., which determines what you can do, how well and for how long. 

I guess what I'm saying is, I really don't miss the number-crunching and min-maxing of the older games and I don't want to see it back.

----------


## The_Jackal

> I'd be quite happy to lose "attributes" entirely, including health, stamina and magicka. Replace them with a status system where you can be "fresh", "ready", "winded", "tired", "exhausted" etc., which determines what you can do, how well and for how long. 
> 
> I guess what I'm saying is, I really don't miss the number-crunching and min-maxing of the older games and I don't want to see it back.


Well, I think the issue with Skyrim's stats is that too many of them are completely worthless. Stamina? Trash, since you just needed 1 stamina to start a power attack, and a Vegetable soup would get you functionally infinite stamina for 12 minutes. Magicka? Worthless, because any remotely min-maxed build would use cost reduction to reduce spell costs to near zero. In effect, the only actually relevant stat was health.

So, to my mind, the issue isn't that stats are bad, but specifically the stats created for Skyrim had no real utility to anyone who spent even a small amount of time researching the game mechanics. I like the idea of stats as a means for customizing your character, but Bethesda's complete lack of balance in their design makes those choices meaningless.

----------


## Laughing Dog

> Magicka? Worthless, because any *enchanter will reduce costs to* zero.


  Fixed that for you :Small Tongue:

----------


## Rynjin

> Personally, I would prefer for attributes and derived attributes to return, but for the attribute growth system I would rather have a system similar to the one in Dungeon Siege, where attributes essentially gain experience and level up based on what skills you use,


There's a really good Oblivion mod that does this. This is a pretty fine middle ground too, I just like the idea of having a bit of choice, since there are some corner cases where taking a "detour" to level some less combat worthy skills can render the game more difficult than it needs to be due to level  scaling.

Then again, they should probably tweak level scaling again so it's more satisfying anyway; Skyrim was a big step up from Oblivion, but it could still use improvement so it doesn't have this curve where the early game and endgame are trivial, but the midgame can be brutally hard in spots as enemy HP suddenly inflates to the point you do minimal damage at around level 30.

----------


## factotum

They really need to make it so only combat-related skills contribute toward your level when determining the level of the enemies. Enemies shouldn't get tougher because I just learned how to craft a ring or pick a lock more efficiently.

----------


## DigoDragon

> The Customised Favourites Menu mod was a godsend for that.


Dear nine gods yes. It's a must-have mod for me along with SkyUI. It's those little quality of life things that really make my day.





> No more loading doors to enter cities, please.


I can understand why they do that, but if they are going to put a city in its own world space, I'd like to see more effort into making the city huge and populated. I wanna be able to get lost the first time I explore it. :3

----------


## Keltest

> Dear nine gods yes. It's a must-have mod for me along with SkyUI. It's those little quality of life things that really make my day.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I can understand why they do that, but if they are going to put a city in its own world space, I'd like to see more effort into making the city huge and populated. I wanna be able to get lost the first time I explore it. :3


Agreed. Im pretty sure some of the fort battles have more population than Whiterun or Solitude, so its not like youre gaining too much.

----------


## Eldan

Novigrad in Witcher 3 is open-ish to the world map and has hundreds of People. 

*Spoiler: undefined*
Show





If a relatively small Studio managed that 6 years ago, surely Bethesda can do a bit better on their cities.

----------


## Keltest

> Novigrad is open-ish to the world map and has hundreds of People. 
> 
> *Spoiler: undefined*
> Show
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> If a relatively small Studio managed that 6 years ago, surely Bethesda can do a bit better on their cities.


From my understanding, the problem is that each entity in Skyrim is considerably more complex than in the Witcher, each having their own dialogue, life story, skills, equipment, etc...

Which is not to say they couldnt do it, but its not quite as simple as "the technology is there, just do it Bethesda."

Having said that, i would be fine with filling the cities full of empty nameless NPCs who never stop and chat with us. Not every dockworker needs a deep personality.

----------


## Eldan

I mean, theoretically, yes, they are more complex, but in effect, how many randos on the street in Solitude actually had something to say?

----------


## Keltest

> I mean, theoretically, yes, they are more complex, but in effect, how many randos on the street in Solitude actually had something to say?


Almost never, and im personally not attached to the gimmick at all, but thats what they decided they wanted to do.

----------


## Rater202

I will admit, now that I'm thinking about it, that the main cities in Oblivion felt more... Like cities.

I remember getting lost in Skingrad. More than once

----------


## Keltest

> I will admit, now that I'm thinking about it, that the main cities in Oblivion felt more... Like cities.
> 
> I remember getting lost in Skingrad. More than once


Thats because Skingrad has probably the most obtuse layout i have ever seen in a city, with those bridges and that trench nonsense.

----------


## Rater202

> Thats because Skingrad has probably the most obtuse layout i have ever seen in a city, with those bridges and that trench nonsense.


Yeah, that's fair, but in general... The Cities felt like cities. Or at least small towns.

the cities in Skyrim...  Don't.

----------


## Eldan

I guess they also Need to downscale because every house has interiors.

But yeah, it's the Bethesda Problem. Wide as an ocean, shallow as a puddle.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> But yeah, it's the Bethesda Problem. Wide as an ocean, shallow as a puddle.


And buggy as a swamp.

----------


## Anteros

> Well, sort of. Acrobatics determines jump height, Athletics influences movement speed and therefore impacts jump speed.
> 
> ...
> Climbing everywhere would be neat, but in terms of (unlikely) old features returning the one I'd like is open box cities.
> 
> No more loading doors to enter cities, please. And once you do so it returns the option for Levitation (and climbing) because people won't get/see into low res unloaded areas just by moving up and down.


Or just hand wave it away.  A magical fog has begun to form around population centers and you've been tasked to find out why.  Clumsy, but it solves the problem. A good writer could easily flesh it out.





> Cant decide if dyes would be worth having in the single player or not.  If ESO taught me anything its that dyes are inclined to be buggy and inconsistent, and probably wont add enough to the game to balance that out.


Absolutely.  Anything I do with dyes or other cosmetic items is always for my own satisfaction anyway.  I couldn't care less what some random person thinks.

----------


## Vinyadan

I think Skyrim cities may have taken a hit because of the lack of guild chapters. If I think of Morrowind, the cities were generally made up of distinct zones:

Faction areas, with the three imperial guilds, the local Great House, the Camonna Tong, and the TempleService areas, with shopsA residential area with the homes and manors, more or less surrounding the other two areas.An often separate Imperial stronghold with services, beds, and chapters of the Legion and the Imperial Temple.

That's a lot of buildings, generally placed in different clusters. Oblivion had fewer factions, but in general its cities felt larger and very alive (and overall more believable, although the setting lacked the crazy genius of Morrowind). They still had local Guild chapters, although they were less important. This is probably why rebuilding Kvatch was such a common wish. Oblivion also had cathedrals, which were massive and showy. You actually  rescued Martin from one, and part of his story was grappling with his  relationship with the gods. In general, both Morrowind and Oblivion were  better at mixing lore, story, and settlements.
In Skyrim, each city generally gets no more than one faction house, and may actually get none, if it's unlucky. Even a place of worship isn't a certainty. The Dark Brotherhood moved to the middle of nowhere. And, of course, Skyrim doesn't have Vivec or the Imperial City. Beside the size, to me it feels like the cities are generally just there. "Yes, this city sunk. So what?"

----------


## Keltest

Yeah. Morthal, Falkreath and Winterhold... what is even the point of them? They serve as fast travel points to their areas of Skyrim, but thats about all theyre actually good for IMO.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> In Skyrim, each city generally gets no more than one faction house, and may actually get none, if it's unlucky. Even a place of worship isn't a certainty. The Dark Brotherhood moved to the middle of nowhere. And, of course, Skyrim doesn't have Vivec or the Imperial City. Beside the size, to me it feels like the cities are generally just there. "Yes, this city sunk. So what?"


This is a good point. Even just adding a barracks and a couple more in-city shrines could have helped. And there is no reason that the Companions couldnt have an outpost or two outside Jorrvaskr. Add hidey-holes for the Thieves Guild to a couple cities that open up as you progress that questline.

----------


## DigoDragon

> And buggy as a swamp.


Ha! XD
You win comment of the day.





> Yeah. Morthal, Falkreath and Winterhold... what is even the point of them? They serve as fast travel points to their areas of Skyrim, but thats about all theyre actually good for IMO.


The college at Winterhold is probably the only reason I even pass through Winterhold. The other two? Well I guess Falkreath has two quest starts if you're collecting daedric artifacts.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Ha! XD
> You win comment of the day.


Thanks!  :Small Smile: 




> The college at Winterhold is probably the only reason I even pass through Winterhold. The other two? Well I guess Falkreath has two quest starts if you're collecting daedric artifacts.


I do like Morthal for the crazy seer lady running it. But its very true there isnt much to actually do there.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Yeah. Morthal, Falkreath and Winterhold... what is even the point of them? They serve as fast travel points to their areas of Skyrim, but thats about all theyre actually good for IMO.


Dawnstar is so forgettable, it didn't even make it to your list.  :Small Amused: 

Since we're talking about this kind of stuff, digging around in r/teslore, I had found a post about an idea that was scrapped for the Nordic Pantheon, with a distinction between dead gods, evil gods, hearth gods and even future gods. That last one was just Talos who would have been understood as the future Shor of the next kalpa that the Nords pray to more or less just in case and who they'd have thought was the one who showed up at the end of _Oblivion_ rather than Alduin/Akatosh.

I really would have liked this to make it to the final cut, we could have had on the Imperial side the Cult of the Eight Divines with secret Talos worshippers and on the Stormcloak side Ulfric heading a revivalist movement trying to reinstall the old Nordic Pantheon to rid Skyrim of Imperial influence which would be opposed by devouts followers of the Nine who don't want to stop praying to Akatosh and Arkay and don't really care about that "Shor" fellow. Would have fleshed out the divide a bit.

----------


## factotum

> And, of course, Skyrim doesn't have Vivec or the Imperial City. Beside the size, to me it feels like the cities are generally just there. "Yes, this city sunk. So what?"


You really feel like Solitude and Windhelm should be bigger than they are given their importance. Part of the problem there is that both cities have their docks area separate from the main city, partly because the dock area is "open to te world" so can't be mixed in with the main city, so I'd blame that on a limitation of the game engine. In Morrowind all the cities were open, but that meant they either had to be hella small or else occupy a massive chunk of the map (Vivec City, looking at you here), neither of which was ideal.

I guess what annoys me a bit is that Skyrim has all the disadvantages of isolating the city interiors from the world at large without the benefits of the larger city interiors.

----------


## Caelestion

Falkreath is the drop-off point for living at Lakeview Manor.  A clear positive in my book. :)

----------


## veti

> Falkreath is the drop-off point for living at Lakeview Manor.  A clear positive in my book. :)


I just get the carriage driver to drop me off at Lakeview Manor...

I get the feeling that Falkreath and the Pale both exist chiefly for the purpose of giving modders suitably big empty spaces to play with. They're certainly both popular venues for mods.

----------


## Lurkmoar

Since Daggerfall, it's been fairly common to receive Daedric Quests in TES. Occasionally, a Prince will have a significant part of the games even. Azura in Morrowind, Hircine in the Bloodmoon DLC. Then Mehrunes Dagon in Oblivion and Sheggorath in the Shivering Islands. Hermaeus Mora was tangentially involved in the main quest of Skyrim, Discerning the Transmundane(you have to talk to Septimus to get the cube to let you into Blackreach, right?) and a spotlight in Dragonborn.

Any Prince you'd like to see more details/shenanigans/horrors from? 

*alright, now I'm kinda bugged and want to see if it's possible to go through the main quest and not trigger Discerning the Transmundane. Would phasing through a Dwemer gate with a plate + Whirlwind Shout to go to Blackreach and grabbing the Elder Scroll(Dragon) avoid having it pop up?

----------


## Keltest

> Since Daggerfall, it's been fairly common to receive Daedric Quests in TES. Occasionally, a Prince will have a significant part of the games even. Azura in Morrowind, Hircine in the Bloodmoon DLC. Then Mehrunes Dagon in Oblivion and Sheggorath in the Shivering Islands. Hermaeus Mora was tangentially involved in the main quest of Skyrim, Discerning the Transmundane(you have to talk to Septimus to get the cube to let you into Blackreach, right?) and a spotlight in Dragonborn.
> 
> Any Prince you'd like to see more details/shenanigans/horrors from? 
> 
> *alright, now I'm kinda bugged and want to see if it's possible to go through the main quest and not trigger Discerning the Transmundane. Would phasing through a Dwemer gate with a plate + Whirlwind Shout to go to Blackreach and grabbing the Elder Scroll(Dragon) avoid having it pop up?


I dont think you can get the scroll without the cube short of using the console.

----------


## Eldan

> Since Daggerfall, it's been fairly common to receive Daedric Quests in TES. Occasionally, a Prince will have a significant part of the games even. Azura in Morrowind, Hircine in the Bloodmoon DLC. Then Mehrunes Dagon in Oblivion and Sheggorath in the Shivering Islands. Hermaeus Mora was tangentially involved in the main quest of Skyrim, Discerning the Transmundane(you have to talk to Septimus to get the cube to let you into Blackreach, right?) and a spotlight in Dragonborn.
> 
> Any Prince you'd like to see more details/shenanigans/horrors from? 
> 
> *alright, now I'm kinda bugged and want to see if it's possible to go through the main quest and not trigger Discerning the Transmundane. Would phasing through a Dwemer gate with a plate + Whirlwind Shout to go to Blackreach and grabbing the Elder Scroll(Dragon) avoid having it pop up?


I kinda want to see someone do something interesting with Peryite.

----------


## Keltest

> I kinda want to see someone do something interesting with Peryite.


The dwarves didnt disappear, he just took them all as part of a power play so people will stop ignoring him.

----------


## Thomas Cardew

> Since Daggerfall, it's been fairly common to receive Daedric Quests in TES. Occasionally, a Prince will have a significant part of the games even. Azura in Morrowind, Hircine in the Bloodmoon DLC. Then Mehrunes Dagon in Oblivion and Sheggorath in the Shivering Islands. Hermaeus Mora was tangentially involved in the main quest of Skyrim, Discerning the Transmundane(you have to talk to Septimus to get the cube to let you into Blackreach, right?) and a spotlight in Dragonborn.
> 
> Any Prince you'd like to see more details/shenanigans/horrors from? 
> 
> *alright, now I'm kinda bugged and want to see if it's possible to go through the main quest and not trigger Discerning the Transmundane. Would phasing through a Dwemer gate with a plate + Whirlwind Shout to go to Blackreach and grabbing the Elder Scroll(Dragon) avoid having it pop up?


I'd love to a see a Boethiath DLC or questline. The Oblivion quest was nominally an 'intra-planar tournament', but was functionally just a ring of fights in an Oblivion gate. A proper questline having to fight your way through and out of Boethiath's twisted maze of a realm could be a lot of fun.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Any Prince you'd like to see more details/shenanigans/horrors from?


Vaermina, Malacath or Meridia. Nightmares have a lot of potential as far as weird monsters and locals. Id like them to cover the Trinimac-to-Malacath history better than they have. And Meri already got a bit of focus in vanilla ESO, but we didnt really get to explore her realm.




> I kinda want to see someone do something interesting with Peryite.


Ooo, hes a good one too. There is a lot they could do with plagues and disease. I want to know what he did to irritate the other Princes too.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Any Prince you'd like to see more details/shenanigans/horrors from?


Jyggalag*, Peryite, Namira, Malacath.



> Ooo, hes a good one too. There is a lot they could do with plagues and disease. I want to know what he did to irritate the other Princes too.


I think it's just that he's the weakest of the bunch. But yeah, he's severely underused.

I'd like to see some more of the Aedra too.


*Not necessarily a focus, but at least a quest with assorted artifact.

----------


## Eldan

Oh, also just in general, weird cultural aspects of the Princes, like the entire Khajiit Religion, or the norse Woodland Man. 

Edit: while going through UESP, I just noticed that Azura has probably the _worst_ title of any Daedric prince, "Rim of all Holes". Which yeah.

----------


## Grim Portent

> Oh, also just in general, weird cultural aspects of the Princes, like the entire Khajiit Religion, or the norse Woodland Man. 
> 
> Edit: while going through UESP, I just noticed that Azura has probably the _worst_ title of any Daedric prince, "Rim of all Holes". Which yeah.


What Azura does in her own time is none of our business.  :Small Big Grin: 

I'll throw in another vote for Peryite, part of it is that he has a vaguely dragony appearance and I like dragons, but also his domain of pestilence and order intrigues me. I'd like to see some stuff involving his machinations on a grander scale.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Oh, also just in general, weird cultural aspects of the Princes, like the entire Khajiit Religion, or the norse Woodland Man. 
> 
> Edit: while going through UESP, I just noticed that Azura has probably the _worst_ title of any Daedric prince, "Rim of all Holes". Which yeah.


And in _Daggerfall_ she was said to be an ally of Molag "the king of rape" Bal.




> I'll throw in another vote for Peryite, part of it is that he has a vaguely dragony appearance


Not vaguely. His appearance is noted in-universe as being that of a quadrupedal dragon and is some sort of "cosmic joke" on Akatosh. As far as I'm concerned it's another data point for "the gods are aware they are in a video game universe".




> and I like dragons, but also his domain of pestilence and order intrigues me. I'd like to see some stuff involving his machinations on a grander scale.


He's probably responsible for the Thrassian Plague and/or the Knathian Flu both of which killed a lot of people.

----------


## Triaxx

I thought Discerning was only the second part of the quest? So if you never went back to what his face you neved got bothered about it?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I think it's just that he's the weakest of the bunch. But yeah, he's severely underused.


Per one of the Answers-Your-Questions articles, he did _something._




> "Y ou [sic] mortalsso good at acquiring knowledge, and so quick to learn the wrong lessons from it! Allow me to misinterpret: particles of chaotic creatia, when flowing in reaction to the exertion of will, become daedrons that, though injurious to the mortal form, can nonetheless perform work. Underutilized daedrons usually return to quiescencebut if imbued with sufficient purpose, they may escape and coalesce to form potentia vortices. These are dangerous if allowed to self-optimize into realm-rips, so it's best to damp them out early. Trying to keep ahead of it all keeps Peryite mighty busy, but nobody's really sorry for him*after all, he earned it.*"


If they do something with it, it could be fun.

----------


## veti

> *alright, now I'm kinda bugged and want to see if it's possible to go through the main quest and not trigger Discerning the Transmundane. Would phasing through a Dwemer gate with a plate + Whirlwind Shout to go to Blackreach and grabbing the Elder Scroll(Dragon) avoid having it pop up?


It may be possible to glitch yourself into Blackreach, but it's not designed to be. So yeah, by design at least you do have to start the quest.

But you don't have to talk to Hermaeus Mora, or even be aware of his involvement. If you just never go back to Septimus, you'll never encounter him.




> And in _Daggerfall_ she was said to be an ally of Molag "the king of rape" Bal.


"Ally" doesn't mean much, even if that was true. Powers form and break "alliances" all the time, all it means is "we both hate/fear that guy even more than we detest each other".

Didn't _all_ the princes ally against Jyggalag at one point?

----------


## Morty

I'm very sceptical towards the idea of bringing back attributes. They would need a new, clear purpose to be a good addition. Before Skyrim got rid of them, they were mostly there to make character creation and advancement even more of a counter-intuitive minefield.

The same goes for removed skills. While the series has undoubtedly been simplified over time, many of the removed skills were treated this way for a good reason. Athletics and Acrobatics never served a useful purpose. Daggerfall's Climbing skill relied on the majority of obstacles in the game being vertical and placed in dungeons. More vertical mobility is a reasonable thing to ask for, but the climbing skill isn't.

What I would personally like to see is shedding the last vestiges of the combat/stealth/magic split and organizing skills along the lines of what's needed to make a well-rounded character. And maybe redoing the combat skills so it's possible to use more than one of them with the same character.

----------


## Eldan

Maybe not a climbing skill, but I'd really want them to just make characters more mobile in General. I mean, how long have we had vaulting over fences now, 20 years? More? Some climbing would be nice too. At least the ability to pull yourself up on a ledge.

----------


## Morty

> Maybe not a climbing skill, but I'd really want them to just make characters more mobile in General. I mean, how long have we had vaulting over fences now, 20 years? More? Some climbing would be nice too. At least the ability to pull yourself up on a ledge.


That's what I meant, yes. More mobility would be good, but I can't see how a skill responsible for it would fit into the TES system.

----------


## Vinyadan

I think that people at Bethesda do wonder how to improve that sort of mobility without turning into an Ubisoft game.

I think it also has something to do with TES PC roots, compared to console games with a mascot character in third-person view and "lean against wall", "climb" and "vault" commands.

----------


## The_Jackal

> I'm very sceptical towards the idea of bringing back attributes. They would need a new, clear purpose to be a good addition. Before Skyrim got rid of them, they were mostly there to make character creation and advancement even more of a counter-intuitive minefield.
> 
> The same goes for removed skills. While the series has undoubtedly been simplified over time, many of the removed skills were treated this way for a good reason. Athletics and Acrobatics never served a useful purpose. Daggerfall's Climbing skill relied on the majority of obstacles in the game being vertical and placed in dungeons. More vertical mobility is a reasonable thing to ask for, but the climbing skill isn't.


I agree insofar as long as your choices are both meaningful and balanced. A meaningful choice has consequences, while a unbalanced choice, while meaningful, isn't really a choice, when you think about it, at least, no more of a choice than "Your money or your life".

Do I think they need to use Dungeons and Dragons-style attributes with numbers a tables and formulae? Not necessarily, but here's the thing: No matter what they do, the game mechanics will be implemented as math, because that's how computers work. So I don't think there's any particular merit in obfuscating the math, but I also don't think it's virtuous just to deprive players of choices and agency with regards to the type of character they want to make.

The big flaw with Skryim is that they didn't even pay *lip-service* to play balance. Thirty minutes and a spreadsheet would have shown them just how broken their system actually was.

----------


## Triaxx

For one thing, I'd be very interested in seeing that spreadsheet.

For another, I have learned that balance is at best a moving target, and at worst something that ends up not mattering because no matter how hard you try to balance things, the sheer manpower of players means they'll still find that one combination that's totally busted. Would you, as a dev, have thought... hey, what happens if you boost enchanting via a potion, and then use that to enchant a stronger piece of gear to make your alchemy better to increase your enchanting?

----------


## Morty

> I agree insofar as long as your choices are both meaningful and balanced. A meaningful choice has consequences, while a unbalanced choice, while meaningful, isn't really a choice, when you think about it, at least, no more of a choice than "Your money or your life".
> 
> Do I think they need to use Dungeons and Dragons-style attributes with numbers a tables and formulae? Not necessarily, but here's the thing: No matter what they do, the game mechanics will be implemented as math, because that's how computers work. So I don't think there's any particular merit in obfuscating the math, but I also don't think it's virtuous just to deprive players of choices and agency with regards to the type of character they want to make.
> 
> The big flaw with Skryim is that they didn't even pay *lip-service* to play balance. Thirty minutes and a spreadsheet would have shown them just how broken their system actually was.


I'm not going to spend a lot of time defending Skyrim's mechanics, but I don't see how pre-Morrowind attributes provided choice and agency. They were mostly a function of which skills you used, frequently in counter-intuitive ways. If I'm raising my speed because I happen to be using spears, I don't see that as much of a choice.

----------


## halfeye

It is strange that Morrowind used a similar levelling scheme to Oblivion, but when Oblivion's skills were truncated, it somehow ended up making the levelling different enough that you needed to play the leveling system to avoid getting negligible power-ups when you levelled.

----------


## Keltest

> It is strange that Morrowind used a similar levelling scheme to Oblivion, but when Oblivion's skills were truncated, it somehow ended up making the levelling different enough that you needed to play the leveling system to avoid getting negligible power-ups when you levelled.


The problem wasnt the change to the skill system, it was the change made to the scaling system. With a few exceptions, all the threats in Morrowind were fairly static, as was a lot of the high end loot. If a dungeon was too dangerous for you, you could go out, get a couple levels and better gear, and come back to mostly the same level of challenge. In Oblivion, if you do that, then unless you min-max yourself super hard, then when you come back the dungeon will actually be even harder than before because now the mobs are scaled to a higher level, and you didnt keep pace.

----------


## factotum

> The problem wasnt the change to the skill system, it was the change made to the scaling system. With a few exceptions, all the threats in Morrowind were fairly static, as was a lot of the high end loot.


They weren't *entirely* static in Morrowind. What the game did (as you could see by playing with the editing tools provided) was to assign a *range* of levels to a dungeon and the game would scale within those bounds. So, if you designed a dungeon to be level 10-30, someone going in at level 2 would get stomped on, while going in at level 40 would likely be a cakewalk. Within the levels specified it would try to scale the challenge to your level. What Oblivion did, AFAIK, is to remove the range so that everything was always levelled to you.

----------


## Vianceit

What do you all think of the rumors about the new elder Scrolls game? What all do you think they might change about it?

----------


## Fyraltari

> What do you all think of the rumors about the new elder Scrolls game? What all do you think they might change about it?


If they don't have a Breton NPC named Dupont manically keeping a journal, we riot.

----------


## Vinyadan

Are there any new rumors? The only thing similar to TESVI I have heard of is the Avowed announcement, a Skyrim-like by Obsidian.

----------


## mythmonster2

I don't expect we'll hear anything until after Starfield's out.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I don't expect we'll hear anything until after Starfield's out.


Yeah I haven't heard anything new either, unless you count the rumors that there is some doubt that it will be available on all consoles. It's still a few years out, and Hammerfell and/or High Rock is still the favorite as far as what region we'll be going to last I heard.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Are there any new rumors? The only thing similar to TESVI I have heard of is the Avowed announcement, a Skyrim-like by Obsidian.
> *snip*


considering Obsidian's track record with making games I like (Kotor 2, New Vegas, Outer Worlds) I think I'm looking forward more to Avowed than ES6.

----------


## Aeson

> They weren't *entirely* static in Morrowind. What the game did (as you could see by playing with the editing tools provided) was to assign a *range* of levels to a dungeon and the game would scale within those bounds. So, if you designed a dungeon to be level 10-30, someone going in at level 2 would get stomped on, while going in at level 40 would likely be a cakewalk. Within the levels specified it would try to scale the challenge to your level. What Oblivion did, AFAIK, is to remove the range so that everything was always levelled to you.


I think you're missing the point. Yes, more dangerous creatures could be spawned in most areas of Morrowind at higher levels, but, firstly, the enemies themselves almost all had static statistics,* and, secondly, depending on where exactly you went you could run into some pretty nasty stuff at low level.** Fjol the Outlaw is an eighth-level NPC Barbarian with 106 health, a Nordic battle-axe, and fur armor whether you encounter him at level 1, level 8, or level 64; similarly for almost every other enemy or enemy type you can encounter in Morrowind. By contrast, pretty much every enemy NPC in Oblivion is level-scaled, and while many of the monster enemies are not, the level-scaled monster types become increasingly prevalent at high level - which, ironically, is when you're losing your ability to scale your damage fast enough to keep up with the HP scaling on many of those monsters.

*The only exception that comes to mind immediately is Gedna Relvel in Tribunal.

**Oblivion admittedly did a little of this as well, but even where it does it there is usually some level scaling going on, for instance with the atronach guarding Frostfire Glade.

----------


## Rynjin

> considering Obsidian's track record with making games I like (Kotor 2, New Vegas, Outer Worlds) I think I'm looking forward more to Avowed than ES6.


I was lukewarm on Outer Worlds but hope they learn from the mistakes made by that game so that Avowed is GREAT rather than "okay". I never actually even finished Outer Worlds, though think about going back sometimes.

Maybe I'll reinstall it now.

----------


## veti

> Fjol the Outlaw is an eighth-level NPC Barbarian with 106 health, a Nordic battle-axe, and fur armor whether you encounter him at level 1, level 8, or level 64; similarly for almost every other enemy or enemy type you can encounter in Morrowind.


And, pretty much every NPC in Morrowind is individually named and placed. I think there may be a couple of places where you can meet an anonymous "Bandit" or equivalent, but they're extremely rare. Every cave and tower has individually named (and statically levelled) occupants. 

(At least as far as NPCs are concerned. Monsters are another matter.)

----------


## Resileaf

> And, pretty much every NPC in Morrowind is individually named and placed. I think there may be a couple of places where you can meet an anonymous "Bandit" or equivalent, but they're extremely rare. Every cave and tower has individually named (and statically levelled) occupants. 
> 
> (At least as far as NPCs are concerned. Monsters are another matter.)


The level scaling in Morrowind is most noticeable in areas where undead are common. There is a higher variety of undead in Morrowind than other types of monsters, so you'll often see upgraded versions of weak ones when you're high level.

It's harder to notice when exploring in the wilderness, since the upgraded animals are usually the same animal, but diseased or blighted.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

Im kind of hoping we get to see more variety in Daedra in the next game. Both in the multiple realms of Oblivion featured sense and the body styles - not just the usual Fire-Frost-Storm Atronach + Dremora but more exotic things like Hungers, Symphonies of Blades, Harvesters, Daedroth etc. Stuff thats a little more exciting than a humanoid with horns and maybe a weird color.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Im kind of hoping we get to see more variety in Daedra in the next game. Both in the multiple realms of Oblivion featured sense and the body styles - not just the usual Fire-Frost-Storm Atronach + Dremora but more exotic things like Hungers, Symphonies of Blades, Harvesters, Daedroth etc. Stuff thats a little more exciting than a humanoid with horns and maybe a weird color.


I'd like more info about the demiprinces myself. Hey, maybe the villain could be one.

----------


## veti

> Im kind of hoping we get to see more variety in Daedra in the next game. Both in the multiple realms of Oblivion featured sense and the body styles.


Would be nice, yes, but each body shape represents quite a bit of work for artists and animators. I suspect it's the sort of priority that gets mentioned and maybe planned in the early stages, then cut as the scope becomes clearer and everyone realises how overworked they're going to be anyway.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Would be nice, yes, but each body shape represents quite a bit of work for artists and animators. I suspect it's the sort of priority that gets mentioned and maybe planned in the early stages, then cut as the scope becomes clearer and everyone realises how overworked they're going to be anyway.


While I dont disagree, I will note I consider that Bethesdas problem and not something I should cut my wishlist short over. Zenimax pulled the but we added one entire new animation! card as an excuse to charge ludicrous amounts for their reskinned Crown Store stuff too often for me to have much sympathy for them.

----------


## The_Jackal

> Would be nice, yes, but each body shape represents quite a bit of work for artists and animators. I suspect it's the sort of priority that gets mentioned and maybe planned in the early stages, then cut as the scope becomes clearer and everyone realises how overworked they're going to be anyway.


That doesn't mean they shouldn't do it. It's a better solution than making a single scalable mesh for each gender. Especially for a fantasy game, so that Nords and Orcs actually look like they're different species, and Khajiit and Argonians don't look quite so... Egyptian, if you know what I mean.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

Im wondering if were going to get more variety of mounts in the next game. ESO went overboard, but adding something region-appropriate in addition to horses wouldnt go amiss.

----------


## Eldan

What would that be? Camels?

----------


## factotum

> What would that be? Camels?


In the Alik'r Desert doesn't seem unreasonable?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> What would that be? Camels?


Camels for Hammerfell, Guar if we end up in Morrowind or Black Marsh, Slarjei or hire a seche-raht in Elsweyr (I guess the senche-raht would be more of a hireling)

----------


## Fyraltari

If you can get a mount for your followers as well, I'll be happy.

----------


## Eldan

> In the Alik'r Desert doesn't seem unreasonable?


Sure. Just wondering if they would be, well, _interesting_. I'd be wondering how different you can make horses and camels really. I can't imagine size making too much of a difference and endurance and water consumption are very unlikely to be a factor.

----------


## Eldan

> Camels for Hammerfell, Guar if we end up in Morrowind or Black Marsh, Slarjei or hire a seche-raht in Elsweyr (I guess the senche-raht would be more of a hireling)


It's been all but confirmed for a few years now that it's going to be Hammerfell. Bethesda even reserved the name "Redfell" or "Redfall".

----------


## veti

> Sure. Just wondering if they would be, well, _interesting_. I'd be wondering how different you can make horses and camels really. I can't imagine size making too much of a difference and endurance and water consumption are very unlikely to be a factor.


Well, if mounted combat is going to be a real thing (as opposed to the butt-ugly and pointless kludge it is in Skyrim), there would be a significant difference between horses and camels. But other than that, I agree. Unless range and speed are significant factors (which would be a sharp reversal from every other game they've done), there's not much point.

----------


## Divayth Fyr

> It's been all but confirmed for a few years now that it's going to be Hammerfell. Bethesda even reserved the name "Redfell" or "Redfall".


And it has nothing to do with TES.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Sure. Just wondering if they would be, well, _interesting_. I'd be wondering how different you can make horses and camels really. I can't imagine size making too much of a difference and endurance and water consumption are very unlikely to be a factor.


Even if the differences were purely cosmetic it would not be a meaningless addition, it contributes to the atmosphere. Would Morrowind have been nearly as interesting if you took a cart from city to city instead of a Silt Strider? Functionally theyre identical. Or if all the Telvanni mushroom towers were just ordinary stone? Or if all the monsters were just bears, wolves and the occasional spider?

Also being a single player game they could make broad differences between mount species (camels could carry more but horses would be faster, for example, or if they do Guar, maybe make those have a faster swim speed but be slower on land) without worrying about game balance so much, though the speed differences between horse colors annoyed me in Oblivion so Im not sure I want them to.




> It's been all but confirmed for a few years now that it's going to be Hammerfell.


While Im all in favor of going to Hammerfell for ES6, Im not counting it as confirmed until they officially announce it. There have been too many rumors (remember Greenheart?) and anyway, getting bought out might have changed their plans.

EDIT:

Apparently there is going to be an _Anniversary Edition_ of Skyrim. *headdesk*

----------


## DigoDragon

Speaking of Skyrim, I forgotten how annoying the three-stone puzzle in Ustengrav is. Always takes me a few tries because I'm never perfectly aligned like the game wants. Ah well, at least the fire traps are easy to get around. And lure the skellys into. :3

----------


## Triaxx

Stone puzzle is more timing than anything. Pop WS just as the last stone lights.

----------


## veti

> Stone puzzle is more timing than anything. Pop WS just as the last stone lights.


I don't think the timing is that critical. I sprint, and press 'z' somewhere around the first or second stone, and I'm through.

If you can't align straight, though (what sort of controller are you using?), that would be more problematic.

Edit:



> Apparently there is going to be an _Anniversary Edition_ of Skyrim. *headdesk*


Oh noes... "Comes with Creation Club content for free..."

The only way to disable that... stuff, as far as I've found, is to go into your data folder and manually delete the BSAs. Assuming you can even identify them, of course. 

They really, seriously, need to make some kind of mod management function, because the CC content I've seen is... let's say, not so great that I'm going to want it as a part of the base game forevermore.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Oh noes... "Comes with Creation Club content for free..."
> 
> The only way to disable that... stuff, as far as I've found, is to go into your data folder and manually delete the BSAs. Assuming you can even identify them, of course. 
> 
> They really, seriously, need to make some kind of mod management function, because the CC content I've seen is... let's say, not so great that I'm going to want it as a part of the base game forevermore.


My only hope is that the existence of the Creation Club will inspire them to make the Creation Kit controls more robust, intuitive, less buggy, and allover better for Elder Scrolls 6. But I suspect if they do that it will also lead to the removal of free mods, or at best make them no longer officially sanctioned.

I _hope_ not. But it seems like the sort of stupid short-sighted thing Bethesda would do.

----------


## Keltest

> My only hope is that the existence of the Creation Club will inspire them to make the Creation Kit controls more robust, intuitive, less buggy, and allover better for Elder Scrolls 6. But I suspect if they do that it will also lead to the removal of free mods, or at best make them no longer officially sanctioned.
> 
> I _hope_ not. But it seems like the sort of stupid short-sighted thing Bethesda would do.


The last time they tried to touch the accessibility of mods, the community rioted. Even if they do try it again, i doubt it will stick at all.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> The last time they tried to touch the accessibility of mods, the community rioted. Even if they do try it again, i doubt it will stick at all.


Wasn't that the paid mods that was the precursor to the Creation Club?

----------


## Keltest

> Wasn't that the paid mods that was the precursor to the Creation Club?


Yeah. And look at how small all the CC content is.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Yeah. And look at how small all the CC content is.


...It's been so long since I played I can't actually find the thing. Is this a definitive list?

----------


## Keltest

> ...It's been so long since I played I can't actually find the thing. Is this a definitive list?


No idea. It looks right, but i havent ever cared enough to try and find every last one.

----------


## veti

> The last time they tried to touch the accessibility of mods, the community rioted. Even if they do try it again, i doubt it will stick at all.


That was, transparently, exactly what the Creation Club was invented for. Bethesda is itching for a slice of the action from the mod 'market', and it tried to make a grab for it but found "the community" wasn't ready for that.

Yet.

Creation Club is there to help us get used to the idea. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised* to learn that that's why there's still no sign of a release date for for TESVI: they're still softening us up for that grab, they don't want to announce the new game until they're sure a large enough part of "the community" will accept those terms.


* Appalled, yes. Saddened, definitely. Sickened, absolutely. But not surprised.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Creation Club is there to help us get used to the idea. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised* to learn that that's why there's still no sign of a release date for for TESVI: they're still softening us up for that grab, they don't want to announce the new game until they're sure a large enough part of "the community" will accept those terms.


Part of that might be ESO too. As long as theyre churning out Crown Store reskins and the occasional DLC, they keep the Elder Scrolls brand in peoples minds, so theres no rush from a marketing standpoint.

----------


## Rynjin

Honestly I believe their stated reasons for not announcing TES VI yet. They were kinda bored stiff and needed a new IP to work on.

I don't doubt that their paid mods bull**** is far from over, but multiple things can be true at once. It wouldn't make any sense for them to delay release of their flagship franchise for a bit of extra CC money when it can remain a lingering threat to be added into DLC, rereleases, and the next one

----------


## DigoDragon

> I don't think the timing is that critical. I sprint, and press 'z' somewhere around the first or second stone, and I'm through.
> 
> If you can't align straight, though (what sort of controller are you using?), that would be more problematic.


Controller? :3

Alignment is probably the wrong word. Timing! That was probably word I was looking for. I never remember the right spot to hit Whirlwind, so I usually slam right into the first or second gate a few times before it comes to me and I pass.


Meanwhile, the skeletal remains of Mirmulnir (the first dragon you fight) moved into the Whiterun stables and that never stops being amusing to pass by.

----------


## factotum

> Controller? :3


Keyboard and mouse is still a type of controller.

----------


## Triaxx

Nothing short of total bankruptcy was going to prevent another Elder Scrolls, and possibly not even that.

Will we see paid mods again? Probably. i'd guess we'll see them with Starfield. But with Xbox exclusivity we should see the more draconian measures lifted. I'm still convinced that they were there only to appease Sony to getmods on the PlayStation.

----------


## veti

> Honestly I believe their stated reasons for not announcing TES VI yet. They were kinda bored stiff and needed a new IP to work on.


If they're bored with Skyrim, that can only be because they keep re-releasing it. Actual development was finished, done, tested and signed off more than ten years ago.

How many of the people who worked on it originally are even still at Bethesda?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> If they're bored with Skyrim, that can only be because they keep re-releasing it. Actual development was finished, done, tested and signed off more than ten years ago.
> 
> How many of the people who worked on it originally are even still at Bethesda?


This is a good question. Turnover at software companies tends to be high.

Regardless, it's been _ten years_ (call it eight if we count from Dragonborn's release). If they're still bored of it after almost a decade, maybe hire a new team of people to work on it? It's been long enough now they're probably going to need a new game engine or one upgraded into unrecognizability _anyway_, so you'd need to re-train all the old hands if you didn't hire new people who already have the skillset.

----------


## Triaxx

Ugh. At this point I'm hoping they get a new engine and it's so locked down and unmodable it kills modding. Just so I can rub noses in it. But that's just frustration talking.

----------


## Keltest

> Ugh. At this point I'm hoping they get a new engine and it's so locked down and unmodable it kills modding. Just so I can rub noses in it. But that's just frustration talking.


Modding is THE attracting feature for elder scrolls. Its no longer the only member of its genre, and its not especially good at base without that. Locking out mods would kill the game.

----------


## Rynjin

> This is a good question. Turnover at software companies tends to be high.
> 
> Regardless, it's been _ten years_ (call it eight if we count from Dragonborn's release). If they're still bored of it after almost a decade, maybe hire a new team of people to work on it? It's been long enough now they're probably going to need a new game engine or one upgraded into unrecognizability _anyway_, so you'd need to re-train all the old hands if you didn't hire new people who already have the skillset.


They haven't just been bored, they've been working on new IPs, like Starfield. Not like they've been completely sitting on their hands lol, even if we all wish we could forget about 76.

----------


## Caelestion

> Modding is THE attracting feature for elder scrolls. Its no longer the only member of its genre, and its not especially good at base without that. Locking out mods would kill the game.


And that is why Gopher has said a number of times that they'll never disable free modding, because no one wants to kill their own game.

----------


## Vinyadan

I'm not very clear on where the Zenimax and Bethesda dev teams begin and end, but we have had Skyrim in 2011, ESO in 2014, then  an ESO expansion every year from 2017 until today. They definitely haven't been idle with the Elder Scrolls IP. Now they are developing this Starfield thing, which isn't just a game, it's a whole IP that must be at the same level of Elder Scrolls; and the TES IP setting started out pretty undescribed with Arena and built itself up over four games and eight years before it reached Morrowind levels.
BTW, Starfield is meant to launch on 11 November 2022, which obviously brings back Skyrim memories -- and the hope they actually take the time to fix the writing and come out with a really complete experience.

About mods, I don't really have much against paid mods. I see lots of modders asking for donations. A studio allowing a modder to legally make a profit from a mod to which the studio participates looks OK to me, it's like having a freelance external developer. The much lauded Black Mesa is just that, and Valve's decision to sell it on Steam is seen as a generous act of support. I only see two problems: one related to the QA and compatibility fixes that mods usually lack and I would expect from a paid product, the other is the perspective that e.g. Bethesda may change the rules to only allow for paid mods sold through its store (highly unlikely), or make the CK a paid product (also unlikely). And of course, one can debate the share paid to the external developer for his work.

It is however undeniable that there is a huge cultural difference between hobbyist modding and corporate microtransaction complete with pre-paid no-refunds (on Steam) in-store fake money. Actually, I have been wondering: have microtransactions supplanted farming and trading items, accounts and credits for real money in online games? Because they look like the more efficient, corporate version of that practice.

Of course, as a user, I prefer mods being free. But I'd really prefer everything I want being free.

----------


## Rynjin

ESO is an entirely different dev team from the usual Bethesda team.

As for paid mods, make no mistake it would kill the modding scene. Yes, modders do deserve to have some avenue for compensation or their work. That's why donations exist.

But having corporate hooks in that means the corporation can impose their values and restrictions on the mod. Because it has then become a "product". A lot of modders (most?) don't want to be employees by any other name. Some do; their avenue is then to get hired. Making that hiring process pipeline easier would be laudable. Commoditizing mods is not.

----------


## veti

> About mods, I don't really have much against paid mods. I see lots of modders asking for donations. A studio allowing a modder to legally make a profit from a mod to which the studio participates looks OK to me, it's like having a freelance external developer. The much lauded Black Mesa is just that, and Valve's decision to sell it on Steam is seen as a generous act of support. I only see two problems: one related to the QA and compatibility fixes that mods usually lack and I would expect from a paid product, the other is the perspective that e.g. Bethesda may change the rules to only allow for paid mods sold through its store (highly unlikely), or make the CK a paid product (also unlikely). And of course, one can debate the share paid to the external developer for his work.


Thing is, though - these are not just abstract, theoretical, alarmist concerns. They are firmly rooted in Bethesda's own past actions with this very franchise.

I don't object to the idea of paid mods. When Bethesda launched the Creation Club, it made all the right noises and lots of the right promises: about "most mods" remaining free, about sharing proceeds with the creators, but also about quality assurance, integration and support. I don't know how the "sharing" works out, but I imagine it's working as advertised because if not we would have heard about it by now; but the rest of those promises turned out to be worthless.

Free mods? There are precisely none on CC, except when some is temporarily set to free as a promotion. QA, support? Yeah. I've tried one piece of CC content, when it was made available as a promo, and it was dreadful - on Nexus it would have sunk rapidly into well deserved obscurity. (It gave me a new quest - which appeared instantly in my journal, not even bothering to wait for the courier or for me to hear a rumour. The quest itself was a brief and not very interesting dungeon, and the reward at the end was game-breakingly overpowered.)

But the real quality only showed through when I tried to disable (or, failing that, delete) this mod. Turns out, that operation was not supported. At all. As far as Bethesda was concerned, I'd taken the decision to add this crap to my game, and now it was, for me, forever part of the core experience. I deleted the BSA, but as any modder knows, that's neither a clean nor a safe way to remove a mod.

I think there is a faction within Bethesda that wants to do the right thing by modders. It's an influential faction, and because its views are so cuddly and reassuring it's allowed to write and make most of the public pronouncements on the subject. But there's also a faction that sees mods as an ongoing revenue stream to be maximised (and costs to be minimised). And this faction is, ultimately, more powerful - they are, clearly, in a position to starve resources to the CC effort - and likely to prevail.

----------


## Triaxx

Not too long ago I'd have held up nexus as a shiny example of how to do it right. Sadly it's now nothing more than another example of paid mods but this time no revenue will go to the modders. Shame. 

Some modders have gone to modsinexile.com but it'll take so long to gain traction it's doomed to failure before it's started.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Not too long ago I'd have held up nexus as a shiny example of how to do it right. Sadly it's now nothing more than another example of paid mods but this time no revenue will go to the modders. Shame. 
> 
> Some modders have gone to modsinexile.com but it'll take so long to gain traction it's doomed to failure before it's started.


What's happened with Nexus?

----------


## Triaxx

Short answer they got greedy.

Long answer they started making modpacks they call collections which isn't bad on the surface but in order to stop them from breaking they removed the ability for authors to delete their own mods. Which doesnct look good but even versions 'removed' are still accesible to the API to download them. But free users have to manually visit pages to download the mods. Paid users skip that step rendering them the only one's able to get those archived versions, and also robbing the mod authors of potential donations from page visitors.

Suffice to say they looked at Bethesda, and said we can even screw up better. Great Success!

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Short answer they got greedy.
> 
> Long answer they started making modpacks they call collections which isn't bad on the surface but in order to stop them from breaking they removed the ability for authors to delete their own mods. Which doesnct look good but even versions 'removed' are still accesible to the API to download them. But free users have to manually visit pages to download the mods. Paid users skip that step rendering them the only one's able to get those archived versions, and also robbing the mod authors of potential donations from page visitors.
> 
> Suffice to say they looked at Bethesda, and said we can even screw up better. Great Success!


Im abruptly very glad I never finished my feature-kudzud mess of a mod.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Short answer they got greedy.
> 
> Long answer they started making modpacks they call collections which isn't bad on the surface but in order to stop them from breaking they removed the ability for authors to delete their own mods. Which doesnct look good but even versions 'removed' are still accesible to the API to download them. But free users have to manually visit pages to download the mods. Paid users skip that step rendering them the only one's able to get those archived versions, and also robbing the mod authors of potential donations from page visitors.
> 
> Suffice to say they looked at Bethesda, and said we can even screw up better. Great Success!


Lol, modpacks always make people angry in new and exciting ways  :Biggrin: 

Am I remembering wrong, or Nexus once used to be completely paywalled, while Planet Elder Scrolls used to be the free one? I think I remember when Nexus had a golden saint in its banner.

----------


## Anteros

> Lol, modpacks always make people angry in new and exciting ways 
> 
> Am I remembering wrong, or Nexus once used to be completely paywalled, while Planet Elder Scrolls used to be the free one? I think I remember when Nexus had a golden saint in its banner.


I've been using Nexus for....forever and I don't think it was ever paywalled.  I certainly never paid anything for it.  They certainly ask for money constantly, but you can say no.

----------


## Triaxx

I would have been okay with it had they done one of the two obvious fixes. Either allow opting out. Or make the packs cost and profit share with the authors. They were already paying via points this would have been a reasonable step.

But no their response was to double down on their 'you no take mods' stance and royally tick people off.

----------


## DigoDragon

Just finished Meridia's dang beacon quest. It's all fun and looting until the boss starts force-lightning you in the face around corners. If it weren't for the fact the Artifacts of Skyrim makes Dawnbreaker worth it... well, it wouldn't be worth it. XD

Someone remind me, does entering a dungeon location lock that dungeon's level to yours at the time you enter?

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Just finished Meridia's dang beacon quest. It's all fun and looting until the boss starts force-lightning you in the face around corners. If it weren't for the fact the Artifacts of Skyrim makes Dawnbreaker worth it... well, it wouldn't be worth it. XD
> 
> Someone remind me, does entering a dungeon location lock that dungeon's level to yours at the time you enter?


I think so.

I always found it funny how tough the boss guarding Dawnbreaker was so strong, while Orchander, the guy that's literally immune to magic and teleports can be chumped so easily when questing for Spellbreaker.

----------


## Spore

At this point I wish Bethesda would crash and burn with Skyrim Anniversary like Blizzard with WoW or Lionhead with Fable Anniversary.

----------


## Lord Raziere

Okay....in one area I've decided to delete old saves that I don't use so as to help free up space, hopefully by limiting the number of save files I make as possible, my skyrim experience improves to counter the save bloat thing. it seems to be working I think?

I may have figured out something of why my skyrim keeps CTDing around the shrine of mehrunes dagon. I thought it was the modded Umbra enemy put into the game, but I managed to kill her before she could do whatever it is I thought she did, and instead an elder dragon landed and began fighting me then CTD. So I'm thinking that the shrine of mehrunes dagon just doesn't like it when normal speed fighting is occurring, because the way I got around the CTD for the modded Umbra is by using a time slow spell and I was able to kill her without any problems.

thus my logic becomes: the only way I can fight around the shrine of mehrunes dagon is by using a time stop ring to constantly be in a state of slowed down time so as to prevent a CTD from combat _going too fast_. I don't know WHY this is only true for the shrine of mehrunes dagon, other places are functioning fine, but there you go. 

also while I still can't enter Sleeping Giant Inn, I am doing the Dark Brotherhood questline just fine, so maybe I just can't do Dark Brotherhood and the main quest at the same time in my overmodded skyrim. I'm probably wrong, but at this point I'm accepting that I'm a tech priest trying to not to anger my modded skyrim machine spirit.

----------


## Rynjin

Deleting old saves won't help with save bloat. Save bloat is the phenomenon of an INDIVIDUAL save file increasing in size to the point that the game has trouble operating.

----------


## veti

I recently cleaned out all my Skyrim saves older than 1 year. And yet, still the saves folder has more than 9000 files in it. What the actual heck, Skyrim? 

It looks like it's actually keeping _every_ autosave, not just the last three. Wow. That's... a _lot_ of pointless data, since the older files can't be accessed or reloaded.

----------


## Fyraltari

> while Orchander, the guy that's literally immune to magic and teleports can be chumped so easily when questing for Spellbreaker.


I remember the one time I fought him. I was going for a necromancer build and was fairlyblow-level. None of my magic could hurt him and I only had the one crappy sword. So while I could damage him, I couldn't damage him fast enough to overtake his healing. But since all my magic was good for was healing me, he couldn't hurt me so bad that I couldn't heal back to 100% mid-fight as well. So we were locked in a stalemate. The fight went on for long enough that I level up twice solely from the increases in One-Handed (and the occasional Restoration) until the game glitched and froze my character's arm mid-swing which is when I called it a day.

----------


## Mark Hall

> I remember the one time I fought him. I was going for a necromancer build and was fairlyblow-level. None of my magic could hurt him and I only had the one crappy sword. So while I could damage him, I couldn't damage him fast enough to overtake his healing. But since all my magic was good for was healing me, he couldn't hurt me so bad that I couldn't heal back to 100% mid-fight as well. So we were locked in a stalemate. The fight went on for long enough that I level up twice solely from the increases in One-Handed (and the occasional Restoration) until the game glitched and froze my character's arm mid-swing which is when I called it a day.


That is the most Bethesda thing I have ever read.

----------


## Fyraltari

> That is the most Bethesda thing I have ever read.


Legit the funniest thing that happened to me playing this game.

----------


## Mark Hall

So, how many people launder money in Skyrim?

The way I use the term in Skyrim is to buy all of a merchant's stock, then use their new money to sell all of my heavy things. Then I buy back the heavy things (taking a loss), and sell them again, until I am finally rid of my heavy stuff and have gained all of their gold.

Also works with potions.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> So, how many people launder money in Skyrim?
> 
> The way I use the term in Skyrim is to buy all of a merchant's stock, then use their new money to sell all of my heavy things. Then I buy back the heavy things (taking a loss), and sell them again, until I am finally rid of my heavy stuff and have gained all of their gold.
> 
> Also works with potions.


Ive done that, albeit I dont usually buy their _entire_ stock from them, just stuff I might use. Soul gems get this treatment from me a lot, as do any potions that boost carry capacity, but if I tried it on saywooden platesId forget they were in my inventory until I was halfway across Skyrim and _after_ Id passed up more useful or valuable loot as a result. Its a good way to level up Speech.

Mind, Ive done more traditional money laundering in Skyrim too. Take your stolen gems, ingots, furs, ingredients -> craft into jewelry, leather, and potions, all totally legit as far as the shopkeepers can tell. Its very useful if you dont have access to a fence.

----------


## DigoDragon

I usually sell my heavy stuff to buy crafting materials to make stuff to sell. Less about laundry money and more about I need to catch up my crafting skill. The AFT mod let's your companion fence stolen goods and I've used it a couple times when I just didn't feel like finding my local fence.

I do have one pair of boots that got marked as stolen and not even the fences touch it. Weird.
"Here, Lydia, hold onto this."


Yeah, the Orchendor fight was always easy for me. I always sneak on him with a bow and shot hit a couple times, then call it a day.

I just finished the first part of the Wolf Queen quest; I died twice early on fighting a necromancer and drauger that were together because both were summoning ice elementals and raising the dead and casting ice spells, multiplying their force quickly. But then at the end, fighting the trio of cultists? They only came at me one at a time and it only took two hits each to slay them. That was nice of them to wait their turn. XD

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

I thought of something else I want in ES6: the ability to skip the tutorial. It's useful the first time through but there's only so much I can take of 'equip the bow and shoot the bucket' when I've already beaten the game.

----------


## factotum

> I thought of something else I want in ES6: the ability to skip the tutorial. It's useful the first time through but there's only so much I can take of 'equip the bow and shoot the bucket' when I've already beaten the game.


Isn't that why they give you the opportunity to respec at the end of it, though? I think the idea is that you keep a save from that point and just reload that, then respec, if you want to play through again.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Isn't that why they give you the opportunity to respec at the end of it, though? I think the idea is that you keep a save from that point and just reload that, then respec, if you want to play through again.


By that point, you've already picked a gender and race you can't change, though.

I don't think it'd be very hard to add an option to skip _Skyrim_'s tutorial. Like, once Alduin attacks and everything is chaotic, instead of having to ge to the shouty NPCs, there'd be another path out of the city. Add in a dying guard telling you to "warn... Whiterun... Aargh" so you have the beginning of the main quest.

----------


## halfeye

> By that point, you've already picked a gender and race you can't change, though.


Which point is that? I'm pretty sure there's an auto-save and the opportunity for a normal save between the cart ride and your impending execution, which is before the your gender etc. choices.

I agree Oblivion was better in letting you re-spec. on exit from the sewers, where you could also leave a save if you managed to think of it.

----------


## veti

I dunno, is it possible to just turn around and leave the keep once your hands have been untied? 

Though even that would involve an annoying amount of empty replay.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Which point is that? I'm pretty sure there's an auto-save and the opportunity for a normal save between the cart ride and your impending execution, which is before the your gender etc. choices...


Kareeah_Indaga wants a way to skip the tutorial, it starts just after you narrowly avoid execution.

It's the same for Oblivion, once you choose your race and gender you have to go through the whole escape sequence.

----------


## Caelestion

In OB/FO3/FO4, you got to redefine your character creation steps on leaving the sewers/vault.  But then Skyrim doesn't _have_ character creation options, other than what you look like.

----------


## DigoDragon

Finally earned entry into the museum of the Legacy of the Dragonborn mod. Wow... someone had a vision and they really went through with it. I am impressed.

Now to figure out what stuff I got that'll go on display. I have some unusual new items like rare coins and tarot cards.

----------


## Mark Hall

To be honest, I think Skyrim would have worked just fine with a save at the exit of the cave.

One thing I would like is a way to flag that save so you can find it again. This not being able to name your save thing is bull****.

----------


## Keltest

> To be honest, I think Skyrim would have worked just fine with a save at the exit of the cave.
> 
> One thing I would like is a way to flag that save so you can find it again. This not being able to name your save thing is bull****.


If youre on PC, you can name your save files by saving with the dev console. ~ brings it up, then the command is just "save" followed by the save name.

----------


## Triaxx

I've done just that for Fallout 4. One male and one female save just before the Vault Exit. Also for Fallout 3. Didn't for New Vegas or Oblivion. Too many important choices in the NV start, too much to be done in the opening of Oblivion depending on character build.

----------


## Resileaf

> I've done just that for Fallout 4. One male and one female save just before the Vault Exit. Also for Fallout 3. Didn't for New Vegas or Oblivion. Too many important choices in the NV start, too much to be done in the opening of Oblivion depending on character build.


To be fair, the New Vegas intro is just watching Benny shoot you in the face and creating your character with Doc Mitchell. Hardly something you absolutely need to skip through.

----------


## factotum

> To be fair, the New Vegas intro is just watching Benny shoot you in the face and creating your character with Doc Mitchell. Hardly something you absolutely need to skip through.


You do still get the "tutorial" mission with Sunny Smiles--it's obviously optional in FNV, but it gives you quite a bit of XP and a free varmint rifle, so most of the time you'll go through it on every start.

----------


## halfeye

> Kareeah_Indaga wants a way to skip the tutorial, it starts just after you narrowly avoid execution.


Ah, there, I don't know any way to dodge that.




> It's the same for Oblivion, once you choose your race and gender you have to go through the whole escape sequence.


On the PC, you can change your race and gender until you come out of the sewers, there's a gate, and you get a prompt saying something like "exit sewers, do you want to change your character Y/N", I think you can't save the game after saying no, which throws you out across the water from Vilverin, but if you say yes, then you can save before you click the gate again to leave. I'm not sure whether you can change your character anywhere else after the start.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

I was thinking more of a checkbox you click to be dumped into the game proper with some basic gear once you're done with character creation, but a spot to save at the end of whatever tutorial ES6 has would work too I suppose. 

Unrelated: I was not expecting to see this in my news lineup today.

----------


## Triaxx

Plus of course the decision whether to help Goodsprings or the Powder Gangers.

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

You think the next game will give definitive answers regarding some of the more...contentious decisions one can make in Skyrim?  Or will they say something along the lines of "Things got worse no matter what decision actually got made" given the sheer amount of arguing over those plotlines has gone on for literal YEARS and one side being declared "the better choice" would probably make EVERYONE unhappy, even if their side "won?"

Of course, saying a Dragon Break happened is always an option, but I think most players would say playing that card a second time following Daggerfall would cheapen its dramatic use as a plot element, that it'd be lazy (even for Bethesda)...

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> You think the next game will give definitive answers regarding some of the more...contentious decisions one can make in Skyrim?  Or will they say something along the lines of "Things got worse no matter what decision actually got made" given the sheer amount of arguing over those plotlines has gone on for literal YEARS and one side being declared "the better choice" would probably make EVERYONE unhappy, even if their side "won?"


Depends on the thing. I wouldnt be surprised if the results of the Civil War get swept under the rug - either by having ES6 happening concurrently with Skyrim or have some other major disaster overshadow it post-game. (Falmer invasion? Fallout from the Eye of Magnus swallows the whole region? Plague wipes everyone out?)

But some of the other things - Paarthurnax will probably be dead, because the only way to complete that quest is to kill him. The Emperor will have been assassinated. I suspect the Dark Brotherhood will have survived - even if the join branch werent a _lot_ more fleshed out, I gather theyre a popular faction and I dont see Bethesda getting rid of them permanently. 




> Of course, saying a Dragon Break happened is always an option, but I think most players would say playing that card a second time following Daggerfall would cheapen its dramatic use as a plot element, that it'd be lazy (even for Bethesda)...


Agreed; Dragon Breaks should be a last resort after theyve written themselves into a corner, not the first plot device they turn to.

----------


## Keltest

My guess is that the region will be attacked by the Dominion, and the exact details of how the Civil War were going get lost as all sides get wiped out or otherwise displaced.

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

> Depends on the thing. I wouldnt be surprised if the results of the Civil War get swept under the rug - either by having ES6 happening concurrently with Skyrim or have some other major disaster overshadow it post-game. (Falmer invasion? Fallout from the Eye of Magnus swallows the whole region? Plague wipes everyone out?)
> 
> But some of the other things - Paarthurnax will probably be dead, because the only way to complete that quest is to kill him. *The Emperor will have been assassinated.*  I suspect the Dark Brotherhood will have survived - even if the join branch werent a _lot_ more fleshed out, I gather theyre a popular faction and I dont see Bethesda getting rid of them permanently.


That's honestly what I was afraid of: I feel like the Civil War's outcome is kind of rendered moot if the Dark Brotherhood's questline is played through to completion.  With the death of the Emperor, the whole Empire becomes destabilized, whether Skyrim is part of it or not.

----------


## Fyraltari

> That's honestly what I was afraid of: I feel like the Civil War's outcome is kind of rendered moot if the Dark Brotherhood's questline is played through to completion.  With the death of the Emperor, the whole Empire becomes destabilized, whether Skyrim is part of it or not.


Not necessarily. I don't think Motierre's plan stopped at killing the Emperor. Most likely he has a successor ready for a smooth transition of power.

----------


## veti

Yep, everything the player did for Skyrim one way or the other will turn out to be meaningless. (How else can you reconcile "free choice" with "canonical timeline"?) The Emperor will have died (or vanished), although obviously no-one will blame the Dragonborn for that. My money is on "the Thalmor promptly invaded Skyrim making the outcome of the Civil War moot anyway".

Except for stopping Alduin/Ancano/Harkon/Miraak. That'll be baked in (because there weren't any real alternate endings for those quests), although obviously there'll be a whole new existential threat now.

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

> Not necessarily. I don't think Motierre's plan stopped at killing the Emperor. Most likely he has a successor ready for a smooth transition of power.


I thought that intended successor was himself.  :Small Confused:

----------


## Fyraltari

> I thought that intended successor was himself.


Why?

And, let's be clear even if the Dragonborn killing him thwarted the conspiracy he was part of (which I seriously doubt he was the only member, I mean come on, we're not talking about planning a picnic here), Titus Mede very probably has heirs. Like, he's very old and he's expecting to die so the question of his succession must have come up. We're never told he has children, but he had at least one adult cousin so there's a good chance there is at least one relative with a good claim to the throne out there. Probably one Motierre wanted on the throne rather than Mede who he obviously felt was in the way of his political agenda, whatever that is.

Ultimately the Mede Empire survived two Emperors, I don't think the loss of a third is enough in itself to void the consequences of the civil war. Particularly if the Imperials won.

Also, I think the Empire being indeed gone by the time of TES: VI could be an interesting direction for the overall story. It's declined quite a lot since _Arena_, and Talos himself mused in _Morrowind_ that it may have lived its time and it might be better for something else to replace it. Maybe some sort of anti-Dominion coalition of Skyrim, High Rock, Morrowind, Cyrodiil, Argonia and Hammerfell (and Orsinium?). Who knows?

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

He's already on the Elder Council, the only station I could conceivably see being higher than that is Emperor, right?

The general vibe I got is the Thalmor win no matter which decision is taken: If the Emperor survives but Stormcloaks win, Skyrim secedes and the Empire is weakened, allowing the Dominion to win Round 2 of the Great War.  If the Emperor is assassinated and the Stormcloaks win, the Empire and Skyrim now stand divided and are that much easier for the Dominion to conquer.  If the Emperor survives and the Empire wins, the Talos ban goes into full effect, furthering the Thalmor's overarching metaphysical goal of destroying Talos and with him reality.  If the Emperor is assassinated but the Empire wins, then the Dominion win on both fronts, conquering the now weakened Empire and Talos' power is weakened with the now fully enforced ban.

----------


## Rynjin

Didn't he also have a bunch of the other Elder Council members killed too, making him one of the sole surviving members of the chain of command?

Even if he didn't become Emperor, he could seed the new Council with people loyal to him, effectively becoming the power behind the throne.

----------


## Fyraltari

> He's already on the Elder Council, the only station I could conceivably see being higher than that is Emperor, right?


There are a lot of kings and queens on Tamriel who probably outrank most council members. That's the trick, who don't know the actual make-up of the Council and how much power each member actually wield. There's got to be a lot of variation between the High Chancellor and the average member. Especially since a good deal of them must derive power from their titles, positions and fortunes they have in addition to their seat. Also, I don't think it's ever actually said that Motierre _is_ a member of the Council.

And again, why do you think he's in this for personal advancement? The man tells you several time that you are doing a great service to the Empire, that the necessary policies will be implemented now. But you're an assassin for hire from a death cult, he doesn't need to bull**** you. Why would he tell you this if _he_ didn't believe it? The man fights for a cause, methinks. Not that it's incompatible with him getting a lot of money and power from it, mind. Also, If he intended to take the throne, his place would be back in the Imperial City to act as fast as possible. I don't think Motierre is the brain behind this operation, I think he's the guy who was trusted enough to organize the assassination but not important enough that they couldn't have their coup with him half a continent away.




> The general vibe I got is the Thalmor win no matter which decision is taken: If the Emperor survives but Stormcloaks win, Skyrim secedes and the Empire is weakened, allowing the Dominion to win Round 2 of the Great War.  If the Emperor is assassinated and the Stormcloaks win, the Empire and Skyrim now stand divided and are that much easier for the Dominion to conquer.  If the Emperor survives and the Empire wins, the Talos ban goes into full effect, furthering the Thalmor's overarching metaphysical goal of destroying Talos and with him reality.  If the Emperor is assassinated but the Empire wins, then the Dominion win on both fronts, conquering the now weakened Empire and Talos' power is weakened with the now fully enforced ban.


Thing is, nobody on the Empire actually supports the talos ban, or the Thalmor. Tullius starts planning the Second Great War the moment Ulfric's head hits the ground. Also, the Dominion haven't exactly had a great time since the Great War. They lost a huge part of their military (how big the loss relative to the Empire's isn't clear) and have been booted out of Hammerfell. They are also rather impopular on their own territories (or among their soldiers for that matter). The Empire had to deal with secessionists groups and they are several orders of magnitude more tolerant than the Dominion so it probably gets violent even if it hasn't reisen to Civil War level.

Speaking of, that's the whole reason they were so happy about the civil war, wasn't it? It kept the humans' focus away from them and weakened them. They wouldn't care about it that much if they were confident they could take on the Third Empire again.

Besides, say the Stormcloaks win and Skyrim secede. When the Thalmor goes to war against either nation, do you think the other is going to stand back idly? I think they'd take the opportunity to attack the Dominion.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Also, I don't think it's ever actually said that Motierre _is_ a member of the Council.


He's got one of their specially-crafted-for-each-member amulets on his person. Beyond that he speaks with authority and has his own bodyguard. And Babette says he's part of "a very old and powerful Breton family, firmly established in Cyrodiil." He admittedly doesn't get addressed as 'Elder Councilor Mortierre' but since he's on a clandestine and very treasonous mission, he wouldn't be.

I think we can safely assume he's intended to be an Elder Councilor unless and until a later game outright states he's not.




> And again, why do you think he's in this for personal advancement?


Astrid says so. "_The Elder Council... Oh, now that explains quite a bit. Motierre, you naughty, naughty boy. Hiring the Dark Brotherhood to help you rise beyond your station. Delicious._"

----------


## Rater202

Regarding Amaund Montierre... And not directly related to the conversation at hand, I feel its important to note that he shares a Surname with Francois Montierre, a wealthy Breton from Cyrodiil whose death the Hero of Kvatch faked as part of Oblivion's Dark Brotherhood questline, and Mirrable Motierre, a former noblewoman from Cyrodiil who got bored of her life of luxury, casually murdered her handmaid, and then joined the Dark Brotherhood after being invited in The Elder Scrolls Online.

The implication very much seems to be that whenever this family runs into trouble they call the Brotherhood becuase one of their ancestors was a member.

----------


## Lord Raziere

I have a mod that makes the Dark Brotherhood questline have more information about who your killing so that all the targets have done horrible stuff so that it feels more deserving, in that mod Titus Mede II basically sold out his Empire and you kill him before he signs away the whole empire to the Dominion, with the good guy reasoning being that maybe Motierre will be a better ruler. 

but of course the downside of mods is that its so full of CTDs, and now my one of characters just CTDs on load, so now I'm seriously considering just trying to uninstall and reinstall my Skyrim SE then switch to MO2 and try to recreate all my characters. like maybe some things it won't help with, but at least I might be able to see mod conflicts better or easier so I know what to get rid of before I start.

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

What does CTD mean in this context?

----------


## Lord Raziere

> What does CTD mean in this context?


Crash To Desktop. basically the game closes and your back at the desktop.

----------


## Vinyadan

In theory, the following games could just avoid mentioning the matters. The Civil War is just a secondary quest, and, by comparison, we never get told which House the Nerevarine joined (to tell the truth, I am not sure that someone won the war, as there was no king elected; someone above the fray like the guy in Whiterun could get the crown, and I think the fans would like it). Paarthurnax must be unknown to amost anyone in Tamriel, and has spent ages without going anywhere. The Emperor can be killed without the Brotherhood, as we've seen in the past, and the Penitus Oculatus already knew where the Brotherhood was and the password, so the two events don't exclude each other. There may be other such bifurcations, but I don't remember them right now.



> Astrid says so. "_The Elder Council... Oh, now that explains quite a bit. Motierre, you naughty, naughty boy. Hiring the Dark Brotherhood to help you rise beyond your station. Delicious._"


That's how she talks? Damn, I'm glad I killed her.

----------


## Rynjin

Astrid is great, I dunno what you're talking about. The Brotherhood in Skyrim isn't as delightfully hammy as the one in Oblivion, but at least they try.

----------


## Aeson

> Astrid says so. "_The Elder Council... Oh, now that explains quite a bit. Motierre, you naughty, naughty boy. Hiring the Dark Brotherhood to help you rise beyond your station. Delicious._"


I would point out that this appears to be the conclusion that Astrid has drawn from the knowledge that Motierre wants the Emperor dead and the implication that Motierre is somehow connected to the Elder Council. In-universe, she does not seem to have any better information on Motierre's motives than the player character does - quite possibly less, given that the player character actually meets the guy whereas she apparently doesn't even have any idea of who  he is.

Her not knowing who Motierre is even after polling the Dark Brotherhood's contacts, incidentally, makes the idea that Motierre is an agent of an Elder Councilor* rather than being one himself fairly plausible to me. Astrid's in a position where she should probably know, or at the very least be able to find out, who the Elder Councilors are - the Council looks to be something like a Cabinet, not some secret club, and even with the state of Skyrim's Dark Brotherhood they ought to have at least the contacts to find a member list for a major public body like that - and yet it seems that all she and the Dark Brotherhood can discover about this guy is that his family's historically at least somewhat wealthy and influential.

*Or possibly even the Emperor, if you buy into the theory that Titus Mede II plotted his own assassination to clear the way for a successor with less baggage who might therefore be better positioned to unite the various factions within the Empire and lead it in a new war against the Dominion.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Her not knowing who Motierre is even after polling the Dark Brotherhood's contacts, incidentally, makes the idea that Motierre is an agent of an Elder Councilor* rather than being one himself fairly plausible to me. Astrid's in a position where she should probably know, or at the very least be able to find out, who the Elder Councilors are - the Council looks to be something like a Cabinet, not some secret club, and even with the state of Skyrim's Dark Brotherhood they ought to have at least the contacts to find a member list for a major public body like that - and yet it seems that all she and the Dark Brotherhood can discover about this guy is that his family's historically at least somewhat wealthy and influential.


She didnt even know what the _necklace_ was; I think we can safely assume the whos who of the Elder Council is beyond her current pool of contacts. Major government body or no, theyre still down in Cyrodiil and her area of operations is Skyrim, and its not like she can type Amaund Motierre into a search engine and get his wiki page.

----------


## Morty

> In theory, the following games could just avoid mentioning the matters. The Civil War is just a secondary quest, and, by comparison, we never get told which House the Nerevarine joined (to tell the truth, I am not sure that someone won the war, as there was no king elected; someone above the fray like the guy in Whiterun could get the crown, and I think the fans would like it). Paarthurnax must be unknown to amost anyone in Tamriel, and has spent ages without going anywhere. The Emperor can be killed without the Brotherhood, as we've seen in the past, and the Penitus Oculatus already knew where the Brotherhood was and the password, so the two events don't exclude each other. There may be other such bifurcations, but I don't remember them right now.


This strikes me as the most obvious route. Wherever and whenever TES6 takes place, the decisions that can be made in Skyrim will be rendered moot, unmentioned, or both.

----------


## Aeson

> She didnÂt even know what the _necklace_ was; I think we can safely assume the whoÂs who of the Elder Council is beyond her current pool of contacts. Major government body or no, theyÂre still down in Cyrodiil and her area of operations is Skyrim, and itÂs not like she can type ÂAmaund MotierreÂ into a search engine and get his wiki page.


Delvin Mallory recognizes the amulet pretty much instantly. Beyond that, a bunch of high-ranking Imperial officers and Thalmor agents who'd almost certainly personally know members of the Elder Council are in the province, at least the upper tier of Skyrim's local nobility at the bare minimum should have contacts with the Imperial Court...

Skyrim's not some isolated backwater, and even in its dilapidated condition the local Dark Brotherhood chapter ought to have contacts among at least some of these groups. Heck, Delvin Mallory instantly recognizing what ought to be a very rare and, by your reasoning, hardly known in Skyrim piece of jewelry suggests that he might be someone to ask about the composition of the Elder Council.

----------


## veti

> Delvin Mallory recognizes the amulet pretty much instantly. Beyond that, a bunch of high-ranking Imperial officers and Thalmor agents who'd almost certainly personally know members of the Elder Council are in the province, at least the upper tier of Skyrim's local nobility at the bare minimum should have contacts with the Imperial Court...


I think it is a mistake to parse too much significance into the "pretty much instantly" part. Remember how Calcelmo has spent years studying ancient Falmer, but Enthir picks it up in seconds after one glance at his Rosetta Stone? Research in Skyrim always happens at the speed of plot, and I assume that "pretty much instantly" may actually involve a good deal of rummaging through papers, consulting books and colleagues and other stuff that's just too dull to put in a cutscene.

----------


## halfeye

> ... just too dull to put in a cutscene.


There's been a cutscene that wasn't totally dull?

----------


## Rynjin

> There's been a cutscene that wasn't totally dull?


The execution cutscene is really cool the first time through.

There was also the one in Knights of the Nine where you're rocketing through the sky, that was pretty exciting.

----------


## halfeye

> The execution cutscene is really cool the first time through.


The first time maybe, I have never in any game whatever seen one that isn't dull the 101st time through.

----------


## Aeson

> I think it is a mistake to parse too much significance into the "pretty much instantly" part. Remember how Calcelmo has spent years studying ancient Falmer, but Enthir picks it up in seconds after one glance at his Rosetta Stone? Research in Skyrim always happens at the speed of plot, and I assume that "pretty much instantly" may actually involve a good deal of rummaging through papers, consulting books and colleagues and other stuff that's just too dull to put in a cutscene.


If you want to show, or at least suggest, that something takes time to do, the most obvious way to handle it is to tell the player to come back later and maybe give them something to do in the meantime. Morrowind did this, Oblivion did this, Dragonborn did this...

----------


## Spore

> There was also the one in Knights of the Nine where you're rocketing through the sky, that was pretty exciting.


In that vein, people joke about Meridia's beacon and the quest is too short for my liking but the end scene that shows you Skyrim from above is pretty cool, even if you can see Skyrim's technical limits from that angle.

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

Random question: how seriously am I supposed to to take AllInAll's interpretations of Elder Scrolls stuff?

*Spoiler*
Show

Namely the idea that Ulfric Stormcloak and Elenwen apparently had some sort of relationship that produced a Nord-blooded Altmer kid that's now leading Thalmor efforts to excavate or rebuild Numidium...Where did these ideas COME from?!  :Small Eek:

----------


## Fyraltari

It's a fanfic.

----------


## Taevyr

> Random question: how seriously am I supposed to to take AllInAll's interpretations of Elder Scrolls stuff?
> 
> *Spoiler*
> Show
> 
> Namely the idea that Ulfric Stormcloak and Elenwen apparently had some sort of relationship that produced a Nord-blooded Altmer kid that's now leading Thalmor efforts to excavate or rebuild Numidium...Where did these ideas COME from?!


Sounds like a bad fanfic.

And after looking it up...... clearly IS a bad fanfic, from what little I read about it.

----------


## Rynjin

Allinall's stuff is good, but generally shouldn't be taken seriously. The Pelinal rock-opera is pretty amazing though. Just wish it was longer.

In terms of general lore friendliness some of it is fairly accurate (see: aforementioned Pelinal opera) but stylized. Even for that though, it's like asking how seriously you should take Young Scrolls' work.

In terms of their talent and ability to craft entertaining material? Allinall's animations are good and the beats on Zoom and Saint are ****ing sublime. They both have serious talent as artists, if that's what you mean.

But are they "lore friendly"? Only in the sense of that "everything is canon, even fanworks" semi-canon meme.

----------


## Fyraltari

He is using the Thalmor's grand plan (unmake existence) whose canonicity depends on how much credit you give to the "Obscure Texts" since it is only at best implied in the games.

For the rest, I don't think anyone would complain if VI had Mannimarco be back in some fashion. As for him having Thalmor ties, I don't think there's an argument to make either way*. The idea that Elenwen and Ulfric had a loving relationship and children I don't really like since she's all but stated to have been the one who oversaw his torture during the Great War. In any case, I have a hard time picturing anybody with that amount of Mannish blood reaching such a high position within the Thalmor.

*The Thalmor could see ol' Many as either a great hero who personally achieved what they aim to do or a great betrayer who used the tools of the enemy for his own benefit and left everybody else to rot.

----------


## Triaxx

Here's a brain buster for you: TES 6:Atmora 

Skyrim's Civil War made no difference because the continent of Atmora reappeared. It fulfilled a prophecy and the Thalmor were wiped out by a plague unleashed because of it, and now the empire is trying to settle this new land. But you also have high and dark elves and Bretons claiming it as ancestral homelands, plus a Khajiit legend of the end times which they've come in force to prevent.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Here's a brain buster for you: TES 6:Atmora 
> 
> Skyrim's Civil War made no difference because the continent of Atmora reappeared. It fulfilled a prophecy and the Thalmor were wiped out by a plague unleashed because of it, and now the empire is trying to settle this new land. But you also have high and dark elves and Bretons claiming it as ancestral homelands, plus a Khajiit legend of the end times which they've come in force to prevent.


While I certainly wouldn't mind going to Atmora, I thought it wasn't so much missing as frozen solid?  :Small Confused: 

Even with that being true there are still possibilities of course. Lots of ancient ruins buried in the ice, the mystery of how/why it froze over in the first place, settlers and explorers who are in _way_ over their heads and need the player's help to obtain food/find shelter/fight off the giant Ice Worm with the huge burning knife for a face native creatures. Entire lost cities populated with the ghosts of the people who didn't flee to Tamriel in time...officials getting assassinated left, right and center as the various factions try to outmaneuver each other in order to lay claim to it...

----------


## Fyraltari

> But you also have high and dark elves and Bretons claiming it as ancestral homelands


I think you may be confusing Atmora and Aldmeris.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> I think you may be confusing Atmora and Aldmeris.


Yeah Atmora actually exists, Aldmeris is just the Altmer's collective fever dream they all insist for reals actually happened like some elven lost city.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Yeah Atmora actually exists, Aldmeris is just the Altmer's collective fever dream they all insist for reals actually happened like some elven lost city.


Hey now, It can be a real place. If it is, though, the most likely candidate is mainland Tamriel since it'd fit with the Annotated Anuad, explain when the Bosmer got to Tamriel (they didn't leave the Aldmer, it was the other way around) and why Topal was looking in that direction.

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

> He is using the Thalmor's grand plan (unmake existence) whose canonicity depends on how much credit you give to the "Obscure Texts" since it is only at best implied in the games.


Wait, there's no concrete evidence in Skyrim itself that unmaking reality is what the Thalmor are working towards?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Wait, there's no concrete evidence in Skyrim itself that unmaking reality is what the Thalmor are working towards?


Esbern mentions it. On the way back to Delphine after digging him out of Riften IIRC.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Esbern mentions it. On the way back to Delphine after digging him out of Riften IIRC.


Indeed:



> _"Well. They've been hunting down Blades since the Great War, on general principle. But if you mean me, now, in particular... maybe they've started to get an inkling of what the return of the dragons means. I don't suppose they want the world to end any more than we do. Or at least, they'd prefer it to end on their terms."_


important wording there. that is a voiced line in a main quest.

----------


## Vinyadan

About the Thalmor, I think I remember that the Elves consider themselves of the same kind as the Gods, but severed from them by the act of creation, which is why they see Lorkhan (or his equivalent) in a negative light. So undoing creation to gain back their place does sound like what a group of very nationalist high elves could do.




> Here's a brain buster for you: TES 6:Atmora 
> 
> Skyrim's Civil War made no difference because the continent of Atmora reappeared. It fulfilled a prophecy and the Thalmor were wiped out by a plague unleashed because of it, and now the empire is trying to settle this new land. But you also have high and dark elves and Bretons claiming it as ancestral homelands, plus a Khajiit legend of the end times which they've come in force to prevent.


I have a great idea: TES Atmora as a MMORPG set in this deserted continent, no NPCs, with just the players discovering a new world!

----------


## Lord Raziere

> I have a great idea: TES Atmora as a MMORPG set in this deserted continent, no NPCs, with just the players discovering a new world!


and we can have a microtransaction shop in it, and put all the bugs and glitches we can in it, after all who doesn't everyone love those funny bethesda glitch moments, am I right? whats a few exploiters managing to exploit the game to the point where they can abuse it to get stuff from said microtransaction shop so that they don't have to pay for any it between friends?

and then we can release a Skyrim-based update to it six months to a year later so they can have more Skyrim in their Atmora, after all why stop selling Skyrim just because its another game right? we can sell Skyrim with OTHER GAMES TOO! So that every game is in some way, selling Skyrim again. It just works, Vinyadan. It just works.

----------


## factotum

> important wording there. that is a voiced line in a main quest.


But it doesn't actually say that the Thalmor are actively working to end the world, only that they want it to end on their terms if that's what's going to happen anyway. Not to mention it's one man's opinion when all is said and done, and he could be, y'know, *wrong*. Concrete evidence would consist, IMHO, of some smoking gun parchment found in the Thalmor embassy, and I don't recall finding anything like that.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> But it doesn't actually say that the Thalmor are actively working to end the world, only that they want it to end on their terms if that's what's going to happen anyway. Not to mention it's one man's opinion when all is said and done, and he could be, y'know, *wrong*. Concrete evidence would consist, IMHO, of some smoking gun parchment found in the Thalmor embassy, and I don't recall finding anything like that.


Right, because an organization like the Thalmor is just going to leave evidence like that around for some to cause a political scandal when its in their best interests to not say what their goals are in the middle of the kingdom full of nords that hate elves on principle. and announcing that your going to destroy the world is generally not a good political move in general. while Esbern is an experienced Blade who has probably been investigating this for a while to figure out WHY they're doing all this, so I'd trust him over any thing the Thalmor themselves would say because why would they even write that down? 

while Alduin wouldn't end the world in a way they want: he would end the world to make way for a new kalpa, which probably doesn't achieve the "return to their spiritual godliness" thing they intend, but start a new age on Nirn itself, thus keeping it intact but ruining any chance of them succeeding. so they have reason to stop him because his "end" is a part of a cycle, not a true return to their spirit ancestor state.

----------


## Grim Portent

I also doubt any of the Thalmor in Skyrim would have any reason to discuss the plan to end the world, especially in writing. It's a plan for the rulers of the Thalmor and their magical and theological advisors to discuss and work on from the safety of the Summerset Isles, their agents don't need to know anything about it that you couldn't hear from any altmer priest of Auri-El. Hell, most of their agents don't even need to believe in it being possible or desirable to act towards it.

The elven faiths preach that the world is a prison, it's a common thread in most of them, but I doubt most elves actually believe it deep down, much as I doubt many Nords truly believe in Sovngarde, or believed in Alduin or dragons.

In theory the divide between true religious zealots and pragmatic racists could extend all the way up their heirarchy. We don't know anything about who's actually in charge of the Thalmor as an organisation, it's entirely possible that some of the highest ranking members believe in ending the world and have the steps they believe to be important in that as part of the cost of their cooperation with the more down to earth Thalmor. Coincidentally the important stuff to end the world is mostly things the Thalmor want to do anyway regardless of if it brings about the end of days. Oppress non-altmer, outlaw Talos, destroy the Empire, hoard magical and religious artifacts which might be helpful to bring about or prevent the end of the world.

----------


## veti

> The elven faiths preach that the world is a prison, it's a common thread in most of them, but I doubt most elves actually believe it deep down, much as I doubt many Nords truly believe in Sovngarde, or believed in Alduin or dragons.


Most Nords seem to take Sovngarde pretty seriously, and I don't see any signs of prior non-belief in dragons either. There are dragon burial mounds all over the landscape, dragon word walls, there's even a dragon skull mounted on the wall in Dragonsreach. 

I am sceptical of Esbern's level of knowledge and understanding of the Thalmor's agenda. Sure, he's a Blade, but all that means is that he would have been privy to some of the rumours and speculation of that organisation. And the one thing we can say with certainty about the Blades' knowledge of the Thalmor is, it wasn't good enough.

----------


## Rater202

On how to handle Skyrim in the next game: Something bad happened that overshadowed the entire game specifically becuase the Psjdic order ran off with th Eye of Magnus before the LAst Dragon Born could use it, as the Auger told them too.

the Psjdics are in the next game as a major faction, split between "well, how could we know that would happen" asshats and people who are actually apologetic over their screw-up. May or may not be part of the main quest

----------


## factotum

> Right, because an organization like the Thalmor is just going to leave evidence like that around for some to cause a political scandal when its in their best interests to not say what their goals are in the middle of the kingdom full of nords that hate elves on principle. and announcing that your going to destroy the world is generally not a good political move in general. while Esbern is an experienced Blade who has probably been investigating this for a while to figure out WHY they're doing all this, so I'd trust him over any thing the Thalmor themselves would say because why would they even write that down?


Would now be a good time to remind you that Esbern is also slightly loopy and definitely more than a bit paranoid? Recall his reaction when you first meet him in the Riften sewers. Sure, the Thalmor have excellent reasons to want him dead, but there's suitable caution and then there's whatever the heck he's doing. As for leaving evidence around, they're definitely happy to leave written confirmation that Ulfric Stormcloak was an agent of theirs in the Embassy, which I'm pretty sure is going to be far more politically explosive than some crazy ideas about ending the world!

----------


## Rater202

...Wait, wasn't Ancarno *actively trying* to destroy the world with the Eye of Magnus?

----------


## Fyraltari

> written confirmation that Ulfric Stormcloak was an agent of theirs in the Embassy, which I'm pretty sure is going to be far more politically explosive than some crazy ideas about ending the world!


Asset, not agent.



> ...Wait, wasn't Ancarno *actively trying* to destroy the world with the Eye of Magnus?


Aye. But it's never said wether it's a Thalmor thing or an Ancano thing.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I am sceptical of Esbern's level of knowledge and understanding of the Thalmor's agenda. Sure, he's a Blade, but all that means is that he would have been privy to some of the rumours and speculation of that organisation. And the one thing we can say with certainty about the Blades' knowledge of the Thalmor is, it wasn't good enough.


I will point out that Esbern is specifically the Blades _Loremaster_. Its literally his job to know these things, and the last time he brought up a crackpot theory and no one believed him it was about Alduin, and he was spot on about that.




> the Psjdics are in the next game as a major faction, split between "well, how could we know that would happen" asshats and people who are actually apologetic over their screw-up. May or may not be part of the main quest


Sad part is I wouldnt have given this possibility any weight before ESOand now I consider it a strong possibility.  :Small Annoyed: 




> Would now be a good time to remind you that Esbern is also slightly loopy and definitely more than a bit paranoid? Recall his reaction when you first meet him in the Riften sewers. Sure, the Thalmor have excellent reasons to want him dead, but there's suitable caution and then there's whatever the heck he's doing. As for leaving evidence around, they're definitely happy to leave written confirmation that Ulfric Stormcloak was an agent of theirs in the Embassy, which I'm pretty sure is going to be far more politically explosive than some crazy ideas about ending the world!


How exactly do you get loopy out of Esberns behavior?

Also, Ulfric being an asset is extremely relevant to the work the Embassy is doing (keeping the war going). Its the kind of thing that could plausibly end up in the new employee briefing - if by chance you run across the leader of the Stormcloaks, dont kill him because we need him alive.

----------


## veti

> I will point out that Esbern is specifically the Blades _Loremaster_. Its literally his job to know these things, and the last time he brought up a crackpot theory and no one believed him it was about Alduin, and he was spot on about that.


1. Sure, but as I said - the one thing we know for stone cold certainty about the Blades' intel on the Thalmor is, _it wasn't very good_. Even at the height of their power, they could neither accurately estimate the Thalmor's strength nor anticipate their moves. Esbern's speculation may be relatively well informed, but it's still speculation.

(Edit: 1a: I'm also not entirely convinced that "Loremaster" translates accurately to "chief intelligence analyst". Seems likely that "Archivist" might be a more plausible equivalent.)

2. Spot on? I thought we agreed just a few pages ago that Alduin _wasn't_, perceptibly, trying to destroy the world. 




> Also, Ulfric being an asset is extremely relevant to the work the Embassy is doing (keeping the war going). Its the kind of thing that could plausibly end up in the new employee briefing - if by chance you run across the leader of the Stormcloaks, dont kill him because we need him alive.


That's no reason to have it written down in the Embassy, unless either (a) you are over-confident in the Embassy's own security and sure it could never fall into unfriendly hands, or (b) you _don't mind_ it falling into unfriendly hands because it's not actually true, but designed to mislead your enemies. In the former case, the lack of other written evidence in the Embassy remains unexplained. In the latter case that lack makes perfect sense, but we'd have to admit that any other evidence was also unreliable anyway so what's the point.

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

> I also doubt any of the Thalmor in Skyrim would have any reason to discuss the plan to end the world, especially in writing. It's a plan for the rulers of the Thalmor and their magical and theological advisors to discuss and work on from the safety of the Summerset Isles, their agents don't need to know anything about it that you couldn't hear from any altmer priest of Auri-El. Hell, most of their agents don't even need to believe in it being possible or desirable to act towards it.
> 
> The elven faiths preach that the world is a prison, it's a common thread in most of them, but I doubt most elves actually believe it deep down, much as I doubt many Nords truly believe in Sovngarde, or believed in Alduin or dragons.
> 
> In theory the divide between true religious zealots and pragmatic racists could extend all the way up their heirarchy. We don't know anything about who's actually in charge of the Thalmor as an organisation, it's entirely possible that some of the highest ranking members believe in ending the world and have the steps they believe to be important in that as part of the cost of their cooperation with the more down to earth Thalmor. Coincidentally the important stuff to end the world is mostly things the Thalmor want to do anyway regardless of if it brings about the end of days. Oppress non-altmer, outlaw Talos, destroy the Empire, hoard magical and religious artifacts which might be helpful to bring about or prevent the end of the world.


So it doesn't really make much of a difference if the the dissolution of reality in an attempt to reclaim pre-creation spiritual forms is an active goal of the Thalmor or if it's just a sort of guiding ethos, taking Altmer religious philosophy to an extreme as justification for their real-world activities, and thus the idea that they're trying to rebuild Akulakhan and convert all of Summerset Isle into a giant crystal battery/remote-control for it so they can stop around Tamriel to destroy the Towers holding reality together is just AllinAll's speculation?

I was just kinda concerned because it looks like, from some of AllinAll's other videos, that he's got ties to Michael Kirkbride (who sang a cover of "Fly Me to the Moon" for the credits of AllinAll's Elder Scrolls/Evangelion mashup) and has had FudgeMuppet do voicework for some of his videos.  I wondered if having connections to those kinds of big names in Elder Scrolls lore and Fandom meant AllinAll had some kind of insider information in regards to where the setting is going.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> So it doesn't really make much of a difference if the the dissolution of reality in an attempt to reclaim pre-creation spiritual forms is an active goal of the Thalmor or if it's just a sort of guiding ethos, taking Altmer religious philosophy to an extreme as justification for their real-world activities, and thus the idea that they're trying to rebuild Akulakhan and convert all of Summerset Isle into a giant crystal battery/remote-control for it so they can stop around Tamriel to destroy the Towers holding reality together is just AllinAll's speculation?
> 
> I was just kinda concerned because it looks like, from some of AllinAll's other videos, that he's got ties to Michael Kirkbride (who sang a cover of "Fly Me to the Moon" for the credits of AllinAll's Elder Scrolls/Evangelion mashup) and has had FudgeMuppet do voicework for some of his videos.  I wondered if having connections to those kinds of big names in Elder Scrolls lore and Fandom meant AllinAll had some kind of insider information in regards to where the setting is going.


Unfortunately No. Kirkbride is not canon, despite the fact that his ideas are infinitely cooler and more interesting than anything bethesda could dream up because they delve straight into the kind of weirdness that makes Elder Scrolls more than just a DnD clone in digital form. a sad state of affairs to be sure.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> 1. Sure, but as I said - the one thing we know for stone cold certainty about the Blades' intel on the Thalmor is, _it wasn't very good_. Even at the height of their power, they could neither accurately estimate the Thalmor's strength nor anticipate their moves. Esbern's speculation may be relatively well informed, but it's still speculation.


Citation needed. While we know they were on the losing side of the Great War, we know the Blades won enough minor victories that the Thalmor still consider them a threat. We also know that the Blades no longer had a direct line to the Emperor, as the Mede Dynasty replaced them with the Penitus Oculatus, so they were fighting with a handicap. And on top of that the area protected by the Blades got hit by more in the way of disasters (succession crisis right after the Oblivion Crisis, Umbriel, the fall of Baar Dau and the Red Year) than the Thalmor prior to the Great War.

_No_ indication whatsoever that their loss was due to bad information.




> (Edit: 1a: I'm also not entirely convinced that "Loremaster" translates accurately to "chief intelligence analyst". Seems likely that "Archivist" might be a more plausible equivalent.)


While that is not _untrue_:




> He was not a field agent, but is now believed to have been behind some of the most damaging operations carried out by the Blades during the pre-war years, including the Falinesti Incident and the breach of the Blue River Prison.


He knew enough about the Thalmor's plans to hurt them and to avoid them when most of the rest of the Blades' organization was killed.




> 2. Spot on? I thought we agreed just a few pages ago that Alduin _wasn't_, perceptibly, trying to destroy the world.


Eh? He knew Alduin was going to come back before he came back, which was why everyone thought Esbern was crazy.




> That's no reason to have it written down in the Embassy, unless either (a) you are over-confident in the Embassy's own security and sure it could never fall into unfriendly hands,


...which is the Thalmor to the T.




> or (b) you _don't mind_ it falling into unfriendly hands because it's not actually true, but designed to mislead your enemies. In the former case, the lack of other written evidence in the Embassy remains unexplained. In the latter case that lack makes perfect sense, but we'd have to admit that any other evidence was also unreliable anyway so what's the point.


As I believe has been pointed out before, if you're letting your enemies get into your inner sanctum just to mislead them, that's not cleverness that's incompetence, and the Thalmor aren't that.

Also, they had the location of Esbern written down as well, and that is perfectly verifiable.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Citation needed. While we know they were on the losing side of the Great War, we know the Blades won enough minor victories that the Thalmor still consider them a threat. We also know that the Blades no longer had a direct line to the Emperor, as the Mede Dynasty replaced them with the Penitus Oculatus, so they were fighting with a handicap. And on top of that the area protected by the Blades got hit by more in the way of disasters (succession crisis right after the Oblivion Crisis, Umbriel, the fall of Baar Dau and the Red Year) than the Thalmor prior to the Great War.
> 
> _No_ indication whatsoever that their loss was due to bad information.


The Great War started with the Thalmor presenting Titus with a carriage filled _with the heads of every single one of the Blades' operatives within Dominion territory_. That's an extremely humiliating defeat on the Blades' part.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> The Great War started with the Thalmor presenting Titus with a carriage filled _with the heads of every single one of the Blades' operatives within Dominion territory_. That's an extremely humiliating defeat on the Blades' part.


Still doesn't prove their information was bad. Being badly outgunned is a possibility, for example.

----------


## Rater202

> The Great War started with the Thalmor presenting Titus with a carriage filled _with the heads of every single one of the Blades' operatives within Dominion territory_. That's an extremely humiliating defeat on the Blades' part.


That a matter of perspective really.

Were the Blades defeated humiliatingly... Or were the Thalmor agents who took them out just that good?

----------


## Fyraltari

> Still doesn't prove their information was bad. Being badly outgunned is a possibility, for example.


They're spies, my dude. They didn't get killed in battle. The Thalmor managed to indentify them all and murder them without any of them managing to escape. This is a massive operation that required dozens or hundreds of Thalmor agents to act in a coordinated fashion across two provinces. This wouldnahve taken months to prepare despite the Thalmor most likely being the single most important group of interest to the Blades. And the Blades (and the Empire at large) were taken completely unawares.

----------


## Keltest

> That a matter of perspective really.
> 
> Were the Blades defeated humiliatingly... Or were the Thalmor agents who took them out just that good?


That seems like a rather semantic difference. For an intelligence group, the defeat is humiliating either way.

----------


## Rater202

> That seems like a rather semantic difference. For an intelligence group, the defeat is humiliating either way.


It's only a humiliating defeat if you should have won but lost for reasons outside your control.

Ain't no shame in being beaten by someone who is just legitimately better than you.

I'm not willing to assume that this group who for four games were set up as an ancient order of super badasses got beaten out of stupidity.

----------


## Keltest

> It's only a humiliating defeat if you should have won but lost for reasons outside your control.
> 
> Ain't no shame in being beaten by someone who is just legitimately better than you.
> 
> I'm not willing to assume that this group who for four games were set up as an ancient order of super badasses got beaten out of stupidity.


For a group that prides itself on being very good, finding somebody who is leagues ahead of you and losing to them is still humiliating. It makes you look bad. Also, you know, they all died, which is kind of embarassing.

----------


## Rater202

> For a group that prides itself on being very good, finding somebody who is leagues ahead of you and losing to them is still humiliating. It makes you look bad. Also, you know, they all died, which is kind of embarassing.


No, that's tragic. a tragic loss is not necessarily a humiliating one, and if your ego is so fragile that being bested by someone who is leagues ahead of you was humiliating then you probably didn't have a healthy enough go to be that good in the first place.

----------


## Keltest

> No, that's tragic. a tragic loss is not necessarily a humiliating one, and if your ego is so fragile that being bested by someone who is leagues ahead of you was humiliating then you probably didn't have a healthy enough go to be that good in the first place.


Rater, i think youre rather missing the point here. Whether they were humiliated or "just" shamed for their incompetence, they had absolutely no grasp on the Thalmor's strength, numbers, movements or knowledge. They literally failed at every aspect of their job. That means they are very much not an authority on what the Thalmor are doing or what their endgame is.

----------


## Lurkmoar

Losing all of your intelligence operatives in a province and having their heads carted in is gonna sting. 

I for one believe that the Blades would have felt humiliated. Doubly so after Cloud Ruler Temple was sacked. And Ocato was killed. And then being officially disbanded after their organization has served the empire for centuries and have to watch their backs because of kill on sight Thalmor orders.

Edit: My bad, forgot that Ocato was assassinated prior to the great war. Still, not a good look for the Blades.

----------


## veti

> Citation needed. While we know they were on the losing side of the Great War, we know the Blades won enough minor victories that the Thalmor still consider them a threat. We also know that the Blades no longer had a direct line to the Emperor, as the Mede Dynasty replaced them with the Penitus Oculatus, so they were fighting with a handicap. And on top of that the area protected by the Blades got hit by more in the way of disasters (succession crisis right after the Oblivion Crisis, Umbriel, the fall of Baar Dau and the Red Year) than the Thalmor prior to the Great War.
> 
> _No_ indication whatsoever that their loss was due to bad information.


Citation:



> "We fought them in the shadows, all across Tamriel. We thought we were more than a match for them. We were wrong."
> 
> "We fatally underestimated the Thalmor."
> 
> "But even the Blades didn't see the Great War coming. We underestimated the Thalmor, and they destroyed us."


You make a good point about them being cut off from the Emperor. All the more reason to doubt the quality of their intelligence. As for the disasters, those all happened at least two lifetimes before the Great War. Sure, disasters are bad, but for a healthy body there's such a thing as recovery.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I'm not willing to assume that this group who for four games were set up as an ancient order of super badasses got beaten out of stupidity.


I mean, you remember what started the Oblivion Crisis, right? The Blades really don't live up to their hype.

Meanwhile all of the Thalmor's successes are intrigue-related: Usurping power in the Summerset Isles, possibly assassinating Ocato, supporting a _coup d'état_ in Valenwood to install a puppet regime, causing/taking credit for solving the Void Nights, driving the Blades out of their territory, crafting the White-Gold concordat to be as damaging to the Empire in the long run as possible and manipulating Ulfric into starting a civil war.

I think it's fair to say that the Thalmor are the best at political sneakiness in all of Tamriel.

Of course, the Blades got nerfed and the Thalmor got vilain grade plot armour in service to the story, but still.

----------


## Rater202

> I mean, you remember what started the Oblivion Crisis, right?


The bad guy's somehow knowing about the Emporer's secret escape tunnel and the Emporer just letting them kill him when the PC could have easily killed the last of the assailants because he foresaw his own death?

Like, seriously, there is literally no reason for the Emporer to die there other than he himself believing it was pre-ordained... When the previous game established that Prophecy meant jack squat unless you put stock in it and even then doesn't have to be followed to the strict letter.

----------


## Fyraltari

> The bad guy's somehow knowing about the Emporer's secret escape tunnel and the Emporer just letting them kill him when the PC could have easily killed the last of the assailants because he foresaw his own death?


The Crimson Dawn putting _The Entire Imperial family, meaning the Emperor's three adult sons and any children they moght have to the sword_.

And then finding out the secret passage _and_ the Amulet of King's hiding place.
Amulet that was left unsupervised because the grandmaster of the Order left to pray.

Oh and one of the clues every member of the Crimson Dawn is supposed ro find to join, the one that shows the location of their main base is painted right in front of the White-Gold Tower.

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

I think I remember someone saying on a Tumblr somewhere that they felt Caius Cosades was the best of the Blades, but only because he didn't really bother with spying at all: he just did skooma and maintained a few contacts.  He gave you leads and pointed you in the right direction, but he always encouraged you to care more about Morrowind, not the Empire.

What's it say about the Blades that the skooma-addled slacker who didn't even really care that much about the Empire's political interests in the province he was assigned to, was more effective overall than the ones who took their jobs seriously?  :Small Amused:

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> They're spies, my dude. They didn't get killed in battle. The Thalmor managed to indentify them all and murder them without any of them managing to escape. This is a massive operation that required dozens or hundreds of Thalmor agents to act in a coordinated fashion across two provinces. This wouldnahve taken months to prepare despite the Thalmor most likely being the single most important group of interest to the Blades. And the Blades (and the Empire at large) were taken completely unawares.


On the Thalmor's home turf, where the Thalmor also have the _massive_ advantage of _being_ the local government and being able to bring all of its resources to bear. Still not inherently an intelligence issue. 

Being able to tell that the hurricane is coming and being able to _stop_ it from coming are two different things.




> As for the disasters, those all happened at least two lifetimes before the Great War. Sure, disasters are bad, but for a healthy body there's such a thing as recovery.


_Whose_ lifetimes? Esbern was born around the time of the Great Collapse of Winterhold (which also probably didn't help), and he's a human as opposed to something longer lived. I will also point out that the Empire as a whole has not really recovered: Black Marsh is still independent, the Dunmer are still refugees, High Rock is IIRC under attack by pirates...




> The Crimson Dawn


Nitpick: _Mythic_ Dawn.

Edit: Also does it bother anyone else that the symbol for Mehrunes Dagon in ESO is the _exact same one_ as the Mythic Dawn in Oblivion?  :Small Yuk:

----------


## DigoDragon

> Aye. But it's never said whether it's a Thalmor thing or an Ancano thing.


I think the one getting the blame/credit depends on whether the plan failed or succeeded. ;)


Random curiosity question about Anise, the hermit witch living in the shack SW of Riverwood: besides trespassing in her basement and stealing from her, what causes her to aggro against you? Seems like in all my play throughs she's friendly the first time I pass her, but on a second passing she will get up and _Force Lightning_ me in the face, even if I've not entered her home.  :Small Eek:  I can't think of anything I do that could trigger her to attack me.


Anyway, I am getting very invested in the Legacy of the Dragonborn mod! I'm running all around collecting artifacts to put on display. Still learning how the display mechanics work. I figured most of it out by trial and error, and it's easy enough to just grab things I didn't want it taking. The paintings look rather neat in the halls. 10/10.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I think the one getting the blame/credit depends on whether the plan failed or succeeded. ;)


I like this theory.  :Small Big Grin: 




> Random curiosity question about Anise, the hermit witch living in the shack SW of Riverwood: besides trespassing in her basement and stealing from her, what causes her to aggro against you? Seems like in all my play throughs she's friendly the first time I pass her, but on a second passing she will get up and _Force Lightning_ me in the face, even if I've not entered her home.  I can't think of anything I do that could trigger her to attack me.


Shes hiding the fact that shes a witch, and all her magic stuff is in that basement. So you knowing her secret is why she attacks you.

----------


## Fyraltari

> On the Thalmor's home turf, where the Thalmor also have the _massive_ advantage of _being_ the local government and being able to bring all of its resources to bear. Still not inherently an intelligence issue.


Yes, yes, it is. These people were there specifically to spy on the Thalmor. Like, for comparison the mass arrest of the Knight Templars all over the kingdom of France on Friday the 13th of October 1307 took an entire month to plan and the fact that it went without any Templar learning of it in advance is considered borderline prodigious (to the point some suggest it as the origin of the "Friday the 13th is unlucky" superstition although, that's probably wrong) and the Templars were not trying to find out what the French government was up to. 




> Being able to tell that the hurricane is coming and being able to _stop_ it from coming are two different things.


When it comes to intelligence, they kind of are the same.






> Nitpick: _Mythic_ Dawn.


Talos damn it!




> Edit: Also does it bother anyone else that the symbol for Mehrunes Dagon in ESO is the _exact same one_ as the Mythic Dawn in Oblivion?


I don't think one can accuse the Prince of Destruction of being a very creative fellow.



> I think the one getting the blame/credit depends on whether the plan failed or succeeded. ;)


I mean yes, but if he were doing this with the approval of his bosses, I'd have expected a couple of their death squads to help him out. He was after all, trying to misuse a magical artifact in the one place in the province most likely to have people with the necessary skill to stop him.

----------


## veti

> I think I remember someone saying on a Tumblr somewhere that they felt Caius Cosades was the best of the Blades, but only because he didn't really bother with spying at all: he just did skooma and maintained a few contacts.  He gave you leads and pointed you in the right direction, but he always encouraged you to care more about Morrowind, not the Empire.
> 
> What's it say about the Blades that the skooma-addled slacker who didn't even really care that much about the Empire's political interests in the province he was assigned to, was more effective overall than the ones who took their jobs seriously?


He was following the Emperor's direct orders. Which were to groom/encourage the PC to mantle the Nerevarine, which inherently meant caring about Morrowind. 

I agree, old Caius was a good agent - not least because he actively encouraged you to go out and gain levels before taking his missions, which is something I miss in the later games where everything needs to be done nownowNOW (even though we all know it won't make the slightest difference in reality if it's left for, ooh, twenty levels or so). But I don't think it reflects particularly badly on the rest of the organisation. "Skooma-addled" he may have been, but there's no evidence he was indifferent or slack in carrying out his orders.

----------


## Rynjin

> As I believe has been pointed out before, if you're letting your enemies get into your inner sanctum just to mislead them, that's not cleverness that's incompetence, and the Thalmor aren't that.
> 
> Also, they had the location of Esbern written down as well, and that is perfectly verifiable.


I think the mistake is believing the Embassy in Skyrim is their "inner sanctum" by any means. Sure, it's where a lot of agents work out of, but they're small fry in the grand scheme. They have no need to know basis for any of the grand strategic plans the Thalmor leadership are planning.

There's no reason for Elenewen, who is likely IN DISGRACE with the Thalmor for some reason (having been assigned to a frozen ****hole she clearly hates the idea of even being in) would know the grand master plan for the Thalmor, much less have incriminating documentation about it.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> I mean yes, but if he were doing this with the approval of his bosses, I'd have expected a couple of their death squads to help him out. He was after all, trying to misuse a magical artifact in the one place in the province most likely to have people with the necessary skill to stop him.


I mean he had that one guy who tried to stop you after you defeat Morokei to get the Staff of Magnus as well, Estormo. doesn't confirm it one way or another though. though there is the logic that death squads showing up would be too obvious and get you only fireballs with people grouped together....there is also the possibility that it was simply a low priority, high risk mission kind of thing that they sent Ancano going "okay if your right, do so with our blessing but if your wrong, your death won't be a big loss"

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

> He was following the Emperor's direct orders. Which were to groom/encourage the PC to mantle the Nerevarine, which inherently meant caring about Morrowind. 
> 
> I agree, old Caius was a good agent - not least because he actively encouraged you to go out and gain levels before taking his missions, which is something I miss in the later games where everything needs to be done nownowNOW (even though we all know it won't make the slightest difference in reality if it's left for, ooh, twenty levels or so). But I don't think it reflects particularly badly on the rest of the organisation. "Skooma-addled" he may have been, but there's no evidence he was indifferent or slack in carrying out his orders.


That's fair.  How much of Caius' reputation as your Nerevarine's cool Skooma uncle comes from the actual text and how much comes from memes is up for debate.  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Keltest

> I think the mistake is believing the Embassy in Skyrim is their "inner sanctum" by any means. Sure, it's where a lot of agents work out of, but they're small fry in the grand scheme. They have no need to know basis for any of the grand strategic plans the Thalmor leadership are planning.
> 
> There's no reason for Elenewen, who is likely IN DISGRACE with the Thalmor for some reason (having been assigned to a frozen ****hole she clearly hates the idea of even being in) would know the grand master plan for the Thalmor, much less have incriminating documentation about it.


On the other hand, if breaking the Towers and ending reality actually is the Thalmor's ultimate goal, one would expect the person placed in charge of, you know, doing that for this tower to have SOME sort of notes or investigation or something on that.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> On the other hand, if breaking the Towers and ending reality actually is the Thalmor's ultimate goal, one would expect the person placed in charge of, you know, doing that for this tower to have SOME sort of notes or investigation or something on that.


I mean.... the Dragonborn Prophecy implies that they don't need to for Skyrim at the time you play. the brekaing of Skyrim's tower already happened/accomplished:
_"When the Snow Tower lies sundered, kingless, bleeding..."
"...the World-Eater wakes, and the Wheel turns upon the Last Dragonborn."_

Ulfric, the known Thalmor tool/pawn has _already_ murdered High King Torygg. the Last Dragonborn wouldn't be here if he didn't. he has already done his bigger role for the Thalmor, the rest of his unknowing job is just to keep the Nords fighting each other rather than the Thalmor.

----------


## Keltest

> I mean.... the Dragonborn Prophecy implies that they don't need to for Skyrim at the time you play. the brekaing of Skyrim's tower already happened/accomplished:
> _"When the Snow Tower lies sundered, kingless, bleeding..."
> "...the World-Eater wakes, and the Wheel turns upon the Last Dragonborn."_
> 
> Ulfric, the known Thalmor tool/pawn has _already_ murdered High King Torygg. the Last Dragonborn wouldn't be here if he didn't. he has already done his bigger role for the Thalmor, the rest of his unknowing job is just to keep the Nords fighting each other rather than the Thalmor.


Sure, but thats very much a temporary state, and its really ambiguous whether that counts as "broken" enough for the purposes of unraveling reality.

----------


## Triaxx

Ugh, the lore here is incredibly depressing.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Sure, but thats very much a temporary state, and its really ambiguous whether that counts as "broken" enough for the purposes of unraveling reality.


well they need a focusing stone to function.

what a "focusing stone" is can be very flexible, given that one tower is a freaking Brass golem, and another is a tree that was walking around until it decided not to, with its with a perchance acorn being likely candidate.

the Heart of Lorkan served as the focusing stone for both Brass Tower and the Red Mountain at one time or another. so clearly it need not be literal rock.

The White Gold's stone was the Amulet of King's center gem stone.

point is, for all we know the canonical Snow-Throat stone could be something we don't expect. for all we know the Elder Scroll the dwemer put in a light show puzzle so no one would use it to mess with the Snow Throat stone by using to see into the past we screwed up the stone using the scroll, because its ripping the wound in time even more. it could be the Dragonstone we got for that wizard guy in Whiterun at the beginning and because its moved from its crypt it no longer works. it could be the Eye of Magnus and the psijics did an oops by teleporting it away. would certainly help explain all the warning surrounding it. the Snow Throat's stone might've even been Alduin himself given his divine power and his role, towers can be mobile and ending one cycle so another can begin is technically helping to uphold a part of the world. 

lots of possibilities here.

----------


## Archpaladin Zousha

> Ugh, the lore here is incredibly depressing.


I agree...when Morrowind and Oblivion ended, the general vibe I got was "The future's uncertain, but we prevented the worst from happening and that gives us hope."

The lore updates that led to Skyrim pull the rug out from under that like "Haha, NOPE! EVERYTHING GOT WORSE!"  The whole thing with Red Mountain exploding and Morrowind getting devastated is a real punch to the gut because of how the game makes you CARE about Morrowind so much.  And part of the reason the Dark Brotherhood's conclusion being canon is so concerning to me is because I'd hoped after Oblivion's events there'd be some degree of resilience in the Empire that it'd manage without the Septims just fine, but shortly after that the Thalmor come on the scene and hit the Empire so hard it's on life-support, and if the loss of the Septim Emperors broke the Empire that hard, I imagine the loss of the Mede Emperors would practically be a death-blow.

Morrowind and Oblivion made me feel like I was making things better, Skyrim makes me feel like I'm just delaying the inevitable.  :Small Frown:

----------


## factotum

It does have to be said that the outcome of Morrowind not being so great is actually pretty reasonable if you think about it. That giant hunk of rock above Vivec City is explicitly being held up there by the power of the Tribunal, and we know that power is derived from the Heart of Lorkhan, which is just as explicitly destroyed at the end of Morrowind. So, at some point that rock is going to fall, so at the very least Vivec City is doomed with all its people. That it led to Red Mountain erupting and devastating the rest of Vvardenfell is maybe a bit more of a reach, but still within the bounds of reasonableness.

As for Oblivion, can't judge that, never completed it.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Morrowind and Oblivion made me feel like I was making things better, Skyrim makes me feel like I'm just delaying the inevitable.


Yeah, the Civil War in particular makes me want to pull a Psijic and make a bunch of life raft demiplanes to evacuate everyone I care about from Nirn.

----------


## Silly Name

> The elven faiths preach that the world is a prison, it's a common thread in most of them, but I doubt most elves actually believe it deep down, much as I doubt many Nords truly believe in Sovngarde, or believed in Alduin or dragons.


... why wouldn't they? My history professor always used to say "as a rule of thumb, people tend to believe in their religion" when somebody in class tried to argue that nobody could believe something, despite _going to war over it_ or other quite extreme stuff. It's far more ridicolous to think that entire countries shared into some form of national lie in which nobody believed in a widespread belief but pretended to for some reason. Sure, some people use others' beliefs to their own end without really sharing in those beliefs or manipulate those beliefs to their benefits but actually share in said beliefs, but I don't see why Nords, on average, wouldn't believe Sovngarde to be a thing. There being an afterlife for those of your people that died valiantly is not a particularly egregious belief to hold.

Plus, we're talking about a world where magic is undeniably real, and you walk alongside elves and argonians on a daily basis. Why would "dragons" seem ridicolous superstition?

----------


## Fyraltari

> ... why wouldn't they?


With regards to high elves believing the world to be a prison, most of them seem nowhere near depressed enough to actually truly believe that.

----------


## mjp1050

> Plus, we're talking about a world where magic is undeniably real, and you walk alongside elves and argonians on a daily basis. Why would "dragons" seem ridicolous superstition?


You can walk down any street in Tamriel and see an elf, Argonian, and/or magic. It's a little harder to believe in dragons or Sovngarde when no one* in living memory has actually seen either of them.

*I don't count the Greybeards here since they keep their dragon a secret.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> With regards to high elves believing the world to be a prison, most of them seem nowhere near depressed enough to actually truly believe that.


I mean they're elves. they don't really need to conform to human psychology on that.

----------


## Fyraltari

> You can walk down any street in Tamriel and see an elf, Argonian, and/or magic. It's a little harder to believe in dragons or Sovngarde when no one* in living memory has actually seen either of them.
> 
> *I don't count the Greybeards here since they keep their dragon a secret.


Any elf who was hanging around near Stross M'Kai when it was conquered by Tiber Septim could attest of dragons being a very real thing. Also there's the skull of a dragon in the Jarl's palace in Dragonsreach.

----------


## veti

> _ The Wheel turns upon the Last Dragonborn."_


The disturbing part of that is how you're explicitly called "Last". Implying that there can't be any more, ever. If the world needs saving again, it won't be a dragonborn hero that does the job. 




> well they need a focusing stone to function.


Depressing theory/prediction: Paarthunax is the stone, and the canonical ending of Skyrim will turn out to be one where TLD killed him. 




> It does have to be said that the outcome of Morrowind not being so great is actually pretty reasonable if you think about it. That giant hunk of rock above Vivec City is explicitly being held up there by the power of the Tribunal, and we know that power is derived from the Heart of Lorkhan, which is just as explicitly destroyed at the end of Morrowind.


Vivec, who is the one who stopped the moon's fall in the first place, is still powerful in his own right. I had hoped he could have lowered the moon gently to drop it harmlessly in the sea.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> The disturbing part of that is how you're explicitly called "Last". Implying that there can't be any more, ever. If the world needs saving again, it won't be a dragonborn hero that does the job.


There might be a bit of silver lining to this:
1.) Dragonborn could be plural (our character starts a dynasty or something)
2.) Future calamities just won't _need_ someone Dragonborn
3.) Our character could wind up an immortal or near-immortal vampire and be around for a long, long, long time.




> Vivec, who is the one who stopped the moon's fall in the first place, is still powerful in his own right. I had hoped he could have lowered the moon gently to drop it harmlessly in the sea.


IIRC he got kidnapped by Daedra, and the only reason it stayed up as long as it did after that was because the Dunmer made a magic doohicky that kept it up - but it took a steady fuel of souls to power the thing, and when the girlfriend of one of the doohicky's makers got picked to help fuel it, well...RIP Vivec City.

----------


## Silly Name

> With regards to high elves believing the world to be a prison, most of them seem nowhere near depressed enough to actually truly believe that.


Without drawing any explicit parallel comparison to real-world religious beliefs, many philosophies across the ages have interpreted the corporeal condition as a prison of sorts from which one must seek freedom, and their adherents on average weren't a bunch of deeply depressed people.

----------


## Silly Name

> You can walk down any street in Tamriel and see an elf, Argonian, and/or magic. It's a little harder to believe in dragons or Sovngarde when no one* in living memory has actually seen either of them.
> 
> *I don't count the Greybeards here since they keep their dragon a secret.


So, what's the more likely option:

- People who genuinely believe in an afterlife/that dragons are real

Or

- An entire nation who pretends to believe in something nobody really believes in but they all pretend because everyone believes except they don't so how did that belief even got established in the first place?

----------


## Rynjin

> The disturbing part of that is how you're explicitly called "Last". Implying that there can't be any more, ever. If the world needs saving again, it won't be a dragonborn hero that does the job.


Or because prophecies are by necessity told in a past tense from the position of a future observer, "The Last Dragonborn" could just be the previous one before whatever other crisis comes up.

----------


## Fyraltari

> The disturbing part of that is how you're explicitly called "Last". Implying that there can't be any more, ever. If the world needs saving again, it won't be a dragonborn hero that does the job.


And? It's not like it's a requirement to save the world.






> Vivec, who is the one who stopped the moon's fall in the first place, is still powerful in his own right. I had hoped he could have lowered the moon gently to drop it harmlessly in the sea.


Vivec could have done that whenever he wanted in Three Eras. Vivec could have done that the moment he realized what was needed to stop Dagoth Ur (that probably would have helped with maintening the Ghostfence too). Vivec didn't do that. Vivec stated that the rock would hover as long as the Dunmer loved him. It destroying Vvardenfell when the Dunmer turned away from worshiping the Tribunal wasn't a bug, but a feature.

----------


## DigoDragon

> Shes hiding the fact that shes a witch, and all her magic stuff is in that basement. So you knowing her secret is why she attacks you.


Yeah... I'm trying to think of where I would of learned her secret outside her house...





> The disturbing part of that is how you're explicitly called "Last". Implying that there can't be any more, ever.


Possibly, though there's enough contradictory lore in-universe that maybe that'll get changed in the future timeline.

----------


## Lurkmoar

A dragonborn hero won't be needed, because it seems that Alduin was the only dragon with the resurrection shout. He won't be back until the appointed time of the world's natural end.

Dragons are indeed mighty, but hardly invincible.  A solo mage from the Twin Secrets book was able to best one. Now when a dragon dies, it doesn't matter if it's soul remains, it's taking a nap until the true end times.

----------


## veti

> A dragonborn hero won't be needed, because it seems that Alduin was the only dragon with the resurrection shout. He won't be back until the appointed time of the world's natural end.


What if this _is_ that appointed time? There are indications of that.

E.g. Esbern's commentary on Alduin's Wall: "The Last Dragonborn does battle with Alduin _at the end of time_." (Not an exact quote, but he definitely uses that phrase.)

Or Felldir's words on banishing Alduin from the time of the Dragon War: "We shout you out, from all our endings _until the last_."

Then there's Paarthunax's none-too-cryptic warnings to the Dragonborn: "Those who try to hasten the end, may delay it. Those who work to delay the end, may bring it closer."

And of course the repeated references to "the Last Dragonborn". Not just from the prophecy - Miraak also uses the term.

----------


## factotum

> What if this _is_ that appointed time? There are indications of that.


Isn't the main contradictory indication, though, that the *world doesn't end*? And you don't absorb Alduin's soul when you kill him at the end of the game, so there's a reasonable chance that he can come back at some point.

----------


## veti

> Isn't the main contradictory indication, though, that the *world doesn't end*? And you don't absorb Alduin's soul when you kill him at the end of the game, so there's a reasonable chance that he can come back at some point.


The world doesn't end - yet - but it's _prophesied_ to end.

What happens, exactly, when a prophecy - or multiple prophecies - are falsified? Well, obviously nothing much - directly. But what happens, specifically, to all notions of "the appointed time" for something?

----------


## halfeye

> The world doesn't end - yet - but it's _prophesied_ to end.
> 
> What happens, exactly, when a prophecy - or multiple prophecies - are falsified? Well, obviously nothing much - directly. But what happens, specifically, to all notions of "the appointed time" for something?


In the real world, prophesies are hogwash. In fiction, prophesies are whatever the author wants, for as long as the author wants, and if the author changes her mind, then the status of the prophesy changes. If the authors change (as in different people become authors) on a weekly basis, as seems to be the case with the Elder Scrolls, then the chances of a prophecy meaning the same thing between games are very very slender.

----------


## Fyraltari

Thing is, the Amulet of Kings is destroyed meaning no more Dragonborn Emperors and Alduin's body is slain meaning he will only ever come back when Aka(tosh) decides it is time for him to come back and for the kalpa to end. At which point Aka(tosh) is unlikely to spawn a Dragonborn to stop Alduin. So why would there ever be another Dragonborn?

----------


## Eldan

Several cultures, at least the Khajiit, the Nords and the Redguard, claim to have experience with previous Kalpas. So the idea of Kalpas ending is reasonably credible.

----------


## Spore

> Thing is, the Amulet of Kings is destroyed meaning no more Dragonborn Emperors and Alduin's body is slain meaning he will only ever come back when Aka(tosh) decides it is time for him to come back and for the kalpa to end. At which point Aka(tosh) is unlikely to spawn a Dragonborn to stop Alduin. So why would there ever be another Dragonborn?


You think the god of time's devotee in Elder Scrolls is stopped by such a trifling matter as continuity? To put on my imaginary tinfoil hat fully, I assume dwemer vanished by some time travel shenanigans. They either breached the mortal realm by realizing they can quite literally all achieve CHIM (and thus realize they are in a game) or where simply "written out of existence" by Akatosh. But not fully deleted, as to warn mortals about the dangers of achieving divinity as a mortal. 

And if my wishes would be granted, the ultimate TES part would have the daedra (who are tricksters and oppose the aedra, the gods) actively fight against the aedra, actually being the good guys for once, because they want the illusion to end.

----------


## Keltest

> You think the god of time's devotee in Elder Scrolls is stopped by such a trifling matter as continuity? To put on my imaginary tinfoil hat fully, I assume dwemer vanished by some time travel shenanigans. They either breached the mortal realm by realizing they can quite literally all achieve CHIM (and thus realize they are in a game) or where simply "written out of existence" by Akatosh. But not fully deleted, as to warn mortals about the dangers of achieving divinity as a mortal. 
> 
> And if my wishes would be granted, the ultimate TES part would have the daedra (who are tricksters and oppose the aedra, the gods) actively fight against the aedra, actually being the good guys for once, because they want the illusion to end.


The Aedra arent actually "Good" though, in any sense that we understand. Theyre Law, to the Daedra's Chaos. Naturally mortals side with them because consistency of reality is very good for people who dont have the power to just arbitrarily affect the rules to get what they want, but the Aedra dont necessarily have mortals best interests at heart, whatever their priests may say. Case in point, Alduin and the dragons exist, whether they are aedra themselves or simply the direct agents of one.

----------


## Fyraltari

> You think the god of time's devotee in Elder Scrolls is stopped by such a trifling matter as continuity?


I don't understand what you mean.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> The Aedra arent actually "Good" though, in any sense that we understand. Theyre Law, to the Daedra's Chaos. Naturally mortals side with them because consistency of reality is very good for people who dont have the power to just arbitrarily affect the rules to get what they want, but the Aedra dont necessarily have mortals best interests at heart, whatever their priests may say. Case in point, Alduin and the dragons exist, whether they are aedra themselves or simply the direct agents of one.


I dunno the Celestials (minus Serpent) seem like pretty good people when they aren't being mind controlled.

----------


## InvisibleBison

> You think the god of time's devotee in Elder Scrolls is stopped by such a trifling matter as continuity?


Yes, definitely. Akatosh isn't simply "the god of time"; he's the god of _linear_ time. All the instances of time shenanigans occur when Akatosh's influence over reality is weakened or suspended. That's why they're called Dragon Breaks.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I dunno the Celestials (minus Serpent) seem like pretty good people when they aren't being mind controlled.


The celestials? You mean the constellations? Do they ever do anything?



> Yes, definitely. Akatosh isn't simply "the god of time"; he's the god of _linear_ time. All the instances of time shenanigans occur when Akatosh's influence over reality is weakened or suspended. That's why they're called Dragon Breaks.


Akatosh leaves to get coffee and people start giving bith to their parents. Is it really a surprise he's okay with Alduin eating everybody?

----------


## Misery Esquire

> Akatosh leaves to get coffee and people start giving bith to their parents. Is it really a surprise he's okay with Alduin eating everybody?


This just created the image of Akatosh and Periyte as a pair of overworked IT support guys.

Akatosh is a server admin that can't look away without someone letting a million spam bots in and Dagon trying to crash the exchange stack, and Periyte gets sent around to computers that are "super defective, get up here and fix it or lose your job" when it's just not plugged in.

And then he has to carry all the junk off someone's desk down to Akatosh, who's furious because Sheogorath posted the company WAN details and password in a Facebook meme.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> The celestials? You mean the constellations? Do they ever do anything?


You mean, aside from giving everyone minor super powers just for being born in their months/touching their stones? Yes, theres an entire questline for them in Craglorn.




> Akatosh leaves to get coffee and people start giving bith to their parents. Is it really a surprise he's okay with Alduin eating everybody?


Is he though? He arranged for a Dragonborn just in time to stop Alduin.




> This just created the image of Akatosh and Periyte as a pair of overworked IT support guys.
> 
> Akatosh is a server admin that can't look away without someone letting a million spam bots in and Dagon trying to crash the exchange stack, and Periyte gets sent around to computers that are "super defective, get up here and fix it or lose your job" when it's just not plugged in.
> 
> And then he has to carry all the junk off someone's desk down to Akatosh, who's furious because Sheogorath posted the company WAN details and password in a Facebook meme.


I like this mental image.  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## veti

> Thing is, the Amulet of Kings is destroyed meaning no more Dragonborn Emperors and Alduin's body is slain meaning he will only ever come back when Aka(tosh) decides it is time for him to come back and for the kalpa to end. At which point Aka(tosh) is unlikely to spawn a Dragonborn to stop Alduin. So why would there ever be another Dragonborn?


Well, in the past there have been fairly steady streams of Dragonborn. The entire Septim line, for instance. I've also seen it suggested that the heroes of previous games are also Dragonborn (nobody uses the word back then because it has no particular significance except to the Greybeards, who aren't in any of those games), and that accounts for how they (alone of all people in all the world) are able to level up so quickly and achieve what they do.

----------


## Lurkmoar

Besides Uriel (and maybe Martin) Septim, the only previous character in an Elder Scrolls game that I think had a chance of being Dragonborn was perhaps Mankar Cameron, and even that is shaky. If there's one thing Cameron was good at, it was lying and misdirecting.

Previous heroes were favored in some way(Not the hero of Daggerfall though, lol). That doesn't necessarily mean the previous protagonists were Dragonborn.

----------


## Keltest

> Besides Uriel (and maybe Martin) Septim, the only previous character in an Elder Scrolls game that I think had a chance of being Dragonborn was perhaps Mankar Cameron, and even that is shaky. If there's one thing Cameron was good at, it was lying and misdirecting.
> 
> Previous heroes were favored in some way(Not the hero of Daggerfall though, lol). That doesn't necessarily mean the previous protagonists were Dragonborn.


We know for a fact that the Champion of Cyrodiil at least was NOT a dragonborn, since they couldnt wear the Amulet of Kings.

----------


## Triaxx

The Champion could have since the amulet was attuned to Dragonblood. While a Dragonborn might not qualify. Which makes no sense but when gods are involved rules tend to be the first thing hurled out the window.

----------


## Eldan

> This just created the image of Akatosh and Periyte as a pair of overworked IT support guys.
> 
> Akatosh is a server admin that can't look away without someone letting a million spam bots in and Dagon trying to crash the exchange stack, and Periyte gets sent around to computers that are "super defective, get up here and fix it or lose your job" when it's just not plugged in.
> 
> And then he has to carry all the junk off someone's desk down to Akatosh, who's furious because Sheogorath posted the company WAN details and password in a Facebook meme.


And then some people have a dance-protest outside his office because he's "too elven" and somehow manage to crash his server.

----------


## Fyraltari

> This just created the image of Akatosh and Periyte as a pair of overworked IT support guys.
> 
> Akatosh is a server admin that can't look away without someone letting a million spam bots in and Dagon trying to crash the exchange stack, and Periyte gets sent around to computers that are "super defective, get up here and fix it or lose your job" when it's just not plugged in.
> 
> And then he has to carry all the junk off someone's desk down to Akatosh, who's furious because Sheogorath posted the company WAN details and password in a Facebook meme.


Oh, I like that. Anu is the CEO who no one ever sees. Magnus was the guy who set up most of the software infrastructure but left the company a while ago and nobody is really sure how it all works now. Julianos is from accounting. Zenithar and Stendarr are the HR guy and the local union leader but I don't know which fits which better. Mephala jsut love to spread gossip around and will make up stuff if nothing is interesting enough. Mara is the one who is always ready to help out the newbies and give them advice.  Kynareth is the the only one who waters the plants. Nobody really knows what Sanguine actually _does_, but he's there.

And I'm out of ideas.





> You mean, aside from giving everyone minor super powers just for being born in their months/touching their stones?


Yes aside, from that, since they dot seem to have much control over that (although I think lore-wise, only the Heroes get to enjoy that). 


> Yes, theres an entire questline for them in Craglorn.


Is that an ESO thing? That sounds like an ESO thing.






> Is he though? He arranged for a Dragonborn just in time to stop Alduin.


He's not fine with Alduin ruling the world as a tyrannical god-king or eating the souls in Sovngarde but the fact that you don't absorb Alduin's soul _strongly_ suggests that Akatosh is keeping him for later use.





> Well, in the past there have been fairly steady streams of Dragonborn. The entire Septim line, for instance.


The Dragonborn Emperors were dragonborn because of the Covenant between Alessia and Akatosh. That Covenant ended when the Amulet of Kings was broken.



> I've also seen it suggested that the heroes of previous games are also Dragonborn (nobody uses the word back then because it has no particular significance except to the Greybeards, who aren't in any of those games), and that accounts for how they (alone of all people in all the world) are able to level up so quickly and achieve what they do.


No, being a Hero and being a Dragonborn are two unrelated things (most likely). Cyrus, the PC of _Redguard_ was a Hero but not a Dragonborn (since he didn't absorb the soul of Nafaalilargus when he killed him).

We know for a fact the Hero of Kvatch and the Imperial Agent were not dragonborn either, since the HoK couldn't put on the Amulet of Kings and the Agent couldn't use the Totem of Tiber Septim to control Anumidium.

The only indication that any of them may be Dragonborn is that the Nerevarine is said to be "dragon-born and star-marked" which is likely to mean "was born in Imperial territory".



> Besides Uriel (and maybe Martin) Septim, the only previous character in an Elder Scrolls game that I think had a chance of being Dragonborn was perhaps Mankar Cameron, and even that is shaky. If there's one thing Cameron was good at, it was lying and misdirecting.
> 
> Previous heroes were favored in some way(Not the hero of Daggerfall though, lol). That doesn't necessarily mean the previous protagonists were Dragonborn.


Mankar Camoran (he's from the Summerset Isles, not the British Isles) being Dragonborn is the only way to explain why _he_ can wear the Amulet of Kings when the HoK can't. At least, it's the only way I know of.



> The Champion could have since the amulet was attuned to Dragonblood. While a Dragonborn might not qualify. Which makes no sense but when gods are involved rules tend to be the first thing hurled out the window.


My understanding is that all the Dragonborns have the dragonblood, but the Dragonborn Emperors (except Tiber and Reman) only had the dragonblood and not the rest of the package.



> And then some people have a dance-protest outside his office because he's "too elven" and somehow manage to crash his server.


*Sighs*
Customer service...

----------


## Eldan

> Oh, I like that. Anu is the CEO who no one ever sees. Magnus was the guy who set up most of the software infrastructure but left the company a while ago and nobody is really sure how it all works now. Julianos is from accounting. Zenithar and Stendarr are the HR guy and the local union leader but I don't know which fits which better. Mephala jsut love to spread gossip around and will make up stuff if nothing is interesting enough. Mara is the one who is always ready to help out the newbies and give them advice.  Kynareth is the the only one who waters the plants. Nobody really knows what Sanguine actually _does_, but he's there.


Lorkhan is the one who convinced everyone that they need a GUI instead of a command line interface to attract customers.

Which makes all the elves neckbeards who want to go back to pure assembly language or something.

----------


## Misery Esquire

> Oh, I like that. Anu is the CEO who no one ever sees. Magnus was the guy who set up most of the software infrastructure but left the company a while ago and nobody is really sure how it all works now. Julianos is from accounting. Zenithar and Stendarr are the HR guy and the local union leader but I don't know which fits which better. Mephala jsut love to spread gossip around and will make up stuff if nothing is interesting enough. Mara is the one who is always ready to help out the newbies and give them advice.  Kynareth is the the only one who waters the plants. Nobody really knows what Sanguine actually _does_, but he's there.
> 
> And I'm out of ideas.





> And then some people have a dance-protest outside his office because he's "too elven" and somehow manage to crash his server.





> Lorkhan is the one who convinced everyone that they need a GUI instead of a command line interface to attract customers.
> 
> Which makes all the elves neckbeards who want to go back to pure assembly language or something.


Alright just for fun, let's take this and make the whole cast : 
*Spoiler*
Show


Lorkhan : Started this entire branch of the corporation, introduced all the ease-of-use designs and actually lead the first production team himself in a garage. For these amazingly successful efforts, he later received... The hatred of everyone on salary, and got shredded on social media until they could fire him.

Magnus : Built almost all the cabling and company internals himself. Didn't like Lorkhan's "artistic direction", and just up and quit without notice leaving a lot of things unfinished and in Akatosh's claws to deal with.



Akatosh : The overworked head of IT that's had to do 90% of the server work himself for the last <years error> since Magnus left. Rarely leaves his office, and when he does, everyone goes ballistic because their network starts to crash.

Arkay : HR manager, the one that's always doing the actual interview when you're being hired... Or fired.

Dibella : She's always getting newer, nicer, offices and things for _reasons_. Cough. Also usually is the one arranging the office party scheduling, and other mandated celebrations.

Julianos : He says he's from accounting, but any time anyone sees him he's reading the news. From tomorrow, the 1800s, or something in Ancient Sumerian.

Kynareth : She's a founding member of the company, but oddly never moves up in the world. Keeps all the office plants watered, and is usually arguing with landscaping maintenance.

Mara : No one is entirely sure which department she's in ever since the time people ganged up to get rid of Lorkhan, she's usually busy talking with the workers and bringing in food.

Stendarr : Is the one that does all the paperwork in HR and all the internal interviews. Almost always sides against certain parts of management. Oddly started keeping a mace above his office door. No one's asked about it yet.

Zenithar : The Union president, who hasn't had to deal with a strike yet because honestly most of the workforce (mortals) don't realize they have anything to do about  management. Is antsy about this "Thalmor" social media group.

Talos : An industrial contractor that ended up on salary. Some of the normal staff dislike him, others love him. 



Azura : No one has seen her do any work in the last forever, aside from whenever she storms down from her corner office to reprimand an entire department staff for sophistry.

Boethiah : All of the employees that work in her advertising department are hollow eyed and nervous; they're usually all backbiting to try and get her to smile on them.

Clavicus Vile : A company lawyer, who's closely followed by his briefcase-carrying junior associate. Has a gold inlaid mahogany desk with a Newton's cradle on it. And is irritated that some twerp managed to take contracting away from him.

Hermaeus Mora : He's the lead from design. People usually edge away when he's staring at them, which is always. His office was once blocked off for a week when a pile of trashy Scientific Journals fell over in front of his door.

Hircine : Keeps bringing a bunch of hounds into work and tracking mud all over. Always off on hunting weekends, or assigning lower-level managers deal with his work for him.

Jyggalag : He was a strict no-nonsense downer Chief Financial Officer that pedantically marched on over everyone else at every meeting until he had his way. So they forced him to come to a company party and spiked his drink. Hasn't been seen since. Though, that Sheogorath fellow...?

Malacath : A manager of engineering. Is very serious when working on something, but finding him when he's not red-faced with rage otherwise is a real challenge. And so is getting back out of his office after saying something like that.

Mehrunes Dagon : Hasn't stopped insisting that he has a better corporate plan and that this place is just one step from falling down. Usually sabotaging company works to make this at least partially true. Spreads political theories to the workers, and is all smiles to those who listen. And tries to get the rest fired immediately.

Mephala : Claims she's in charge of administration, but this may just be an excuse to read everyone's paperwork. So she can have something to tease everyone else with. Put a spider tank on the cubicle dividers for people to admire, isn't sure why people don't. Does wiccan art online under a pseudonym.

Meridia : Is one of the few on this side of the office that does a lot of work, claims she's the only one keeping the lights on around here. Collects any worker she likes onto her team, where they find it extremely difficult to get transferred back out of.

Molag Bal : Calls himself the "Chief People Officer". The HR department refuses to report to him, and in fact have an ever-growing pile of complaints about him. Even those who leave the company can still find it difficult to avoid him.

Namira : Always in the office after hours. Says she's in charge of Sanitation. Encourages beggars to stay in the lobby. Odd smell around her. Sends company memos deriding Arkay CC'd to everyone.

Nocturnal : Is the oldest manager in the entire building. People mutter that the place was just built around her when she chose not to move. Keep an eye on your office supplies, or she'll have them. Also walks off with personal items. You'll never get them back, don't go looking.

Peryite : Has a sign that says Inferior Assistant Under-Manager nailed to his door. Does all the work that other people claim that they're responsible for. Hangs around Akatosh whenever possible, because they're third cousins twice removed on his uncle's wife's side. Has a year-round head cold, and is always sniffling.

Sanguine : Often shouts "hip" internet slogans and sprays people down with champagne. Has relations with the workers, which the other managers find more than odd and slightly uncomfortable (except for Malog Bal, which should make anyone reconsider their choices). Always 110% chipper and just back from vacation somewhere exotic.

Sheogorath : Looks oddly like Jyggalag if he had been a mad tramp surfer instead of a 40-something balding accountant. Carries a box of fishsticks under one arm and tells rambling stories to anyone who will listen, until either giving them real gold Spanish doubloons or sticking a live anchovy in their ear. The rest of management refuse to do anything about this and say, "It's fine. That's fine. Better than expected, really." Everyone is amazed that not only can he work a computer, but is also a wild break-away memetic hit with every social media post.

Vaermina : Once brought in a "home crafts project", judging by the number of managers and workers that suddenly needed to leave it was a great success! She'll pull your ear if you're not working, but the more committed to the job you are, the more upset she is with you.



Ideal Masters : After taking over a files and documents room they said that, as middle management, they should be making all the decisions instead. Few of the upper management or workers seem to remember they're there at all.

Tribunal : Three workers took over a wing of the building and ran it fairly well until Azura got tired of them doctoring their profit numbers.

Dagoth Ur : Found Lorkhan's old plans, which the Tribunal used later, and holy **** is that cancerous!? Get him out of here!

Umbra : Spray paints outside of the building with "Suck it, Clavicus!" tags when not writing contracts.

Numidium : Someone thought they were ordering a Mercedes-Benz. They received this instead. It was a lawn ornament until someone stole it, crashed it into the internet cables outside and Akatosh wrote an enraged 5000-page company wide notice about the impact it _mysteriously disappeared._

Mannimarco : Who the [email protected]?# is this guy? Who invited him? What do you mean, read the notice?

----------


## Fyraltari

The Hist: an old tree in the courtyard of the main building. Sanguine swears it hissed at him once, but he might have been high.

Trinimac: Former head of security and Akatosh's best buddy, was fired after having a fight with Boethiah when she called him a compulsive liar. Malacth inherited his office.

Morihaus: Kynareth's son, was an intern for a while with his buddy Pelinal. Hard-working and reliable but did not leave much of an impression.

Pelinal: Also an intern, made friend with Morihaus. A complete mess that you would never know if was going to work a 20-hours shift or show up late and yell at everybody. Couldn't stand Akatosh and once ripped off a toilet seat and used it to break another toilet seat. Liked to rant about how "VR is the future, man!"

Alkosh: Akatosh's pet cat. Pelinal kicked him once by accident and he scratched him so hard he had to go to the hospital

The Hoon Ding: Head of logistics and transportation. Very rarely at the office but when he is things tend to go smoother.

Ebonharm: One of the company's very first employees. Isn't around anymore but nobody is sure if he retired, was fired, muted to another building or what.

Sithis: not an employee, he works for construction company that made the building where the main offices are. Hangs out at the same pub the others do.

Mai'q: A janitor. Likes to quote obscure proverbs and refuses to elaborate on their meaning.

Sai: Who?

----------


## Resileaf

> Mai'q: A janitor. Likes to quote obscure proverbs and refuses to elaborate on their meaning.


Also occasionally makes a world-shattering remark that has everyone questionning their existence or hints at a deeply hidden company secret that would make it go under if it was ever found out, but again, he never elaborates and management just ignores him hoping that he'll continue like that.

----------


## Eldan

Man, this is getting Kirkbridian. We're this close to Tal-OS.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Sai: Who?


Sai is the stray someone found in the parking lot and brought inside. Mara in particular considers him to be something of an office mascot.

----------


## Fyraltari

Guys, we forgot about Y'ffre.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Guys, we forgot about Y'ffre.


Yffre is the one who never goes out to eat with the rest of the team and never touches the food other people bring in because its not a cheat day.

----------


## Eldan

Mainly talks about how he runs marathons in his spare time. Bikes to work. Has six potted plants on his desk.

----------


## Misery Esquire

Ah, there's also;

Alduin : Akatosh's vandal son. Spends his time making torrents and DDOSing people. Tries to lord it over the employees, but because he doesn't work there (yet) he's usually shown the door. Calls workers "wage-slaves".

Leki : An employee that was master of leaving conversations without you noticing. Ended up with her own break room/office because she showed up with an "authentic 1000 year old katana" and threatened everyone into working harder until management thought it was hilarious and gave her a supervisor job.

Miraak : Thought he was as cool as Mannimarco and could cheat his way into a position - wasn't. Thought he could pretend to be friends with Alduin long enough to get into management - couldn't. Got banished to the mail room where Hermaeus Mora makes him sort his manga & Marvel collections.

Mane : Dude knows where to get the stuff, alright? Plus he's besties with M'aiq. Seems to have a few hundred relatives that are always visiting. Apparently is actually a vicar that just needed another job.

----------


## Fyraltari

I just learned (two months late) that it turns out the name "Redfall" won't have anything to do with _The Elder Scrolls VI_ bit is in fact a new IP, developped by Arkane.

----------


## Eldan

Eh, they still showed the coast of Hammerfell in that otherwise pointless three second teaser.

----------


## DigoDragon

One of the best parts about replaying a quest you did maybe just once years ago; remembering how annoying it is to get from Dawnstar to Dagon's shrine, somehow overshooting it to find yourself in Labyrinthium(sp), and then ending up in Morthal to warm up because you almost froze to death thanks to the Frost fall mod. XD

Next time I'm just going to summon my physics breaking horse and brute force climb the mountain.

Just broke 100 exhibits in Legacy of the Dragonborn.

----------


## veti

In an effort to add a bit more - well, effort - to Skyrim, I've been experimenting with the 'Genesis' mod. It works well enough at adding bandits to bandit lairs, but it's a bit hit-and-miss with everything else.

I just worked my way through Kilkreath Temple. The mod had added a few bandits to the early stages, which (as well as being lore-stupid) was a bit of an own goal as they had been fighting the native shades. But the true stupid didn't set in until the end, when I snuck my way into Malkoran's inner sanctum and found...

What I had expected was that he would be surrounded by dozens of corrupted shades, and he was. But what I wasn't expecting was half a dozen Malkorans. They all had his face, his robes - and his level and spells. You remember how tough one Malkoran can be? - well, imagine that times six. (Quite a bit worse, in fact, because being a necromancer, he strengthens nearby undead - including the shades of his own clones.)

After dying half a dozen times, and filled with the burning curiosity to see just how excessive this encounter was, I toggled on god mode. The ensuing battle gained me one point in Marksmanship, five points in One-handed and five points in Restoration (mostly from offensive spells), and I think there were a few light armour increases in there as well. So... yeah. I don't think Genesis has struck its balance quite right.

----------


## DigoDragon

Up to 223 exhibits in the museum now. I gotta say, getting stuff to put on display is actually fun. Before I'd just have these artifacts sitting in boxes in whatever my player home is, but now having them on display gives them at least a visual purpose.

The library still gives me a little bit of a fight, because it seems like the sorter won't put the special books/series on the lower displays or cases, just sorts it all in the upper general section. I think I figured out the other display sorters.

Now I have to go install a mod so I can move the family into the safehouse. Didn't know there was an extra step there!

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

What are peoples thoughts on survival mode in ES6? Want it, dont want it? Ive never done survival mods as I didnt think it would be something I would enjoy, but I had loads of fun in Subnautica and now Im wondering if Ive been missing out.

----------


## veti

> What are peoples thoughts on survival mode in ES6? Want it, dont want it? Ive never done survival mods as I didnt think it would be something I would enjoy, but I had loads of fun in Subnautica and now Im wondering if Ive been missing out.


I've experimented with Frostfall in Skyrim, and not found it adding anything I enjoy. I'll probably try the creation club version, once, when I get the anniversary edition, just to see if that's more to my liking.

I like the idea of survival, but I've yet to find an implementation that I actually enjoy. It may be something that needs to be baked in to the game from the outset and can't be simply bolted on after the event.

----------


## factotum

Assuming we're talking a survival mode similar to FO4, some changes (e.g. no fast travel, only being able to save at a bed you own) I'm OK with, some I'm meh about (having to eat and drink to stay alive is just pointless busywork in a game, IMHO) and some are just plain broken (significant chance of getting ill every time I sleep? Hard pass on that one).

----------


## Rynjin

I kinda hate FO4's Survival mode, particularly the way it limits saves. No game that Bethesda has EVER released is stable enough for that to be viable.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Assuming we're talking a survival mode similar to FO4, some changes (e.g. no fast travel, only being able to save at a bed you own) I'm OK with, some I'm meh about (having to eat and drink to stay alive is just pointless busywork in a game, IMHO) and some are just plain broken (significant chance of getting ill every time I sleep? Hard pass on that one).


Having to eat and drink would be an inventory management boon to me. "Why do I have 134 bottles of Nuka Cola? And haven't even done Nuka World?"

----------


## DigoDragon

> I've experimented with Frostfall in Skyrim, and not found it adding anything I enjoy.


I use Frost fall, but I tweaked mine to just be strictly bonuses for being warm and penalties for freezing. That way I have incentive to stay warm but I don't die if I spend a little too long shopping outside my modded Winterhold. ;)


Edit. My museum is up to 297 exhibits! I am loving this Legacy of the Dragonborn mod.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I kinda hate FO4's Survival mode, particularly the way it limits saves. No game that Bethesda has EVER released is stable enough for that to be viable.


Havent played FO4 but Im going to second this anyway. Subnautica hardmode was already problematic for me, I ended up losing more progress to game crashes than I did actual deaths thanks to the no save unless you quit the game aspect of hardmode.  :Small Annoyed:  And the ES games generally have more going on.




> I use Frost fall, but I tweaked mine to just be strictly bonuses for being warm and penalties for freezing. That way I have incentive to stay warm but I don't die if I spend a little too long shopping outside my modded Winterhold. ;)


That sounds like a good balance TBH. They already do similarly for rest bonuses.

----------


## Triaxx

I don't mind the dying, but I set Companion Rescue to 100%.

As for F4, I've only had 2 crashes in 500+ hours of the game. I can occasionally get two crashes getting to the main menu in FNV.

----------


## Vinyadan

I have been replaying Morrowind. There's a lot of new (for me) mods, and they're really good. 

The roleplaying mod in particular lets you just be some guy instead of the Nerevarine, starting in any city, and it's great for old players that want a different experience from the get-go. https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/49389

Then there is "Beautiful cities of Morrowind", which is a very lore-friendly overhaul of the various towns. It's subtle, they look better, but they still look like themselves. Plus, it contains a million optional compatibility patches. https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/49231

I also modded combat. I used a mod that lets 100% of hits connect and instead uses weapon skills for damage, adding special characteristics for each weapon class (e.g. axes cause bleeding). It speeds up combat a lot, avoiding the early, exhausting duels against harmless critters. https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/46993 Dangerous enemies are still dangerous, however!

At this point, though, combat was too efficient, which left spellcasting in the shadows, so I modded it, too. 

First, I created a mod that removes spell failure (if someone wants it, I can upload and link it; it's lua, and works with MWSE). 

Then, to retain the original balance (and leave a use for magical skills), I tried to create a mod that used a cost formula of 

```
cost = original cost * (100/magic skill)
```

 The idea was that you would still pay the same overall amount of Magika per successful casting, without wasting your time with actual spell failure. 

However, I didn't manage to pull it off. So instead I installed a mod that increases your magicka based on your total magic skills. In addition, skills gradually decrease casting cost, reaching 50% at 100.  https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/45058 It also does other adjustments, and it's very customisable.

To balance the added magicka with the lack of spell failure, I created a simple mod that doubles spell cost for all magical effects (except feather, which I brought to Oblivion levels). This, however, makes enchanting even more demanding, so I installed a mod to improve enchantment balance. https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/44420

Right now, I am very happy with the experience. No more ordeals of swing&misses; all spells get cast; there is still a sense of progression; feather and enchanting are now usable; and, thanks to the Code Patch, I can cast on the fly like in Oblivion, but have all the customisability of Morrowind magic. I also kept no magicka regeneration, because I didn't like how it slowed down fights in Oblivion, causing kiting and pillar dancing: now it's either drink a potion, or find an alternative. Actually, knowing that spells are reliable and usable has led me to consume quite a lot of potions, compared to the past...

----------


## veti

> First, I created a mod that removes spell failure (if someone wants it, I can upload and link it; it's lua, and works with MWSE). 
> 
> Then, to retain the original balance (and leave a use for magical skills), I tried to create a mod that used a cost formula of 
> 
> ```
> cost = original cost * (100/magic skill)
> ```
> 
>  The idea was that you would still pay the same overall amount of Magika per successful casting, without wasting your time with actual spell failure.


The spell failure chance is more complicated than that. It takes into account the spell difficulty (higher-cost spells are more likely to fail), your willpower stat, and your current fatigue level, as well as your skill. My experience is that once my skill level is up to 40-45, as long as my fatigue is full, spell failure for common stuff (like Intervention, Mark, Recall, Healing) becomes pretty rare - one attempt in ten, maybe.

----------


## Vinyadan

> The spell failure chance is more complicated than that. It takes into account the spell difficulty (higher-cost spells are more likely to fail), your willpower stat, and your current fatigue level, as well as your skill. My experience is that once my skill level is up to 40-45, as long as my fatigue is full, spell failure for common stuff (like Intervention, Mark, Recall, Healing) becomes pretty rare - one attempt in ten, maybe.


You're right, of course: the formula I wanted was cost = original cost * (100 / castChance). So for example a 6 points spell at 46% chance would cost 13 points.

Unfortunately, I don't know how to implement it. I tried doing it using as a model a mod that I later found out doesn't even seem to work any more, and I find esp mods unreadable (I can't just do like with text files and compare original and mod).

Also, the existing mods that reduce casting cost based on skill actually make you cast at full cost and then give you back some magicka. This means that, with such a mod, you cannot cast a spell whose original cost you can't cover. Using them as a model for increased cost, the cost increase would also need to be calculated separately. SO the formula would be something like increase = (original cost * 100 / castchance) - original cost, and then cost = increase + original cost. I'm not sure of what would happen, if such a mod were installed and you cast a spell whose original cost you can cover, but not the cost increase.

----------


## Laughing Dog

So I've been having a bit of fun with the Relics of Hyrule mod for Skyrim.  For what started out as basically a collection of weapons and armor mods, it has turned into full-sized DLC mod.  It is only mildly lore-breaking; which when you consider that this is a crossover with the Legend of Zelda, that is a minor feat in and of it self.
*Spoiler: Quick Plot synopsis*
Show

Basically, during the Mythic Era, Hyrule and surrounding countries were part of the previous worlds that got smooshed into becoming Nirn/Tamriel.  Crap happens; millennia later, items from the past start showing up again.

  What it is: Basically, a shipload (or three) of weapons and armors.  It also has a large number of new monsters, a fair few new dungeons (at least 10 full-sized{plus however many you want to count it's end-game dungeon(s?) as}), fairly clever level designs, a few bosses you might want to be at a higher-level than you you're currently at, a handful of merchants, a museum of it's own (not connected to Legacy of the Dragonborn {actually might need a patch to prevent conflicts?}), a good chunk of reading, guide-dang-it galore, new magic, a few new followers, and I think that's it?

  What it is not: The Legend of Zelda, the Dragonborn of Destiny.  It isn't a remake of a Zelda game using the Skyrim engine.  It also does not mod in Link1, Ganondorf1, Ganon1, or Zelda1 into the game.  It does not add in new quests2, or new dialogue.  It is pc only, primarily because the mod author has no desire to get into a cage match with Nintendo3.

Aside from mentionsOther than unmarked finding of the various scattered items, and occasional-what-the-heck-happened-here-s.I'm paraphrasing, of course.

Recommendations:  Play an Argonian, there's a lot of under water exploration.
Related question: Are there any mods that improve underwater visibility?

----------


## Lord Raziere

oh yeah, I have that Zelda mod. its probably the closest I'll ever come to buying a Zelda game myself after my long ago failed attempt at beating wind-waker. it has no quests, its an entirely an exploration-based mod so to access its content you have to figure it out or know where to go. some of the stuff is in places where your likely to go to anyways but those are breadcrumbs to give you clues to the rest. Once I got real far into exploring with it and discovered the ruins of Hyrule which was its own worldspace, I think? there was nothing really to do there but the fact that I could find it was cool.

----------


## DigoDragon

Legacy of the Dragonborn has a khajiit spellcaster follower that didn't try to kill me off AND an airship? I love this mod. XD

I think mods that give you a museum to take care of are secretly genius. I never cared about the big player home mods that you can put stuff on display because it didn't really do anything other than for looks. But putting stuff in the museum nets you new quests, companions, interesting new loot donations from patrons... suddenly I am invested in gathering those daedric artifacts and exploring those lesser dungeons.

----------


## Spore

> Legacy of the Dragonborn has a khajiit spellcaster follower that didn't try to kill me off AND an airship? I love this mod. XD


To bring topic back to Jhzargo for a hot minute here; am I the only one that kinda respects his hustle? I assume he is the only one with his head screwed on tight in this so-called "college", other than the dealer guy.

9 times out of 10, I should not be the candidate for archmage, and by all means he is the most powerful sorcerer in all of Skyrim assuming max level scaling is concerned, but by that logic, Hold guards are the most powerful warriors in all of the game too. But he possesses sheer raw talent in story too, but his side quest is very inconsequential. It would be a great budding rivalry until you are almost archmage, but you need to defeat him in a last test of power (after you have shown skill by uncovering the Eye of Magnus and magery by controlling it).

Imagine the frustration of having been overlooked for years by your teachers only for them to throw themselves at the guy with the figurative health bar above his head. I can get behind that ire.




> oh yeah, I have that Zelda mod. its probably the closest I'll ever come to buying a Zelda game myself after my long ago failed attempt at beating wind-waker.


If you are after a somewhat budget Zelda experience, try to get an older used Switch with Breath of the Wild after the oLED Switch rolls out. If you love Skyrim, and you like Zelda, BotW is a no-brainer for you.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> If you are after a somewhat budget Zelda experience, try to get an older used Switch with Breath of the Wild after the oLED Switch rolls out. If you love Skyrim, and you like Zelda, BotW is a no-brainer for you.


Not really.

The reason I like Skyrim is because I can customize my character and grab a bunch of cool things I can keep to do whatever I want with them.

BotW has a fixed character- Link. so that whole character customization thing is gone. while I can't really keep anything because all the drops will break.

There is no reason for me to play Breath of the Wild. I'd rather go for trying Majora's Mask because its more of time loop thing than an open world thing and I never got far on it when I was young even though my brother beat it. its the same reason why despite my brother recommending Witcher 3 and trying it out I didn't really get far, because I'm just not interested in Geralt, when I want an open world experience I like who my character IS being just as open as the world, which has become rarer as of late unfortunately.

----------


## Spore

Every once in a while someone should try something they "know" they wouldn't like just to test if it is still true.

On a less truism-heavy way of argumenting: You will miss out on so many cool stories if you always just pick games where your character is exchangable because there are always many caveats that come with their interaction with the environment.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Every once in a while someone should try something they "know" they wouldn't like just to test if it is still true.
> 
> On a less truism-heavy way of argumenting: You will miss out on so many cool stories if you always just pick games where your character is exchangable because there are always many caveats that come with their interaction with the environment.


1. There are some fixed character stories that I'm willing to pick the game for yes, but the story has to be incredibly good for me to bother. like we're talking top tier stuff here, enough to make me want to experience it directly first. There is a lot of media to sift through, and I have to filter out a lot of things to get to the gems.

2. Otherwise, I don't need to. For everything else, if I'm interested but not willing or able to pick up the game I can watch a lets play instead and miss nothing if there is a fixed story. If the game is so good it will persuade me to get it at some point even _when_ I know the story, because it will make me willing to experience it _again_ but with my own efforts behind it. While watching a streamer experience a game a bit day one can be informative about whether its even worth purchasing yet, like the buggy mess that was Cyberpunk 2077. 

3. Meanwhile a game with a customizable character, branching dialogue options and whatnot- that makes sure I _play_ the game over just watching it. Because those are MY choices being made, rather than someone's choices which I have no control over. After all, if its the story I make, then its not the story that is being made by someone else, and while story wise watching someone else play a fixed story is largely the same experience as playing it yourself- a story with a customizable character and agency in what choices picked is an entirely different one, I find. sure I don't exactly experience the gameplay, but that is entirely different desire which has nothing to do with my desire for stories, fixed or mutable.

----------


## Rynjin

Yeah... except none of that third bit makes any sense given the examples you've thrown out. You'll play Skyrim, a game where you can make your own character but have next to ZERO ability to affect the plot (it's one step off from being a Pokemon game, ehich sometimes gives you the riveting choice between "Yeah!" and "Of course!"), but not the Witcher games, which have a fixed character but give you infinitely more ability to actually make meaningful choices and affect outcomes.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Yeah... except none of that third bit makes any sense given the examples you've thrown out. You'll play Skyrim, a game where you can make your own character but have next to ZERO ability to affect the plot (it's one step off from being a Pokemon game, ehich sometimes gives you the riveting choice between "Yeah!" and "Of course!"), but not the Witcher games, which have a fixed character but give you infinitely more ability to actually make meaningful choices and affect outcomes.


Well I don't watch Skyrim stuff for plot, no skyrim stream or video does plot, its all funny stuff to show what crazy things you can do by modifying the game. which is much more entertaining in the case of Skyrim. Also I _really_ like customizing my characters appearance.

While Witcher 3, I've already purchased it, and just procrastinating for years on getting back to actually playing it. Since I HAVE the game, watching a lets play would be spoilers since I can experience it myself if I ever put the effort in. Now I might consider breaking this rule, if only to break me out of this and at least get it over and done with so I can move on, and because I had uninstall the game to make room for others I wanted to play and reinstalling it could take up a lot of space. but maybe enough of a preview might persuade me to play it again, who knows?

----------


## DigoDragon

> To bring topic back to Jhzargo for a hot minute here; am I the only one that kinda respects his hustle? I assume he is the only one with his head screwed on tight in this so-called "college", other than the dealer guy.


That's a fair assessment, really. Jhzargo has the ambition to be running the college way more than I, who is just here for the artifacts for my collection. If I were him, I'd probably be frustrated too. I have used him a couple times as a companion, and he is good at what he does, but not one of my fav companions to go back to.

Its just that I don't even like the college all that much. Okay, yeah the destruction of Winterhold wasn't the College's fault, but that's your community! Surely you should be doing more to help rebuild the town?

I wish you could pick someone else to be Archimage. Just let me have a day pass to use the college library. Or name a new dorm hall after me. XD

----------


## Keltest

I will say, Skyrim's handing out of faction leadership through totally unrelated plot rather than through genuine aptitude and dedication to the faction is one of the most obnoxious things about the game to me. It makes sense with the Companions, because they have a "first among equals, i only give suggestions instead of orders" system, but thats the only place. With the College, i do precisely nothing to actually further the College's goals, or indeed even really learn magic, in any way. I just avert disaster that somebody else instigated.

----------


## Eldan

Really think they should just go with the player charactder being something like "Guild Champion" or "Favored Agent" or whatever instead of actual guild leader in most cases. "Yes, you found the eye of magnus and stabbed 648 necromancers to death, but that guy over there wrote a twenty-nine volume treatise on mysticism and has been with the guild for 200 years, so, you know..."

----------


## Triaxx

I watched someone with a mod to let Tolfdir become Arch-mage, and he just gives you the quests to deal with the wisp things.

----------


## halfeye

> 1. There are some fixed character stories that I'm willing to pick the game for yes, but the story has to be incredibly good for me to bother. like we're talking top tier stuff here, enough to make me want to experience it directly first. There is a lot of media to sift through, and I have to filter out a lot of things to get to the gems.


There are probably more games where you don't chose your character than where you do.

Doom (and 2, 3 etc), Quake (2, 3, etc), Deus Ex (2, 3, etc), Half Life (and expansions, 2 and expansions) The Witcher (2,3) not all the follow-ons are brilliant (I was not impressed with Quake 4), but there are some pretty good games (for their times) in my list.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I will say, Skyrim's handing out of faction leadership through totally unrelated plot rather than through genuine aptitude and dedication to the faction is one of the most obnoxious things about the game to me.





> Really think they should just go with the player charactder being something like "Guild Champion" or "Favored Agent" or whatever instead of actual guild leader in most cases. "Yes, you found the eye of magnus and stabbed 648 necromancers to death, but that guy over there wrote a twenty-nine volume treatise on mysticism and has been with the guild for 200 years, so, you know..."


Second both of these; when Im out in the wilderness picking mushrooms and murdering fish for potions Im not solving the guilds day to day problems the way a person in a leadership role should - and Id _rather_ be picking mushrooms and murdering fish. Give me a nice title that reflects my accomplishments and leave the boring meetings and paperwork to someone else!

----------


## veti

> There are probably more games where you don't chose your character than where you do.
> 
> Doom (and 2, 3 etc), Quake (2, 3, etc), Deus Ex (2, 3, etc), Half Life (and expansions, 2 and expansions) The Witcher (2,3) not all the follow-ons are brilliant (I was not impressed with Quake 4), but there are some pretty good games (for their times) in my list.


Definitely a lot more. Letting you build your own character is the exception, not the norm. It's a strength of the Elder Scrolls franchise that the games can build their central story around any character - the railroading can still be pretty offensive, but you've always got some sort of choice. Compare with (e.g.) Fallout (3, 4 at least), where you're saddled with a whole family history.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Definitely a lot more. Letting you build your own character is the exception, not the norm. It's a strength of the Elder Scrolls franchise that the games can build their central story around any character - the railroading can still be pretty offensive, but you've always got some sort of choice. Compare with (e.g.) Fallout (3, 4 at least), where you're saddled with a whole family history.


Yes its incredibly sad. Seems I was born into a time where it more common than most and that time seems to have passed. I hope it becomes more common.

----------


## Anteros

People are free to like or dislike whatever they want.  That said, Link is barely a character.  I'm not convinced that the Dragonborn doesn't have more personality than him.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> That said, Link is barely a character.  I'm not convinced that the Dragonborn doesn't have more personality than him.


Yeah, whats the point of a non-character if you can't customize the appearance so that its YOUR non-character at least? Makes no sense.

----------


## factotum

> Yeah, whats the point of a non-character if you can't customize the appearance so that its YOUR non-character at least? Makes no sense.


In something like The Witcher the whole point is that you're playing a specific character from the source material. If you could customise your appearance you wouldn't be Geralt the White Wolf anymore.

----------


## Rynjin

> Yes its incredibly sad. Seems I was born into a time where it more common than most and that time seems to have passed. I hope it becomes more common.


I wish I knew what time that was, because as far as I know there's NEVER been a time when pure create-a-characters was the norm.

----------


## Eldan

> Second both of these; when Im out in the wilderness picking mushrooms and murdering fish for potions Im not solving the guilds day to day problems the way a person in a leadership role should - and Id _rather_ be picking mushrooms and murdering fish. Give me a nice title that reflects my accomplishments and leave the boring meetings and paperwork to someone else!


I mean, it's not a thing that Elder Scrolls would do, I feel, but I think it would actually be _hilarious_ if you went through all the trouble of becoming head of the mage's guild and the only effect was from then on, other mages would randomly come up to you and say stuff like "Archmage! We need you to sign this contract with the carpenter's guild for 200 new staves!", "Archmage, we need you to grade these entrance exams!", "Archmage! We need you to resolve a dispute, do you think the elemental particle of Magicka has up spin or down spin?" "Archmage, our guild house in Bravil collapsed! We need funds for the bricklayers!" "Archmage, did you read my funding application for the expedition to the Dragontail mountains yet? I need six grad students to carry my equipment!"

----------


## Lord Raziere

> I wish I knew what time that was, because as far as I know there's NEVER been a time when pure create-a-characters was the norm.


Well there's your problem: your thinking it was the norm according to whatever definition of "norm" is to you, but haven't made the logical leap of looking it from my perspective that it would be normal to me even if it wasn't objectively true. and are stuck on looking at it from your perspective that you assume is some wide view of videogame industry and assuming I know what that perspective is. I don't. 

Sure objectively you can say its not the "norm", But I grew up on games like say, Jade Empire, Kotors 1 and 2, Dragon age, Mass Effect, how foolish of me to think that these would continue. Clearly I should've saw them eventually going away like some genius. Clearly I should've predicted Skyrim being resold a million times instead new games like it being made and prepared accordingly. How shortsighted I am. It wasn't all I played sure, but they were a big part of it, and were pretty much ttrpgs before ttrpgs for me.

Now as for trying new things, I find certain strategy games (Civ 6, Stellaris) and digital card games scratch the customization itch by allowing me to pick a strategy that I like the most. After all if I beat something my way, is that not an expression of self? if I lose due to its weaknesses, is it not also a fair trade for identifying with its victories? Also Dark Souls, Nioh 2 and Code Vein offer enough customization that I like them and am willing to put up with their difficulty, because its dealing with the difficulty MY way with my character.

----------


## Spore

> People are free to like or dislike whatever they want.


And I never said something different. And I TRULY get that one cannot get into a game even if it has stellar gameplay if the "fluff", the story and characters are not to your liking. I often have even gaming sessions where I am annoyed at not being able to control some story bits because the character has their own ideas on how to handle things.

Like the time when trained assassin and bodyguard Corvo Attano who KNOWS how to deal with magic users throws himself at an overpowered witch he only knew from fairy tales previously. Like that's a smart idea. 




> That said, Link is barely a character.


I know what you mean but I disagree. Link is always an elf/Hylian, he typically uses swords and a shield (though other weapons are a thing) and his greatest powers are finding incredibly powerful items and absorbing life force/stamina through exceedingly bull**** ways.

Yeah, half of it is baked in gameplay loop, but it defines his character. Plus I must admit, in BotW he even has MORE personality in the flashbacks. He is overprotective, doesn't think the princess can take care of herself and has a rivalry with an ally, a goron friend and a mom-friend in the Gerudo lady. That's plenty of backstory compared to Skyrim's "you crossed the border at the same time as rebels, you damn [insert race here]".

----------


## Vinyadan

> Give me a nice title that reflects my accomplishments and leave the boring meetings and paperwork to someone else!


"Trebonius"  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Mark Hall

> "Trebonius"


First time I beat Morrowind, I was simultaneously head of House Telvanni and the Archmage of the Mage's Guild. I got to be the second by showing to everyone that the previous Archmage was overly influenced by an infiltrator from House Telvanni.

 :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Keltest

> Yeah, whats the point of a non-character if you can't customize the appearance so that its YOUR non-character at least? Makes no sense.


Keep in mind that Link the non-character first showed up in a period of gaming where being able to distinguish a face in the pixels was considered high quality graphics. There isnt exactly a lot to customize there, and his identity as a character has grown along with his pixel and polygon counts. Link from Breath of the Wild isnt a non-character at this point, he's Link. Stoic, mute, skilled, brave to the point of foolishness and fairly single minded in his quest. He isnt as deep as, say, Geralt of Rivia, but he does have a fairly consistent portrayal that carries across the games, to the extent that its possible to do so without letting us see his dialogue.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Keep in mind that Link the non-character first showed up in a period of gaming where being able to distinguish a face in the pixels was considered high quality graphics. There isnt exactly a lot to customize there, and his identity as a character has grown along with his pixel and polygon counts. Link from Breath of the Wild isnt a non-character at this point, he's Link. Stoic, mute, skilled, brave to the point of foolishness and fairly single minded in his quest. He isnt as deep as, say, Geralt of Rivia, but he does have a fairly consistent portrayal that carries across the games, to the extent that its possible to do so without letting us see his dialogue.


Also, Lunk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6jDObuhtKI

----------


## Triaxx

On top of that Link is generally designed to be that sort of basic blank slate, to let the player step into his shoes. So you don't put too much characterization in, lest it feel like ypu're playing someone else's story.

Precisely the issue Fallout 4 slammed head first into.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> On top of that Link is generally designed to be that sort of basic blank slate, to let the player step into his shoes. So you don't put too much characterization in, lest it feel like ypu're playing someone else's story.


He is a character with an appearance and name I cannot customize. that is already too much characterization for what I personally desire for an open world game. if it wasn't an open world game, it'd a different story. also its a Nintendo game so they expect you to play the game for the sake of playing the game and liking the core loop and not care about getting any rewards. thats not real interesting to me, because it means the real reward is mastering the gameplay for the sake of mastering gameplay which I've never felt a desire to do. it means the real draw of BotW isn't anything _I'd_ like out of an open world game, but instead going through repetitive motions for the sake of experiencing those motions. you go out and explore Skyrim, stumble across a fort, kill the bandits there, you can at least keep the loot you find. you go find a moblin camp in BotW, all your getting is a bunch of weapons that will break, so really its just being done to stockpile a bunch of interchangeable random disposable killsticks and like food/mats so you can do it again but without even something different or an upgrade to make it worthwhile. which is fine if your into gameplay for the sake of gameplay, I'm not going to judge whoever gets fun out of doing that, it just isn't me when I want an open world to explore and do stuff in.

like if we're talking linear games I'm much more accepting of a fixed character because the expectation is that the story of that linear game is good enough to be worth playing through the rails. you want to tell a story with the character and put gameplay into it, tell it. I'm a fan of things like Asura's Wrath, Undertale, the first three paper marios, a couple Tales Of games, Hades and such but I don't consider any of them open world. adding an open world to a linear story with a fixed character protagonist is mystifying to me. you want me to play a specific characters story, don't waste time just focus on telling it.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I mean, it's not a thing that Elder Scrolls would do, I feel, but I think it would actually be _hilarious_ if you went through all the trouble of becoming head of the mage's guild and the only effect was from then on, other mages would randomly come up to you and say stuff like "Archmage! We need you to sign this contract with the carpenter's guild for 200 new staves!", "Archmage, we need you to grade these entrance exams!", "Archmage! We need you to resolve a dispute, do you think the elemental particle of Magicka has up spin or down spin?" "Archmage, our guild house in Bravil collapsed! We need funds for the bricklayers!" "Archmage, did you read my funding application for the expedition to the Dragontail mountains yet? I need six grad students to carry my equipment!"


I agree it would be hilarious, but disagree that they wouldnt do it - recall we already have the find the missing alembic repeatable quest, and Season Unending is basically a real life meeting with fantasy characters.




> That's plenty of backstory compared to Skyrim's "you crossed the border at the same time as rebels, you damn [insert race here]".


I dunno about _backstory_, but the Dragonborn is pretty consistently portrayed as a bit of a snarker, the Nerevarine is thorough but disorganized (*cough*quest journal*cough*), and the Vestige is a bit clueless.

----------


## Rater202

And in terms of backstory, the Champion of Cyrodiil is implied to have some kind of connection to the grave industry: They know the criminal penalties for both necrophilia and grave robbery off the top of their heads.

Regarding becoming Guild Heads: Considering that you mostly end up just taking a tithe or doing some kind of easy repeatable quest whenever you feel like it as a HEad, I think what it is is that you're being used as a figurehead while you're number 2 does all of the actual runnings of the guild with you being the one who takes the heat. They don't get all the little perks, but they also don't get the blame and the stress of having to live up to the reputation.

Let's look at the Dark Brotherhood: In Oblivion you just make a trip to get some names once a week tops and in Skyrim you get an infinitely repeatable quest to go kill some random guy. Actually running the brotherhood is delegated to someone else.

----------


## Rynjin

> And in terms of backstory, the Champion of Cyrodiil is implied to have some kind of connection to the grave industry: They know the criminal penalties for both necrophilia and grave robbery off the top of their heads.


Given that you start the game in prison, I think the implication is less "you were part of the grave industry" and more "you have personal experience with sentencing"...

----------


## Rater202

> Given that you start the game in prison, I think the implication is less "you were part of the grave industry" and more "you have personal experience with sentencing"...


The fact that you clearly don't know why you're in prison, you just sort of woke up there, suggests otherwise.

Especially since the penalty for grave robbery is apparently summary execution.

----------


## Rynjin

> The fact that you clearly don't know why you're in prison, you just sort of woke up there, suggests otherwise.
> 
> Especially since the penalty for grave robbery is apparently summary execution.


You clearly had the good sense to surrender instead of fighting the guards. Therefore the penalty is 25 to life.

----------


## Keltest

Or its just a bit of fascinating trivia that you like to entertain your friends with. Or you were a lawyer. Or an executioner. Or a guard.

Lots of plausible reasons you might know that.

----------


## veti

> I agree it would be hilarious, but disagree that they wouldnt do it - recall we already have the find the missing alembic repeatable quest, and Season Unending is basically a real life meeting with fantasy characters.


'Season Unending' is your idea of "hilarious"? Well, diff'rent strokes I guess...

I _think_ even Bethesda must realise they messed up with that quest, and I hope they won't repeat it. It would be kinda fun to have to deal with the day to day work of running the College, but that's not Skyrim (think of the amount of dialogue you'd have to record!), it's a whole different game.

----------


## Fyraltari

I guess once you become head of the guild, you could have an office filled with paperwork with a unique interaction "work" instead of "seat" and when you do that the screen goes black and it cuts to five hours later or something. You should probably get some minor reward out of it.

Really, while you being "the leader" of the guild was always borked I think it got so much worse in Skyrim because it removed all the little ranks there were so instead of a meteor-quick but still gradual progression you're just catapulted guildmaster out of the blue.

----------


## Rater202

> I guess once you become head of the guild, you could have an office filled with paperwork with a unique interaction "work" instead of "seat" and when you do that the screen goes black and it cuts to five hours later or something. You should probably get some minor reward out of it.
> 
> Really, while you being "the leader" of the guild was always borked I think it got so much worse in Skyrim because it removed all the little ranks there were so instead of a meteor-quick but still gradual progression you're just catapulted guildmaster out of the blue.


I think the only one where it works in Skyrim is the Brotherhood.

You get declared the destined Grand Head Poobah not even halfway in, most of the cast doesn't give a crap except for two people, one who is a religious fanatic and the other immediately sees you as a threat even though, while you're nominally the leader, traditionally you'd just listen for targets and tell them to the other leaders.

The entire rest of the plotline is caused by those two people overrecacting.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Really, while you being "the leader" of the guild was always borked I think it got so much worse in Skyrim because it removed all the little ranks there were so instead of a meteor-quick but still gradual progression you're just catapulted guildmaster out of the blue.


Yeah, in Oblivion at least the traipsing between towns gave you some exposure to the other guild members and their magical specialties, and the speed of your rise to power can at least be partially explained by half the guild defecting/getting killed. In contrast the College still has most of its senior staff by the end of the story.

----------


## Spore

> I dunno about _backstory_, but the Dragonborn is pretty consistently portrayed as a bit of a snarker, the Nerevarine is thorough but disorganized (*cough*quest journal*cough*), and the Vestige is a bit clueless.


What do you base your obervations on? Dialogue options? Journal entries?

Because to me, Nerevarine felt like a grifter (let's try these 15+ organizations until SOMEONE let's me in). The Dragonborn always felt like a knucklehead brute ever since I realize the typical hero is a weapon swinging brute, and while this naturally works for the Civil War and Companions, it always feels very much brutish when playing something more delicate like College, Dark Brotherhood or Thieves' Guild. They reiterate several times on murder/carnage in DB and Thieves', and our thread knows you need minimal magic ability for the College.

I can't speak for the MMO hero, but generally they don't even feel like an RPG character, but more like an avatar of murder.

----------


## Vinyadan

For the first time, I tried using Morrowind's trainers. They're nice for alchemy. However, I was very disappointed when I found out you cannot train your skills beyond their controlling attributes; it doesn't make much sense, when you can just grind spellcasting skills.

----------


## Keltest

> I think the only one where it works in Skyrim is the Brotherhood.
> 
> You get declared the destined Grand Head Poobah not even halfway in, most of the cast doesn't give a crap except for two people, one who is a religious fanatic and the other immediately sees you as a threat even though, while you're nominally the leader, traditionally you'd just listen for targets and tell them to the other leaders.
> 
> The entire rest of the plotline is caused by those two people overrecacting.


The Companions kind of works too due to them being more a literal group of friends and companions who happen to all be mercenaries, rather than an actual formal guild with structure and rank. Although theres still a whole bunch of "youre in charge because Destiny said so" rather than being promoted on your merits.

----------


## Grim Portent

> The Companions kind of works too due to them being more a literal group of friends and companions who happen to all be mercenaries, rather than an actual formal guild with structure and rank. Although theres still a whole bunch of "youre in charge because Destiny said so" rather than being promoted on your merits.


To be fair, none of the other inner circle want to be Harbinger, even if you're only in the inner circle because of Kodlak's favoritism and Farkas revealing that he was a werewolf at an early date making you privy to the big secret of the Companions.

Though to be honest I wouldn't say anyone else would make a good Harbinger anyway, the basic members are largely unpleasant in one way or another, Farkas is uninterested in complicated thought, Vilkas is heavily conflicted with himself, and Aela is a daedric cultist.



I did much prefer the guilds in the older games, Skyrim seems to have leaned really hard into all of them being fractured, broken and down on their luck, with the exception of the Companions who just aren't really a guild, as opposed to them being mostly healthy but with something important going on that leads to you working with the guild leader and becoming their designated heir.

----------


## Triaxx

Aela's just a furry, not a cultist.

----------


## Rynjin

> Aela's just a furry, not a cultist.


Most of the Circle, besides Kodlak, actively worship Hircine and want to go to his afterlife.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> What do you base your obervations on? Dialogue options? Journal entries?


Dialog for the Dragonborn and Vestige, journal entries for the Nerevarine.

----------


## Grim Portent

> Most of the Circle, besides Kodlak, actively worship Hircine and want to go to his afterlife.


2/5 really. Skjor and Aela worship Hircine, Vilkas has been talked around to rejecting him and lycanthropy by Kodlak when you join the Companions and Farkas follows Vilkas' lead on the matter but doesn't seem to understand or care about why it matters.

I suppose the player could bump it to 3/6 depending on how you play them. After all you can readily embrace lycanthropy through the werewolf totem quests with Aela and Hircine's daedric quest, cure it, or wander off and become a vampire instead.

EDIT: Y'know, it occurs to me that it's a shame we don't see more of Skjor, either before his death or after it. It would be nice to have someone serve as a dissenting voice to Kodlak when it comes to the beastblood and the perception of Sovngarde vs Hircine's Hunting Grounds.

----------


## Rynjin

Well, either way, Aela is a cultist lol.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I did much prefer the guilds in the older games, Skyrim seems to have leaned really hard into all of them being fractured, broken and down on their luck, with the exception of the Companions who just aren't really a guild, as opposed to them being mostly healthy but with something important going on that leads to you working with the guild leader and becoming their designated heir.


That's a general theme in _Skyrim_, every faction but the Thalmor took a beating: the Empire's fractured, the blades are down to a couple members, The Drak Brotherhood doesn't even have a Listener anymore, the Thieves' Guild is cursed and the Mages' Guild straight-up disbanded.  



> EDIT: Y'know, it occurs to me that it's a shame we don't see more of Skjor, either before his death or after it. It would be nice to have someone serve as a dissenting voice to Kodlak when it comes to the beastblood and the perception of Sovngarde vs Hircine's Hunting Grounds.


Also, this would have been great.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> EDIT: Y'know, it occurs to me that it's a shame we don't see more of Skjor, either before his death or after it. It would be nice to have someone serve as a dissenting voice to Kodlak when it comes to the beastblood and the perception of Sovngarde vs Hircine's Hunting Grounds.


Quasi-related, in one playthrough I ended up with a glitch where Skjor miraculously reappeared after his death. I was Harbinger and he still called me whelp.  :Small Tongue:  No, Aela, Im pretty sure Skjors spirit is _not_ with us, its back in Jorvaskr where we left him!

----------


## Rater202

> Quasi-related, in one playthrough I ended up with a glitch where Skjor miraculously reappeared after his death. I was Harbinger and he still called me whelp.  No, Aela, Im pretty sure Skjors spirit is _not_ with us, its back in Jorvaskr where we left him!


To go off topic for a moment, in Quinn/Introspective Spy's Mass Effect let' play(on the StreamFourStar channel), he pretty much let Miranda die because he didn't like how she asked for help in Mass Effect 3.

Then she showed up during the Citadel DLC. And from that point onward the game treated her as alive.

That kind of glitch, as long as it doesn't break anything, is always a bit funny.

----------


## Rynjin

Man, I cannot get into any of their new gaming content for the most part. Kirran and Grant are always great but that Famicom Detective playthrough annoyed me since they kinda just talked over everything. I...don't really care about any of the new randoms, either.

It's sad to see how much their content has fallen over the past couple of years.

----------


## Rater202

> Man, I cannot get into any of their new gaming content for the most part. Kirran and Grant are always great but that Famicom Detective playthrough annoyed me since they kinda just talked over everything. I...don't really care about any of the new randoms, either.
> 
> It's sad to see how much their content has fallen over the past couple of years.


They've _always_ talked over everything. Sometimes they flat out ignore the cutscenessee their Fallout Four playthrough where their ultimate characterization of Captain Ravager was born in part from their complete inability to pay attention to cutscenes and ignoring/contradicting every explanation of, for example, what Synthes actually _are_.

Though I admit that I have trouble with videos that are just those two.

----------


## Rynjin

> They've _always_ talked over everything. Sometimes they flat out ignore the cutscenessee their Fallout Four playthrough where their ultimate characterization of Captain Ravager was born in part from their complete inability to pay attention to cutscenes and ignoring/contradicting every explanation of, for example, what Synthes actually _are_.
> 
> Though I admit that I have trouble with videos that are just those two.


They've never really done it to that extent for the adventure games before, like Contradiction, Telltale Batman, etc. Hell, they didn't even really do it for Dark Side of the Moon as much. Like, who gives a **** about FO4's plot? But games like Famicom Detective all the fun is found in the actual game.

I think it's because they lost the footage for the entire first chapter or some such. I didn't watch far enough to see where they hadn't played up to yet, maybe it gets better.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Man, I cannot get into any of their new gaming content for the most part. Kirran and Grant are always great but that Famicom Detective playthrough annoyed me since they kinda just talked over everything. I...don't really care about any of the new randoms, either.
> 
> It's sad to see how much their content has fallen over the past couple of years.


Yeah, I'm not a big fan of the Grant and Kirran show no matter what form it takes. TFS works best when their humor is mixed in certain ways. you put Grant and Kirran together without anyone else, all your going to get is nonstop lighter nonsense without any of Lani's versatility to balance them out. Takahata without anyone else shifts between between energetic and chill and just all over the place without anyone else to bounce off of. Kaiser is chill and good snark but has a tendency drift into more serious topics without anyone to keep him focused. Lani is probably the most well-rounded and consistent because he can shift between drama, comedy, chill, rage and so on smoothly without being unbelievable or jarring and has one of the more consistent schedules. Zito is chiller than people think but can be angrier than he claims. You put Zito and Taka together and you have something because they fill a classic comedy duo of Taka being the wise guy and a Zito being an angry straight man which plays off real well with each other. 

Quinn actually works well on his own because he is just a chill snarker who doesn't have Kaiserneko's flaw of getting too ranty and serious. so while not the most exciting your guaranteed to have a chill time with him. and his dry humor works well with everyone else whenever its with others.

But I can point to where their quality declined and I'm going to be 100% honest with you: its when hbi2k left. when he was there, TFS kept to a much more consistent and defined, organized schedule. I remember him commenting on stream where he described working at his job like working at an IT Tech thing where everyone else was a bunch of introverts and people needed to be kept on task, and when the next TFS at the Table had Zito announcing what was essentially a near rock falls everybody dies scenario to hbi2k and thus his character leaving, I knew that a terrible mistake had been made somewhere. like you could tell their streaming schedule just suddenly became a lot more fluid, they spend more time on individual streams than when together, if you were there at the time you just felt the shift in content. that and hbi2k when he was on stream fulfilled a similar chillsnark role as Quinn.

Tyler though, yeah, I never liked him or his humor. I don't get why anyone likes him. he is just annoying to me.

anyone else doesn't really much of a presence, are pretty much nonentities who don't know what to do with the rapid fire jokes being thrown at them. you can tell because I remember their faces but not their names.

it is sad that their quality has declined, because they work better together than alone.

----------


## Rynjin

Yeah when Ben left things really did take a turn. The most annoying part  is, the thing he left over (not announcing the end of DBZA and a focus on transitioning to other content) is the thing they ended up doing anyway...after another year or so of waffling over it.

----------


## Rater202

Raz, you're a little backward: The Rocks Fall Everyone Dies came _because_ HBI2K left.

Ben had some ideas for creative projects he liked, but Lani and Kaiser werren't sure it was the right direction for the company, so he stepped down from his position and sold his shares in the company back to them so that there wouldn't be a conflict of interest if he went and worked on the projects on his own.

All involved parties insist that it was an amicable split and that they're still friends.

Ben considered staying on for the D&D campaign but ultimately did not in part for a number of reasons, and Zito... basically had to go with the bad end of that chapter and move on to the next becuase he couldn't come up with a way to write around Eloy.

The new D&D game they're doing is good so far though.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Raz, you're a little backward: The Rocks Fall Everyone Dies came _because_ HBI2K left.


I know Rater.

I was describing my experience at the time, that TFS at the trouble announcement was when I was informed of it. I was describing my feeling that a mistake had been made and this was the result that you just said.

But whatever, its years over and done with.

----------


## Rater202

Also gonna be honest I think the pandemic had something to do with the eratic scheduling too.

Apparently, there was an extended period of time where they literally weren't allowed to go into their office becuase of shutdowns.

----------


## Rynjin

> Also gonna be honest I think the pandemic had something to do with the eratic scheduling too.
> 
> Apparently, there was an extended period of time where they literally weren't allowed to go into their office becuase of shutdowns.


This is also the case. It was just depressing that I was rewatching an old stream and they were like "Yeah! 13,000 people in the chat!" and then their last stream had like 300 viewers.

That's less than they were pulling per stream back when they first started (eg. with Drunklstiltskin).

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Also gonna be honest I think the pandemic had something to do with the eratic scheduling too.
> 
> Apparently, there was an extended period of time where they literally weren't allowed to go into their office becuase of shutdowns.


Well they were starting to get back on their feet with Unabridged but then the pandemic just shot them in the leg before they can even start walking.

----------


## Rater202

> Well they were starting to get back on their feet with Unabridged but then the pandemic just shot them in the leg before they can even start walking.


They're back in the office now though, and gaming content seems to be picking back up.

Hopefully, they'll be able to finish Unabridged.

Also, not gonna lie... The Beaststars video they did is one of the funniest things I've ever seen and I don't even like Beastars.

We should probably get back o talking about The Elder Scrolls though...

...the more I think about Season unending, the more frustrated I feel that there are no options to just beat the crap out of Ulfrick and or Tullius until they agree to take things seriously instead of trying to use the ceasefire negotiation as a power grab.

I know I've talked about this before but after an entire game of being able to punch your problems, up to and including a mechanic about fist fighting people to solve disputes(which sometimes results in those people liking you) and talk about how, like a dragon soul in a mortal body you have the same urge to destroy and conquer as dragons and nothing comes of it.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> We should probably get back o talking about The Elder Scrolls though...
> 
> ...the more I think about Season unending, the more frustrated I feel that there are no options to just beat the crap out of Ulfrick and or Tullius until they agree to take things seriously instead of trying to use the ceasefire negotiation as a power grab.
> 
> I know I've talked about this before but after an entire game of being able to punch your problems, up to and including a mechanic about fist fighting people to solve disputes(which sometimes results in those people liking you) and talk about how, like a dragon soul in a mortal body you have the same urge to destroy and conquer as dragons and nothing comes of it.


Indeed, I'm sorry for derailing.

Yeah, Elder Scrolls is one of those games where there is so much freedom that when you encounter a limitation its just a bit sad but not surprising because it has to be limited somehow, and you wish they could've done a bit more work on it.

either that or I wish that people would use Elder Scrolls as a roleplaying setting more, because it took DnD and managed to get rid of the sillier elements while not going too dark/Games of Throney like Warhammer or Dragon Age, by replacing them with its own bizarre synthwave drug trip elements instead.

----------


## Rater202

A friend of mine was going to run a game set in Morrowing during the events of the game but unrelated to them back in high school but it never got off the ground.

I was going to play Nord gentleman who'd come all the way from Skyrim to find and kill the damned witch who stole my finest set of clothes.

...Though now if I was going to play in the setting I'd probably want to play a child infected with a relatively mild strain of either lycanthropy or vampirism. Just a creepy monster kid trying to get by without being found out. It'd depend on the time period and region though, obviously.

Edit: I now have the mental image of a little borderline feral wolf boy or a really tiny vampire lord living out in a cave in the woods, preying on the local wildlife and occasionally delivering pelts to nearby villages in exchange for supplies but having to go to different ones every two or three times becuase people keep getting suspicious.

----------


## veti

> ...the more I think about Season unending, the more frustrated I feel that there are no options to just beat the crap out of Ulfrick and or Tullius until they agree to take things seriously instead of trying to use the ceasefire negotiation as a power grab.


Look at it from their point of view. Neither of them can afford to let the other gain a strong strategic advantage, at least not without paying commensurately for it. If Tullius gives away too much, he'd be recalled to Cyrodiil in disgrace and replaced by someone whose first act would be to repudiate the truce.

 Ulfric's position is even more precarious: he has the backing of several of the jarls, but some of his supporters are less than wholehearted, and any suggestion of weakness would be fatal to his aspirations (and most likely to him).

Ulfric _has_ to be able to claim to have won the negotiation, and Tullius _has_ to be able to say that he hasn't given away any significant advantage. They're not bluffing, either one of them really would walk away if they can't thread that needle somehow.

----------


## Rynjin

I ran a Pathfinder campaign set in Hammerfell during the Oblivion crisis for a good bit. That was fun.

----------


## Rater202

> Look at it from their point of view. Neither of them can afford to let the other gain a strong strategic advantage, at least not without paying commensurately for it. If Tullius gives away too much, he'd be recalled to Cyrodiil in disgrace and replaced by someone whose first act would be to repudiate the truce.
> 
>  Ulfric's position is even more precarious: he has the backing of several of the jarls, but some of his supporters are less than wholehearted, and any suggestion of weakness would be fatal to his aspirations (and most likely to him).
> 
> Ulfric _has_ to be able to claim to have won the negotiation, and Tullius _has_ to be able to say that he hasn't given away any significant advantage. They're not bluffing, either one of them really would walk away if they can't thread that needle somehow.


Or they could just both agree to not try to kill each other for a couple of days so that we can avoid the world being enslaved and/or destroyed by dragons.

This is bigger than the war and everyone at the table knows it. Saying "I won't call a ceasefire long enough to trap a dragon at the one palace unless you surrender a hold to me" "well I won't do it unless you surrender a hold to me, and another to compensate for the one I'm giving you" is just the both of them being petty in comparison.

----------


## veti

> This is bigger than the war and everyone at the table knows it. Saying "I won't call a ceasefire long enough to trap a dragon at the one palace unless you surrender a hold to me" "well I won't do it unless you surrender a hold to me, and another to compensate for the one I'm giving you" is just the both of them being petty in comparison.


Bigger than the war? For Tullius, Ulfric, Rikke and Galmar, nothing is bigger. If they climb down, they personally will _die_. 

That gives them a far bigger investment than the rest of us dilettantes. It's all very well for us to say "bigger than the war", but I suggest we should check our privilege before trying to impose that value judgement by force.

----------


## Rynjin

And if they don't, they will also die.

This means that they all, collectively, have tacitly made the choice that between dying and saving everyone else, or spiting the world and killing everyone else with them if they must die, they all prefer the latter.

----------


## Rater202

> Bigger than the war? For Tullius, Ulfric, Rikke and Galmar, nothing is bigger. If they climb down, they personally will _die_.


Says who? Nothing in the game suggests that either party would suffer in any way from just agreeing not to fight for a few days.

Unless you're really suggesting that their pride/political aspirations/so on is worth more than the life of literally everyone on Nirn plus all the souls in Soverngarde.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Bigger than the war? For Tullius, Ulfric, Rikke and Galmar, nothing is bigger. If they climb down, they personally will _die_. 
> 
> That gives them a far bigger investment than the rest of us dilettantes. It's all very well for us to say "bigger than the war", but I suggest we should check our privilege before trying to impose that value judgement by force.


I don't care. They're both jerks, screw them.

what is with people defending idiot jerks like this? moral relativity only goes so far. we compassionately pass the buck on this sort of thing upwards through history far enough the only person we can blame is Lorkhan for making anything in the first place.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> ...the more I think about Season unending, the more frustrated I feel that there are no options to just beat the crap out of Ulfrick and or Tullius until they agree to take things seriously instead of trying to use the ceasefire negotiation as a power grab.


My dream scenario involves handing Delphine a BIG roll of duct tape and having her tape Elenwen to a chair, and also tape her mouth shut.

But failing that, being allowed to take charge of the meeting _immediately_ before any city swap waffling can occur, and keeping it on task until its conclusion.

now that Ive written that down I think I might be fantasizing a bit.




> Bigger than the war? For Tullius, Ulfric, Rikke and Galmar, nothing is bigger. If they climb down, they personally will _die_.


Er, what? Ulfric I could see that being a logical outcome, but where are you getting that for everyone else?

----------


## Rater202

> My dream scenario involves handing Delphine a BIG roll of duct tape and having her tape Elenwen to a chair, and also tape her mouth shut.
> 
> But failing that, being allowed to take charge of the meeting _immediately_ before any city swap waffling can occur, and keeping it on task until its conclusion.
> 
> now that Ive written that down I think I might be fantasizing a bit.


My dream scenario is shouting "Silence You Fools" in the dragon language, which silences everyone in the room but you and keeps them cowed long enough to go through a dialog tree that, strong together, becomes a speech that's some variation of chastising everyone present for their flaws while driving the point home that the Civil War, the succession, the White-Gold Concordant, whether or not Talos is divine, and the exact political situation anywhere in all of it is insignificant compared to defeating the dragons and preventing the conquest or destruction of Nirn that they can all agree to a cease-fire long enough to solve the Dragon Problem or _you_ will end the war and if you end the war neither side will be happy with the results.

If your speech skill is high enough that convinces everyone by itself, but if not the sheer insult of it gets Ulfrick and Tullius enough on the same page that you can talk them into taking it out back and fighting them both at the same time with you defeating them leading to them conceding your point.

Bonus points: Doing it this way means Ulfrick and Tullius are at Dragon'reach when you summon Odhaviin and you have them dangling precariously from his feat as he flies off.

The whole time going through the last dungeon and in Sovergarde they'll be following you around and be snarking at each other.

----------


## Triaxx

Galmar was Ulfric's chief advisor. Ulfric steps down, they're both going to the headsmans block. No empire survives allowing traitors to live. The rest of the Jarls that supported Ulfric would likely be immediately in line after them, along with their advisors.

As for Tullius and Rikke, admitting defeat is disobeying orders and even if Ulfric lets them go (which he's liable to do since he doesn't actually hate them personally), going home likely means a death sentence for disobeying orders. Rikke might escape if Tullius falls on his sword and even then she's likely to be in the 'not to be trusted' category and reassigned to somewhere lonely and desolate, which is tantamount to death for a Nord anyway.

----------


## Rater202

> Galmar was Ulfric's chief advisor. Ulfric steps down, they're both going to the headsmans block. No empire survives allowing traitors to live. The rest of the Jarls that supported Ulfric would likely be immediately in line after them, along with their advisors.
> 
> As for Tullius and Rikke, admitting defeat is disobeying orders and even if Ulfric lets them go (which he's liable to do since he doesn't actually hate them personally), going home likely means a death sentence for disobeying orders. Rikke might escape if Tullius falls on his sword and even then she's likely to be in the 'not to be trusted' category and reassigned to somewhere lonely and desolate, which is tantamount to death for a Nord anyway.


How are you getting "admit defeat and submit to execution" from "mutually agree to a cease-fire for a few days without being an asshat about it."

The people in question are no more likely to be executed under this scenrio than they were in canon.

Even if this _was_ permanent peace talks, _executing the other side_ isn't normally part of peace talks. IT's an inherently unreasonable demand. Under normal circumstances, nobody is going to agree to their own execution.

The only way either side's leaders die is if the war continues as in the base game.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> How are you getting "admit defeat and submit to execution" from "mutually agree to a cease-fire for a few days without being an asshat about it."


Indeed, all they are doing is shifting the burden from "these two guys have the responsibility to agree to a ceasefire for the good of the world" to "everyone else on both sides have the responsibility of not executing the leaders who negotiate a ceasefire on their behalf for the good of the world". thats absurd.

----------


## Grim Portent

Indeed, assuming the Dragonborn hasn't picked a side the two factions are in a stalemate anyway, all that actually needs to happen is for them to agree not to make any moves on Whiterun until Ohdaviing is captured. They don't even need to stop fighting over the other holds, not that agreeing not to make any military advances on the other side for two or three weeks at most should be a huge demand to make.

----------


## Keltest

I think you guys are dramatically overestimating how much of an existential threat the dragons are in and of themselves. There is exactly one settlement or military post that gets actively destroyed by a dragon, and that one was wildly unprepared for the dragons.

From the perspective of the Dovahkiin, its Alduin specifically who is the existential threat, and that relies on you believing in a prophecy that neither of the two sides have even heard of or care about.

But from the perspective of the generals, the Dragonborn is asking them to pretty please put their war on hold so that he can go fight a giant monster that ultimately wont make the dragons go away anyway.

----------


## Anteros

Y'all realize Tullius is a general right?  He doesn't have the authority to just ignore open rebellion even if he wanted to for some insane reason.  What do y'all expect him to do?  Go home and tell the Senate or whatever exists in Cyrodil that he just didn't feel like dealing with a major part of their country breaking off?  They decided to make some Ulfric or random guy who can speak Dragon king because he asked them to?  Because he claims to have saved the world from dragons that are still actively rampaging, and don't appear to present any sort of threat to the world itself?

Do you understand how silly that sounds?  They'd just hang him and send a non-moron general to replace him.

Peace talks?  Do you know what they call it when you stop trying to defeat a rebellion and start peace talks?  *Losing the war.*  The instant you legitimize the insurgency as an actual faction to be dealt with you've lost the grounds to continue your war.

----------


## Rater202

> Y'all realize Tullius is a general right?  He doesn't have the authority to just ignore open rebellion even if he wanted to for some insane reason.  What do y'all expect him to do?  Go home and tell the Senate or whatever exists in Cyrodil that he just didn't feel like dealing with a major part of their country breaking off?  They decided to make some Ulfric or random guy who can speak Dragon king because he asked them to?  Because he claims to have saved the world from dragons that are still actively rampaging, and don't appear to present any sort of threat to the world itself?
> 
> Do you understand how silly that sounds?  They'd just hang him and send a non-moron general to replace him.


...

In the game we got. He has the authority to negotiate and enforce a temporary cease-fire.

That is what we are talking about. Negotiating a Ceasefire... But giving the Dragonborn the option to shut down Tullius and Ulfric's respective attempts to power trip or make lang grabs during it.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> I think you guys are dramatically overestimating how much of an existential threat the dragons are in and of themselves. There is exactly one settlement or military post that gets actively destroyed by a dragon, and that one was wildly unprepared for the dragons.


No I'm not. First of all, Helgen and that watchtower west of Whiterun are TWO military posts.

Second, the reason why they don't destroy the rest of Skyrim is because they keep attacking the Dragonborn or the same places as where the Dragonborn is. since a prophecy is involved, they can't NOT do that, because they are fated to be slain by the Last Dragonborn. Thus they are an existential threat, cancelled out by the Last Dragonborn's existence bending reality to make sure they always get slain near them, thus making sure they don't destroy more. Its only because the Dragonborn was there they are not a threat, because they are the badass dragonslaying shield keeping everyone from being killed by them. Which makes sense, because that is what the game is about. of course if the Dragonborn dies they are free to kill everyone else, which is why its a game over.

----------


## Anteros

> ...
> 
> In the game we got. He has the authority to negotiate and enforce a temporary cease-fire.
> 
> That is what we are talking about. Negotiating a Ceasefire... But giving the Dragonborn the option to shut down Tullius and Ulfric's respective attempts to power trip or make lang grabs during it.


Why should they?  What actual incentive do they have to do so?  Some random dude with magic powers (that coincidentally the rebel leader also has) asked them to?  Or else some monster they've never heard of will destroy the world?  Sure.  Totally believable.  

Unless you're arguing that Tullius and Ulfric actually believe the Dragonborn has the power to single-handedly put down both of their armies (they don't) then they have no incentive to listen to you at all.  The fact that you can get as far as you can is already sheer plot armor.





> No I'm not. First of all, Helgen and that watchtower west of Whiterun are TWO military posts.
> 
> Second, the reason why they don't destroy the rest of Skyrim is because they keep attacking the Dragonborn or the same places as where the Dragonborn is. since a prophecy is involved, they can't NOT do that, because they are fated to be slain by the Last Dragonborn. Thus they are an existential threat, cancelled out by the Last Dragonborn's existence bending reality to make sure they always get slain near them, thus making sure they don't destroy more. Its only because the Dragonborn was there they are not a threat, because they are the badass dragonslaying shield keeping everyone from being killed by them. Which makes sense, because that is what the game is about. of course if the Dragonborn dies they are free to kill everyone else, which is why its a game over.


Why should they believe any of this?  Why should anyone who isn't a Greybeard or the Dragonborn himself?  Also, there are totally dragons doing plenty of things besides following the Dragonborn around.  Even if you magically convince them that the Dragons are compelled to follow and attack you somehow, that's far more likely to end up with you in a sack on your way to Morrowind than being put in any position of authority.

----------


## Vinyadan

I don't remember exactly how the meeting went, but I left it with such a negative impression of Ulfric, that I joined the Legion because of it. Plus, Skyrim cities aren't that recognisable, so, when they asked me to choose which cities should be exchanged I spent a lot of time looking up which city was which, at which point the game got bored and made a decision for me.

The exchange itself as I remember it made no sense as a condition for a few days of pause; I  think it was Ulfric who said "I want some holds as payment if I make peace" and  Tullius went "Well, I should get as many as you, then", and that worked,  which I can only explain as a show of the Voice of the Emperor.

I consider it part of Skyrim's generally bad writing, probably exacerbated by the openly undercooked Civil War questline.

----------


## Rater202

> Why should they?  What actual incentive do they have to do so?  Some random dude with magic powers (that coincidentally the rebel leader also has) asked them to?  Or else some monster they've never heard of will destroy the world?  Sure.  Totally believable.


They showed up.

If they didn't beleive that the dragons were a threat, or in Alduin, they _would have refused to meet to discuss a ceasefire._

they have literally no reason to show up.

As it is, unless you blatantly favor one side over the other when mediating the negotiations, neither side really gains anything. They both come off worse off, as holds are switched around and power blocks are broken up. Both sides lose out to some degree.

All it amounts to is a pissing contest.

And by this point in the game, even if you have literally done nothing but the main quest, you have killed multiple dragons, absorbed their souls, with credible witnesses, have been acknowledged by the Greybeards as the Dragonborn, are publically accepted as such, and ware a Thane in at least one hold. You may, in fact, have an Elder Scroll on your person, and you have slaughtered dozens of th best men of the Thalmor in situations where they were acting illegally and you were justified in doing so.

Judging from Guard Dialog, knowledge of your skills and deads spreads through the province like wildfire and some of that is bound to trickle up.

by this point, both Ulfrick and Tullius should have a general idea of what your'e capable of.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> From the perspective of the Dovahkiin, its Alduin specifically who is the existential threat, and that relies on you believing in a prophecy that neither of the two sides have even heard of or care about.


Incorrect, Ulfric knows about Alduin. Maybe not specifically a Dragonborn is prophesied to destroy Alduin but he is suitably concerned when you tell him Alduin is back to get him to come in the first place.

----------


## Rater202

> I don't remember exactly how the meeting went, but I left it with such a negative impression of Ulfric, that I joined the Legion because of it. Plus, Skyrim cities aren't that recognisable, so, when they asked me to choose which cities should be exchanged I spent a lot of time looking up which city was which, at which point the game got bored and made a decision for me.
> 
> The exchange itself as I remember it made no sense as a condition for a few days of pause; I  think it was Ulfric who said "I want some holds as payment if I make peace" and  Tullius went "Well, I should get as many as you, then", and that worked,  which I can only explain as a show of the Voice of the Emperor.
> 
> I consider it part of Skyrim's generally bad writing, probably exacerbated by the openly undercooked Civil War questline.


The first thing Ulfric does is demand that Thalmor Bitch leave. He's willing to give up a hold to not be in the same room as the woman who tortured him and convinced him that he was singlehandedly responsible for the Empire losing the war with the Thalmor.

----------


## Anteros

> They showed up.
> 
> If they didn't beleive that the dragons were a threat, or in Alduin, they _would have refused to meet to discuss a ceasefire._
> 
> they have literally no reason to show up.
> 
> As it is, unless you blatantly favor one side over the other when mediating the negotiations, neither side really gains anything. They both come off worse off, as holds are switched around and power blocks are broken up. Both sides lose out to some degree.
> 
> All it amounts to is a pissing contest.
> ...


It's a pretty far cry between showing up to a meeting to humor a politically and personally powerful individual, and actually enacting a cease-fire based off of their outlandish claims that if they don't do so the world will end.  

There's also a big difference between "this person is powerful, and we want them on our side" and "this person is single-handedly powerful enough to force us to listen to them or they'll destroy our army".


You can't even convince everyone in the thread that a cease-fire is reasonable from the general's views, and we played the game and saw everything from the Dragonborn's perspective.  Good luck using those arguments on someone with literally no reason to believe your claims and every incentive to ignore them.

As an aside, this thread has me wanting to play Skyrim again.  It's a shame that actually playing Skyrim isn't nearly as fun as thinking about playing Skyrim.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Incorrect, Ulfric knows about Alduin. Maybe not specifically a Dragonborn is prophesied to destroy Alduin but he is suitably concerned when you tell him Alduin is back to get him to come in the first place.


I suspect Rilke had something to do with Tullius showing up. Even the barely alphabetised Nord who wrote the best-selling book "Alduin Is Real" knew Alduin was bad news, while implying that Imperials don't.




> First time I beat Morrowind, I was  simultaneously head of House Telvanni and the Archmage of the Mage's  Guild. I got to be the second by showing to everyone that the previous  Archmage was overly influenced by an infiltrator from House Telvanni.


As it turns out, Ocato sent quite the letter to Trebonius. https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Morrowind:Letter_from_Ocato It's really funny, however -- he asked him to do substantially the same things as the player would do once Arch-mage, same title and all. 

Who knows, hadn't he gone ape, maybe he could have achieved CHIM?  :Small Big Grin: 




> The first thing Ulfric does is demand that  Thalmor [_] leave. He's willing to give up a hold to not be in the same  room as the woman who tortured him and convinced him that he was  singlehandedly responsible for the Empire losing the war with the  Thalmor.


But will he give _you_ a hold if you make Elenwen leave? Intentions, intentions...  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Rater202

> There's also a big difference between "this person is powerful, and we want them on our side" and "this person is single-handedly powerful enough to force us to listen to them or they'll destroy our army".


Consider that the weakest dragons are able to slaughter entire squads of soldiers, be they Imperials, Stomrclaocks, or Hold Guards.

Consider that dragons are really more of a nuisance than anything else for the Dragonborn and that there are witnesses to you killing them two you for sure fight in the story mode.

Consider that the Dragonborn by this point in the game has probably killed hundreds of discrete individuals, not counting wild animals and out and out monsters, in addition to multiple dragons, with it being highly plausible that both Tullius and Ulfric know about most of them.

And that's just assuming that you've done nothing but the main questline.

If you've taken the time to grind your skills, then it becomes publicly know that there's an expert or master of one or more disciplines.

If you destroyed the Dark Brotherhood, people recognize you on sight as the one who did it.

If you joined the Dark Brotherhood... Every single guard knows you're in the brotherhood but either can't prove it and is a little afraid of you(in which case they'll say "I know who you are but... Please, these are good people") or they're Sithis Worshipers("I know who you are... Hail Sithis.") So if you completed the Dark Brotherhood questline then it's an entirely reasonable interpretation for Tullius to know damn well that he's sitting next to the man who either snuck about the Emperor's ship and killed him without getting caught or else slaughtered an entire ship full of his personal guard before killing him and he can't do a damn thing about it.

If you completed the Collegeand you have to at least join as part of the main quest, unless you go way out of your way to avoid doing sothen you've already saved the world once and it's a reasonable assumption that you're highly skilled at least one form of magic.

Flipping it around, Ulfric believes full well in the old stories. The simple fact that you're Dragonborn should give him pause.

If you did the companions questline, then you're the first among equals of the inner circle of the most badass band of warriors in Skyrim and are publically known to have wiped out a coven of, particularly infamous witches. Anyone who puts stock in traditional Nord values like, say, the Storm Cloaks? Yeah, kind of a big deal.

God forbid you do what I tend to do and do all the faction quests and "become a Thane" quests before progressing the main queest very far.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I don't remember exactly how the meeting went, but I left it with such a negative impression of Ulfric, that I joined the Legion because of it. Plus, Skyrim cities aren't that recognisable, so, when they asked me to choose which cities should be exchanged I spent a lot of time looking up which city was which, at which point the game got bored and made a decision for me.


My first playthough I think I redid the quest something like three times trying to get a fair outcome for everyone involvedthe game yelled at me for it.  :Small Yuk: 

Then I ended up being pro-Imperial because they wanted me to oust the cool seer lady who runs Morthal.

----------


## Misery Esquire

> Then I ended up being pro-Imperial because they wanted me to oust the cool seer lady who runs Morthal.


Yeah, both sides seem to have a Cool Jarl(tm) and a Trash Jarl(tm) that end up in/stay in power if you side with them.

And then there's Riften.
... _disable 00019DD1_

----------


## veti

> Yeah, both sides seem to have a Cool Jarl(tm) and a Trash Jarl(tm) that end up in/stay in power if you side with them.
> 
> And then there's Riften.
> ... _disable 00019DD1_


That's the reason I'll never again win the war for the Imperials. (Or give them Riften in the negotiation.)

I'd say they've each got a couple of each category, but Maven is head and shoulders above anyone as worst of the whole bunch.

----------


## Fyraltari

> That's the reason I'll never again win the war for the Imperials. (Or give them Riften in the negotiation.)
> 
> I'd say they've each got a couple of each category, but Maven is head and shoulders above anyone as worst of the whole bunch.


Right, but Balgruuf is way better than any other Jarl.

----------


## Vinyadan

> That's the reason I'll never again win the war for the Imperials. (Or give them Riften in the negotiation.)
> 
> I'd say they've each got a couple of each category, but Maven is head and shoulders above anyone as worst of the whole bunch.


By the way, what happens if you kill a jarl? I never thought of trying. Are there successors?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I'd say they've each got a couple of each category, but Maven is head and shoulders above anyone as worst of the whole bunch.


This.




> Right, but Balgruuf is way better than any other Jarl.


Also this. Ousting him is why it's painful siding with the Stormcloaks - and then there's no Free-Winter, either.




> By the way, what happens if you kill a jarl? I never thought of trying. Are there successors?


I think they're marked essential because they're quest givers.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I think they're marked essential because they're quest givers.


Which is why Maven remains a problem.

----------


## Rater202

Maven would be more tolerable if the game acknowledged that, if you become the Guildmaster of the Thieves Guild and either joined or destroyed the Dark brotherhood that you basically own her ass.

Her power comes in part from her ties to the Thieves Guild and in part because she has a contact with the Brotherhood... Though the Thieves Guild.

She can't have you assassinated if you're in the Brotherhood or have destroyed the Brotherhood, and by the time you're the Guildmaster the Guild basically controls every hold but Riften _without_ Maven. The Guild doesn't need her, but she still needs it.

The only thing she can do if you piss her off is whistleblow... And you know all about her criminal operations and can take her down with you.

Or just kill her if she pisses you off. You already killed the Emporer, she's nothing in comparison.

----------


## veti

> I think they're marked essential because they're quest givers.


Yes, but it's more than that. There's a whole special... thing about being a jarl or potential jarl, which has all kinds of triggers and conditions attached. (Presumably because all the jarl dialogue is recorded for only those two unique voices per hold.)

 Removing one is a much bigger deal than deleting a regular "essential" NPC. I don't even know of any mod that's done it.

----------


## Vinyadan

In the end, I enabled magicka regeneration in my Morrowind playthrough. I did it when I realised that my longswords had increased 30 points while Destruction had increased just 5. 

As it turns out, combat doesn't really change -- Morrowind fights never were particularly long, and, with 100% casting and hitting success, they are over very quickly, so magicka regeneration doesn't have any negative effect: you don't find yourself wasting your time waiting for it to recharge, like I did in Oblivion. Instead, it's a big improvement when travelling the wilderness. For example, if I use levitation, I don't have to stop right after to recharge. I will have low magicka right after casting, but it will recharge autonomously, so spells will be an option, if I later meet a nix hound or some other enemy. It feels much more organic and makes magic far more usable.

To sum it up, right now I am playing with 100% hit chance, 100% casting chance, the ability to cast without assuming a casting position, magic skill training dependent on magicka consumed instead of spells cast, spells mostly cost twice as much as normal but you recover up to 50% of the cost as your skill approaches 100, and you get a hefty bonus multiplier to total magicka based on the sum of your magical skills (ATM I think I am around a 100% bonus).

I don't think many people buy Elder Scrolls games for their combat (compare: Dark Messiah of M&M), but this setup removes much of what made combat detrimental to an otherwise amazing game like Morrowind (especially now that it's almost 20 years old).

----------


## Misery Esquire

> In the end, I enabled magicka regeneration in my Morrowind playthrough. I did it when I realised that my longswords had increased 30 points while Destruction had increased just 5.


Black White Black Black Black 
Black White White Black White

HP & Mana regen on XBox - I'm almost certain there's other cheats, but those are the two I remember and that drove my first high-level playthrough. You can still get killed by going into a challenge past what you're levelled for, or falling, but random death is far more limited.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Black White Black Black Black 
> Black White White Black White
> 
> HP & Mana regen on XBox - I'm almost certain there's other cheats, but those are the two I remember and that drove my first high-level playthrough. You can still get killed by going into a challenge past what you're levelled for, or falling, but random death is far more limited.


I didn't know the Xbox buttons were colour coded, I spent a while wondering what that meant  :Small Big Grin: 

I forgot to mention, since enchanting is rebalanced, I had an item made with +7 fatigue regen/second. It was costly, but totally worth it. It's not enough to recover if you swing wildly during combat, but you can run and jump around without fear. No surprise Oblivion went a similar way by default (and, to tell the truth, Morrowind did so, too, as a reward: Azura's ring is game-changing because of its fatigue regeneration powers).

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

I got the itch to play ESO again recently, returning impressions are as follows:
There's a stickerbook for gear sets now - it lets you recreate anything you've found before. No more hoarding every possibly-useful gear set on the off chance it will be wanted later!Endeavors were added while I was out; basically a system to buy the Crown Crate contents with in-game activities. I gather it's a Microsoft thing. If true, I just regained a tiny, tiny glimmer of hope that Elder Scrolls 6 will not be a total cash grab.I tried out Antiquities during the ESO+ free trial; it reminds me of Pokemon Platinum's Underground. Bit repetitive though - Platinum had a variety of shapes and sizes to its treasure, maybe I didn't dig around enough but in ESO every item in a tier seems to be the exact same size and shape as every other item. Also minor annoyance: once you get max charges for the shovel or trowel, you HAVE to expend them all at once. Damaged more loot than I cared to because of that.Most of the new dungeons were fun on normal.They finally added some content to the Witches' Festival that wasn't drops, and expanded the New Life Festival a tiny bit (added Imperial quest). It's not much, but it's at least a tiny step in the right direction.The inventory management mess, sadly, is not much different than when I stopped playing - I don't really see that ever changing given that they make money off ESO+.
I haven't dug into most of the quest content I missed while I was out (Greymoor, Markarth), but I have poked around Blackwood a little and it seems they're leaning a little too heavily on 'look! Here's a character you've interacted with before!' I'd read enough complaints about Companions on the forums not to expect too much from them, but with the forewarning they're not too bad.

Mostly it's just making me want a new single player game more.  :Small Tongue:

----------


## The_Jackal

> Maven would be more tolerable if the game acknowledged that, if you become the Guildmaster of the Thieves Guild and either joined or destroyed the Dark brotherhood that you basically own her ass.


Well, some modicum of respect would be okay. But let me tell you the other side of the coin is not profoundly better, where you're in World of Warcraft and every other cutscene includes an aside where all these legendary faction-leaders behave like you're the one true savior, when you're literally surrounded by hundreds of other players doing the exact same thing.

----------


## Rater202

> Well, some modicum of respect would be okay. But let me tell you the other side of the coin is not profoundly better, where you're in World of Warcraft and every other cutscene includes an aside where all these legendary faction-leaders behave like you're the one true savior, when you're literally surrounded by hundreds of other players doing the exact same thing.


That's less a problem with writing and more a problem with the MMO medium. You just kind of have to suspend your disbelief on that one, unless you're on a private server.

----------


## Anteros

> Well, some modicum of respect would be okay. But let me tell you the other side of the coin is not profoundly better, where you're in World of Warcraft and every other cutscene includes an aside where all these legendary faction-leaders behave like you're the one true savior, when you're literally surrounded by hundreds of other players doing the exact same thing.


I somewhat prefer that over their old method where the player would do all the heavy lifting, only to have an NPC swoop in at the end and get the credit.

----------


## veti

> I somewhat prefer that over their old method where the player would do all the heavy lifting, only to have an NPC swoop in at the end and get the credit.


I wouldn't mind that, that sounds just like real life. Add in a sequel where the NPC begs you to come back and save their backside again, and that's basically the fantasy fulfilment.

----------


## Spore

> I wouldn't mind that, that sounds just like real life. Add in a sequel where the NPC begs you to come back and save their backside again, and that's basically the fantasy fulfilment.


I just wished they would go "whole-hog" on the "replacable soldier of faction xyz" aspect. You can be a good soldier, one worthy of praise and rewards, but it helps the immersion in an MMO immensely more to see you're one of a group of many, instead of pretending any one player character is the chosen one. Even if another chosen one is standing right next to them.

Of course writers would have to deviate from the "hero's journey" type of storytelling a slight bit. And again, there are so many shooters out there that do "nameless soldier to war hero" quite well without making it look like a single playable dork won an entire conflict.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

What is everyones favorite type of Atronach? Ive gotten to like the Iron Atronachs in ESO and I hope theyre summonable in the next single player game; theyre sturdy, powerful, and cool looking with some neat effects (ex: leaving puddles of lava around).

Flame Atronachs are probably second, since theyre ranged, generally easy to summon, and the explode-on-discorporation effect is useful.

----------


## veti

I'd like to have a favourite atronach, but to me they all seem interchangeably dull. I have favourite daedra (Daedroths in Morrowind, Clannfears in Oblivion), but atronachs have never (to my mind) been imbued with any kind of personality that makes one any more interesting than another.

----------


## Rynjin

Gotta admit, that's basically my opinion in a nutshell. They're all just elementals. Boring, utilitarian. Fine to have in the game but far from interesting enough for me to have a "favorite".

I do have a LEAST favorite: Storm Atronachs. Why is it a bunch of rocks held together by electricity and not like...a living cloud with sparks coming off it or something?

----------


## Aeson

My favorite type of atronach is the birthsign, specifically its Morrowind incarnation.

As to the hostile/summonable atronachs, I have to agree with Rynjin and veti; I don't find atronachs to be particularly interesting - they're just elemental-themed humanoid daedra. I suppose if I had to pick one then of the summons it'd be Storm since that's the most generally useful while of the enemies it'd probably be Frost or Storm since I find Frost and Void Salts more useful than Fire Salts in Morrowind, which is the TES game I play most. I don't play TESO, so I have no opinions on atronachs introduced there.

----------


## Mark Hall

> My favorite type of atronach is the birthsign, specifically its Morrowind incarnation.


While I liked it in Morrowind, and the stone was fine in Skyrim, the Atronach in Oblivion wound up being BRUTAL, because while everyone else regened magic at a fairly quick rate, you did not, and potions were a lot heavier than in Morrowind.


For the summonable type? While I usually summon Storm atronachs as soon as I can, I have an enduring fondness for the Ice atronach. Tough, and with a good mix of melee and ranged.

----------


## Vinyadan

I always found the Morrowind fire atronaches pretty cool, and I liked the fire-skating of the ones in Skyrim.

----------


## Spore

Honestly, atronachs are basically just an excuse for elementals and a bit of 'demonic diversity'. But I immensely like the idea of "absorbing magic" instead of regenerating it. It is an old idea in a risky gameplay choice, but since it is single player and the choice doesnt ruin or enhance anyones fun but your owns it is very cool.

That being said, balancingwise, it is HORRIBLE. When it is not an active hindrance to your character (as in, it nets more mana than it prevents regenerating), it is either overpowered or straight up "missing" the fluff (every other vanilla Skyrim build uses Atronach since it just lets you blanket absorb 50% of magic).

----------


## Triaxx

I rather like the Flame Atronachs simply for their accuracy at hitting dragons.

As for Storm Atronachs? Of course they're living electrical storms. And the stones? Probably small ferrous stones that have been picked up around the storm.

Atronach sign itself isn't bad but man if it's not silly in how useful it is.

----------


## factotum

Let's be honest here, the best summon in Skyrim is easily the Dremora Lord. Not because of their combat effectiveness (although that *is* pretty good), but because of the stuff they say on sighting an enemy. "I honour my lord by destroying you!" being a particular favourite of mine.

----------


## Laughing Dog

My favorite type of Atronarch?  Flesh.  Mainly because they were basically a fusion-elemental-thing, but I kind of wish we get to summon them in the next elder scrolls.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Let's be honest here, the best summon in Skyrim is easily the Dremora Lord. Not because of their combat effectiveness (although that *is* pretty good), but because of the stuff they say on sighting an enemy. "I honour my lord by destroying you!" being a particular favourite of mine.


Oh, sure, I run around with a pair of them all the time. HOWEVER, if there's a dragon involved? Storm Atronach. Too many are immune to fire or cold, and the Storm will sap their Magicka, which saps their breath (which is, behind the scenes, powered by MP)

----------


## Aeson

> potions were a lot heavier than in Morrowind.


Oblivion's standard potions all come in at 0.5 weight units; in Morrowind, only Exclusive potions are lighter while Standard, Cheap, and Bargain potions are all heavier (not that Cheap and especially Bargain potions are worth all that much to a spellcasting Atronach character). I'll grant that custom potions could be lighter in Morrowind even though both games nominally use the average of the ingredients weights for the potion weight, but since you can make Restore Magicka potions at 0.1 weight units in Oblivion I don't think it's that big of a deal to carry a big stack of them around.

In my opinion, the bigger problem with using potions to offset Stunted Magicka in Oblivion is that the magic system was designed with fairly fast passive magicka regeneration in mind and, probably as a result, the available potions are generally pretty weak until you have a reasonably high Alchemy skill and decent apparatus. Even a Strong Potion of Sorcery is only worth 100 points of magicka - maybe ten or twelve casts of relatively low-end spells, and less than half a first-level Atronach character's maximum magicka in Oblivion - and Strong Potions of Sorcery are pretty rare at low levels, if you can find them at all. The more readily available standard potions and the custom potions you can make with low-end equipment and low Alchemy skill are even worse, probably only being good for a few spells.

As to the birthsign itself, the Oblivion incarnation is a pretty solid defensive birthsign for a noncaster or an infrequent caster and may even be acceptable for a primary caster once you can make strong Restore Magicka potions, it's just a very rough start for a primary caster since 150 magicka isn't actually that much and spellcasting enemies are a bit sparse at low level.

----------


## Triaxx

If my knowledge isn't failing me, you wanted to stack the birthsign, the standing stone, and... the Ring of Khajiit? together to get you to a persistant 100% magicka absorb. And if you were REALLY cheeky, there was a way to give yourself a mana battery spell that recharged you more than you spent, but I don't recall the details there.

----------


## Aeson

> If my knowledge isn't failing me, you wanted to stack the birthsign, the standing stone, and... the Ring of Khajiit? together to get you to a persistant 100% magicka absorb. And if you were REALLY cheeky, there was a way to give yourself a mana battery spell that recharged you more than you spent, but I don't recall the details there.


I'm pretty sure that the Doomstones give you Greater Powers, not passive abilities or Lesser Powers, so if you're using the Atronach Stone to reach 100% Spell Absorption you can only do so for a limited time each day, and the Ring of Khajiit is stealth-focused. Persistent 100% spell absorption wants some combination of Ring of Sorcery (25%), a high-level version of the Spelldrinker Amulet (up to 26%), Magebane / Cursed Magebane gauntlets (20% / 24%), Sigil Stone custom enchanted item (up to 15%), and maybe one or two other things.

I believe the trick you're thinking of involved telekinesis spells but only works with high-level mysticism because you expend the skill-modified cost of the spell and absorb the base cost of the spell; it also couldn't fully restore your magicka since casting cost was subtracted after the base cost was absorbed or something like that. Additionally, absorbing your own telekinesis spells prevents you from using telekinesis as telekinesis.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Let's be honest here, the best summon in Skyrim is easily the Dremora Lord. Not because of their combat effectiveness (although that *is* pretty good), but because of the stuff they say on sighting an enemy. "I honour my lord by destroying you!" being a particular favourite of mine.


I have never run around with Dremora. Sounds like I need to roll up a conjurer for my next playthrough!

----------


## Triaxx

Ah right that's the trick. I recall rerolling Sigil stones a lot. But the trick I was remembering was punching scamps so they'd turn on you.

----------


## Vinyadan

> I have never run around with Dremora. Sounds like I need to roll up a conjurer for my next playthrough!


Obligatory link: _I Was Summoned By a Mortal_, by Kynval Zzedenkathik.

----------


## veti

I'd forgotten the Atronach birthsign. That was one of my favourites in Morrowind. The cheapest and low-risk way I figured out to recharge mana was to punch a scrib.

----------


## Vinyadan

> I'd forgotten the Atronach birthsign. That was one of my favourites in Morrowind. The cheapest and low-risk way I figured out to recharge mana was to punch a scrib.


I remember playing around with it, summoning an ancestor ghost when low on magicka. But stunted magicka always felt off to me, maybe because what I wanted was a good spellcaster, instead of someone well-protected against spells, and a High Elf worked much better in that regard. On the other hand, I still find it strange that only High Elves got that much magicka without huge tradeoffs, especially without real-time regeneration. Looking back, I'd probably give every other race twice the normal magicka.

----------


## Rynjin

Oblivion is weird because even with cheats/console your max magicka is well below what's needed to cast some custom spells.

...But the cap is higher with infinite effect you ched magicka for some reason, even though the issue with the console is an overflow error.

----------


## Vinyadan

I remember doing a replay and waiting a while before taking the Finger of the Mountain spell, because I had thought that, being levelled, it would be a better spell at higher levels. 

Instead, I got it so late, that it was too costly for me to cast.

Now I kinda want to do the Oblivion questlines again, but Oblivion combat really throws me off (bullet sponges ahoy). Maybe I'll try something out when I'm done with Morrowind.

----------


## Aeson

High Elves' trade-off is that they're the only race in Morrowind with any strictly-negative racial abilities and no racial spells or powers (mind you, Beast Tongue is pretty close to useless, Water Breathing is probably only an Argonians racial spell because you need to drown yourself to complete the Puzzle Canal, and the Drain Agility on Berserk can be painful); "lots of magicka" is pretty much the only thing they have going for them.

That said, I agree that higher base magicka across the board would probably have been a good thing for Morrowind. I also think that for Morrowind specifically the magicka bonuses for the Atronach and the Apprentice could stand to be swapped - Stunted Magicka wasn't a significant drawback and Spell Absorption was great, so even though the Apprentice's Weakness to Magicka also wasn't much of a drawback there just wasn't much reason to take it over Atronach if you wanted a lot of magicka.

----------


## Triaxx

Oblivion wierdly just... You can't play without Oscuro's after having done it. Even considering how much harder it makes the start. Eventually you reach the point where you're getting stronger and mostly you remain that way.

That said I usually went Apprentice on my mages. Bonus healing strength was always welcome.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> High Elves' trade-off is that they're the only race in Morrowind with any strictly-negative racial abilities and no racial spells or powers (mind you, Beast Tongue is pretty close to useless, Water Breathing is probably only an Argonians racial spell because you need to drown yourself to complete the Puzzle Canal, and the Drain Agility on Berserk can be painful); "lots of magicka" is pretty much the only thing they have going for them.


Tangent, but the Argonian Water Breathing makes me hope to some day have a map that's half under water. (Black Marsh? Thras DLC? Sunken Yokuda?) The "everyone must be able to do everything" mentality means it's borderline useless, because they don't put in much content that will only be seen by 10% or so of player characters, but it _should_ be really useful anywhere that has a coastline or decent number of lakes.

----------


## Aeson

> Tangent, but the Argonian Water Breathing makes me hope to some day have a map that's half under water. (Black Marsh? Thras DLC? Sunken Yokuda?) The "everyone must be able to do everything" mentality means it's borderline useless, because they don't put in much content that will only be seen by 10% or so of player characters, but it _should_ be really useful anywhere that has a coastline or decent number of lakes.


Between spells, potions, enchanted items, and drowning being implemented as low-level continuous damage, I don't really see why extensive underwater areas should be incompatible with the "anyone can do anything" model. It isn't like there's a minimum skill required to drink a potion, use a scroll, or wear an enchanted item of water breathing, and even if you don't have any of those handy you can still try to tank the damage or heal through it.

----------


## factotum

> That said, I agree that higher base magicka across the board would probably have been a good thing for Morrowind.


I'm pretty sure that magic was the way it was in Morrowind due to a massive over-reaction to Daggerfall, where magic was Godly and you'd have to be insane to not use it--so they nerfed it into near uselessness in Morrowind. Not only were there all the problems with how much magicka you had and the inability to regenerate it naturally but a lot of the really nasty mobs in the game were immune to most magic anyway!

----------


## Anteros

Yet magic in morrowind was far more powerful and versatile than in Oblivion or Skyrim.

----------


## veti

> Yet magic in morrowind was far more powerful and versatile than in Oblivion or Skyrim.


Definitely.

My favourite spell was "Bound Weapon (15s)". Casting cost: 1 magicka, for which you get a ridiculously powerful weapon that never needs maintenance, and that lasts quite long enough to put down nearly any opponent. And when the spell runs out, all that happens is it gets replaced by your regular weapon, so you've lost nothing. 

If you wanted to kill things with Destruction magic, then you had to do it via Enchanting. That seems to be the sticking point for many people, who want to be able to simply fling lightning at enemies. But Conjuration was ridiculously strong, and Alteration and Mysticism both had options that were so powerful they were removed entirely from Oblivion onward.

And then there were the weightless potions...

----------


## Vinyadan

About Morrowind magic, the game itself didn't use all of its effects as much as it could have. Tamriel Rebuilt for example gives you Legion duties that fundamentally have you act as a real cop. You find yourself dealing with a violent husband, and he might get belligerent towards you. However, if you can cast a calm spell, you can use that window of clarity to convince the perp to stand down and let himself be arrested.

Another example: this might be due to playstyle, but I generally found little use for the lock spell. However, if Morrowind enemies could run away or pursue you across interior/exterior, Lock would suddenly become much more interesting (there's a mod that does that now). It could even be a fun expansion for security, locking doors instead of opening them.

In a game with radiant AI, you could use lock for more or less nefarious purposes: steal someone's key to his own home and lock him outside, or inside (for example, to win a quest where you would otherwise have to compete with him, or to advance more murderous purposes).

About lockpicking, I wonder if it can be modded to remove chance failure and work like multitools in Deus Ex games. Let's say something like this: Each kind of lockpicks has a certain number of charges. Locks go from 1 to 20 in difficulty, and the difficulty is the same as the number of charges I have to burn. Every 10 security levels, I shave off 1 difficulty point (minimum stays at 1). Lockpicks would have different charges based on quality, something like 5 (apprentice) -10 (journeyman) - 15 (master) - 20 (grandmaster) (the numbers would need to be tweaked based on loot frequency; then again, they can be bought, so prices would also need some balancing).

This would allow you to open a 20-charge lock (equivalent to 100) from the start, but it would consume a lot of lockpicks. The better your skill, the fewer the charges you need. At 100 security, you would be able to open any lock by using up a journeyman's lockpick or its equivalent.

----------


## Aeson

> If you wanted to kill things with Destruction magic, then you had to do it via Enchanting. That seems to be the sticking point for many people, who want to be able to simply fling lightning at enemies.


Or... You could carry restore magicka potions and, you know, drink them whenever you run out of magicka while throwing fireballs and lightning around.

You don't _have_ to use enchanted items if you want to kill things with Destruction magic; I'd even say that using enchanted items is worse if you have a low Enchant skill but a large magicka pool and the skill to cast a comparable spell, because passive charge regeneration is slow and at low Enchant skill you'll often drain an item in three or four casts.

----------


## Rater202

> Or... You could carry restore magicka potions and, you know, drink them whenever you run out of magicka while throwing fireballs and lightning around.
> 
> You don't _have_ to use enchanted items if you want to kill things with Destruction magic; I'd even say that using enchanted items is worse if you have a low Enchant skill but a large magicka pool and the skill to cast a comparable spell, because passive charge regeneration is slow and at low Enchant skill you'll often drain an item in three or four casts.


Seriously, that always bothered me about how magic weapons and stuff work in the Elder Scrolls: You get a magic item because you can't cast spells or so you don't have to. The way it works here is just... Casting spells with more steps.

The only magic weapon I ever used was the Dawn/Duskbreaker in Oblivion because it automatically recharged when it switched over and thus was just more convenient than anything else.

And a staff of soul trap from the MAges guild becuase when I was enchanting 100% chameleon armor because that was more convenient than grinding up the relevant skill to get the soul trap spell. I was a lazy gamer back then.

Having to either keep a steady stock of soul gems or run back to a guildhall to rechant was just too... Urg.

----------


## Keltest

I hate the soul gem weapon charge mechanic as well. It adds so much extra unnecessary work to just having a sword that burns people.

----------


## Aeson

I can't say that I see much logic in a sword that does 15 fire damage on touch when it hits something not being subject to the same constraints as a ring/wand/staff that does 15 fire damage on touch when activated - those are functionally the same enchantment, just with different trigger conditions - and if the ring/wand/staff isn't meant to be better than casting a spell that does 15 fire damage on touch then there has to be some kind of limit on its use.

That said, with Oblivion having introduced relatively fast passive magicka regeneration I don't think that the removal of Morrowind's fairly slow passive item charge regeneration really made a lot of sense, and passive item charge regeneration - particularly one tied to the strength of the soul powering the enchantment - would have allowed for the creation of items with functionally-infinite charge as long as the enchantment remained within some power limit.

----------


## Vinyadan

I don't think exclusive recharging through soul gems is fun, so the competition for me is between slow recharge and infinite charges. I think the preference depends on the damage formula. If you have a formula like "with low skill, you will do more damage with this flaming iron shortsword, but, if your skill increases, you are better off with an unenchanted steel shortsword", then you can have infinite charges for enchanted weapons. The problem is when enchanted, low tier weapons are just better than rare, unenchanted higher tier weapons, as upgrading your gear is part of the fun. Of course, if the game lets you find enchanted daedric or ebony weapons, the problem really isn't there, but I think Morrowind and maybe Skyrim didn't really have such weapons. Morrowind random creatures that spawn with high tier weapons, like Golden Saints and Dremora Lords, can appear with ebony or daedric weapons, but they are always unenchanted.

Let's say that, generally speaking, I like the idea of slow recharge that be aided through soul gems, but I wish it could be much faster and doable by just pressing a hotkey. Maybe add an option to set which souls not to use, though...

About enchanted items, I was surprised at how nice it felt to have no constant effect jewels. I could just swap magic items and forget about it. Instead, when you have your ideal combo of always casting items, each time you use something else, then you must remember to put everything back as it was.

----------


## veti

I agree, I also miss Morrowind's item charge regeneration. Also all the "wearable" equipment slots it gave you: to me it made a lot of sense to be wearing trousers under my armour, and there's no reason why they couldn't have an enchantment of their own. I do miss that in the later games.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I agree, I also miss Morrowind's item charge regeneration. Also all the "wearable" equipment slots it gave you: to me it made a lot of sense to be wearing trousers under my armour, and there's no reason why they couldn't have an enchantment of their own. I do miss that in the later games.


I still think it's odd that you can't wear rings on both hands in Skyrim.

----------


## veti

> I still think it's odd that you can't wear rings on both hands in Skyrim.


I've been playing with left-handed rings for so long, I almost contradicted you there. Some mods just feel like part of the game, y'know?

----------


## Vinyadan

> I still think it's odd that you can't wear rings on both hands in Skyrim.


I think it's because of how powerful enchanting is in Skyrim. I don't remember exactly how the effects are divided among slots, but even just one more slot lets you cast (more) spells for free. That's something you notice with an otherwise innocent mod like the one that lets you wear cloaks.

On the other hand, Morrowind had a borderline unusable version of enchanting, so you were likely staking powerful items, but nothing quite that game changing (except for when you found the amulet of shadows and the ring the Emperor sent you, which together gave you 100% chameleon on demand).

----------


## veti

What I liked about Morrowind's enchanting - apart from the fact that you could do it anywhere, which saved my bacon more than once - was the concept of enchanting capacity varying between different items and materials. It's the only really good reason I've ever seen for using heavy armour - because ebony can support stronger enchantments than glass.

----------


## Spore

> I think it's because of how powerful enchanting is in Skyrim. I don't remember exactly how the effects are divided among slots, but even just one more slot lets you cast (more) spells for free. That's something you notice with an otherwise innocent mod like the one that lets you wear cloaks.


Do you really think ANYTHING in Skyrim was made for balance bar the absolute minimum? Well, I assume it was not made because Enchanting (the skill) is so powerful, but because stacking similar enchantments (on ingame items) is too powerful. Similar to how maxed enchanting (now its the skill!) mage sets exactly give 100% cost reduction on one school of magic.

Again, if Skyrim cared about balance, all they needed to do was remove enchantments from the restoration school of magic to untyped to prevent alchemy/enchantment loops.

----------


## factotum

> On the other hand, Morrowind had a borderline unusable version of enchanting, so you were likely staking powerful items, but nothing quite that game changing


Well, except the released game (not sure if they ever fixed this) had a very simple loop whereby you could enchant an item with Fortify Enchant, then wear that item to create a more powerful Fortify Enchant item, and keep going until you had silly levels of Enchant skill and could put ridiculously powerful effects on items.

----------


## Aeson

> Well, except the released game (not sure if they ever fixed this) had a very simple loop whereby you could enchant an item with Fortify Enchant, then wear that item to create a more powerful Fortify Enchant item, and keep going until you had silly levels of Enchant skill and could put ridiculously powerful effects on items.


Never 'fixed,' though if I am not mistaken it was very difficult to obtain a Fortify Skill effect prior to the expansions as the only obtainable spell in the game with the effect was Mephala's Skill, which was the reward for completing Threads of the Webspinner, and good luck doing that without a guide.

Regardless, Fortify Intelligence effects did much the same thing, and the alchemy loop's a lot easier than the enchanting loop since it's easier to get Fortify Intelligence ingredients than filled soul gems from merchants.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Well, except the released game (not sure if they ever fixed this) had a very simple loop whereby you could enchant an item with Fortify Enchant, then wear that item to create a more powerful Fortify Enchant item, and keep going until you had silly levels of Enchant skill and could put ridiculously powerful effects on items.


They partially corrected it, in the sense that you don't have access to fortify skill spells in the main game after a certain patch. They allowed it again with Mournhold and Bloodmoon, however.

To be honest, I've never had the patience for this sort of things, in spite of having a habit of training my characters by casting spells in empty rooms. But I've read that you can cast fortify skill on trainers to make them train you beyond your own skill, and that's something I'd like. Now I wonder if one could use fortify attribute as a way to train a skill beyond its controlling attribute.




> Do you really think ANYTHING in Skyrim was made for balance bar the absolute minimum? Well, I assume it was not made because Enchanting (the skill) is so powerful, but because stacking similar enchantments (on ingame items) is too powerful. Similar to how maxed enchanting (now its the skill!) mage sets exactly give 100% cost reduction on one school of magic.
> 
> Again, if Skyrim cared about balance, all they needed to do was remove enchantments from the restoration school of magic to untyped to prevent alchemy/enchantment loops.


Yep, that's why I think that it's very powerful, it lets you cast spells for free by staking enchanted items you can produce yourself. Add an item, that's one more cost-free school. And it's doable while lumbering around covered in daedric armour. To tell the truth, however, I think that it makes for a nice skill capstone. It really changes how you play. But it shouldn't be expanded to too many schools at the same time.

As far as Skyrim balance goes, no idea -- certain perks are very strong, like destruction's Impact, which lets you interrupt dragon attacks. But I've never felt the call of e.g. the sneaky archer, and much of Oblivion's far better balance than Morrowind's was carried over.

----------


## Triaxx

I mean you wave the balance flag, but... It's a single player game. If I want to keep the balance I just... Don't use the loop. Also it's a fair bit of work. Especially when I could just TGM and be invincible.

On the other hand invincible godhood while fun sometimes does get boring.

----------


## Mark Hall

One of the most powerful spells in Morrowind, incidentally, was Damage Intelligence... combine it with Damage Strength and it became a killer. I remember doing Fort Firemoth with a Damage Intelligence, and just slammed the lich at the end. No Intelligence, no Magicka, and utterly harmless.

----------


## veti

> I mean you wave the balance flag, but... It's a single player game. If I want to keep the balance I just... Don't use the loop.


Exactly. In ten years of playing Skyrim, I've never used it. Of course the past nine or so of those years I've been using the unofficial patch, which blocks it anyway, and more recently reinforced with a homemade patch that caps the casting cost reduction you can achieve for any school at 75%...

Yes, Skyrim is poorly balanced. Oddly enough, though, if you look at the popular mods and how they sell themselves, it seems as if "balance" is on virtually no-one's wishlist.

----------


## Anteros

Well, there are some games people play to be challenged, and some games people play for power fantasies.  Skyrim is definitely the latter.

----------


## Triaxx

I mean I can and have modded Skyrim to make it a challenge. If you want to melee in my Skyrim you'd better be fast and deadly.

----------


## Anteros

You can mod it to have Thomas the Tank Engine flying through the sky ridden by Master Chief as well, but it's hardly the standard or intended experience.

----------


## Vinyadan

I think that Elder Scrolls games in general have such incredible gameworlds, that a lot of things that concern combat, among which balance, take a step back. However, I still consider good combat and balance (especially among mechanics, from power to usability) added value, although I admit that player-environment balance is difficult to implement in an RPG with an open world (these games also come with a difficulty slider, so the choice is really always on the player).

About balance in single player, just think of shooters. If one gun is too good, the rest might have the most interesting mechanics, but you are likely not going to use them. If a boss is too hard, it can be a chore (or even impossible) to beat, and, if the levels are too easy, they can become pointless.

----------


## veti

> You can mod it to have Thomas the Tank Engine flying through the sky ridden by Master Chief as well, but it's hardly the standard or intended experience.


Well, yes, although that would be quite a big mod. Also infringing on at least two other intellectual properties...

But I suggest that the most successful mods give a useful indication of what the more dedicated players actually want in the game. And (discounting sex because there are good reasons why the publisher steers clear of that), the most popular mods are those that (a) fix minor bugs without making much change to play, (b) add more content without significantly changing play at all, (c) tinker with the interface, or (d) change the gameplay by overhauling the skill/perk trees.

Of these categories, (a) is something the publisher will strive for anyway, but some errors will always get through, and (c) and (d) fall under the heading of "different, but not self-evidently better for everyone". Sending the very clear message to the publisher that the important thing is as much "content" as possible, and everything else is secondary. 

Balance? Not even on the radar.

----------


## Keltest

> Well, yes, although that would be quite a big mod. Also infringing on at least two other intellectual properties...


"Can" in this case means "There is already a mod that does this." shockingly enough.

----------


## Rynjin

> Well, yes, although that would be quite a big mod.


The Thomas the Tank Engine mod was one of the first mods ever released for Skyrim, before the Creation Kit was even made available for people to use. It was not by any means a "big mod".

The first OFFICIAL mod (made by Bethesda to celebrate the Steam Workshop opening up) was something that added Wheatley from Portal 2 into the game.

----------


## Keltest

> The Thomas the Tank Engine mod was one of the first mods ever released for Skyrim, before the Creation Kit was even made available for people to use. It was not by any means a "big mod".
> 
> The first OFFICIAL mod (made by Bethesda to celebrate the Steam Workshop opening up) was something that added Wheatley from Portal 2 into the game.


Im still sad that didnt get a port for the Special Edition. I miss my space core friend.

----------


## Vinyadan

Per se, I think Thomas the Tank Engine is simply a model, texture, and sound swap, without editing animations, or even just removing them. Put the tank files instead of the dragon files, and you're good to go. How big the mod is depends on the amount of work put on the new assets, and it wouldn't surprise me if they had been already available somewhere.

What cracks me up about it is the shadow of the engine. Ominous and "wait, what--?"

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Im still sad that didnt get a port for the Special Edition. I miss my space core friend.


Im glad someone does; I put the Space Core in Breezehome and could hear the thing chattering constantly in the Bannered Mare.  :Small Annoyed:  Finally ended up uninstalling the mod.

----------


## Vinyadan

Today Skyrim Anniversary Edition came out. Two things that I don't like: one is that it's a paid upgrade for the Legendary Edition, which I don't have. The second thing has to do with Skyrim in general: while the video, especially in the first part, tries very hard to show a colourful world full of variety, Skyrim has this thing of including a lot of deep shadows in its textures, so that everything is very grimy, rather than dark. It's very visible in the bucket of fish, where the fish seem to be emerging from some black substance. Oblivion also had something similar, for example in the exteriors of the buildings of the Imperial city. I much prefer Morrowind's approach to colour.

In other news, someone is making Oblivion work in the very new Unreal Engine 5 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJrw5nddxS4 I really like how it looks inside the cathedral. I am not very clear on what the purpose is, however: work towards a full release, or just testing out the new engine.

----------


## veti

> Today Skyrim Anniversary Edition came out. Two things that I don't like: one is that it's a paid upgrade for the Legendary Edition, which I don't have.


So, this three-hour download has overwritten my existing SE installation. Now I have to wait for a new version of SKSE.

I guess this is the "free next-gen upgrade" that Bethesda have been threatening with the AE. After my previous experience with Creation Club content I can't see myself paying actual money to get the AE; I just hope I don't have to rebuild my modlist from the ground up (again).

Interestingly, my original (pre-Legendary) edition has _not_ been updated.

----------


## Triaxx

Oldrim players unite.

Meeting Cancelled due to unresolved error.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I guess this is the "free next-gen upgrade" that Bethesda have been threatening with the AE. After my previous experience with Creation Club content I can't see myself paying actual money to get the AE; I just hope I don't have to rebuild my modlist from the ground up (again).


Ive not tried the Creation Club stuff but second not buying the AE. I already paid for this game once, Bethesda!  :Small Annoyed:

----------


## Keltest

> Ive not tried the Creation Club stuff but second not buying the AE. I already paid for this game once, Bethesda!


Ditto. And several people have paid for it several times.

----------


## veti

Welp, I tried loading up my previous save, but no luck there.

So I tried starting a new game. That worked fine until - well, not very far in when it crashed for no obvious reason. When I try to load the early autosaves, the whole computer hangs - there are loading screens for a short time, then the whole screen goes black. And stays there.

Always before I've been able to alt-tab out of Skyrim, or to invoke Task Manager to shut it down cleanly. It was one of its best under-appreciated features, the way it played nicely with Windows. No longer. Neither alt-tab nor ctrl-alt-del will allow you to focus on the Task Manager window for long enough to issue a command through it. 

This crap has overwritten my SE installation, which has been working perfectly for the past five years up until last night. Now I get to rebuild my mod list with the added complication that every test involves starting a game, saving, and reloading; and every failure requires a hard reboot of the whole system.

Nice going, Bethesda. That's _just_ how I wanted to spend the next month.

----------


## Rynjin

Well, of course the game is going to crash if you're trying to launch it with an outdated SKSE after installing the update. Why install it if you still wanted to play with mods?

Also, you need to set Task Manager settings to "always on top" for it to override other program priority when it comes to true FUllscreen (as opposed to Windowed Fullscreen)..

----------


## veti

> Well, of course the game is going to crash if you're trying to launch it with an outdated SKSE after installing the update. Why install it if you still wanted to play with mods?
> 
> Also, you need to set Task Manager settings to "always on top" for it to override other program priority when it comes to true FUllscreen (as opposed to Windowed Fullscreen)..


One, I didn't get any choice about the update. It wasn't offered, just installed.

Two, I have updated SKSE. That's not the issue. If it was, the game wouldn't launch at all, which is a much friendlier way of failing.

Three, as I said, the configuration of Task Manager has been working just fine ever since the game was first published.

----------


## Rynjin

> One, I didn't get any choice about the update. It wasn't offered, just installed.


You can turn off auto-updates; most people did years ago so CC updates didn't break their game. Mine is still sitting there at "update required", which it very much isn't unless I try to launch the game via Steam instead of the SKSE launcher.

Trying to launch via SKSE before opening Steam, however, will launch the game via Steam first and it will download any required files then.




> Two, I have updated SKSE. That's not the issue. If it was, the game wouldn't launch at all, which is a much friendlier way of failing.


SKSE doesn't always crash on startup if it's out of date. But even with the new SKSE it literally says 




> The primary feature that is missing is the plugin manager, which is currently disabled until I can rewrite the system that handles plugin compatibility checks. Plugin developers can build local versions with it enabled, but keep in mind that the version check code is going to change.
> If you have an existing mod setup on pre-AE that you would like to keep working, this is not a sign that you should upgrade and start using this version of SKSE. However, if you have already upgraded to AE and are feeling adventurous, then try this out.


TL;DR: SKSE updated, many plugins still borked.




> Three, as I said, the configuration of Task Manager has been working just fine ever since the game was first published.


Big game updates often reset to some kind of default. It probably reset the default to Fullscreen instead of Windowed Fullscreen.

Likewise, Windows 10 updates often reset Task manager settings.

Regardless, this should help.

----------


## Calemyr

Apparently they know about the problem but haven't got an ETA on the fix. These idiots can't get the same friggin' game right after ten years!

One place I read said that the new compiler made the mod-processing "too efficient", causing scripts to start before the game itself did, resulting in null pointer errors crashing the game. 

So you've got the beautiful choice of deciding between playing the game vanilla (even with the CC mods, this is not a pretty option) or sitting around waiting for it to fix.

And yeah, if you weren't paying attention, you're kinda screwed. Bethesda "upgraded" all SE installs to the AE base code and included four creation club items for free (Saints And Seducers and Rare Curios are pretty good, really, but Survival Mode is frickin' terrible. Fishing is... well fishing. Haven't gotten to try it, yet. Gonna have to play that Noctis run, now). And since Steam defaults to Auto-Update, the only way to preserve your old, functional game is to have either saved a copy in another folder or set the update mode to manual. Neither of which help in hindsight so, yay! 

The AE stuff itself... well, it's nice that all the CC stuff is now set to trigger based on reading notes you find rather than the blasted wall of quests you get Fus Ro Dah'd with after leaving the starter dungeon. A bit of it looks pretty promising, a lot of it looks like modders did it better already, but I'll give credit that I'm actually looking forward to trying some of them once they get this <redacted> mess sorted out.

And to make matters more fun, AE was compiled with a more modern compiler than SE used. Which, I'll be honest, I never expected to them to update any of their technology at all, so credit where credit is due. Since this is a new compiler, all the old addresses in the code that SKSE used are not accurate anymore and anything reliant on it is funked up beyond all repair. They did do us a minor solid, though, and gave the SKSE crew an early copy of the new code so that they could get a head start on finding the hooks they need. A functional version of SKSE is out now out for AE, but really all that it effectively supports is SkyUI. That's enough to start with, though, since the vanilla menu system is god awful on a keyboard. It's extremely experimental, though, so there's no telling what other mods may or may not work.

One fix that MAY work (no promises) is to disable all your mods and start a new game raw, then create a manual save. Then reactivate your mods. This black screen crap isn't as common during in-game loads, so you start the game on the manual save, and then load your current game from there. Ugly, inefficient, stupidly complicated, and prone to fail, but it might keep you limping along until Bugthesda gets their asses in gear. In theory, anyway. Haven't tested it yet, as I just thought of it.

That's what I've got so far. Outside of the *HOLY CRAP THIS IS ANNOYING AND I AM ROYALLY PISSED I WASTED MY DAY OFF TRYING TO GET THIS TO WORK* thing, anyway.

----------


## veti

> You can turn off auto-updates; most people did years ago so CC updates didn't break their game.


I preferred to keep the game up to date because that's what mod authors work with. Looks like I may have to rethink that.




> SKSE doesn't always crash on startup if it's out of date.


It doesn't crash, it gives a nice polite message saying "SKSE version (...) does not match runtime version (...)", it tells you why it's an error and how to fix it, and aborts the launch. The whole operation takes a fraction of a second and leaves me with a fully responsive PC. That's what I call a good failure.




> TL;DR: SKSE updated, many plugins still borked.


I've painstakingly removed all the plugins. Doesn't help.




> Big game updates often reset to some kind of default. It probably reset the default to Fullscreen instead of Windowed Fullscreen.


I wasn't aware Skyrim used a "windowed fullscreen" mode? My understanding was that that should leave some window elements, like a frame border, possibly a close button and the taskbar, still visible. Skyrim has always been "fullscreen" as far as I could see.




> Regardless, this should help.


Thank you for that, it does look helpful as a last resort.

----------


## Rynjin

Borderless Windowed is actually what a lot of games use by default these days. It stops the game from freaking out when you tab out. I'm relatively certain SE implemented a Borderless Windowed setting into the game as the default.

----------


## Spore

> Borderless Windowed is actually what a lot of games use by default these days. It stops the game from freaking out when you tab out. I'm relatively certain SE implemented a Borderless Windowed setting into the game as the default.


As someone who uses borderless in all his games, I have learned the major issue is the resolution. Have the same resolution on desktop and ingame, and your computer clutches its virtual head way less, mainly because it doesn't need to change the resolution everytime you tab out.




> Oldrim players unite.
> 
> Meeting Cancelled due to unresolved error.


Hah!  :Small Amused: 

I wanted to stay on Oldrim, but SE is so much more stable. Bethesda tried to make the Creation Club attractive but failed. Anyway, 64 bit version of Skyrim for free was nice.

I will not get the AE however.

----------


## Vinyadan

Well, I've made my Morrowind installation unplayable by emptying the overwrite folder in MO2. After some copy-paste, it now more or less functions, but grass has disappeared.

----------


## Triaxx

With one exception i've got mine mostly stabilized. I'm even confident I know the answer. But due to the way mods interact it's not a fixable issue without breaking the game. Or rather without breaking progress in the mod.

----------


## DigoDragon

About a month ago I had one of the greatest Quality-of-Life game glitches ever. I started the The House of Horrors quest (against my better judgement) and after the initial house warming party, I marched off to go free Logrolf from the Forsworn camp he was held in.

But Logrolf learned levitation.

By far this was the fastest I completed the quest. XD

--


About two weeks ago I noticed my game started getting buggy. Specifically parts of the _Wet and Cold_ mod and the _Vigor_ combat overhaul mod aren't working quite right. CTDs went from one every blue moon to about once per session of playing. I don't think it has to do with the new version out, since this was going on a little bit before then, but heck if I really know what's up. Eh, I guess one crash a play session is still pretty decent. ^^

----------


## veti

Well, in the circumstances I'm not going to recommend updating your game, but it might be time to begin a new character.

----------


## Keltest

> Well, in the circumstances I'm not going to recommend updating your game, but it might be time to begin a new character.


Yeah. From my understanding, a save file's instability grows with time, and while Skyrim is better about it than Oblivion, every save either dies fun or lives long enough to become unplayable.

----------


## Rynjin

One of the benefits of Special Edition is eliminating or at least drastically reducing that issue.

----------


## Keltest

> One of the benefits of Special Edition is eliminating or at least drastically reducing that issue.


Yeah. None of my save filed have lived long enough for that, at least. This being bethesda, im sure they didnt completely solve the issue, but its sufficiently taken care of as to not come up for me personally.

----------


## Vinyadan

Morrowind now can be played with HDR. It's very good if you add a mod that removes non-in-game sources of light (so your character's eyes adapt to a candlelight setting), but it makes the night unrealistically bright. I have modded them to be really really dark. It looks very good as long as some light source is around and you can see the contrast between illuminated and dark items. However, without a light around, the textures do that thing they did with old games, where low luminosity caused exaggerated banding and shadows looked like wet black fabric sticking on a wall.

----------


## Aeson

Personally, I've never been that fond of 'realistic' lighting in games, particularly when it comes to times when and areas where it should be quite dark. I'd rather be able to see than be in a realistically-dark cave, especially with hand-held lights being largely incompatible with the use of two-handed weapons and shields. Morrowind has the additional nuisance of most or all of the generic light enchantments being on target rather than on self or constant effect, so they're basically useless outside of combat scenarios.

Also, Nirn has two reasonably large moons, so I would expect that the nights are generally fairly bright.

----------


## veti

In all the time I played Morrowind I can only recall one place where it was too dark to see clearly, and that was one of the caves on Solstheim. I remember the draugr eyes glowing in that darkness...

But it's trivial in Morrowind to get any light effect you want, or night vision if you want to be stealthy about it.

I do think dark nights tend to underestimate the power of moonlight. Those two moons are _ enormous_, both of them. And the stars are pretty impressive too.

 And some lighting mods also seem to forget that one's eyes adjust to the dark. All in all, I would think genuinely dark nights would be a pretty rare occurrence on Nirn.

----------


## Spore

> Yeah. From my understanding, a save file's instability grows with time, and while Skyrim is better about it than Oblivion, every save either dies fun or lives long enough to become unplayable.





> One of the benefits of Special Edition is eliminating or at least drastically reducing that issue.


The switch from 32 bit to 64 bit is the major player in this. You can cram so much more stuff into a 64 bit database before it catches fire.  :Small Wink:

----------


## Vinyadan

Vanilla Morrowind indeed doesn't have actual darkness, and can be played without touching a torch or casting a light spell (which would need to be created with spellmaking, since the on target versions don't make much sense).

However,  the HDR is REALLY strong: to the point where I can drive around with the boots of blinding speed and almost no visual impairment, because it automatically lightens up the scene.

I noticed with a Skyrim mod that I liked a more realistic approach to lighting, as long as the game gives you a way to enhance your sight, and Morrowind has handheld torches and two spells for that. It just feels more immersive to me.

About the moons, I would love a mod that makes them shine light like the sun. Dark night, then Masser (or secunda, I'm not sure which one is which) comes up, and now it's a blood-red night! Maybe complete with phase-based changes in luminosity. Morrowind does have a sunlight setting for the night, but it really represents the overall light coming from the sky.

----------


## Aeson

Whether or not vanilla Morrowind is bright enough that you don't need a light depends on your computer - it's fine on my desktop, but on my laptop a number of the less well-lit caves are too dark, especially if their walls are of the darker stone, and increasing the gamma setting made the day too bright.

----------


## Mark Hall

The lighting was "fine" on my PC for Morrowind, but light potions were incredibly cheap and easy to make. I would fly through the air, shining like the sun and glimmering with magical items. Or leap across the landscape, like the god that I was.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> About the moons, I would love a mod that makes them shine light like the sun. Dark night, then Masser (or secunda, I'm not sure which one is which) comes up, and now it's a blood-red night! Maybe complete with phase-based changes in luminosity. Morrowind does have a sunlight setting for the night, but it really represents the overall light coming from the sky.


Second this. I would also like to see tides by the coast - in fact that might be an easy way to get the everyone-can-access-everything aspect into a map thats half underwater: make it only underwater at high tide.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Second this. I would also like to see tides by the coast - in fact that might be an easy way to get the everyone-can-access-everything aspect into a map thats half underwater: make it only underwater at high tide.


You know, that doesn't sound impossible. MWSE allowed modding in a lot of new stuff, like sheathing weapons like in Oblivion (there's a lot of armed people around, it turns out). A mod that changes sea level in a loop based on the hour of the day or every x hours might be doable. The game already contains a command to change water height, although it currently only works in interiors.

I've had to leave my dark night ambitions behind. I found a shader that repairs banding, but I noticed that, with my settings, mornings looked absolutely awful.

----------


## Spore

> The lighting was "fine" on my PC for Morrowind, but light potions were incredibly cheap and easy to make. I would fly through the air, shining like the sun and glimmering with magical items. Or leap across the landscape, like the god that I was.


As someone who played Morrowind on the original Xbox, the lighting engine blew me out of the water. It lagged like hell and had fog everywhere when you used the Scroll of Icarus flight, but the first sunrise after basically sleeping in the mud on the westcoast between Seyda Neen and Balmorra was glorious, even if the island is still a mud and ash covered hellhole.

But the nights were bright moonlit starry nights. Dark were the caves. I recall the Dwemer ruins next to Balmorra being extremely dark. Normal caves were acceptable, but usually they had braziers or torches lining the walls.

----------


## Fyraltari

This is a bit of a niche question, but... I know that you can join the Morag Tong in _Morrowind_. I never did, because I don't like sneaky characters very much. When you do, can you find anything there that confirms it was them who killed the Akaviri Potentate Versidue-Shaie? Because I always thought that the whole "the assasin wrote "Morag Tong" on a wall with the blood of the victim" thing sounded like a transparent attempt by a third party to frame them.

----------


## Anteros

> This is a bit of a niche question, but... I know that you can join the Morag Tong in _Morrowind_. I never did, because I don't like sneaky characters very much. When you do, can you find anything there that confirms it was them who killed the Akaviri Potentate Versidue-Shaie? Because I always thought that the whole "the assasin wrote "Morag Tong" on a wall with the blood of the victim" thing sounded like a transparent attempt by a third party to frame them.


Morag tong assassinations are legal. You can walk up to someone in broad daylight, stab them in the face, hand your papers to the guard, and be on your way.  Framing them for a murder seems like something that could be easily disproven.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Morag tong assassinations are legal. You can walk up to someone in broad daylight, stab them in the face, hand your papers to the guard, and be on your way.  Framing them for a murder seems like something that could be easily disproven.


Legal in Morrowind. Which was not part of the Empire at all at the time.

----------


## Spore

> Because I always thought that the whole "the assasin wrote "Morag Tong" on a wall with the blood of the victim" thing sounded like a transparent attempt by a third party to frame them.


I agree in this case. But understand that laws are just a commonly accepted bunch of ruleswork, and that they apply depending on circumstance. I don't think the Morag Tong could handwave an assassination this large even with a small paper, because there are influential polticians on the side of the murdered that dont give a crap about a murder contract if it targets one of their most influential benefactors.

Imagine two of the three large houses of Morrowind support the Potentate. Imagine the third house hires the Morag Tong to kill him. Would you really think they would not react at the murder at all? This is enough cause for a civil war, or a coup d'etat at the slightest.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I agree in this case. But understand that laws are just a commonly accepted bunch of ruleswork, and that they apply depending on circumstance. I don't think the Morag Tong could handwave an assassination this large even with a small paper, because there are influential polticians on the side of the murdered that dont give a crap about a murder contract if it targets one of their most influential benefactors.
> 
> Imagine two of the three large houses of Morrowind support the Potentate. Imagine the third house hires the Morag Tong to kill him. Would you really think they would not react at the murder at all? This is enough cause for a civil war, or a coup d'etat at the slightest.


Did you mean to quote me? Because I don't understand how that relates to what you quoted.

In any case, I doubt the murder of the ruler of the Empire would cause that much trouble in Morrowind. The Tribunal was still at full power at the time, so their word was law and that was it.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> This is a bit of a niche question, but... I know that you can join the Morag Tong in _Morrowind_. I never did, because I don't like sneaky characters very much. When you do, can you find anything there that confirms it was them who killed the Akaviri Potentate Versidue-Shaie? Because I always thought that the whole "the assasin wrote "Morag Tong" on a wall with the blood of the victim" thing sounded like a transparent attempt by a third party to frame them.


Can't speak to Morrowind, but ESO does. There's a quest in Hakoshae (N. Elsweyr DLC) where the descendant of that assassin is looking into rumors that a descendant of the Potentate survived. 

...Which grated on me for a number of reasons including 'bad puzzle design', 'you can't stab the assassin in the face because he's a reoccurring character', and 'Naryu said the Tong lost a lot of reputation for that assassination spree so why are they letting this idiot pull the scabs off old wounds', but nevermind.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Can't speak to Morrowind, but ESO does. There's a quest in Hakoshae (N. Elsweyr DLC) where the descendant of that assassin is looking into rumors that a descendant of the Potentate survived. 
> 
> ...Which grated on me for a number of reasons including 'bad puzzle design', 'you can't stab the assassin in the face because he's a reoccurring character', and 'Naryu said the Tong lost a lot of reputation for that assassination spree so why are they letting this idiot pull the scabs off old wounds', but nevermind.


Huh, so I guess they really did become that reckless.

Did they confirm that the reason they assassinated Versidue-Shaie was because he was the one who hired them to murder Reman III and then double-crossed them, as is frequently speculated both in-and out-of-universe?

----------


## Aeson

I don't believe that any of the Morag Tong members in Morrowind have dialogue related to the assassination of the Potentate.

It's worth bearing in mind that the assassination of Versidue-Shaie occurred almost a thousand years before the events of Morrowind - Versidue-Shaie was killed in 2E 324, the Second Era ends 562 years later in 2E 896,  and the events of Morrowind are set in 3E 427. Even elves don't typically live that long - the millennarian Telvanni wizards are an exception, not the rule, and I believe the oldest elves with known ages otherwise are Barenziah (~430 in Tribunal; possibly at a point in the elven lifespan similar to a human woman of about 50 given that her daughter Morgiah was born in 3E 384, when Barenziah was ~387, and thus if she's past child-bearing age it's not by that much, relatively speaking) Symmachus (~422 when killed during riots in 3E 391), and Vorian Direnni (611 by his own account at the time of authoring De Rerum Dirennis). As such, the Morag Tong as it appears in Morrowind is probably at least one and a half to two full elven lifespans removed from the Morag Tong that may have killed Versidue-Shaie and claimed responsibility for it in his own blood even using the longer many-hundred-year lifespans implied in some of the in-game material rather than the shorter 200- or 300-year lifespans indicated in most of the more recent (Oblivion onwards) material; active lifespan, particularly in a hazardous occupation such as assassination, is likely shorter and so there could easily be ten or more generations of Morag Tong between the characters you meet in Morrowind and the Morag Tong that assassinated Versidue-Shaie.

Assuming that it was the Morag Tong, I also wouldn't be terribly surprised if any Morag Tong members with much knowledge of that assassination were long since dead, either hunted down and killed during the continent-wide crackdown resulting from the killing, eliminated by the Morag Tong itself for bringing such disastrous consequences down on the organization, or slain in a shadow war with the Dark Brotherhood which seems to have been under way by no later than 2E 360.

As to it really being the Morag Tong: Claiming responsibility for the deed might not have been the wisest course of action, but, looking at certain events in the real world, I can't say I find it particularly unbelievable, especially for an organization accustomed to operating with impunity or something close to it throughout Tamriel despite technically being an outlawed organization. It also wouldn't terribly surprise me if it was something the (presumably then-nascent) Dark Brotherhood did either while still a (rogue) faction within the Morag Tong or as a first blow in the shadow war between the two assassins' guilds (mind you, I don't believe that the Dark Brotherhood is known to have existed much before 2E 360, and at that stage it's more an implied than confirmed existence) - but framing your competitor for what is in some respects an excellent demonstration of your skill in the services you offer has some drawbacks.

----------


## Vinyadan

I think that there is an important factor about they Morag Tong: they are Daedra worshippers. While that was normal for the Chimer, the Morag Tong have an actual altar dedicated to the veneration of Mephala in the times of the Nerevarine, in an era when Daedra worshippers aren't integrated with society at all (Dunmer are supposed not to venerate the Daedra, even the good ones). 

So I don't consider it impossible that they used to be more extreme in their worship, and Mephala, for some reason, decided to have them do a couple of huge hits (they killed an Emperor and the relative successor), after which the Morag Tong found themselves banned all over Tamriel except in Morrowind, which wasn't part of the Empire. After that, there could have been a discussion between Almsivi and either their leader or Mephala directly, to make them part of the House system and make House wars less deadly by targeted assassination. (interestingly, Mephala is said to have taught the Dunmer to build Houses, with a capital H).

The schism with the Dark Brotherhood also seems to have happened around the time the Potentate was killed, which could be explained by the sudden division between the legal Morag Tong in Morrowind and its illegal part in the Empire that had become completely autonomous. But the schism might have had already happened by then, and the Brotherhood simply killed the Potentate to put the blame on the Morag Tong.

Anyway, a book hints to the fact that the Morag Tong survive because it's the Tribunal's will. Not much that the Houses can do about it. https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Fire_and_Darkness

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Huh, so I guess they really did become that reckless.
> 
> Did they confirm that the reason they assassinated Versidue-Shaie was because he was the one who hired them to murder Reman III and then double-crossed them, as is frequently speculated both in-and out-of-universe?


It didn't go into that level of detail.

*Spoiler: Quest Summary*
Show


You start the quest by talking to Ashur, a Morag Tong assassin whose grandfather was the assassin who wiped out the Potentate's heirs. He's in Hakoshae because he heard rumors the leader of the town, one Feina-Darak, is descended from said Potentate and he's here to clean up any loose ends he might find. But she gets kidnapped by the ghost of one of the assassinated heirs, who is mad at her because apparently she's NOT his descendant - her ancestor was his _bodyguard_ who bailed on him and stole his identity.



So not much about the politics of why they wanted the Potentate's line dead.

----------


## Keltest

> I agree in this case. But understand that laws are just a commonly accepted bunch of ruleswork, and that they apply depending on circumstance. I don't think the Morag Tong could handwave an assassination this large even with a small paper, because there are influential polticians on the side of the murdered that dont give a crap about a murder contract if it targets one of their most influential benefactors.
> 
> Imagine two of the three large houses of Morrowind support the Potentate. Imagine the third house hires the Morag Tong to kill him. Would you really think they would not react at the murder at all? This is enough cause for a civil war, or a coup d'etat at the slightest.


Theoretically, the whole point of the Tong is specifically to avoid that outcome. Regardless of your personal feelings on the subject or their politics, if a Writ shows up for that person and they are killed by the Morag Tong, then sucks to be them, but its time to move on and figure out what to do going forward.

----------


## Triaxx

I personally don't worry much about the Tong worshipping a Daedra. It's not like DB are followers of the god of happy bunnies.

----------


## Fyraltari

> As to it really being the Morag Tong: Claiming responsibility for the deed might not have been the wisest course of action, but, looking at certain events in the real world, I can't say I find it particularly unbelievable, especially for an organization accustomed to operating with impunity or something close to it throughout Tamriel despite technically being an outlawed organization. It also wouldn't terribly surprise me if it was something the (presumably then-nascent) Dark Brotherhood did either while still a (rogue) faction within the Morag Tong or as a first blow in the shadow war between the two assassins' guilds (mind you, I don't believe that the Dark Brotherhood is known to have existed much before 2E 360, and at that stage it's more an implied than confirmed existence) - but framing your competitor for what is in some respects an excellent demonstration of your skill in the services you offer has some drawbacks.


I am a fan of the theory that the Night Nother is none other than Mephala. If the Tong had gotten sloppy enough to attract attentio like that, it could make sense for her to create the Dark Brotherhood and initiate a shadow war if only to force everybody involved to hone their skills.

I also hadn't thought of the (future?) Dark Brotherhood as potential culprits (I was thinking of Savirien-Chorak) but it makes sense.



> After that, there could have been a discussion between Almsivi and either their leader or Mephala directly, to make them part of the House system and make House wars less deadly by targeted assassination. (interestingly, Mephala is said to have taught the Dunmer to build Houses, with a capital H).


I think this was already the purpose of the Morag Tong during the First Era, going back at least to the rise of the Tribunal, possibly even before.



> It didn't go into that level of detail.
> 
> *Spoiler: Quest Summary*
> Show
> 
> 
> You start the quest by talking to Ashur, a Morag Tong assassin whose grandfather was the assassin who wiped out the Potentate's heirs. He's in Hakoshae because he heard rumors the leader of the town, one Feina-Darak, is descended from said Potentate and he's here to clean up any loose ends he might find. But she gets kidnapped by the ghost of one of the assassinated heirs, who is mad at her because apparently she's NOT his descendant - her ancestor was his _bodyguard_ who bailed on him and stole his identity.
> 
> 
> ...


Hold on. When the Tong killed Versidue-Shaie, they definitely left his heir, Savirien-Chorak alive (he probably was elsewhere than Elsweyr on the continent) since he ruled for another hundred years before the Dark Brotherhood murdered him and _his_ heirs. What's going on there?

Also, the ghost of a Tsaesci showed up? Did he have legs?

----------


## DigoDragon

> Yeah. From my understanding, a save file's instability grows with time, and while Skyrim is better about it than Oblivion, every save either dies fun or lives long enough to become unplayable.


Aye, it definitely is much more stable than my "Oldrim" playthroughs. Since I know what mods cause the occasional crash, I can see about working around them and play this character until the save files become completely unplayable.

----------


## halfeye

> Yeah. From my understanding, a save file's instability grows with time, and while Skyrim is better about it than Oblivion, every save either dies fun or lives long enough to become unplayable.


Really? in Skyrim without mods?

I know that was the case in later versions of Oblivion, but I was also aware that there were utilities that claimed to (temporarily but repeatably) fix that, at least one of which worked.

----------


## Resileaf

> Really? in Skyrim without mods?
> 
> I know that was the case in later versions of Oblivion, but I was also aware that there were utilities that claimed to (temporarily but repeatably) fix that, at least one of which worked.


It's just an inevitable result of the game eventually becoming unable to calculate every new variable in the world as it changes. Because it's an open world, with so many people and creatures that it has to track, the information bloat becomes too much for the game to handle. I imagine those utilities to mention clean up the process by removing uneeded tracking.

----------


## Spore

> It's not like DB are followers of the god of happy bunnies.


Oh, Sithis is actually a cool and calming concept. It is more the necrophilia and sanctification of a eons old corpse that creeps me out. Eternal silence and darkness can feel calming; ignoring the obvious connection to real world mental illness.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Oh, Sithis is actually a cool and calming concept. It is more the necrophilia and sanctification of a eons old corpse that creeps me out. Eternal silence and darkness can feel calming; ignoring the obvious connection to real world mental illness.


You do remember the part where they worship him by murdering people, right?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Hold on. When the Tong killed Versidue-Shaie, they definitely left his heir, Savirien-Chorak alive (he probably was elsewhere than Elsweyr on the continent) since he ruled for another hundred years before the Dark Brotherhood murdered him and _his_ heirs. What's going on there?
> 
> Also, the ghost of a Tsaesci showed up? Did he have legs?


*double-checks* 




> *What exactly is the Akaviri Potentate?*
> "Potentate Versidue-Shaie began his political career as advisor to Emperor Reman III. When the emperor was assassinated, the potentate stepped up as Cyrodiil's leader.
> Very fortunate for Versidue-Shaie, of course. He was emperor in all but name."
> *Did Versidue-Shaie plot the assassination?*
> "So goes the rumors, though nothing was ever proven.
> Unsurprisingly, an Akaviri on the Ruby Throne created conflict. The Potentate was eventually assassinated himself. A few decades later, his heir was similarly slain."
> *Who assassinated them?*
> "The Morag Tong, of course. Who else would be so competent?
> Following the death of Potentate Savirien-Chorak and his heirs, a large number of Akaviri and their followers left Cyrodiil. Many wound up here, in Elsweyr."
> ...


Source.

Re: legs, yes he did.

----------


## Fyraltari

> *double-checks* 
> 
> 
> 
> Source.
> 
> Re: legs, yes he did.


Okay, so apparently the claim that Savirien-Chorak was murdered by the Dark Brotherhood comes from the book _Brotherhood of Darkness_... who dates back to ye olden days of _Daggerfall_ and also claims that the Dark Brotherhood is simply the Morag Tong after some reorganization and rebranding, so not exactly reliable when it comes to Current LoreTM.

So I guess, it's canon (as far as that goes) that both Potentates were killed by the Mora Tong. Well, that's cleared up, thanks!

Also, one more data-point for the Tsaesci being East-Asian looking humans with a heavy snake cultural motif rather than vampiric snakefolks.

----------


## Spore

> You do remember the part where they worship him by murdering people, right?


To be fair, people can become annoying. I take offense in the part where they take gold for it.

----------


## halfeye

> It's just an inevitable result of the game eventually becoming unable to calculate every new variable in the world as it changes. Because it's an open world, with so many people and creatures that it has to track, the information bloat becomes too much for the game to handle. I imagine those utilities to mention clean up the process by removing uneeded tracking.


With Oblivion it was one particular variable that had a limit value, which when crossed made all the fires and doors a bit strange and totally ruined the your movement rate. The fix just set that variable back to zero, and it would presumably go up over it's limit value if you kept playing long enough, and if it did that fix could be applied again.

----------


## Vinyadan

I often find myself wondering at just how far Morrowind modding has gone. Here are some examples.

Enhanced detection and telekynesis make these spells work in real time. This improves usability by a lot. It feels good to water-walk, notice some kollops beneath your feet, and cast telekynesis to open them for pearls. https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/47480 https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/47534

Enhanced light turns the light spell into the version from Skyrim, with a floating ball of light. I love this version. https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/47672

Enchanced reflection causes target spells to literally bounce from their target. https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/48956 It works, although it doesn't come up that often for me.

I talked about opening kollops; that's something you can really do now https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/42238 https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/49297 for opening at mouseover

Perfect placement to decorate your room and walls with your trophies or stuff you like https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/46562

Also, Tamriel Rebuilt is insane. It might be the best mod ever made. The cities and towns are mostly fantastic. The only thing I feel like saying is that the quests move in the right direction, but sometimes stop just short of going the extra mile and being very, very good.

----------


## veti

Morrowind might be the perfect distraction, while I wait for The Community to repair the damage to Skyrim. Thank you for that idea.

----------


## Anteros

I just wish Morrowind had a better interface, and slightly better graphics. I've tried a few mods but none of them made the game playable for me. That UI aged *poorly.*

----------


## Rynjin

Big same from me. It doesn't help that the default control scheme is really bizarre too.

----------


## Eldan

Skywind will be out any day now, guys. Any day now.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Skywind will be out any day now, guys. Any day now.


I read that as Skyrim for a second and thought, "Did they do another Skyrim port for a platform I've never heard of?"

----------


## Aeson

> I just wish Morrowind had a better interface, and slightly better graphics. I've tried a few mods but none of them made the game playable for me. That UI aged *poorly.*


Maybe to you; to me, it's still the best UI in any of the 'recent' TES games that I've played.

----------


## Vinyadan

> I just wish Morrowind had a better interface, and slightly better graphics. I've tried a few mods but none of them made the game playable for me. That UI aged *poorly.*


There's actually a mod I really like and forgot to post earlier: UI Expanded https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/46071 The main reason why I like it is that, when you trade, it automatically hides items that the trader doesn't buy. It also adds search by name for items and spells. 

This one instead uses a SkyUI-like look https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/46071 and sounds like something you would like. I am not really clear on what it is, however, and whether it works with MWSE. I also prefer the original interface.

MGE XE allows you to use point-by-point illumination, which is the system the STALKER games pioneered (I believe they were the first to use it exclusively). Plus you get new shaders. I can post a bigger list, if anyone is interested.

I also have a couple mods I made myself, one has the Imperial legion give you identifying rings you can use as uniform instead of their heavy armour. It's mostly to avoid a silly weight tax. The second one is a mod that disables spellcasting failure, although that one needs to work in tandem with some other mod that upgrades what magical skills do, or they become useless.

And graphics are relative. There's a recent Imperial building remake, for example, that looks better thank Skyrim, to me. https://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/49735

And there's arcane stuff like the project Atlas, that allows for hi-res textures that get much lighter on the system. However, it's true that modding and modding doesn't help stability. OpenMW would probably be better, but it's not compatible with MGE XE and the Lua mods I use.

----------


## veti

> Skywind will be out any day now, guys. Any day now.


Like the rest of the Skyrim modding world, I would guess Skywind will have suffered a setback from the Anniversary Edition update. We can probably add another year or so to that.

I wonder if Bethesda intended to break so many mods, as a way of reasserting control of their game and trying to win more people over to the Creation Club.

----------


## Anteros

> Like the rest of the Skyrim modding world, I would guess Skywind will have suffered a setback from the Anniversary Edition update. We can probably add another year or so to that.
> 
> I wonder if Bethesda intended to break so many mods, as a way of reasserting control of their game and trying to win more people over to the Creation Club.


What's one more year added to infinity?  Cause it's never coming out anyway.  There's a reason they haven't even given a tentative release date for all these years, and it's probably not "we're making great progress and it's almost done"

----------


## Rynjin

Skyblivion, on the other hand, looks like it might actually arrive some time before Elder Scrolls VI comes out.

----------


## DigoDragon

> I wonder if Bethesda intended to break so many mods, as a way of reasserting control of their game and trying to win more people over to the Creation Club.


I don't think it's malice. Skyrim mods can break just from Creation club message updates in the title screen. It's just the nature of programming when you modify a game executable. This is why I disabled automatic updates in Steam and made a backup of the exe file.

It took me an hour last Sunday to fix my mod instability issues and dang it if I'm gonna let an update break that again. ^^

----------


## Triaxx

Skyrim mods break because they feel like it. Even if nothing changes.

Heck I had a mod that would be fine 80% of the time then just break every fifth load of the game. No rhyme or reason just would fail. And then be fine again.

----------


## veti

> I don't think it's malice. Skyrim mods can break just from Creation club message updates in the title screen. It's just the nature of programming when you modify a game executable. This is why I disabled automatic updates in Steam and made a backup of the exe file.


Sure, I know that of course. This isn't the first update I've experienced. But it is, far and away, the worst. Heck, I think it may be worse than the change from Oldrim to SE. At least with that, we all knew what we had to do.

Plugins are worst affected - basic utilities like Uncapper, or the one that skips the repeated confirmation boxes you have to click through when crafting. And it's not just a quick fix they need, it's several days of hard work. 

But other mods are broken in subtle and hard to diagnose ways, that modders themselves may not even have noticed yet. For instance, I tried playing Maelstrom last weekend - which went fine right up to when I tried to turn a pillar in one of the puzzles. You know, just like the pillars in the main game that have different animals on the three sides? - but with runes instead of animals. The pillar just won't turn. Makes it hard to solve the puzzle. Everything else is fine, but the pillar just sits there like it's solidly built in to the floor.

My own quest-skipping mod - seems to work, shows every sign of working, but then I notice Alik'r warrior encounters on the roads that should be disabled. They *were* disabled, dammit. But they're back. It's a very small thing, barely affects anything, but it's a new bug and I don't know how many more like it there may be.

Right now I suspect you could start a long adventure mod, like Rigmor, and invest several hours in it before you reach the new game-breaking bug. That's pretty much the worst of all possible worlds.

----------


## DigoDragon

It's definitely one of the worst breakages, but I still do not believe it was intentional on Bethesda's part to break our mods. They wanted to make a big update for the anniversary and they did so. They aren't going to hold off on updates for third party modders like us.

I'm sure the community will figure things out and update their mods. Maybe it won't be as bad as when Skyrim went to SE edition and modders had to rebuild a bunch of mods up from scratch with a new creation kit.

----------


## Vinyadan

It's probably worth looking at the positive side: Skyrim is still being maintained.

----------


## Anteros

> It's probably worth looking at the positive side: Skyrim is still being maintained.


Why wouldn't they maintain the only game they actually put any development effort into?   :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Vinyadan

There's a new version of OpenMW out. If I understand correctly, the one after this should have Lua support. If modders were to convert MWSE Lua mods to work with OpenMW, I would cross to OpenMW.




About the grayed out subjects in the dialogue window, I think UI Expanded has that for MWSE. It's a nice improvement. Topics that would yield unique answers from a character are blue instead.

----------


## veti

There have been two more releases of Skyrim since the hideous "AE" update, and I'm happy to report that progress has been made.

My optimism was piqued by seeing that the latest (mid-December) update, 1.6.342, was billed as "fixing many minor bugs". I've never before seen Bethesda even officially acknowledge that there _were_ actual bugs in Skyrim, so this was surely a step in the right direction. And an update that's _not_ focused on introducing "new content" or slinging the Creation Club in one's face - must surely be welcome.

And sure enough, it does fix most of the problems that AE introduced. (And also, allegedly, some issues that have been there for years, such as the infamous "shooting downwards" bug.) There's still an issue with plugins (DLL-based mods) created for SE, but apart from that, everything seems to be in order now. Most of my mod list is working again.

As for the "bonus" free content - meh. Saints and Seducers is, frankly, crap. It seems to be unlevelled, meaning that if you tackle it at low level you'll face near invincible enemies but you'll get ridiculously overlevelled rewards - such as four 'Summon' spells that net you very powerful daedra, for less than half the cost of summoning a familiar. You get two quite useless and unattractive "pets", decent swords, bows, and armour - although this last only if your Dragonborn is either female or transvestite, because Bethesda's pride in ownership hasn't extended to making the stuff unisex like most every other clothing in the world.

I haven't tried Survival Mode. Maybe I'll give it a shot, but only when I get really fed up with everything else, and it's been ten years already so that could take a while.

But I do like "Fishing". Not that I've tried it, you understand - can you imagine anything more dull? - but it adds a few new species to the rivers and menus, it's unobtrusive and doesn't clutter up your journal needlessly. It's nice to know it's there if I feel like that change of pace. Adds a much-needed minilayer of depth to the game world. About twenty more mods like that, and it would start to feel quite - organic.

----------


## Lurkmoar

Yeah, some of the Creation Club stuff seems to be rather... swingy. Staff of Hasedoki(60 second Soul Trap, single target knock back about on par of a full Unrelenting Force and constant ward effect) and the Bow of Shadows(invisibility when drawn and faster draw speed then Zephyr) come to mind. It's not hard to become an near invincible demi-god(if you don't use console commands), but you at least had to do some quests and/or level up your enchanting/alchemy first.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> But I do like "Fishing". Not that I've tried it, you understand - can you imagine anything more dull? - but it adds a few new species to the rivers and menus, it's unobtrusive and doesn't clutter up your journal needlessly. It's nice to know it's there if I feel like that change of pace. Adds a much-needed minilayer of depth to the game world. About twenty more mods like that, and it would start to feel quite - organic.


I finally rolled up my conjuror over Christmas and Ive dipped my toe into fishing a bit. Generally I agree with you, more specific feedback is as follows:

*Spoiler: Fishing*
Show

Keeping in mind Ive only used it a few times so far, I wish I could do something more with my catches besides cook them - all the alchemy regent fishes Ive actually caught with the rod were preexisting fishes, and the only quasi-exception was the Juvenile Mudcrab, which I found while wandering rather than fishing for. Maybe the ratio will change when I get deeper into it.Speaking of, this exacerbates an issue Ive had with cooking since vanilla - namely, you need salt for everything, and there is little to nothing you can make without it, as the ONLY thing you can make with most items is Roast [ITEM]. This makes the food inventory management very clunky for very little benefit. (Some of you may recall that I prefer the ESO system of ingredients? This is why. All of your ESO white quality fish get filleted into ONE generic fish item, so you have _one_ slot in the inventory taken up instead of _fifty_.)Occasionally catching random junk (so far: a bottle of Alto wine and two buckets) amuses me, so nice touch to the mod maker there.Supposedly there are fishing spots in the overland maps, but so far Ive only found them in dungeons. (I admit I have not gone out of my way to look for them.)If theres a way to target specific fish Ive not run into it yet, but Ive got a quest taking me to Riften so well see if that changes.Having to equip the fishing rod to fish is a little annoying (I dont have to specifically equip my pickaxe or hatchet to mine or chop wood respectively, why fishing?)

Unrelated, Ive been playing ESO for too long because now every time my character plays the mining animation I think to myself: this would be a lot more interesting if I were using the Antiquities dig system instead of having to stop playing for fifteen seconds every time I dig. I like being able to dig up my raw materials the way Zenithar intended but I hope its more interesting in Elder Scrolls VI.

EDIT:

Several hours of wandering and a Dragon attack later, I made it to Riften.

*Spoiler*
Show


The NPCs the quest directs you to have very, very minimal dialog and communicate primarily by handing you notes. I _suspect_ this is so the modmaker could use pre-canned dialog, but the effect is jarring and unnatural. If it had been me Id have directed the user to the book first instead, as _that_ seems to be nicely informative. Maybe have the fishing bounty quests come from a notice board or something. </soapbox>

Unrelated, Im blaming the presence of goldfish in Skyrim on nobles releasing unwanted pets.  :Small Tongue: 


In short so far it feels very much like a mod rather than a DLC.

----------


## veti

> Unrelated, Ive been playing ESO for too long because now every time my character plays the mining animation I think to myself: this would be a lot more interesting if I were using the Antiquities dig system instead of having to stop playing for fifteen seconds every time I dig. I like being able to dig up my raw materials the way Zenithar intended but I hope its more interesting in Elder Scrolls VI.


Not sure what Zenithar intended, but you know you can mine without using the canned animation in Skyrim? Equip the pickaxe to your right (or left, I imagine) hand, and just hack away at the ore seam as if it were an enemy.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Not sure what Zenithar intended, but you know you can mine without using the canned animation in Skyrim? Equip the pickaxe to your right (or left, I imagine) hand, and just hack away at the ore seam as if it were an enemy.


Random High Elf: *hacks away at Lorkhan's Prison with wild abandon*
Thalmor: Inappreciate your spirit, but that's not going to work.
Random High Elf: *works so hard they accidentally mantle Zenithar and ascend to Aetherius*
Thalmor: Hey, wait!

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Not sure what Zenithar intended, but you know you can mine without using the canned animation in Skyrim? Equip the pickaxe to your right (or left, I imagine) hand, and just hack away at the ore seam as if it were an enemy.


Even better, you can use the Elemental Fury shout to swing faster.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Not sure what Zenithar intended, but you know you can mine without using the canned animation in Skyrim? Equip the pickaxe to your right (or left, I imagine) hand, and just hack away at the ore seam as if it were an enemy.


I did not! Thank you, Ill try that!  :Small Smile: 




> Random High Elf: *hacks away at Lorkhan's Prison with wild abandon*
> Thalmor: Inappreciate your spirit, but that's not going to work.
> Random High Elf: *works so hard they accidentally mantle Zenithar and ascend to Aetherius*
> Thalmor: Hey, wait!


 :Small Big Grin: 

EDIT: 
Im about level 20 now and its getting to the point where the Flame Atronach I conjure is barely more than a distraction for the things Im fighting, hopefully the College will have some better summons.  :Small Yuk: 

Unrelated, I forgot how _clunky_ the Skyrim UI is. I know some of this is because they wanted it to work with consoles, but not all of it, and I really, really, really hope that Elder Scrolls 6 does it better.

----------


## Spore

> Im about level 20 now and its getting to the point where the Flame Atronach I conjure is barely more than a distraction for the things Im fighting, hopefully the College will have some better summons. 
> .


Anything other than daedra warriors is a minor distraction (and even those suck against bosses) but the storm atronach's lightning drains MP rendering enemy mages literally helpless, including Dragon Priests and Dragons.

----------


## veti

My present DB summoned Dark Seducers for a while, which was not as exciting as it sounds but remained useful beyond level 30. After completing the main quest, "Call of Valour" makes a pretty good indoor summon.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Anything other than daedra warriors is a minor distraction (and even those suck against bosses) but the storm atronach's lightning drains MP rendering enemy mages literally helpless, including Dragon Priests and Dragons.


I havent found a spell book for those yet, so right now Im settling for lasts more than one hit from a bear. My conjuror is squishy and Lydia tends to get left behind when I take shortcuts down hillsides.

I did start the College questline, and got the Frost Atronach summon from the Conjuration teacher there. Its working okay for now, my dunmer was more excited to learn that Skyrim has its own bug armor after poking around in Stillborn Cave. So she might swap over to heavy armor and maybe that will solve some of the squishy problem too. I really need more ways to boost my carry weight in that case though.

*Spoiler: Fishing update*
Show

I still havent got the last fish I need for the first quest, but I think Im too far north for the Goldfish at the moment (last fishing attempt was in the seas around Winterhold).

----------


## Lurkmoar

> My present DB summoned Dark Seducers for a while, which was not as exciting as it sounds but remained useful beyond level 30. After completing the main quest, "Call of Valour" makes a pretty good indoor summon.


How does the Dark Seducer stack up to the Wrathman summon you can find in the Soul Cairn?

----------


## veti

> How does the Dark Seducer stack up to the Wrathman summon you can find in the Soul Cairn?


Not as powerful. But easier to find (in the sense that you don't have to go through the whole rigmarole of the Dawnguard questline).

You get four spells at essentially the same time, summoning Dark Seducers and Golden Saints as Warriors or Archers. I haven't experimented with the Archer versions, frankly I can't think of a good use for them. Warrior-wise, the Seducer moves faster, the Saint is a bit more tanky, although she still doesn't last long against four Falmer Nightprowlers. 

The big attraction, frankly, is that all four summons are ridiculously cheap to cast - significantly cheaper than a standard Familiar - so I can just keep spamming them pretty much as long as I like.

----------


## Lurkmoar

I just had flashbacks to the Soul Cairn and hunting down Jiub's lost opus. One of the notes clipped through the floor and I think I reee'd for about a minute. I remedied it by blasting the area with a fireball and luckily the note dropped through to a lower a level. Bethesda sure loves open spaces and find x items in it!

Thanks for the info.

----------


## Triaxx

For anyone having issues with the fishing might I suggest a nice scenic visit to Belethor.

On summons: Frost Atronach is excellent at blocking up doorways. Especially if you then spray Ice Storms over the top of him.

My rogue types tend to be squishy and so they like hitting up Sanguine to get the Sanguine Rose. Conjuring a large angry tank helps you get away more often than you might think.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

Speaking of Saints and Seducers and buggy quests, I seem to have somehow started that mods quest.

*Spoiler*
Show

I was heading toward Forsaken Cave to pick up the White Phial, and it triggered a quest regarding bandits I never encountered and mentioned Khajiit I never spoke to.


Good to know Bethesda quality assurance is as high as ever.  :Small Sigh:  Also:

*Spoiler: Fishing update*
Show

Still no Goldfish - Im headed south so hopefully that will change - but I did notice there is, for some reason, an entirely new variation of Salmon Steak. I think its made when I use Salmon instead of Salmon Meat, but why the mod maker wanted or needed to make a largely identical item is puzzling.





> On summons: Frost Atronach is excellent at blocking up doorways. Especially if you then spray Ice Storms over the top of him.


Ooo, I dont have Ice Storm yet but I will keep an eye out!

----------


## Mark Hall

> For anyone having issues with the fishing might I suggest a nice scenic visit to Belethor.
> 
> On summons: Frost Atronach is excellent at blocking up doorways. Especially if you then spray Ice Storms over the top of him.
> 
> My rogue types tend to be squishy and so they like hitting up Sanguine to get the Sanguine Rose. Conjuring a large angry tank helps you get away more often than you might think.


Frost Atronachs are tanks, for the most part.
Storm Atronachs are my favorite early in dragon fights (get them down to the ground), followed by dremora.
Dremora are my walking around summons, though.

----------


## veti

> Good to know Bethesda quality assurance is as high as ever.


The worst thing about Creation Club content is, there's no reasonable way to get rid of it once installed. That nonsense is not even a mod, it's part of the base game, now, for us.

----------


## Mando Knight

> The worst thing about Creation Club content is, there's no reasonable way to get rid of it once installed. That nonsense is not even a mod, it's part of the base game, now, for us.


Just pull it out of the data folder and have a mod manager handle it, like anything else.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Just pull it out of the data folder and have a mod manager handle it, like anything else.


My issue with this is that it puts the onus on me, the user, for a piece of content I didnt ask for in the first place, where previously I at least had the option of not engaging with it by not buying/installing it. It bodes ill for future games, because now at _no_ point is Bethesda actually interacting with me, as a player or a customer:

Someone _else_ is making the content_No one_ is testing itI dont have the option of refusing it, regardless of what shape its in
Previously, if the base game was too buggy to be playable, I could check the reviews and put off buying it until it was stable. Ditto for the DLCs. If a mod was broken I could uninstall it. Now my options are dont play/buy the game or let Bethesda decide what content I should have when they have no meaningful input into the process. 

To be clear Im not directing this at Saints and Seducers specifically or any of the other mods CC content, S and S bugging out just highlighted it. My issue is with the precedent this sets, as I dont see it leading to a quality gaming experience in the future.

----------


## Fyraltari

> My issue with this is that it puts the onus on me, the user, for a piece of content I didnt ask for in the first place


Wait, how did you get the creation club in the first place?

----------


## veti

> Wait, how did you get the creation club in the first place?


Did you miss the part where the game auto updated on the 10th anniversary of its first launch? Unless you took active measures to keep your game on an unsupported obsolete version.

Yes, there's an identifiable plugin for S&S, and yes it can be deactivated. But what assurance do we have that the whole mod is contained in that one plugin? What if changes have been made elsewhere that have never been tested without S&S present?

----------


## Fyraltari

> Did you miss the part where the game auto updated on the 10th anniversary of its first launch? Unless you took active measures to keep your game on an unsupported obsolete version.


I haven't touched _Skyrim_ in a long while. The Anniversary edition was an automatic upgrade? I thought it was a cash-grab? Has Internet lied to me?

----------


## Triaxx

Special Edition auto-updates with some CC content. Anniversary contained the rest and was an expensive additional purchase.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Special Edition auto-updates with some CC content. Anniversary contained the rest and was an expensive additional purchase.


Yes, this; everyone automatically got:
Saints and SeducersFishingRare CuriosSurvival Mode (with the note that this one asks you if you want to turn it on after finishing the tutorial)

----------


## Vinyadan

There a couple of neat-looking Elder Scrolls-themed mods, if someone likes strategy and big battles. I have yet to try them out.

Elder Scrolls -- Battle for Tamriel for BFME 2 (ROTWK) https://www.moddb.com/mods/the-elder...le-for-tamriel

And Morrowind: House Wars for Mount and Blade Warband https://www.moddb.com/mods/morrowind-house-wars

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

Things I want in Elder Scrolls 6 UI:

Some indication for you already know this spell or you already learned this enchantment when Im looking at a spellbook/enchanted item. Im tired of buying spellbooks only to find it was for a spell I started the game with, and carrying (heavy!) swords and armor across town twice when I find out its safe to sell.Some way to sort items by weight, value, and _at least_ filter by name - I want to find the stuff that is weighing me down the most and what Im most likely to want to sell at _bare minimum._I want the option to hide any recipes, potion attributes, armor types etc. that I dont currently have the materials for. I shouldnt have to scroll through ten thousand things when I can only make two of them.Speaking of potions, I want the ability to favorite recipes.Poison is clunky and ESO does it better. Dont make me hand select a poison out of my hoard of bottles every time I want to use one, at least give me a handful of hits per bottle.Please dont make me listen to the shopkeepers canned dialog when I click out of the shop and immediately back in again.

----------


## Mark Hall

> [*]Some way to sort items by weight, value, and _at least_ filter by name - I want to find the stuff that is weighing me down the most and what Im most likely to want to sell at _bare minimum._


Part of what I loved about SkyUI was exactly this. I'm on a computer. Stop treating me like I'm on a console.

----------


## Aeson

> Some indication for you already know  this spell ... Im tired of buying spellbooks only to find it was for a  spell I started the game with


I'd honestly rather that  they dropped spell tomes as the mechanic for learning spells from  merchants and just used the system that they used for Morrowind and  Oblivion - the merchant shows you a list of the spells which they can  sell you that you don't already know, and you learn the spell when you  buy it rather than having to take the extra step of going into your  inventory and reading a spell tome. Spell tomes are okay as a way to  obtain spells from loot, but there's not really any gameplay value in  using them to obtain spells from merchants - it's not like opening your  inventory to read a spell tome or three makes for interesting or  engaging gameplay, and there's not even a trade-off between spells known  and carry capacity such as would result from needing to carry a tome  for every spell that you want to be able to use - and I can't say I see  any reason to want to buy a spell tome rather than the spell itself  unless you're trying to build a library with as many unique books as  possible or something like that.




> Poison is clunky and ESO does it better. Dont make me hand select a  poison out of my hoard of bottles every time I want to use one, at least  give me a handful of hits per bottle.


I don't really agree  with this one; the only poisons in Skyrim that I'd really want to apply  to my next N hits are the direct-damage poisons - all the Aversion to X  and the stronger no-Magicka/Stamina-regen poisons last long enough that I  shouldn't really need to re-apply it to a given target within the next N strikes for reasonable values of N, Paralysis and  the weaker no-Magicka/Stamina-regen poisons probably wouldn't be useful  unless I change targets with each hit, tagging one enemy with Fear or  Frenzy is usually good enough (and tagging multiple enemies with Fear  can start to get counterproductive since you end up having to chase  after them and most of the point of making an enemy run away is to gain  time/space to deal with another enemy without the first enemy's  interference), and for reasonable values of N a poison that applies an  effect to my next N strikes will probably have worn off before any of  these need to be re-applied anyways.

Beyond that, generally  speaking my feeling is that if an effect is weak enough that it's  reasonable to allow it to apply to the next N>1 hits then it probably  ought to come from a (semi-)permanent enchantment or a buff spell  rather than a poison, and a poison that has such a weak effect is  probably too weak, at least for my current level - especially if it's  that weak even in comparison to common level-appropriate (or, worse,  weaker-than-level-appropriate) enemies. I would far rather have  instant-damage poisons whose magnitudes read "drop dead" to most common  enemies, DoT poisons strong enough to do the same for most elite/boss  enemies given time to run their course, and  crowd-control/debuff/damage-amplifying poisons strong enough and common  enemies weak enough that I don't feel the need to poison every enemy I  encounter than have a poison whose effect is +30 damage to my next 5  attacks. _Especially_ if there are spells, non-poison  consumables, or enchantments that do basically the same thing, because  if you're going to give me temporary ways to amplify my damage (or,  really, to do anything else) then I'd rather have a system that gives me  meaningfully distinct options - e.g. a poison that adds 500 damage to  my next hit and a buff spell that increases my attack damage by 50 for  the next 30 seconds - than one where all the different options give me  the same end result (e.g. 50 more damage on each attack for the next 30  seconds regardless of whether I apply a poison, cast a spell, burn a  scroll, or whatever), because if it's done well then the former will  allow for one option to be better in some cases and another option to be  better in other cases whereas the latter gives the exact same result  regardless of approach.

----------


## Triaxx

As far as I can tell the reason to have Spell Tomes is so enemies can drop them. I'd be okay with keeping the tomes if they only dropped from enemies/loot chests.

----------


## Rater202

> As far as I can tell the reason to have Spell Tomes is so enemies can drop them. I'd be okay with keeping the tomes if they only dropped from enemies/loot chests.


With the caveat that a spell you already know, or multiples of the same spell, won't spawn in.

Just... You know, keep things simple.

----------


## Keltest

> With the caveat that a spell you already know, or multiples of the same spell, won't spawn in.
> 
> Just... You know, keep things simple.


I mean, frankly im fine with selling 8 tomes of fireball to merchants, the same way im fine with selling 8 Elven Swords to merchants. Heck, theyre lighter than most weapons, so i'd actually prefer loot in spells.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I don't really agree  with this one; the only poisons in Skyrim that I'd really want to apply  to my next N hits are the direct-damage poisons


These are the ONLY poisons Ive been using regularly.  :Small Tongue:  Stamina drain is only useful against power attacking foes, Magicka drain is only good for spellcasters, but _everything_ uses hitpoints. So I would much rather do the ESO method of putting a big stack of poison into the poison slot of the weapon Im using and forget about it until it runs out ten fights from now. Its much less micromanage-y than having to dig through the unfilterable mess of poisons and potions Im carrying around multiple times per fight, just to find another damage health bottle. I would be willing to put up with a little inefficiency in the form of wasted doses on already-poisoned or immune-to-poison foes to avoid that hassle.

(Admittedly ESO also has you making x4 the number of poisons for each batch you make compared to potions; wastage isnt as big a deal when youre making 16 poisons for each set of ingredients you use.)




> As far as I can tell the reason to have Spell Tomes is so enemies can drop them. I'd be okay with keeping the tomes if they only dropped from enemies/loot chests.


I dont mind buying the tomes, it happens rarely enough that the two seconds to pop into my inventory to click them arent a big deal. What I mind is that the duplicates, when they occur (especially via accidental purchase due to lousy UI  :Small Tongue:  but loot and quest rewards too) are not _useful_. Why cant we teach the extras to our followers? Or make it so reading a spell tome we already know gives us a boost to the relevant magic skill? Or if we can spellcraft in ES6, make one of the creation requirements be an existing spellbook of the same school? There are lots of better, more interesting options than sell it (possibly back) to the merchant for a fraction of the price you would have paid for it.

But failing all that, tweak the UI so that Im not buying duplicates in the first place.  :Small Annoyed:

----------


## Aeson

> These are the ONLY poisons Ive been using regularly.  Stamina drain is only useful against power attacking foes, Magicka drain is only good for spellcasters, but _everything_ uses hitpoints. So I would much rather do the ESO method of putting a big stack of poison into the poison slot of the weapon Im using and forget about it until it runs out ten fights from now. Its much less micromanage-y than having to dig through the unfilterable mess of poisons and potions Im carrying around multiple times per fight, just to find another damage health bottle. I would be willing to put up with a little inefficiency in the form of wasted doses on already-poisoned or immune-to-poison foes to avoid that hassle.
> 
> (Admittedly ESO also has you making x4 the number of poisons for each batch you make compared to potions; wastage isnt as big a deal when youre making 16 poisons for each set of ingredients you use.)


To me, this just says that poisons are too weak and too common and that basic enemies have too much health. +Some damage on hit (semi-)permanently is what weapon enchants are for.

Also, if you're not using the poisons that don't offer direct damage, why are you carrying so many of them that it's hard to find your damage poisons? They're not so common in loot that this just happens every time you clear a dungeon despite selling all your unwanted poisons whenever you go in to a town.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> To me, this just says that poisons are too weak and too common and that basic enemies have too much health. +Some damage on hit (semi-)permanently is what weapon enchants are for.


My current character is, as mentioned before, squishy (I found most of my Falmer armor set but her skill with it is low, ergo its not as helpful as it should be), so I will take all the damage plusses I can stack on when the enemies get past Lydia and my Frost Atronach meat ice shield. Also enchanting my sword means I cant improve it farther yet, as my Smithing skill isnt high enough for that perk, so my most recent sword doesnt have an enchantment yet. 

(_And_ I need to Soul trap another Mammoth for it, because Wylandrias gem stole the last one, but thats a tangent.)

Tl:dr - its just poison right now.




> Also, if you're not using the poisons that don't offer direct damage, why are you carrying so many of them that it's hard to find your damage poisons? They're not so common in loot that this just happens every time you clear a dungeon despite selling all your unwanted poisons whenever you go in to a town.


Ive been fighting the Falmer a lot to get the cool bug heavy armor, so yes I _do_ run across that many poisons.Im the sort who will pause my rampage through the dungeon to use the Alchemy table in it, so I get _more_ potions/poisons that way, and every time my Alchemy level goes up they take a new slot because the power changes.I havent played in a while and Im not using the wiki for alchemy traits, so there are a lot of weird combo/sell only potions and poisons in there from trial and error.And yes, I do want to sell the unneeded ones at some point, so Im holding on to them until then and not dumping them on the ground at random.

----------


## veti

If you're having trouble finding and sorting out your potions and poisons, there are mods to help you with that.

And if you want a permanent damage boost to your weapons, then I suggest focusing obsessively on training up smithing. It's the easiest way to achieve that early. And it'll help with your armour as well.

Edit: As for spell tomes, I've seen a couple of mods that add gameplay around them. One that requires you to find a quiet, safe place and spend time reading the tome, in several sessions, to learn the spell. Another, probably more in line with the Skyrim ethos, uses a tome of a known spell to upgrade the spell to a more powerful version. 

So there are ways to make tomes worthwhile. Maybe TES6 could do something with them.

----------


## Aeson

UI changes won't solve self-inflicted problems. If you're finding your weapons and armor inadequate and you're refusing to upgrade them because you could upgrade them more later or are using something that you lack the skill to use effectively because of how it looks, that's on you, and changing poisons in such a manner as to make them in effect just another weapon enchant just so that you can keep using your cool-looking but ineffective equipment is in my opinion a change that's harmful to the game.

Also, _why_ aren't you upgrading your weapon? It's not like all the weapons in Skyrim are unique and irreplaceable masterworks the likes of which cannot be found anywhere in the world; most of them can be found by the armload in any dungeon with the right type of enemies or crafted in quantities limited only by your patience and the resources you have at hand.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> If you're having trouble finding and sorting out your potions and poisons, there are mods to help you with that.


Thank you, but Im trying to go mod-free for now. Once I get bored with the base game again, then I might branch out. Also, some of this critiquing is with an eye towards what I do and dont want to see in ES6 - admittedly not likely to affect it, but it keeps me interested when things get buggy. 




> And if you want a permanent damage boost to your weapons, then I suggest focusing obsessively on training up smithing. It's the easiest way to achieve that early. And it'll help with your armour as well.


I am. Thats why the enchanting has been a bit problematic (Im about ten skill levels shy of the perk to upgrade enchanted items).




> UI changes won't solve self-inflicted problems. If you're finding your weapons and armor inadequate and you're refusing to upgrade them because you could upgrade them more later or are using something that you lack the skill to use effectively because of how it looks, that's on you, and changing poisons in such a manner as to make them in effect just another weapon enchant just so that you can keep using your cool-looking but ineffective equipment is in my opinion a change that's harmful to the game.


Youre inventing problems, here, and seem to have skipped over a chunk of what I wrote. Suffice to say I disagree; its a bad UI and the next game should do it better.




> Also, _why_ aren't you upgrading your weapon?


See above.

----------


## Aeson

> See above.


What, that you don't have a Mammoth's soul and lack the Arcane Smithing perk? See: Self-inflicted problem (refusal to upgrade a weapon now because you could upgrade it more later). You're feeling that your weapon's performance is inadequate, so _upgrade it with what you have available_. Even if you're well and truly attached to having a specific weapon model, it isn't like you can't just go get another copy of it by visiting the local shop, crafting it yourself, or raiding a nearby dungeon once you have the materials/skills to do better for most of the weapon models in Skyrim.

----------


## Vinyadan

Skyrim's UI also had the fault of being black and white. Oblivion was a console UI, but, at least, it was easy to read. It actually pains me that Microsoft is still following this B&W UI concept in some elements (like the system tray), when close to all screens are colour.

----------


## halfeye

> Things I want in Elder Scrolls 6 UI:
> [*]Some indication for you already know this spell or you already learned this enchantment when Im looking at a spellbook/enchanted item. Im tired of buying spellbooks only to find it was for a spell I started the game with, and carrying (heavy!) swords and armor across town twice when I find out its safe to sell.


The "you have already read this book" tag in the later editions of Witcher One was a huge improvement.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> What, that you don't have a Mammoth's soul and lack the Arcane Smithing perk? See: Self-inflicted problem (refusal to upgrade a weapon now because you could upgrade it more later).


Im still not following your leap of logic for how I dont have the materials to enchant my sword is somehow self-inflicted, unless you expect me to console-command in a filled Soul Gem. Sorry, but I want to actually _play_ the game.




> You're feeling that your weapon's performance is inadequate, so _upgrade it with what you have available_.


I am; Im throwing poison on it to boost the damage, hence the complaints about the terrible Skyrim UI.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Some indication for you already know this spell or you already learned this enchantment when Im looking at a spellbook/enchanted item. Im tired of buying spellbooks only to find it was for a spell I started the game with, and carrying (heavy!) swords and armor across town twice when I find out its safe to sell.


For the spells, at least, that's part of SkyUI as well... Tomes are Books, and it will show you books you have already read.

----------


## Rynjin

I've long since forgotten that was a SKyUI feature and not a base one. There are people who don't use SkyUI these days?

And if you don't, as in you're playing a purely vanilla game...why is it an issue? There are like 30 spells in Skyrim, it shouldn't be that hard to remember which ones you know lol.

----------


## Aeson

> IÂm still not following your leap of logic for how ÂI donÂt have the materials to enchant my swordÂ is somehow self-inflicted, unless you expect me to console-command in a filled Soul Gem. Sorry, but I want to actually _play_ the game.


You didn't say that you lacked the materials to enchant your sword, you said that you lacked a mammoth's soul with which to enchant your sword. There are a great many non-mammoth creatures in Skyrim with souls suitable for enchanting, and while most of them are not nearly as good as mammoth souls are a great many of them are also significantly more readily available - for example the Falmer that you've apparently been fighting. If you really need every scrap of damage you can get, then it seems to me that you ought to be willing to enchant your sword with the best _available_ soul rather than holding out for the _best_ soul. Your complaint about inadequate damage thus strikes me as a self-inflicted problem because it seems to me that you're holding off on enchanting your sword until you can get the _best_ soul and so are missing out on damage that you could have (and claim to want) now when you could instead enchant it with the best _available_ soul to get some additional damage now and then replace your current sword later on once you've had time to obtain a better soul.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> And if you don't, as in you're playing a purely vanilla game...why is it an issue? There are like 30 spells in Skyrim, it shouldn't be that hard to remember which ones you know lol.


There are only 30 spells but they have a lot of similar names - Candlelight and Magelight f.ex.

----------


## veti

Today's Big Content Mod is "The Second Great War".

Basically, it's a rerun of the civil war with Thalmor skins. The civil war has to be completed first, but you can just click a box in the MCM to say which side you supported and it gets completed for you. That's a nice feature.

It's about the best feature, though. I won't go into detail, but the questline - and sidequests - are over-scripted and just not that interesting. The first two battles - defending Riften and Markarth - are scripted to be lost (so, completely pointless really), and Falkreath falls without you even being there. But none of this makes any difference, any more than the Civil War did. The same jarls go on ruling the occupied holds, the same people go about the same daily routines, guards who just happen to be Thalmor - continue to treat you with the same benign contempt as their human counterparts did. Lakeview Manor is untouched. The Rikke-equivalent tells you to kill any Thalmor you happen to see out on the roads (although - who doesn't do that anyway?), and that's a nice little blood sport, but it's as useless as it is harmless.

The Dominion apparently has an overwhelming numerical advantage. How, exactly, it bred and trained so many elves so quickly after the last great war - is not explained or even mused over, and if anyone is serious about writing this mod, I suggest that would be a profitable line of enquiry. (They do have khajiit, of course, who I could well believe are fast breeders, but they're only a minority of the army.) 

Today I played through the finale, and I'd like to reserve a special dose of blech for that. *Spoiler*
Show

Rather than pursuing the fleeing Thalmor across the Jeralls to champion the liberation of Cyrodiil, you're sent to an unmapped cave to take out their commander.

When you finally face her, you start by putting your sword away. That's never a good sign. Then she delivers an _interminable_ monologue, long enough to run down all your precast buffs, which you just have to stand there and listen to (as opposed to, e.g., simply Shouting her headfirst into the far wall of the cave, which would have been my opening gambit). Then you get to start fighting her, only to find that whenever her health bar drops more than about 25%, she teleports behind a force wall and summons minions at you. And she's able to do this teleporting trick even if she's _flying headfirst through the air towards the far wall of the cave_ at the time.

(You can cast summons - and only summons - through the wall of force, which is a bit of a gap in her defence. Or it would be, but for the fact that she takes no damage from anything while on the far side. I know because I 'disabled' it. Hey, if she's going to cheat, why shouldn't I?)

Once you deal with all her minions, it seems she's pretty much out of tricks and can be taken out like any other powerful spellsword. So she dies - only to promptly pop back up as a ghost and gloat at you _all over again_. And this time you can't even do anything about it. (Maybe if I'd soul-trapped her it would have shut her up, but I'm betting not. She's probably immune to that too.)


Frustrating, unfulfilling, and frankly rather tedious. Very like the Civil War itself, really, but less polished in execution.

----------


## Vinyadan

Lol, that Thalmor sounds a lot like Vaarsuvius.

I tried that mod, but I never finished it. Skyrim just doesn't have a good enough combat system for battles as large and long as they can be set up, and I was almost invulnerable by then, which was one more cause of boredom.

----------


## veti

> Lol, that Thalmor sounds a lot like Vaarsuvius.
> 
> I tried that mod, but I never finished it.


Sound move on your part. I was sorely tempted, but resolved to get through it in case any great bits had been worked in somewhere.

They weren't. The ending is simply an animated narration, like the end of a Fallout DLC. 

The Thalmor has better gear than Vaarsuvius, but considerably lower INT and none of the dry wit, sadly. A little bit of humour would have improved the mod considerably.

----------


## NeoVid

A friend of mine just got addicted to Skyrim, and so I'm asking for a reminder of which mods are must-have improvements to the game.  The sort that make the game more functional and should have been features included by default, like SkyUI.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> A friend of mine just got addicted to Skyrim, and so I'm asking for a reminder of which mods are must-have improvements to the game.  The sort that make the game more functional and should have been features included by default, like SkyUI.


Enairim sounds like what your looking for to me. its basically a bunch of mods made by EnaiSiaion who combined together is just supposed to make all the stuff already in skyrim better, there is an entire subreddit about it.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> A friend of mine just got addicted to Skyrim, and so I'm asking for a reminder of which mods are must-have improvements to the game.  The sort that make the game more functional and should have been features included by default, like SkyUI.


More functional might be a stretch and Im uncertain which have been ported to the latest edition, but Ill recommend Silence is Golden (cuts down on the constant un-asked for chatter of the NPCs) and Left Handed Rings (lets you wear two rings at once).

----------


## DigoDragon

> A friend of mine just got addicted to Skyrim, and so I'm asking for a reminder of which mods are must-have improvements to the game.  The sort that make the game more functional and should have been features included by default, like SkyUI.


I'm a fan of Amazing Follower Tweaks, which helps you customize and manage your adventuring companions. You can change their combat styles, set what equipment they use separate from whatever vendor trash you ask them to carry, and one of the most important parts-- an option to force them to catch up to you if they got stuck somewhere and fell way behind. :3

----------


## Grim Portent

AFT also has the neat option to give followers diferent outfits they wear in towns/at home, which can be a bit buggy, but is actually quite nice when you think about how weird it can be to be going everywhere with people in full sets of spiky armour worth more than the average mansion.

----------


## Mark Hall

> A friend of mine just got addicted to Skyrim, and so I'm asking for a reminder of which mods are must-have improvements to the game.  The sort that make the game more functional and should have been features included by default, like SkyUI.


There's one that tweaks the order for the Transmute spell... instead of turning any silver into gold, then any iron into silver (and then into gold), it turns all iron into silver, then all silver into gold, letting you more finely tune your transmutation.

I like the one that opens up options on weapon summoning... it has some weapon and shield combos, not just "dagger, sword, big sword, and bow."

Not 100% useful, but there's also one that replaces all your dialogue with Khajiit accented text... you say the same things, but you say them like a Khajiit, rather than being the only Khajiit who speaks like a Nord.

----------


## Rynjin

> A friend of mine just got addicted to Skyrim, and so I'm asking for a reminder of which mods are must-have improvements to the game.  The sort that make the game more functional and should have been features included by default, like SkyUI.


While my bias would say "get Ordinator and Apocalypse", those technically don't make the game more functional; just more fun.

Static Mesh Improvement Mod (SMIM) is a good one. Makes everything look better while also increasing performance. The Unofficial Patch(es), of course, though you probably already recommended it to them.

One I recently installed: Super Fast Get Up Animation; makes NPCs get out of bed faster (including enemies).

----------


## Vinyadan

Some ambience mods are those for realistic lightning (although this means having to use light spells or torches) and those which add wild animals like wolf packs and herds of wild horses. I found they made the environment more lively.

Convenient horses is a good way to deal with inventory and encumbrance.

----------


## veti

> AFT also has the neat option to give followers diferent outfits they wear in towns/at home, which can be a bit buggy, but is actually quite nice when you think about how weird it can be to be going everywhere with people in full sets of spiky armour worth more than the average mansion.


If it could do the same for the PC, I'd take it in a heartbeat. I'm fed up with realising I just fought through a whole dungeon still wearing my "smithing" gear.

I'd really like to see at least a feature that makes people remove their full helmets, when they're in a peaceful place. Just seems like minimal courtesy, y'know?

----------


## Triaxx

AFT has the option to have followers only helmet up while actively in combat.

----------


## DigoDragon

> that opens up options on weapon summoning... it has some weapon and shield combos, not just "dagger, sword, big sword, and bow."
> 
> Not 100% useful, but there's also one that replaces all your dialogue with Khajiit accented text... you say the same things, but you say them like a Khajiit, rather than being the only Khajiit who speaks like a Nord.


I've played this game for years and never found a magic book on Bound Bow. Always had to just console command myself one.

I second Khajiit Speak. It's a simple mod that adds a lot of immersion if you play Khajiit.





> Convenient horses is a good way to deal with inventory and encumbrance.


Plus having a horn to summon your horse from any outside zone is pretty darn convinient. :3





> I'm fed up with realizing I just fought through a whole dungeon still wearing my "smithing" gear.


Oof. That is... I mean it's kinda funny at the same time I do feel for you. I wish I had a better outfit management system for when I want to switch to my smithing gear and back.

Legacy of the Dragonborn seems to have this in the bedroom of the safehouse, but I'm still trying to figure it out.

----------


## Keltest

> I've played this game for years and never found a magic book on Bound Bow.


Theres one hanging out on/in a bucket in... i think its the fort near Whiterun. Its actually probably the easiest and earliest bound weapon to get a hold of if you know where to look.

Personally bound weapons have always been a bit dubiously useful to me, but the fact that each slot is its own spell in Skyrim instead of being able to summon all your bound equipment with one spell really makes it even less useful than it was in Oblivion. A conjuration mage with just a sword is still just a squishy wizard.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Theres one hanging out on/in a bucket in... i think its the fort near Whiterun. Its actually probably the easiest and earliest bound weapon to get a hold of if you know where to look.
> 
> Personally bound weapons have always been a bit dubiously useful to me, but the fact that each slot is its own spell in Skyrim instead of being able to summon all your bound equipment with one spell really makes it even less useful than it was in Oblivion. A conjuration mage with just a sword is still just a squishy wizard.


Fort Amol, specifically, the Fort Amol Prison cell. In a bucket, under an unlit lantern. There's hidden stuff all over. Found some Moonsilver ignots in the College Midden. In a wicker basket. On of the ceiling beams. A level designer was having some fun there.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Theres one hanging out on/in a bucket in... i think its the fort near Whiterun. Its actually probably the easiest and earliest bound weapon to get a hold of if you know where to look.
> 
> Personally bound weapons have always been a bit dubiously useful to me, but the fact that each slot is its own spell in Skyrim instead of being able to summon all your bound equipment with one spell really makes it even less useful than it was in Oblivion. A conjuration mage with just a sword is still just a squishy wizard.


I love bound weapons... saves so much weight. I don't need to carry a bow, just summon one when I want to open with a snipe. I don't need to carry a sword or a shield. Sure, I wear my armor, but the weapons are taken care of... and a perk'd out summoned weapon also fills soul gems for your specialty weapons.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Personally bound weapons have always been a bit dubiously useful to me, but the fact that each slot is its own spell in Skyrim instead of being able to summon all your bound equipment with one spell really makes it even less useful than it was in Oblivion. A conjuration mage with just a sword is still just a squishy wizard.


I found Bound Sword to be nicely useful at the low levels. But it cant be tempered, so after that its mostly something I can keep casting to boost my Conjuration skill, sadly. Having a Bound Complete Kit spell at the higher levels would be nice.

----------


## Keltest

> I love bound weapons... saves so much weight. I don't need to carry a bow, just summon one when I want to open with a snipe. I don't need to carry a sword or a shield. Sure, I wear my armor, but the weapons are taken care of... and a perk'd out summoned weapon also fills soul gems for your specialty weapons.


I like them conceptually, i just dont think the vanilla game offers enough support for the style to really differentiate it from just having regular weapons on hand.

----------


## Mark Hall

> I found Bound Sword to be nicely useful at the low levels. But it cant be tempered, so after that its mostly something I can keep casting to boost my Conjuration skill, sadly. Having a Bound Complete Kit spell at the higher levels would be nice.


I made the heck out of those in Morrowind. "Armoring Charm" I called them.

----------


## Triaxx

Apocalypse had a cool one called Prepare for Adventure that summoned some basic mage gear, but also a random staff which could be all the way up to Lightning Bolt. And would regen each time you cast. So you could cast it and then have the staff until the spell ran out or resummon to reroll if you weren't happy or it wasn't the right element.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Apocalypse had a cool one called Prepare for Adventure that summoned some basic mage gear, but also a random staff which could be all the way up to Lightning Bolt. And would regen each time you cast. So you could cast it and then have the staff until the spell ran out or resummon to reroll if you weren't happy or it wasn't the right element.


Yeah, I forget whether its apocalypse or other spell mod, but there is a spell called Ocato's Recital where you can store three spells so that they are auto-cast at the beginning of every combat without you spending mana or do anything. so you can store up self buffs so that at every time combat starts, you are at your best. its really good for alteration stuff like having magic armor skin or whatever. pretty sure prepare for adventure was one of the spells that can be stored into it, if I recall correctly, though honestly as the levels climb it becomes one of the less good uses as you get better gear.

----------


## Triaxx

Yeah that's also Alocalypse. I usually put Candlelight, an armor spell and some other defensive buff in. Prepare's a novice spell so it getting outclassed is to be expected but early on it's super handy.

----------


## Keltest

I use Ocato's a lot as well. I typically do an armor spell, an elemental cloak of whatever theme im going for on that character, and typically some third survival spell, whatever i have available at the time. Its such a great thing.

----------


## veti

My favourite (overpowered) spell is Earthbound Weapon, from Forgotten Spells. When powered up, it doubles recovery of both stamina and magicka, doubles duration of all alteration spells, and kicks off a regeneration spell whenever my health drops below 70%. It has room for a couple more effects as well, but I don't usually manage to think of anything else I need...

----------


## Rynjin

Forgotten Magic has some neat stuff. The Phoenix Charge or whatever power/spell that lets you zip to a target and explode on them can actually make combats  feel really dynamic. Kill a guy in front of you, target the guy on the top of the tower in the distance, teleport in front of and gank him, shoot some fireballs down at the people below, whip out your weapon, zip back down into a dude's face, etc. **** is so fun.

Now I wanna boot Skyrim back up and play a Spellblade again.

----------


## Taevyr

> Forgotten Magic has some neat stuff. The Phoenix Charge or whatever power/spell that lets you zip to a target and explode on them can actually make combats  feel really dynamic. Kill a guy in front of you, target the guy on the top of the tower in the distance, teleport in front of and gank him, shoot some fireballs down at the people below, whip out your weapon, zip back down into a dude's face, etc. **** is so fun.
> 
> Now I wanna boot Skyrim back up and play a Spellblade again.


Currently doing a relatively vanilla run (essential mods, of course) specializing in Conjuration, Alteration, Restoration, Archery and One-Handed (axe and ward, generally). Really fun "ranger" build, especially with Vigilance as my permanent animal companion  :Small Tongue: 

Might want to check out Forgotten magic: it sounds fun.

----------


## Lord Raziere

so.....weird thing that happened with my skyrim SE cloud save on Steam.

the cloud save says its only saved as far back as February 3. okay. probably normal.

the weird thing is my local files say that I last saved on Wednesday december 31, _1969_. which I'm pretty certain is impossible.

my skyrim se is modded, so it makes me afraid that somehow skyrim SE doesn't remember the modded saves and if I pick local it'll be overwritten so that they don't work anymore but I don't want it to be overwritten by the cloud save either. is there something I should do, or am I worrying over nothing?

----------


## Keltest

> so.....weird thing that happened with my skyrim SE cloud save on Steam.
> 
> the cloud save says its only saved as far back as February 3. okay. probably normal.
> 
> the weird thing is my local files say that I last saved on Wednesday december 31, _1969_. which I'm pretty certain is impossible.
> 
> my skyrim se is modded, so it makes me afraid that somehow skyrim SE doesn't remember the modded saves and if I pick local it'll be overwritten so that they don't work anymore but I don't want it to be overwritten by the cloud save either. is there something I should do, or am I worrying over nothing?


If you're concerned, you can turn off your internet and run the local save. It won't be able to reach the cloud to override it.

----------


## veti

> so.....weird thing that happened with my skyrim SE cloud save on Steam.
> 
> the cloud save says its only saved as far back as February 3. okay. probably normal.
> 
> the weird thing is my local files say that I last saved on Wednesday december 31, _1969_. which I'm pretty certain is impossible.


I turned off cloud synching years ago, but...

The date is suggestive. It's the day before the start of the POSIX/Unix epoch, which is the earliest date (the "day zero", if you like) that can be natively stored in many types of computer system without conversion tricks.

So I'm guessing there's a timestamp that's stored as an integer, counting the seconds since 00:00:00 on 1 January 1970. And some bright spark had the idea that, in the event of some kind of condition that would stop them from checking the exact time, they would simply put "-1" in this field as an error code.

And the person who coded the function that converts the integer back into a human-readable timestamp was unaware of this possibility, and didn't put in any special handling for it.

So - I doubt if it's anything to do with mods.  It sounds like a bug in the Steam server programming, and the fact that I can't find any other reports of it suggests it's a pretty obscure one. And I don't see why it would cause anything else to be overwritten, although if you're worried, it costs nothing to make a local backup.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

ESO is having a free play event right now (as in, you can make an account and play the base game for free until the event ends). Its scheduled to last until the 26th.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> I turned off cloud synching years ago, but...
> 
> The date is suggestive. It's the day before the start of the POSIX/Unix epoch, which is the earliest date (the "day zero", if you like) that can be natively stored in many types of computer system without conversion tricks.
> 
> So I'm guessing there's a timestamp that's stored as an integer, counting the seconds since 00:00:00 on 1 January 1970. And some bright spark had the idea that, in the event of some kind of condition that would stop them from checking the exact time, they would simply put "-1" in this field as an error code.
> 
> And the person who coded the function that converts the integer back into a human-readable timestamp was unaware of this possibility, and didn't put in any special handling for it.


That programming is also why certain games expired in the Playstation Network store.

----------


## veti

So, after ten years, three major versions and more than 6000 hours* playing Skyrim, today I discovered there's a back route up the mountain to Bleak Falls Barrow.

I wonder how much else there is I've never found yet?

I remember being excited when I found the shortcut from Whiterun to Ivarstead. And the back door into Solitude - that took me a few years to find. But there's still corners I haven't paid much attention to.


* According to Steam, anyway. That'll be a slight overstatement because a fair bit of that time was spent on pause screens while I was (e.g.) cooking dinner, minding children, or sleeping, but it's still a lot.

----------


## Anteros

That's....a lot of hours.  Like almost a full year of playing Skyrim.  I think my most played game now is about 200.  I'm impressed with your attention span.

----------


## Imbalance

Morrowind just turned 20.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Morrowind just turned 20.


Absolutely not.

<old man grunts as he stands up to run away from your lies>

 :Small Wink:

----------


## halfeye

> Morrowind just turned 20.


What does that make Dungeon Master (1987)?

----------


## Aeson

> What does that make Dungeon Master (1987)?


Thirty-four.

----------


## veti

> Morrowind just turned 20.


I'm amazed it's so young...

Skyrim is over 10. And TES7 seems to be developing at the speed of nuclear fusion.

----------


## Telesphoros

> Morrowind just turned 20.


Yup, just fired up a new game to go exploring again. Brushed off a bunch of my old mods to play, like visiting an old friend. Fun stuff!

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I'm amazed it's so young...
> 
> Skyrim is over 10. And TES7 seems to be developing at the speed of nuclear fusion.


Second this. There is hope though; the Zenimax Loremaster was recently replaced because they moved him to another project.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I'm amazed it's so young...
> 
> Skyrim is over 10. And TES7 seems to be developing at the speed of nuclear fusion.


I mean, we've already been waiting for TES VI for a while, sonyou really shouldn't hold your breath for VII.

----------


## Rynjin

> I'm amazed it's so young...
> 
> Skyrim is over 10. And TES7 seems to be developing at the speed of nuclear fusion.


Assuming you mean VI, you do realize it hasn't been "developing slowly", right?

It hasn't been developing at all. They've all been working on Fallout 4, then '76, and finally Starfield, the latter because they wanted a break from making games for the same two IPs one after another.

There's a basic concept in mind but they really only threw that out there to assure people that yes, TES VI would happen...but it was never going to be any time soon.

----------


## Anteros

> because they wanted a break from making games for the same two IPs one after another.


Considering that the Bethesda team in question has made exactly one Fallout game and zero Elder Scrolls games in the last decade+ that's a pretty lame excuse.  ESO was outsourced to another studio, and 76 was Bethesda-Austin which was a newly acquired studio that they slapped their name on and has nothing to do with their main team.

The truth is just that Bethesda has gone the way of other previously high quality game studios when they realized it's easier to coast on past success and brand recognition than actually make good content.

----------


## Rynjin

> Considering that the Bethesda team in question has made exactly one Fallout game and zero Elder Scrolls games in the last decade+ that's a pretty lame excuse.  ESO was outsourced to another studio, and 76 was Bethesda-Austin which was a newly acquired studio that they slapped their name on and has nothing to do with their main team.


...Yes, because they put in-house development of both franchises on hold to make Starfield, as I said.

7 years is not an egregious amount of time to make a game, and isn't even out of line with how long it has taken them to make other games in their existing IPs (it was nearly 6 between Oblivion and Skyrim, for example).

----------


## mjp1050

> Considering that the Bethesda team in question has made exactly one Fallout game and zero Elder Scrolls games in the last decade+ that's a pretty lame excuse.


That's a bit misleading. 11 years ago, Skyrim was released, and later this year Starfield will be released. If you extend your date range by six months in either direction you'll find another game in there.

----------


## veti

> The truth is just that Bethesda has gone the way of other previously high quality game studios when they realized it's easier to coast on past success and brand recognition than actually make good content.


They seem to have never fully stopped working on Skyrim. First porting it to platform after platform, then upgrading the flagship PC version - twice, now.

And I'll give them credit, both the upgrades have been good. Oldrim to SE was a massive improvement in performance, stability and aesthetics. SE to AE was horrible when it rolled out, and the performance improvement is much more marginal, but now that it's had a few patches - and I've figured out how to excise the crappy CC content - it's left me with another slight boost.

I assume the thinking was that whenever 6 does appear, it doesn't have to endure the shock of a platform upgrade at launch, because they've already done that part.

----------


## Anteros

> ...Yes, because they put in-house development of both franchises on hold to make Starfield, as I said.
> 
> 7 years is not an egregious amount of time to make a game, and isn't even out of line with how long it has taken them to make other games in their existing IPs (it was nearly 6 between Oblivion and Skyrim, for example).


You just don't really get to claim you're burnt out on working on something you haven't touched in 11 years.  If they made that comment a decade ago they would get less grief for it.  

Well...you can...but people are going to realize it's obviously silly and call you on it.  They're welcome to do whatever they want with their time, but as a consumer who is evaluating them for potential future purchases they don't look good.

Also, 7 years is a ridiculous amount of time to make a game.  Fromsoft has released 7 AAA titles in the time since they made Skyrim.  Mass Effect took 3 years.  Even your example of Oblivion was only in development for 4 years.  It was longer from Oblivion to Skyrim but they made Fallout 3 and 4 in that time.  The fact that they haven't churned out a decent game in a decade is incredibly concerning.  Even if you're the rare person that considers Fallout 4 to be good, we're still going on twice as long as usual between releases.




> That's a bit misleading. 11 years ago, Skyrim was released, and later this year Starfield will be released. If you extend your date range by six months in either direction you'll find another game in there.



Well, yes....that's how ranges work....they end at the end.

It's not like I'm cherry picking the number to make them look bad anyway.  It's been over a decade.

----------


## Rynjin

> You just don't really get to claim you're burnt out on working on something you haven't touched in 11 years.  If they made that comment a decade ago they would get less grief for it.  
> 
> Well...you can...but people are going to realize it's obviously silly and call you on it.  They're welcome to do whatever they want with their time, but as a consumer who is evaluating them for potential future purchases they don't look good.
> 
> Also, 7 years is a ridiculous amount of time to make a game.  Fromsoft has released 7 AAA titles in the time since they made Skyrim.  Mass Effect took 3 years.  Even your example of Oblivion was only in development for 4 years.  It was longer from Oblivion to Skyrim but they made Fallout 3 and 4 in that time.  The fact that they haven't churned out a decent game in a decade is incredibly concerning.  Even if you're the rare person that considers Fallout 4 to be good, we're still going on twice as long as usual between releases.


Yeah, look, I love FromSoft games. But they've made the same game on the same engine repeatedly for a long time. That cuts down a lot on dev time.

...And even then, it took them 6 years* to make Elden Ring after DS3. Because it takes a long time to make an open world game.

7 years is not, and has never been, "a ridiculous amount of time to make a game". Not every company is Ubisoft or EA who **** out an annual title apiece for 3 different franchises every year.

(Also no...Fallout 4 did not come out before Skyrim, but why let facts get in the way?)

*Before you mention Sekiro, I'm fairly certain it was made by "the B Team" (the same team that made Dark Souls 2), not the "A Team" who made Demon's Souls, Dark Souls 1/3, Bloodborne, and Elden Ring. IIRC they're the team that usually works on Armored Core, but there hadn't been one of those in a while.

----------


## Anteros

Are....you trying to argue that Bethesda doesn't remake the same game?  Cause otherwise you don't have much of a point there.  They've been doing the same thing since Morrowind at least.  You could even make an argument for Daggerfall.

Elden Ring started development in 2017 since we're being nit-picky.  So 5 years at most if we discount Sekiro for some reason despite it being excellent and half Fromsoft's games coming from that team.  

As for studio A vs B, it doesn't really matter to me how a company allocates their staff as long as they're putting out good products.  Something Bethesda hasn't done since 2011.

----------


## Rynjin

> Are....you trying to argue that Bethesda doesn't remake the same game?  Cause otherwise you don't have much of a point there.  They've been doing the same thing since Morrowind at least.  You could even make an argument for Daggerfall.


Significant upgrades in most technical regards, but sure. The main thrust of my point being that _open world games take a ****ing long time to make_. Bethesda is not taking, as I mentioned, the Ubisoft route of making a carbon copy of the exact same game, in the same map, with identical mechanics, and identical side content, with a token "new" (and that's debatable since they've been trying to chase that Vaas high for over a decade now) plot plastered over. If you genuinely believe Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim are the same game, you need to maybe actually play them.




> Elden Ring started development in 2017 since we're being nit-picky.  So 5 years at most if we discount Sekiro for some reason despite it being excellent and half Fromsoft's games coming from that team.


Sekiro gets discounted because I was humoring your own point about '76 and ESO being made by different teams.

_{{scrubbed}}_

Game development takes a long time. That's it. That's really all there is to it.

----------


## Keltest

> Significant upgrades in most technical regards, but sure. The main thrust of my point being that _open world games take a ****ing long time to make_. Bethesda is not taking, as I mentioned, the Ubisoft route of making a carbon copy of the exact same game, in the same map, with identical mechanics, and identical side content, with a token "new" (and that's debatable since they've been trying to chase that Vaas high for over a decade now) plot plastered over. If you genuinely believe Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim are the same game, you need to maybe actually play them.
> 
> 
> 
> Sekiro gets discounted because I was humoring your own point about '76 and ESO being made by different teams.
> 
> But at this point it's clear that you're not actually trying to have a conversation since you're actively discarding and contradicting your own assertions to try and achieve some kind of "dunk" on the company you have a hate boner for.
> 
> Game development takes a long time. That's it. That's really all there is to it.


Youre right, it does take a long time. Which is why game development typically starts much, much earlier than 10 years and change after the previous game was released.

Lets not pretend that the time gap has anything to do with the game development process here, they just haven't been working on it. Which is fine, thats a perfectly valid decision to make, but its not one that needs excuses being made for it either.

----------


## Rynjin

> Youre right, it does take a long time. Which is why game development typically starts much, much earlier than 10 years and change after the previous game was released.
> 
> Lets not pretend that the time gap has anything to do with the game development process here, they just haven't been working on it. Which is fine, thats a perfectly valid decision to make, but its not one that needs excuses being made for it either.


Which game are we talking about?

TES VI? Absolutely, they haven't been working on it. That was my entire point in this conversation. It's why I literally started with that.




> Originally Posted by veti
> 
> 
> I'm amazed it's so young...
> 
> Skyrim is over 10. And TES7 seems to be developing at the speed of nuclear fusion.
> 
> 
> *Assuming you mean VI, you do realize it hasn't been "developing slowly", right?
> ...


Because they've been in the process of making other stuff, primarily Starfield, which they announced in 2018. They'd probably been working on it for a couple of years before that, after they were done making FO4 and its DLC (the last of which released in late 2016). We know it was already planned, since it was trademarked in 2013, but probably took a back seat to FO4's development.

Whether they'll start working on it after Starfield is also another matter, but regardless, this isn't an "excuse"...it's an explanation.

It's just absolutely bizarre to act like they've been working on NOTHING just because they haven't been working on the exact thing you want them to make.

----------


## Imbalance

By all means, keep arguing, but I just booted a 20-year-old game and am loving it all over again.  Have fun, though.

----------


## Anteros

> Significant upgrades in most technical regards, but sure. The main thrust of my point being that _open world games take a ****ing long time to make_. Bethesda is not taking, as I mentioned, the Ubisoft route of making a carbon copy of the exact same game, in the same map, with identical mechanics, and identical side content, with a token "new" (and that's debatable since they've been trying to chase that Vaas high for over a decade now) plot plastered over. If you genuinely believe Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim are the same game, you need to maybe actually play them.


Well, if Ubisoft if your standard, no wonder you think Bethesda is doing fine.  Personally, "better than ubisoft" is not the convincing argument you seem to think it is.  And yes.  Morrowind, Oblivion, Skyrim, Fallout 3, and Fallout 4 are all basically the same game with different skins slapped on it or guns inserted for bows.  They do change the map.  I'll give them that.  They're at least as similar to each other as Fromsoft games which was your original example.  




> Sekiro gets discounted because I was humoring your own point about '76 and ESO being made by different teams.
> 
> _{{scrubbed}}_
> 
> Game development takes a long time. That's it. That's really all there is to it.


These are two different points.  _{{scrubbed}}_

Point one:  It's ridiculous to claim that you're burnt out on something that your studio hasn't touched in a decade.  

Point two:  Bethesda as a whole has not released a high quality product since Skyrim in 2011.

I'm not actually that invested in the Elder Scrolls.  If Starfield is a good game I'll be happy with them.  Do I expect Starfield to be a decent game given their recent track record?  *Absolutely* not.

----------


## Mark Hall

*The Mod Ogre:* Oooh, boy, did I take the wrong time to gloss over this thread. Let's lock it for  a bit and see what needs a mini-nuke applied by a Fat Man, shall we?

*The Mod Edit:* Ok, looks like there wasn't too much that needed attention, just some folks who forgot that Destruction school practice must take place off Collegium grounds. Illusion practice may happen at the Collegium, such as the charm spell I'm casting to make you all ignore my Fallout, rather than Elder Scrolls, reference in the initial post.

Play nice, kitties. Remember, this is a clean fight, so no claws, no Destruction spells (especially not Flames).

----------


## Mark Hall

> By all means, keep arguing, but I just booted a 20-year-old game and am loving it all over again.  Have fun, though.


I played through it a couple years ago and it really was lovely. I'm pretty sure I used a mod that turned the aggression Cliff Racers way down, but I view that as a quality of life kind of mod.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Assuming you mean VI, you do realize it hasn't been "developing slowly", right?
> 
> It hasn't been developing at all. They've all been working on Fallout 4, then '76, and finally Starfield, the latter because they wanted a break from making games for the same two IPs one after another.
> 
> There's a basic concept in mind but they really only threw that out there to assure people that yes, TES VI would happen...but it was never going to be any time soon.


I hope Starfield and Avowed release dates don't overlap. Avowed is Obsidian's TES-like that should come out sometime in the nex two years. There aren't that many future games I really want to play: STALKER 2, Avowed, Starfield, the System Shock UE4 remake, and, should it come to be, a Deus Ex sequel.

I'd like to say that I also want TES VI, but I actually am more stoked about the modding going on around Morrowind. OpenMW is adding Lua support, and MWSE already has it, and it's giving many new options in a setting I already love.

----------


## Rynjin

Avowed I'm hoping is good but sadly don't have great expectations for. The Outer Worlds was very meh, both in terms of gameplay and writing. Maybe working with an existing setting they've already made two games for will help in the latter department though.

----------


## Lord Raziere

I liked Outer Worlds, just as I liked all other stuff Obsidian has made. its commentary was a bit real, but overall I liked it. I'm looking forward to Avowed. even if its nothing but skyrim with a different map and upgraded graphics, I'll be all for it because thats my jam.

----------


## Rynjin

One of the big failings of Outer Worlds, IMO, was the lack of combat variety. None of the skill thresholds or perks actually changed your playstyle or gave you new options, and weapon variety was slim.

I got super bored by the time I was done with Monarch and never finished it.

----------


## Spore

Outer Worlds lacks a bit of build variety, yes. But its writing and the mesh with gameplay is where it is at. If you are in the wilds, suddenly the whole capitalism bad humor gets muted. In Fallout you are ever present with a reminder that war never changes, war is bad and there is an apocalypse happened. OW has nothing like that. If the weapon would advertise its ammo ever so often. If you had a person dying in the wilderness under a vending machine that is tended to by a Board employee because they are not allowed to interfere with customers outside a sale it would probably become more interesting.

There are times where I didnt want to go "out there", because outside of settlements, the whole criticism thing is muted. And as you said, gameplay is not varied. There is shooting, there is subpar melee, and there is playing rock-paper-scissors with your ammo types.

Now if it had more locations akin to Roseway Gardens where the whole place tells a story, I would have enjoyed it more. You enter and do the usual hubbub, but suddenly you are in an empty place puzzling together what happened. For one, the "town" is not sequestered off by a loading screen. For two, there is a mesh of gameplay and story happening. For three, there is an actual impactful choice at the end, which is a proper moral dilemma (similar to Edgewater).

But yea, I still have high hopes for OW 2. Mix up the gameplay a bit, mesh story with actual fighting a bit and you got yourself a good game.

----------


## Fyraltari

> its commentary was a bit real, but overall I liked it.


Isn't that a good thing? How is commenting on real stuff, bad commentary, I don't understand.

I haven'tbplayed the game, by the way.

----------


## Rynjin

I think the bigger issue was the commentary was kind of slipshod. It had a hard time deciding whether the game was a satire of late stage capitalism or a serious discussion of the consequences of it. Some of the tonal shifts in that game are enough to give you whiplash, and it makes it hard to take anything seriously.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> I think the bigger issue was the commentary was kind of slipshod. It had a hard time deciding whether the game was a satire of late stage capitalism or a serious discussion of the consequences of it. Some of the tonal shifts in that game are enough to give you whiplash, and it makes it hard to take anything seriously.


I don't see how thats indecisive. something can be both serious and comedic. thats a valid thing for it to be. Fallout New Vegas has similar levels oscillation between seriousness and silliness. Indeed, the silly absurdities and serious consequences of something are both valid things to point out. just because there are serious consequences to the absurdity doesn't make it not absurd and that it shouldn't be laughed, but just because something is an absurdity doesn't mean we shouldn't acknowledge and be serious when it has consequences. such things are a spectrum and in some ways linked. understanding requires acknowledging complexity and seriousness and silliness are two layers apart of that complexity.

----------


## Taevyr

> I think the bigger issue was the commentary was kind of slipshod. It had a hard time deciding whether the game was a satire of late stage capitalism or a serious discussion of the consequences of it. Some of the tonal shifts in that game are enough to give you whiplash, and it makes it hard to take anything seriously.


That was actually what I liked about it: it was clearly a satirical pastiche of extreme late-stage capitalism, but it also treated it in a realistic manner. The game kind of feels like the uncanny valley in how it uses extreme capitalism: yes, it's clearly an extreme satire, but that satire still feels _far_ too real at times.

Stuff like the moon man merchant on the big ship hub is a great example: the soul-crushing realism of being stuck in a dead-end salesman job for an abusive company, without any other prospects, drawn out into an absurdity that makes it both utterly hilarious and just a _tad_ too real in some of its commentary.

----------


## Fyraltari

Yeah, that's what satire _is_, if you're not using the funny to comment on real life, you're just making a parody.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Yeah, that's what satire _is_, if you're not using the funny to comment on real life, you're just making a parody.


Exactly. Satire is basically commentary through comedic emphasis of criticized behavior combined with realistic consequences of said behavior. In short: what this game does. There is no conflict.

*Spoiler: Outer Worlds example*
Show

Another example is the whole quest you do on the second planet: the woman on the space station sends you down to some research facility to figure out and get whatever they're developing figuring that ti must be valuable somehow. you do this, you go there, you find things going wrong, you figure "huh the experiment must've gone out of control or something" so you brace yourself for whatever mad science experiment is being done THIS time then you get to the alive scientist and what they're developing is......diet tooth paste. Wut? So if your like me, you don't pick up on the hint here and figure this must be some sort of joke on corporations developing a product no one asked for or needed so they can convince people its something they want like corporations did with soap or a joke on how much people are demanding easy ways to diet or something and not think much of it at first.

I do the quest, investigating more, turns out some criminal stole the research and when I get to her she reveals that the tooth paste if altered a little can be rocket fuel which is much more profitable than diet tooth paste. So maybe it was a joke on corporations developing products without considering their full use to push something specific they want it to do? I went back, sold it as rocket fuel and completed the quest.

It wasn't until the reveal with famine being near that it suddenly made sense. the diet toothpaste while a funny concept on its own, _makes perfect realistic sense in context_. Of course the corporations would develop something like that, they're trying to figure out ways to making people eat less so as to conserve food. So a quest that you initially do thinking its just a comedic situation and ridiculous actions over diet tooth paste, turns out to be a bunch of people trying to profit off a product without knowing the actual reason its even being designed for and how it could affect the entire rest of the system, and through your ignorant actions of being a normal rpg player seeking the most benefit they can out of this, takes this solution away and turns into something that is of questionable help: what use is rocket fuel when you need to solve a food shortage? 

the whole situation is a retrospective comedy of errors that only occurs because The Board kept secret about the famine thing in the first place. Without anyone knowing the real reason behind the diet tooth pastes development, they just see something to profit off of while screwing over the man or use to get a promotion. its both ridiculous yet honest about what peoples priorities are when you keep secrets from them about something they need to know- player included.

----------


## Rynjin

> Yeah, that's what satire _is_, if you're not using the funny to comment on real life, you're just making a parody.


The issue for me is that it's not really...funny? The Outer Worlds humor kind of reminds me of this little skit:




Having a mix of serious and silly is fine, but you've gotta know when to do each or it all just falls flat. It's just one of those games where everybody has to be the butt of or root of a joke first, and character second, but then it tries to make you...care, I guess? And I just never could.

----------


## DigoDragon

TIL there's a spot just south of Stillborn cave where you can jump around the mountain and accidentally land inside the city zone for Windhelm. This of course crashes the game when it tried to load the city interior, but realizes that you didn't walk in through one of the proper entrances. XD

Also for some reason a snow leopard spawned inside Windhelm. The city guard took care of it, but never saw that before.

----------


## veti

> TIL there's a spot just south of Stillborn cave where you can jump around the mountain and accidentally land inside the city zone for Windhelm. This of course crashes the game when it tried to load the city interior, but realizes that you didn't walk in through one of the proper entrances. XD


The thing is, the only version of the city that exists in the outside world is the version designed to be seen from outside. It's got the walls, buildings and ground, and that's about all. No people, nothing interactive - including no working doors, which would be a problem if you did get in, because there'd be no way out. (OK, fast travel would probably work, so not that big a problem.) And quite possibly not even all the walls. Faces that are always occluded from outside may not be defined at all. 

On the other hand, you could try it with Open Cities - that might make it a viable shortcut.

----------


## Grim Portent

The front gates still work don't they? They can be interacted with from both sides of the open world, if you somehow get inside the cities placeholder variants.

----------


## Mark Hall

*sigh* This makes me miss Morrowind, where you could jump across the landscape like a demented kangaroo, and levitate into towns without a screen change.

----------


## Grim Portent

FO4 kind of has that, with the ability to enter at least Goodneighbour by dropping in through the skybox as I recall.

When they get around to a future ES game I imagine it'll carry a lot of the general improvements from Fallout 4 forwards, which might lead to them trying to involve a bit more verticality in the game. After all, if jetpacks work in Fallout why can't levitation work in Elder Scrolls?

----------


## Mark Hall

> FO4 kind of has that, with the ability to enter at least Goodneighbour by dropping in through the skybox as I recall.
> 
> When they get around to a future ES game I imagine it'll carry a lot of the general improvements from Fallout 4 forwards, which might lead to them trying to involve a bit more verticality in the game. After all, if jetpacks work in Fallout why can't levitation work in Elder Scrolls?


Most settlements in Fallout 4 aren't locked behind walls... Covenant (maybe? Can you jet pack in?), the Fens, and weird ones like Vault 88.

I hope they bring Levitation and Jumping spells back.

----------


## veti

> The front gates still work don't they? They can be interacted with from both sides of the open world, if you somehow get inside the cities placeholder variants.


I haven't tried the experiment, but it seems unlikely. The front of the gate is an activator that triggers a scene transition (unloading the outside world and loading the city space). The back - I wouldn't expect to have any defined behaviour. The best I'd hope for is that maybe the front activator has enough depth that you can reach it through the gate, in which case you'd find yourself walking in at the front of the fully functional city - but that would qualify as a glitch.




> I hope they bring Levitation and Jumping spells back.


When they did away with those in Oblivion, they took the opportunity to increase railroading. It's much easier to insert "encounters that must be triggered in the correct order" if you remove that extra degree of freedom. Skyrim doesn't lean so heavily on that mechanic, so perhaps they could allow a bit more flexibility in future.

On the other hand, it'd mean a more demanding platform spec, which would be an abrupt reversal. Arthmoor talks a big game about how "Open Cities" has no performance hit, but it absolutely does.

----------


## Spore

> The front gates still work don't they? They can be interacted with from both sides of the open world, if you somehow get inside the cities placeholder variants.


Placeholder cities, skybox areas you can go to and other stuff where you can pull at the seams of the game and realize it is all a big hoax creep me out. Does anyone else share the sense of dread and fear when they drop through the floor? Touch some invisible deathplane (heck even the name death plane is creepy).

I know as a rational being that games need boundaries, and you cannot calculate the whole game world in every direction, but my monkey brain goes apeshift when I realize I have been conned into believing this illusion.




> *sigh* This makes me miss Morrowind, where you could jump across the landscape like a demented kangaroo, and levitate into towns without a screen change.


Me too. Weirdly enough this was one of my biggest complaints in Oblivion. You go from Baldur's Gate or Neverwinter Nights with dedicated city zones to Morrowind. You're awestruck with the immersive and seamless world...

And with the new game they just axe all that work? Why?

----------


## mjp1050

> Weirdly enough this was one of my biggest complaints in Oblivion. You go from Baldur's Gate or Neverwinter Nights with dedicated city zones to Morrowind. You're awestruck with the immersive and seamless world...
> 
> And with the new game they just axe all that work? Why?


Tech issues. The Xbox 360 just isn't powerful enough to render a city, its NPCs, and the surrounding wilderness all at once. The simplest solution is to stick the city behind a loading screen.

----------


## Keltest

> I haven't tried the experiment, but it seems unlikely. The front of the gate is an activator that triggers a scene transition (unloading the outside world and loading the city space). The back - I wouldn't expect to have any defined behaviour. The best I'd hope for is that maybe the front activator has enough depth that you can reach it through the gate, in which case you'd find yourself walking in at the front of the fully functional city - but that would qualify as a glitch.


Typically, with the Elder Scrolls games at least, the entire object can be interacted with in that manner. I know occasionally ive gotten glitched to the wrong side of a door in Oblivion and been able to use it to rescue myself.

----------


## Rynjin

> Tech issues. The Xbox 360 just isn't powerful enough to render a city, its NPCs, and the surrounding wilderness all at once. The simplest solution is to stick the city behind a loading screen.


I think a lot of people forget that Morrowind was largely an empty brown expanse of nothing outside the cities, so it's  easier to run on low spec hardware than Oblivion, which has actual like...terrain, flora, and fauna.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> Tech issues. The Xbox 360 just isn't powerful enough to render a city, its NPCs, and the surrounding wilderness all at once. The simplest solution is to stick the city behind a loading screen.


Also Oblivion has a lot more interactable greebles that have physics, and loading those fills more memory. Culling them by separating out item intensive areas like cities was a reasonable compromise, even if it meant losing levitation.

----------


## veti

> I think a lot of people forget that Morrowind was largely an empty brown expanse of nothing outside the cities, so it's  easier to run on low spec hardware than Oblivion, which has actual like...terrain, flora, and fauna.


I remember quite a lot of terrain, flora and fauna in Morrowind. True there are areas of blasted waste, but that's kinda the whole point of the game. Elsewhere there are trees, flowers, rocks, pools, giant mushrooms, cliff racers, nix hounds, pools of lava, daedric shrines, cliff racers, ghouls, scribs, kwama, mines, forts, cliff racers, kagouti, netch, silt striders, naked Nords, fungi, mudcrabs, slaughterfish, dreugh, and let's not forget cliff racers.

----------


## Rynjin

Notice that a lot of those, like the mushrooms, are very simple and static models. No leaves or grass, for example.

Morrowind is a good example of doing a lot with a little, but it had serious limitations bof its own

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Notice that a lot of those, like the mushrooms, are very simple and static models. No leaves or grass, for example.
> 
> Morrowind is a good example of doing a lot with a little, but it had serious limitations bof its own


None of the alchemy plants you could loot updated when you harvested them either, IIRC.

Tangent, I hope we get more customizable map markers in ES6. Id like to be able to mark things like alchemy plant locations, sleeping spots and so on.

----------


## GloatingSwine

IIRC alchemy plants in Morrowind were actually containers not objects.

----------


## Grim Portent

Harvestable items (rather than chests shaped like plants and things) were added in Oblivion I think, but they didn't change appearance when harvested until Skyrim. I actually remember being pretty excited that whole patches of flowers would change when I first fired up the game back in the day.

----------


## Spore

> Tech issues. The Xbox 360 just isn't powerful enough to render a city, its NPCs, and the surrounding wilderness all at once. The simplest solution is to stick the city behind a loading screen.





> I think a lot of people forget that Morrowind was largely an empty brown expanse of nothing outside the cities, so it's  easier to run on low spec hardware than Oblivion, which has actual like...terrain, flora, and fauna.


Well, Morrowind ran on the OG Xbox, so that is not an argument. The question is where you put the focus. Graphical fidelity or actual connected feel of the world. I say in this case either choice is feasible, but I felt Oblivion did precious little with the ressources granted.

I remember the Ghostgate from Morrowind, the shoreline between Balmorra and Seyda Neen, I remember the desert city of Gnisis (reminding me of bug infested Mos Eisley), the magical towers of Tel Vos. I remember the tribal camps, Vivec and Ebonheart.

Conversely from Oblivion I remember the Imperial City, the place where you close the first Oblivion Gate, the mountain where the Blades reside and loads and loads of boring meadows. Ah yes, and the generic fantasy towns where I had to go to become a mage's guild apprentice.

----------


## Resileaf

Reminder that Morrowind has artificial fog for the sole purpose of making the game look bigger.

----------


## Imbalance

Playing Morrowind now for the first time in years, last loaded up Skyrim about a month ago, years since Oblivion A-bombed on me.  I'll say there's a lot of old tech that the nostalgia glasses can't overcome, yet it feels...like going home.

Yes, alchemy plants are more like single use containers with zero outside indication of contents.  They do respawn, but it seems to take forever.
I can move past a cluttered shelf without everything getting knocked around, though.
Gods, the natural skill curve.  I've been trying to force myself to play it organically, following the quest paths and leveling up without gaming the bonuses, but things like firing thirty arrows before one hits or not being able to jump over a pebble are testing my resolve.
The draw depth and fog were complaints even back in the day when I was still real close with my N64, but when I think about the fact that Oblivion's white tower is visible from nearly every high point in Cyrodiil it just seems so...lazy.  The sun pushing through in a lot of cases is downright gorgeous, though.
I still turn off shadows and autosaves, like, instinctively.  I don't know if that's still necessary.
I spent entirely too much time looking for that damn cube.  Again.  Arktnghand is the only place I've fallen through the floor this run, so far, but I didn't fall off the world.  This *will* happen, though, eventually, because iirc it has mostly to do with player carry weight and I just can't leave stuff lie around.  I don't remember the exact formula to calculate how many jugs of sujama I'd need to drink to make it back to town with fifty Dwemer cogs like I used to.
I'm planning to avoid permanent spell effects exploits, but I'm not above reverse variable magnitude enchantments and I've already got a few modified SR-71 recipes in mind.  Only going to do vampire quests if I contract it, but I'm pretty sure I'll be on Solstheim before long, in large part because one of my all time greatest joys is fighting Vivec as a werewolf.  Oblivion sorely needed a werewolf mode.  Unlike my last Skyrim run, I'm not going to try and glitch into being both in Morrowind.
I am curbing the wanderlust a bit, partly because I'm not exploiting and want more of the story, but also because I'm surprised how much I've forgotten and how fresh it feels again.  This is a game that had scads of replay value even when I had it practically memorized, but now I have to set aside all assumptions because I erroneously ended up in Vivec, not Balmora, when I used Almsivi Intervention, and the map is truly unhelpful when so little is filled in.

It's a really old game, and looks it, but man, am I having fun.

----------


## Resileaf

> It's a really old game, and looks it, but man, am I having fun.


Morrowind may be aged and archaic and looking like crap, but it's impossible not to feel satisfied as you explore and find valuable treasure. Since the loot isn't randomly generated, you can find absolute gems and incredible items by just exploring the right places.

----------


## Caelestion

> Reminder that Morrowind has artificial fog for the sole purpose of making the game look bigger.


The artificial fog is the draw distance, which is linked to processing power.  It was absolutely _not_ there just to make the game look bigger.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> Playing Morrowind now for the first time in years, last loaded up Skyrim about a month ago, years since Oblivion A-bombed on me.  I'll say there's a lot of old tech that the nostalgia glasses can't overcome, yet it feels...like going home.


Remember, anything your nostalgia can't overcome mods probably can...

----------


## Vinyadan

Morrowind actor shadows have the problem that Morrowind assets don't stop light coming through them, so shadows also pass through them. I think they look so bad, it's best to turn them off.

There are lots of Morrowind mods one could suggest using... Beautiful Cities of Morrowind is something of a vanilla+ experience, and then there's that mod that adds lots of new dialogue, that's also pretty cool.

----------


## Spore

> Reminder that Morrowind has artificial fog for the sole purpose of making the game look bigger.


MW lost that illusion to mind about 15 minutes into the game when I Icarus Flight'ed into Balmorra and promptly died on impact.




> Morrowind may be aged and archaic and looking like crap, but it's impossible not to feel satisfied as you explore and find valuable treasure. Since the loot isn't randomly generated, you can find absolute gems and incredible items by just exploring the right places.


And like any similar game, you needn't be "high enough level" to do so. Just run away screaming from any titanic monsters chasing you for long enough. God I despise scaling game worlds...




> The artificial fog is the draw distance, which is linked to processing power.  It was absolutely _not_ there just to make the game look bigger.


Oblivion is designed with many hills to reduce how far you can look. Skyrim and Morrowind too, but Morrowind sorta has the elevation going to the closer you are to the Red Mountain, so the trick isnt as prominent, but the fog is.

----------


## Resileaf

> And like any similar game, you needn't be "high enough level" to do so. Just run away screaming from any titanic monsters chasing you for long enough. God I despise scaling game worlds...


Or go through a door! NPCs hadn't mastered the art of opening doors in this game yet.

----------


## mjp1050

> Well, Morrowind ran on the OG Xbox, so that is not an argument. The question is where you put the focus. Graphical fidelity or actual connected feel of the world. I say in this case either choice is feasible, but I felt Oblivion did precious little with the ressources granted.


I think you're seriously underestimating just how much of a technical improvement Oblivion was over Morrowind.

Morrowind's NPCs didn't have any AI. Oblivion's NPCs had a fairly advanced AI for the time. 

Morrowind's NPCs were mostly static. Oblivion's NPCs had full animation, including lip syncing.

Morrowind's environments were static. Oblivion had foliage, including trees that swayed in the wind.

Morrowind had a small render distance. Oblivion had the entire map visible at all times.

Morrowind had no physics. Heck, it didn't even have gravity - dropped items would remain floating in the air. Oblivion had an actual physics engine.

And this is ignoring the purely graphical upgrades that Oblivion had over Morrowind, like bloom, lighting, level-of-detail, shaders, etc. 

You put all that together and you get something that not even the then-advanced Xbox 360 can handle without some sacrifices being made. There's no doubt in my mind that if Bethesda _could've_ seamlessly integrated Oblivion's cities into the world, they _would've_. But they decided to go with what I listed above instead.


And hey, since this is purely a tech barrier, we might even have seamless worlds again in TES:VI. Consoles today are more than powerful enough to render cities and wilderness together.

----------


## Spore

> I think you're seriously underestimating just how much of a technical improvement Oblivion was over Morrowind.


I mean yea, the nostalgia googles are pretty hard on me considering Morrowind is such a neat game.

----------


## veti

You know, it's so long since I modded the fog out of Morrowind, so that you can see Red Mountain in the distance from Seyda Neen, that I struggle to remember what it was like before. 




> And hey, since this is purely a tech barrier, we might even have seamless worlds again in TES:VI. Consoles today are more than powerful enough to render cities and wilderness together.


Maybe. But people are used to loading screens, and separate worldspaces enable exciting ways to keep the player on the rails. My guess is that processing power will be spent on eye candy, and little else.

----------


## Rynjin

> Maybe. But people are used to loading screens, and separate worldspaces enable exciting ways to keep the player on the rails. My guess is that processing power will be spent on eye candy, and little else.


No, I'm pretty sure people are more used to seamless open worlds now than ones with loading screens. Every big AAA open world of the last 7-8 years is seamless or mostly seamless.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> You know, it's so long since I modded the fog out of Morrowind, so that you can see Red Mountain in the distance from Seyda Neen, that I struggle to remember what it was like before.


Something like this...

----------


## Imbalance

> Something like this...


There's about twice as much swamp village in that pic as loads on my GotY disc.  I remember thinking Balmora is roughly the size of a city block, and you can't see one side from the other.  Or, climb a shelf in the middle of a Walmart Supercenter, and imagine there is smoke at the outer walls - you can just make out those walls, but none of the corners are in view, but straight up is clear sky.  They used volcano lore and ash storms to make it make sense at the time, but I was so disappointed the first time I beat the game and none of that changed.  That would be the one mod I'd really go for, stepping up out of the cone of Red Mountain at the end to see morning sunlight glinting off of the Sea of Ghosts.

----------


## Aeson

Personally, I like the foggy island aesthetic that _Morrowind_'s limited draw distance gave it.




> They used volcano lore and ash storms to make it make sense at the  time, but I was so disappointed the first time I beat the game and none  of that changed.  That would be the one mod I'd really go for, stepping  up out of the cone of Red Mountain at the end to see morning sunlight  glinting off of the Sea of Ghosts.


The way Bethesda's been going with what new games reveal about what happened after the end of the old games, we probably ought to count ourselves lucky that Red Mountain didn't blow up when Dagoth Ur died.

----------


## Imbalance

> The way Bethesda's been going with what new games reveal about what happened after the end of the old games, we probably ought to count ourselves lucky that Red Mountain didn't blow up when Dagoth Ur died.


That was a lesser disappointment, the first time I decided to fight and actually managed to kill Vivec, stepping outside to see Baar Dau still hanging there... :Small Wink: 

Indeed, the Red Year doesn't sound like a good time.

----------


## Vinyadan

> The way Bethesda's been going with what new games reveal about what happened after the end of the old games, we probably ought to count ourselves lucky that Red Mountain didn't blow up when Dagoth Ur died.


There was some minor destruction, and the Nerevarine had to "run for his life", as he stated in his diary.

It would have been pretty crazy if the moon had fallen on Vivec after you killed him, though. Actually, I kinda want something like that, killing Vivec turns the city into a post-apocalyptic environment with the faithful going crazy with anguish, the moon falling, unnatural phenomenons opening up, the city's daedra cultists and Sixth House acting up in the chaos, and the authorities of the various cantons attempting to maintain a semblance of control.

On a smaller scale, I'd like a mod where blight storms reach farther areas of Morrowind as the main quest progresses, to add a sense of urgency, with related dialogue.

----------


## halfeye

> On a smaller scale, I'd like a mod where blight storms reach farther areas of Morrowind as the main quest progresses, to add a sense of urgency, with related dialogue.


I am strongly against countdowns with meaning in any game. Having things ramp up as you wander along the main quest may be fine, but any sign of an actual ticking clock and I'm out.

----------


## Vinyadan

> I am strongly against countdowns with meaning in any game. Having things ramp up as you wander along the main quest may be fine, but any sign of an actual ticking clock and I'm out.


Yep, I wasn't thinking of a clock made of actual time/in-game days, just that completing the quests in the main mission causes the blight storms to advance. I think it would be interesting if, for example, silt strider drivers would refuse to go out during a blight storm, and asked you to wait until the weather got better, as a moderate effect to make you feel that something is really happening.

----------


## Resileaf

Much like how Oblivion spawns more gates as your progress through the main quest and Skyrim has.. Hmm, more dragons, maybe? I'm not actually sure.

----------


## halfeye

> Much like how Oblivion spawns more gates as your progress through the main quest and Skyrim has.. Hmm, more dragons, maybe? I'm not actually sure.


Nah, the gates and dragons have no relation to the main quests. I think there may be a limit on the gates, but it's pretty high, something like 50 or maybe even 70, but I'm not really sure, I lost interest when new gates stopped spawning so I didn't thoroughly check it.

----------


## halfeye

> Much like how Oblivion spawns more gates as your progress through the main quest and Skyrim has.. Hmm, more dragons, maybe? I'm not actually sure.


Nah, the gates and dragons have no relation to the main quests. I think there may be a limit on the gates, but it's pretty high, something like 50 or maybe even 70, but I'm not really sure, I lost interest when new gates stopped spawning so I didn't thoroughly check it. I'm pretty sure that all the gates have set locations and they don't all always spawn in any run through.

----------


## Aeson

> It would have been pretty crazy if the moon had fallen on Vivec after you killed him, though. Actually, I kinda want something like that, killing Vivec turns the city into a post-apocalyptic environment with the faithful going crazy with anguish, the moon falling, unnatural phenomenons opening up, the city's daedra cultists and Sixth House acting up in the chaos, and the authorities of the various cantons attempting to maintain a semblance of control.


A problem I have with Baar Dau falling as a result of killing Vivec is  that if it happens on a game-relevant timescale then it feels to me like  the sort of thing that ought to be a nonstandard game-over - especially  if it falls immediately upon Vivec's death, because between the size of  Baar Dau and Bethesda's decision that it regained the momentum it had  prior to Vivec halting its descent there's no way you're getting to  anything like minimum safe distance without Recalling yourself at least  halfway across the island or out to Mournhold or something like that  more or less immediately upon striking the killing blow (and possibly  not even then - you might have to do something like slap Vivec with a  DoT strong enough to kill him and teleport to safety before he drops in  order to get out of the Palace of Vivec before Baar Dau hits the High  Fane and obliterates the city, if it falls immediately upon Vivec's  demise). This is a major cataclysm, and in triggering it you placed  yourself pretty much at ground zero.




> Nah, the gates and dragons have no relation to the main quests. I think  there may be a limit on the gates, but it's pretty high, something like  50 or maybe even 70, but I'm not really sure, I lost interest when new  gates stopped spawning so I didn't thoroughly check it. I'm pretty sure  that all the gates have set locations and they don't all always spawn in  any run through.


Oblivion Gate occurrence is strongly related to progression in the Main Quest. Completing Find the Heir spawns 10 gates, sets the gate-opening probability to 25%, and sets the maximum number of random gates allowed to 25; completing the Dagon Shrine spawns a further seven gates, increases the gate-opening probability to 50%, and sets the maximum number of random gates allowed to 50; exiting Mankar Camoran's Paradise resets the gate-opening probability to 25% and reduces the number of random gates allowed to 20 (and if you've closed at least 20 random gates then no more will spawn); and completing the Main Quest will reduce the gate-opening probability to 0% and close any remaining gates in the game-world.

----------


## factotum

> Nah, the gates and dragons have no relation to the main quests.


The dragons absolutely do in Skyrim--you won't have a single random dragon encounter until you've done the quest where you kill the one at the Whiterun guard tower and get called as Dovaahkin by the Greybeards.

----------


## Vinyadan

> between the size of  Baar Dau and Bethesda's decision that it regained the momentum it had  prior to Vivec halting its descent


Yea, that would be pretty extreme. I had no idea of the momentum detail; I guess it would be total annihilation. Without it, I would have assumed a strong earthquake followed by a tsunami (the game actually has an option for changing water levels in interiors, so that could be simulated even as you are still inside the palace); much of the problem would have been due to people reacting (the Temple in disarray losing its hold on the city, and various other parties being torn between ensuring their own safety and grabbing whatever is possible, especially the Great Houses; I could also see some factions entering open warfare, at least at the local level, like the Telvanni attacking the Mages Guild).

Now that I think about it, I thought Baar Dau was aiming for the god Vivec, not the city (that it was either in love with or jealous at him). I had forgotten that, according to the Temple, it was misled by Sheogorath and aimed for the city.

----------


## halfeye

> Oblivion Gate occurrence is strongly related to progression in the Main Quest. Completing Find the Heir spawns 10 gates, sets the gate-opening probability to 25%, and sets the maximum number of random gates allowed to 25; completing the Dagon Shrine spawns a further seven gates, increases the gate-opening probability to 50%, and sets the maximum number of random gates allowed to 50; exiting Mankar Camoran's Paradise resets the gate-opening probability to 25% and reduces the number of random gates allowed to 20 (and if you've closed at least 20 random gates then no more will spawn); and completing the Main Quest will reduce the gate-opening probability to 0% and close any remaining gates in the game-world.


I tend or tended to do the main quest up to the battle of Bruma (which can be done by something like level 12 or maybe even 8 (it's a long time ago now)), then ignore it, and ignore the non-obligatory gates until level 17 (because the sigil stones rank up with you until then, so if you leave them you get the strongest ones). I don't think I actually completed the game more than once, but it's still possible that I spent more time on it than Skyrim, so far.




> The dragons absolutely do in Skyrim--you won't have a single random dragon encounter until you've done the quest where you kill the one at the Whiterun guard tower and get called as Dovaahkin by the Greybeards.


You're right, I was thinking of the later aspects of the main quest, but you do have to get them started.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Yea, that would be pretty extreme. I had no idea of the momentum detail; I guess it would be total annihilation. Without it, I would have assumed a strong earthquake followed by a tsunami (the game actually has an option for changing water levels in interiors, so that could be simulated even as you are still inside the palace)


Baar Dau isn't very big or very high, plus it's been hollowed out quite a lot. Without its momentum it'd wreck the building but I don't think it'd do that much more.

----------


## veti

> Baar Dau isn't very big or very high, plus it's been hollowed out quite a lot. Without its momentum it'd wreck the building but I don't think it'd do that much more.


Hollowed out is a significant point. It means that to regain momentum, it must have resumed its fall going a great deal faster than when it initially stopped. Which means the kinetic energy with which it slammed into the city must have been enormous.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Hollowed out is a significant point. It means that to regain momentum, it must have resumed its fall going a great deal faster than when it initially stopped. Which means the kinetic energy with which it slammed into the city must have been enormous.


Well, it woke up the damned volcano, so yes.
It might have just regained its original speed though. It's not like anyone was in any position to check.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Hollowed out is a significant point. It means that to regain momentum, it must have resumed its fall going a great deal faster than when it initially stopped. Which means the kinetic energy with which it slammed into the city must have been enormous.


A non-zero part of me has wondered if the bits they hollowed out ALSO regained momentum, theoretically making another, smaller crater wherever they dumped the rubble.

----------


## Imbalance

> Baar Dau isn't very big or very high, plus it's been hollowed out quite a lot. Without its momentum it'd wreck the building but I don't think it'd do that much more.


The out-of-games novel also had it that there was a rift to Oblivion torn open within before it crashed, and a soul-eating machine was on board that exploded.  Seems the impact bore with it far more might than just the weight of a pitted boulder.

----------


## Aeson

> Baar Dau isn't very big or very high, plus it's been hollowed out quite a lot. Without its momentum it'd wreck the building but I don't think it'd do that much more.


I think that, even as hollowed out as it is, it's big enough that the impact shock would probably do a number on at least the adjacent cantons and the Palace, but, yeah, it probably shouldn't hit hard enough to completely obliterate Vivec City and its environs if it 'just' fell.

It might still be enough to trigger Red Mountain to blow up, if the Tribunal and Dagoth Ur have been doing anything that might destabilize the mountain once their power fails.

----------


## Vinyadan

How big that thing is is also pretty difficult to clear: buildings in Morrowind are often bigger inside than outside, and the geography itself is in many ways symbolic (there are different calculations of Vvardenfell's actal size, from 31,000 square miles using Daggerfall to about a third extrapolating from the books, to 16 square km for the playable Vvardenfell).
So how high, how big, how fast are all up in the air (and so is how deep the sea around Vivec would be, which would change the severity of the tsunami if it were to fall inside the water.)

----------


## veti

> So how high, how big, how fast are all up in the air (and so is how deep the sea around Vivec would be, which would change the severity of the tsunami if it were to fall inside the water.)


My recollection is that the sea is pretty shallow there, such that if the thing merely dropped gently into the water, it likely wouldn't be completely submerged.

I don't know, but intuitively it feels like there must be some minimum depth and space of water required to allow a tsunami to be generated. If the rock was heading for the city, I don't think the splash would do it. (The subsequent earthquake, on the other hand...)

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> So how high, how big, how fast are all up in the air (and so is how deep the sea around Vivec would be, which would change the severity of the tsunami if it were to fall inside the water.)


IIRC it was pointed at a canton.

----------


## Vinyadan

Has anyone played Morroblivion recently? Any opinion? I used to think it wasn't worth playing, then I saw a video of Balmora with Oblivion lighting, and my jaw dropped.

----------


## Vinyadan

OK, some impressions about Morroblivion.

The most important one is that this isn't Morrowind, it's Oblivion with Morrowind assets and spells. So I find that, if you like the Morrowind setting and want to play it out in a new way, this is really good, probably better than any Morrowind mod. Oblivion had a lot of improvements over the Morrowind engine, from mere interface elements to radiant AI to how light works, and you find it all in Morroblivion. Since I am mostly into the Morrowind setting, I find that the AI in particular adds a lot: you see NPCs wandering around that used to never leave their home, clubs fill when it's lunchtime, taverns when it's night time, guards work in shifts, people with instruments actually play them, or read, or eat.

I opted for a thief playthrough (something I have never done in a TES game) and the Oblivion interface helps a lot: you don't have to hold CTRL to sneak, you don't have to swap to a lockpick, and you can see beforehand if what you are doing is illegal. Detect life also works directly on-screen. The fences system is interesting, although I guess it has both benefits and negatives (you may never get high prices for some products, and you cannot sell all stolen goods or at all times of day; I think it simply needs adjusting). Radiant AI also is really cool to have: you can choose the time of day or night for your thefts, and this will change the status and position of NPCs. A novice thief will get a lot out of working at night, while an expert will be able to work well even during the day. I also liked the ability to escape from jail, although reloading the game always ends up being the easiest thing... although you can use jail as another fast transportation method.

Now, the negative. Morroblivion takes some time to install and isn't as simple as I'd like it to be, because it requires a good number of other plugins. More importantly, it is playable and it is still being developed, but it does contain a few bugs, like some doors not connecting to cells or certain quests or dialogues not updating (there's a document online with quest IDs and stages so you can update them manually). Another thing I noticed is that two quests break all saves made after they have been completed (Yngling's Game Rats and buying Vudunius Nuccius' Cursed Ring). Light still seeps through assets, although it's rarely noticeable. The Oblivion dialogue system is very different from Morrowind's, and it's more difficult to handle all of those topics. Parts of the conversion are automatic, so sometimes magic items don't actually work like they should.

Keep in mind that there still are patches coming out, one of them during my playthrough (I haven't installed it because it required a new game). Overall, I think it's a fun mod to try, if you keep in mind that it's still not at v 1.0.

----------


## Caelestion

I thought that they were done with Morroblivion _years_ ago.

----------


## Vinyadan

> I thought that they were done with Morroblivion _years_ ago.


Apparently, it's still getting updates. By the way, it's possible that the problems I've had don't directly depend on Morroblivion, as I was using other mods with it.

----------


## Anteros

I didn't even know Morroblivion was a thing.  I've heard of Skywind, but this is the first I've heard of an Oblivion version.  

Normally I treat most of these mods like vaporware since they don't usually ever actually reach a completed state, but it sounds like this one actually came close.  That's interesting.  

Honestly, the best Elder Scrolls game I've played in years was Enderal (despite the overarching plot being terrible), so maybe it's worth giving another mod a shot.

----------


## veti

> I didn't even know Morroblivion was a thing.  I've heard of Skywind, but this is the first I've heard of an Oblivion version.  
> 
> Normally I treat most of these mods like vaporware since they don't usually ever actually reach a completed state, but it sounds like this one actually came close.  That's interesting.  
> 
> Honestly, the best Elder Scrolls game I've played in years was Enderal (despite the overarching plot being terrible), so maybe it's worth giving another mod a shot.


Well, considering it's a colossal amount of unpaid work by fans, I'm really impressed to learn that Morroblivion has made so much progress. Of course, it had several years' head start over Skywind.

Enderal was cool, but if I understand correctly, it was made by a professional team with an actual budget. So it should have been better than most fan-made efforts. Even so, frankly I don't rate it as highly as, say, Vigilant.

----------


## DigoDragon

I was delving into some barrows in Skyrim to collect treasures for the Dragonborn museum, and I noticed the places I went had similar themes of "people poked into crypt, draugar reanimate and murder everyone". 

So then I got to thinking; if all these dragons coming back are due to a powerful dragon shout, what if there's an unintentional side effect that it's also reanimating other dead beings?

Just a thought.

----------


## Rater202

> I was delving into some barrows in Skyrim to collect treasures for the Dragonborn museum, and I noticed the places I went had similar themes of "people poked into crypt, draugar reanimate and murder everyone". 
> 
> So then I got to thinking; if all these dragons coming back are due to a powerful dragon shout, what if there's an unintentional side effect that it's also reanimating other dead beings?
> 
> Just a thought.


Or the ancient nords who mummified their dead put curses on their tombs.

----------


## Resileaf

Nobody's really surprised that there are undead in Nord tombs, so yeah, probably common curses.

----------


## Keltest

I think the official lore is that the Draugr maintain the tombs periodically and contribute life force to dragon priests and the equivalent draugr bosses at the end of the dungeon to keep them alive.

----------


## Grim Portent

Well the original Draugr from Bloodmoon were cursed for engaging in cannibalism as I recall, and were at the time supposed to be a Solstheim only thing. Pre-dragon cult lore which has basically been overwritten.


The draugr found in Skyrim are primarily dragon cultists, though some like King Olaf presumably came long after the dragon cult fell, and seem to be animated by ancient oaths and spells binding them to eternal service. I forget the name of the Barrow, the one where they all poisoned themselves, but the idea there seems to be that in doing so they would serve the dragons forever, dying and returning until the end of time.

Whatever means they used to animate themselves are probably not directly dragon related, because post-dragon cult draugr exist, so it's probably a form of ceremonial necromancy similar to what the Dunmer do with ancestor guardians which fell out of fashion some time ago.

----------


## Fyraltari

It's possible that, while Draugr roaming the barrows were always a thing, the return of the dragons woke them all up.

----------


## veti

> Well the original Draugr from Bloodmoon were cursed for engaging in cannibalism as I recall, and were at the time supposed to be a Solstheim only thing. Pre-dragon cult lore which has basically been overwritten.
> 
> 
> The draugr found in Skyrim are primarily dragon cultists, though some like King Olaf presumably came long after the dragon cult fell, and seem to be animated by ancient oaths and spells binding them to eternal service. I forget the name of the Barrow, the one where they all poisoned themselves, but the idea there seems to be that in doing so they would serve the dragons forever, dying and returning until the end of time.
> 
> Whatever means they used to animate themselves are probably not directly dragon related, because post-dragon cult draugr exist, so it's probably a form of ceremonial necromancy similar to what the Dunmer do with ancestor guardians which fell out of fashion some time ago.


I was looking at a mod just the other day that changes the draugr on Solstheim to be more compatible with Bloodmoon lore, but mainland Skyrim is a whole different bowl of undead.

There's an in-game book by some... necrologist, I suppose you could call her, who claims to have lived among the draugr for months, studying them. It was clearly written before Alduin's return, and definitely implies that the draugr have been a continuous presence in Skyrim ever since the time of the dragon cult. 

But the presence of post-dragon-cult draugr raises an interesting point. Because for several ages, this "ceremonial necromancy" must have been pretty widely known - so why has it been completely forgotten now? It's not just that nobody does it any more, it's pretty clear nobody has even the faintest inkling of how it was ever done.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I was looking at a mod just the other day that changes the draugr on Solstheim to be more compatible with Bloodmoon lore, but mainland Skyrim is a whole different bowl of undead.
> 
> There's an in-game book by some... necrologist, I suppose you could call her, who claims to have lived among the draugr for months, studying them. It was clearly written before Alduin's return, and definitely implies that the draugr have been a continuous presence in Skyrim ever since the time of the dragon cult. 
> 
> But the presence of post-dragon-cult draugr raises an interesting point. Because for several ages, this "ceremonial necromancy" must have been pretty widely known - so why has it been completely forgotten now? It's not just that nobody does it any more, it's pretty clear nobody has even the faintest inkling of how it was ever done.


I would guess that at some point since Olaf One-Eye (I think he's the "latest" draugr in the game) someone adopted a harder stance on necromancy in Skyrim and had all (or most, I wouldn't put it past the Worm Cult to know the trick) the relevant records purged.

For example, this could have happened shortly after Thrassian Plague and the victory of the All-Flags Navy, with Nords seeing necromancy as the tool of the ennemy who nearly wiped out most of Tamriel's population.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I would guess that at some point since Olaf One-Eye (I think he's the "latest" draugr in the game) someone adopted a harder stance on necromancy in Skyrim and had all (or most, I wouldn't put it past the Worm Cult to know the trick) the relevant records purged.
> 
> For example, this could have happened shortly after Thrassian Plague and the victory of the All-Flags Navy, with Nords seeing necromancy as the tool of the ennemy who nearly wiped out most of Tamriel's population.


Doesnt even have to be necromancy specifically. Nords have been suspicious of their clever men since at least the Second Era.

----------


## DigoDragon

> I think the official lore is that the Draugr maintain the tombs periodically and contribute life force to dragon priests and the equivalent draugr bosses at the end of the dungeon to keep them alive.


"Alive" in a loose sense of the word, considering their physical condition. Well, I suppose even if they were technically alive, that condition gets "corrected" by the Dragonborn real quick. XD


Anyway, common curses it is I suppose. It does make for a decent explanation of why there's fresh food found in the containers. Draugr are cleaning up the remains of foolish explorers and depositing their gear in the tombs.

----------


## Mark Hall

I do like the idea that, while there may have always been draugr, they've gotten more prevalent since Alduin started shouting dragons awake.

----------


## Grim Portent

> I would guess that at some point since Olaf One-Eye (I think he's the "latest" draugr in the game) someone adopted a harder stance on necromancy in Skyrim and had all (or most, I wouldn't put it past the Worm Cult to know the trick) the relevant records purged.
> 
> For example, this could have happened shortly after Thrassian Plague and the victory of the All-Flags Navy, with Nords seeing necromancy as the tool of the ennemy who nearly wiped out most of Tamriel's population.


I think the gradual increase in worship of the Imperial Pantheon is probably a big contributor, Arkay doesn't look fondly on the undead and isn't considered an antagonistic god like his Nordic counterpart Orkey, so the rise of the Imperial pantheon would directly impact the view of any necromancy or necromancy adjacent practices.

Another possibility is that after a war or plague, such as the Thrassian Plague, the sheer amount of bodies needing buried made the ritual burial to create draugr impractical, as well as the construction of new barrows in which to bury the dead, resulting in a shift to burying the dead in surface level cemetaries or mausoleums and crypts like those found in chapels to the Divines throughout the Empire.

Also possible it was just banned at some point by a king who opposed the practice, and the law stuck for long enough that the art was forgotten. The Nords of the fourth era don't seem the sort to want to make draugr anyway.

----------


## veti

> I would guess that at some point since Olaf One-Eye (I think he's the "latest" draugr in the game) someone adopted a harder stance on necromancy in Skyrim and had all (or most, I wouldn't put it past the Worm Cult to know the trick) the relevant records purged.
> 
> For example, this could have happened shortly after Thrassian Plague and the victory of the All-Flags Navy, with Nords seeing necromancy as the tool of the ennemy who nearly wiped out most of Tamriel's population.


Potema was third-era, only 500-ish years before the time of Skyrim. It's possible that the catacombs that bear her name were made much earlier, and she merely appropriated them, but I don't know if there's any authoritative source to that effect. She also describes the last batch of draugr you meet down there as her "inner council".

----------


## Aeson

> Potema was third-era, only 500-ish years before the time of Skyrim. It's possible that the catacombs that bear her name were made much earlier, and she merely appropriated them, but I don't know if there's any authoritative source to that effect. She also describes the last batch of draugr you meet down there as her "inner council".


Solitude's old enough for it, but to my recollection the area where you find Potema doesn't much look like it has an affiliation with the ancient Nords or the Dragon Cult.

Regardless, I don't think that anything more should be read into the use of draugr in the Potema dungeon/quest than that the development team didn't feel that creating another set of undead models for one quest in one dungeon was a worthwhile use of resources.

----------


## Fyraltari

It's also likely that the notion that the servants of a king ought to keep serving him in death fell out of fashion. There doesn't seem to be any servitude going on in Sovngarde.

----------


## Caelestion

Potema was also a necromancer, who went quite insane by the time she was defeated.  It's entirely possible that her "inner council" were sapient undead, even whilst she was alive.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Potema was also a necromancer, who went quite insane by the time she was defeated.  It's entirely possible that her "inner council" were sapient undead, even whilst she was alive.


Heck, they may have been ancient draugr that she particularly liked.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Potema was also a necromancer, who went quite insane by the time she was defeated.  It's entirely possible that her "inner council" were sapient undead, even whilst she was alive.


Biography of the Wolf Queen somewhat supports this theory, or at least it mentions stories of vampiric generals.

----------


## Spore

> It's also likely that the notion that the servants of a king ought to keep serving him in death fell out of fashion. There doesn't seem to be any servitude going on in Sovngarde.


Do you assume (unnamed) Draugr are more than just a body? The lore assumes as such I feel meaning they forsake Sovngarde for a limited (or eternal?) amount of time to serve their masters in (un)death. They do sentient work aside from fighting you as an intruder, so I assume they are specially bound (despite their abundance).

Seeing the lore that way I wish they were rarer in the dungeons now. They are special servants and I doubt many would willingly go into eternal servitude. But I fear this is an opt-out system, not a choice one makes.

----------


## veti

Notice how draugr can be soul trapped in regular "white" soul gems, whereas vampires require a black gem. That suggests their animating spirit, whatever it is, is a good deal weaker than when they were alive.

But Falmer, also, don't use a black gem, and I'm pretty sure they're both alive and sentient. (Has anyone succeeded in soul trapping either of the two uncorrupted snow elves we get to meet?) Hagravens, likewise. What's up with that?

----------


## Fyraltari

> Do you assume (unnamed) Draugr are more than just a body?


I mean, they can speak.



> The lore assumes as such I feel meaning they forsake Sovngarde for a limited (or eternal?) amount of time to serve their masters in (un)death. They do sentient work aside from fighting you as an intruder, so I assume they are specially bound (despite their abundance).


I don't think it's ever clearly stated whether an undead can exist while the soul is away (Flesh Atronachs aren't technically undead) but I think that's usually the case. Think of all the zombies who thank you when you kill them.




> Seeing the lore that way I wish they were rarer in the dungeons now. They are special servants and I doubt many would willingly go into eternal servitude. But I fear this is an opt-out system, not a choice one makes.


You know the legends of the servants of kings being sacrificed during their burial so that they can serve in the afterlife? That seems to be like that, but with necromancy, and nobody was asking the servants' opinion.




> Notice how draugr can be soul trapped in regular "white" soul gems, whereas vampires require a black gem. That suggests their animating spirit, whatever it is, is a good deal weaker than when they were alive.
> 
> But Falmer, also, don't use a black gem, and I'm pretty sure they're both alive and sentient. (Has anyone succeeded in soul trapping either of the two uncorrupted snow elves we get to meet?) Hagravens, likewise. What's up with that?


The white/black soul distinction exists primarily as a game-mecanic, I wouldn't put too much stock in it. Allegedly black souls denote true sapience and the Falmers gaining white souls is evidence of how monstruous what happened to them was. Except that giants, goblins, ogres and minotaurs are obviously as sapient as the player race (they have language, religion, use of tools, art and have formed their own societies, sometimes even mingled freely with playable races), but only get white souls.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Notice how draugr can be soul trapped in regular "white" soul gems, whereas vampires require a black gem. That suggests their animating spirit, whatever it is, is a good deal weaker than when they were alive.
> 
> But Falmer, also, don't use a black gem, and I'm pretty sure they're both alive and sentient. (Has anyone succeeded in soul trapping either of the two uncorrupted snow elves we get to meet?) Hagravens, likewise. What's up with that?


You can blame the Mages Guild for the arbitrary distinction.




> Furthermore, I propose that for the purposes of soul-trapping we categorize all souls into two classes: the legal, or "White" souls, those smaller essences that are captured from beasts and animals, and illegal, or "Black" souls, which are derived from sentient mortals. And we will teach only those spells that can capture White souls, forbidding our students to use the larger soul gems on sentients.


Presumably the Mages Guild people in charge of implementing their standard Soul Trap spell either didnt realize or (IMO more likely) didnt care about the intelligent non-player races. So Giants and such are perfectly legal to Soul Trap despite being being smart.

Minor tangent: Gelebor does say the Falmer are getting more intelligent over time:




> "Perhaps they'll never return to their former appearance, but over the centuries, I've noticed a rise in their intellect. If a line of communication could be established with them, maybe they can find peace. It's the only way they'll discover that they weren't always malignant... they were once a proud and prosperous race."


so for their _specific_ case, it might have been an easier mistake to make back when the spell was being standardized, assuming the people designing it cared in the first place.

----------


## Fyraltari

Problem with that is that black souls are indeed more potent than white souls (which maybe excused as a gameplay feature), and that _Oblivion_ who introduced the division in the first place had the black soul gems be the creation of Mannimarco as a way of bypassing Arkay's Blessing (or Arkay's Law I always get them mixed up), which implies that black souls are those souls who are protected by Arkay and that Arkay is a racist douche.

----------


## Rater202

> Problem with that is that black souls are indeed more potent than white souls (which maybe excused as a gameplay feature), and that _Oblivion_ who introduced the division in the first place had the black soul gems be the creation of Mannimarco as a way of bypassing Arkay's Blessing (or Arkay's Law I always get them mixed up), which implies that black souls are those souls who are protected by Arkay and that Arkay is a racist douche.


Really? I always thought that Black Souls were considered Grand Souls?

----------


## Fyraltari

> Really? I always thought that Black Souls were considered Grand Souls?


No, you're right, black soul gems have the same capacity as grand soul gems, they canjust store NPC souls. This is what I get for not checking.

Doesn't solve the Arkay/Mannimarco issue, though. Unless you consider ESO retcons _Oblivion_.

----------


## Keltest

> Really? I always thought that Black Souls were considered Grand Souls?


They are, but the fact that the quality is consistent whether its a beggar in the street, the bodyguard of a duchess or the archmage of the mage's guild indicates an inherent potency to black souls that white souls don't have.


Its possible that Galerion chose to work on an existing metaphysical distinction when outlawing the trapping of black souls, which would make it easy to enforce, and that he outlawed whatever soul gem creation method had been introduced at the time because it created exclusively black soul gems of varying quality, which Mannimarco only managed to circumvent occasionally under the reign of the guild.

----------


## Resileaf

> Really? I always thought that Black Souls were considered Grand Souls?


Which are more potent than 90% of any other soul you'll find.

----------


## Rater202

Who here has actually used Black Souls?

In Oblivion I was a big fan of the "enchant multiple pieces of gear with a Chameleon enchantment to get free non-dispellable invisibility" exploit and tended to build for it pretty quickly. I'd grab the Chamelon greater power from the stone, then join the Mage's guild ASAP to get a Soul Trapping Staff then would immediately head to one dungeon that had an alter, use it to manufacture black gems, and then head into the dungeon to kill the necromancer mobs inside to fill the gems.

Because I couldn't be assed to figure out what mobs had grand souls and honestly I liked the irony.

In SKyrim the only time I used a Black Soul Gem as during the Dark brotherhood storyline when soul-trapped the head of Emporer's Guard and used him to enchant the dagger I killed the Emporer with as revenge for his ransacking the sanctuary. Told a friend about that in high school and he was horrified...

----------


## Keltest

> Who here has actually used Black Souls?
> 
> In Oblivion I was a big fan of the "enchant multiple pieces of gear with a Chameleon enchantment to get free non-dispellable invisibility" exploit and tended to build for it pretty quickly. I'd grab the Chamelon greater power from the stone, then join the Mage's guild ASAP to get a Soul Trapping Staff then would immediately head to one dungeon that had an alter, use it to manufacture black gems, and then head into the dungeon to kill the necromancer mobs inside to fill the gems.
> 
> Because I couldn't be assed to figure out what mobs had grand souls and honestly I liked the irony.
> 
> In SKyrim the only time I used a Black Soul Gem as during the Dark brotherhood storyline when soul-trapped the head of Emporer's Guard and used him to enchant the dagger I killed the Emporer with as revenge for his ransacking the sanctuary. Told a friend about that in high school and he was horrified...


Soul trapping is generally an inconvenient enough process that I dont bother with it a ton. If i need a soul gem for whatever reason, I'll buy one. Enchanting and smithing grinds are decidedly non-exciting to me, so if I dont ignore them entirely I usually have some mod or other that makes them non-factors.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Who here has actually used Black Souls?
> 
> In Oblivion I was a big fan of the "enchant multiple pieces of gear with a Chameleon enchantment to get free non-dispellable invisibility" exploit and tended to build for it pretty quickly. I'd grab the Chamelon greater power from the stone, then join the Mage's guild ASAP to get a Soul Trapping Staff then would immediately head to one dungeon that had an alter, use it to manufacture black gems, and then head into the dungeon to kill the necromancer mobs inside to fill the gems.
> 
> Because I couldn't be assed to figure out what mobs had grand souls and honestly I liked the irony.
> 
> In SKyrim the only time I used a Black Soul Gem as during the Dark brotherhood storyline when soul-trapped the head of Emporer's Guard and used him to enchant the dagger I killed the Emporer with as revenge for his ransacking the sanctuary. Told a friend about that in high school and he was horrified...


I have used black souls, even have repeatedly done the black azuras star ending of the quest. funny thing: bandits count for black souls so your getting souls for things you'd face and kill eventually anyways. as opposed to giants/mammoths which you need to specifically seek out. that and if your a daedric artifact gathering, vampire-becoming player like me, your probably going to committing a lot of crimes against nature and humanity anyways, so whats one more? though I tend to get grand soul gems and their souls to pick up as just apart of my looting and killing anyways so sometimes its just using whatever I get. its all enchantments to make me strong at the end of day, no need to turn down power whatever form it takes.

----------


## Resileaf

I don't use black souls myself. I don't really use white souls either. It just doesn't feel right to play with souls like that. >_>

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> They are, but the fact that the quality is consistent whether its a beggar in the street, the bodyguard of a duchess or the archmage of the mage's guild indicates an inherent potency to black souls that white souls don't have.


That wasnt true in Morrowind though, was it?




> Who here has actually used Black Souls?


On purpose? Depends on the character. My current Dunmer conjuror, for example, has zero problems with using black souls, but my Khajiit only soul trapped Potema on purpose (IIRC shes not a black soul, but its the thought that counts) and a bandit or two once or twice by accident because I forgot I had my bow of Soul Trap equipped.

----------


## Divayth Fyr

> That wasnt true in Morrowind though, was it?


No, because Morrowind didn't have the distinction. Or the option to soul trap npcs.

----------


## Aeson

> No, because Morrowind didn't have the distinction. Or the option to soul trap npcs.


_Morrowind_ did, however, allow you to soul trap a number of things which either presumably would have black souls or which later games explicitly classify as having black souls - Vivec, Almalexia, Dremora, Golden Saints, possibly some others - which if taken at face value raises some questions about how, exactly, souls get classified as 'white' or 'black' in-universe.

----------


## halfeye

> Who here has actually used Black Souls?


I don't soul trap things, but I do use filled gems I either find or buy. 




> In Oblivion I was a big fan of the "enchant multiple pieces of gear with a Chameleon enchantment to get free non-dispellable invisibility" exploit and tended to build for it pretty quickly. I'd grab the Chamelon greater power from the stone, then join the Mage's guild ASAP to get a Soul Trapping Staff then would immediately head to one dungeon that had an alter, use it to manufacture black gems, and then head into the dungeon to kill the necromancer mobs inside to fill the gems.


In Oblivion I used sigil stones for enchanting things, pretty much exclusively (there was once or twice when I only needed something very weak), it was only in Skyrim that I took to heavily enchanting things at the enchanting stations.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I don't use black souls myself. I don't really use white souls either. It just doesn't feel right to play with souls like that. >_>


Honestly, the whole enchanting system is the most horrific thing in _The Elder Scrolls_ when you stop to ponder its implications.

----------


## Spore

> Who here has actually used Black Souls?


Oh, I would never...but it is so easy. A beggar missing and suddenly I have a fantastic robe to battle evil? Now that is just the greater good really... Now if you excuse me you are cutting into my nightly cackling time.




> You can blame the Mages Guild for the arbitrary distinction.


Because there needs to be a functional difference though. Black Soulstones are linked to the Soul Cairn, and as such should at least be considered worthy by the Ideal Masters to give you more power for them.

But my pet theory that I did not at all just come up here on the spot is that a creature needs a link to the Aedra for it to become a soul. They need to be in some kind of creation myth (so man, mer or beastfolk), they should not be outside of the god's attention (akin to giants, falmer etc.) because often times you can set gods equal to game developers in this weird setting.

If CHIM is more or less a state of meta knowledge allowing you to manipulate the world.
Then "being known by the gods" is more or less the fact that your soul is arbirtrary worth more because of the focus of the devs, I mean gods.

----------


## Fyraltari

> But my pet theory that I did not at all just come up here on the spot is that a creature needs a link to the Aedra for it to become a soul. They need to be in some kind of creation myth (so man, mer or beastfolk), they should not be outside of the god's attention (akin to giants, falmer etc.) because often times you can set gods equal to game developers in this weird setting.


That doesn't work because lesser deadra have black souls (when they're said to have vestiges instead of souls) and they're as removed from the Aedra as one gets. Meanwhile the Minotaurs have white souls despite being descendants of Kyne's nephew.

----------


## Imbalance

I trap souls of every ilk and use the crap out of them.  It's loot currency, especially since there is nothing consistent from game to game either in-world or in terms of mechanics as to whether the act is truly evil.  For crying out loud, some of the most pious quest givers hand out enchanted items as rewards.  In Morrowind I played a soul-collector, since each filled gem retained the name of the trapped creature.  *Spoiler: If Almalexia hadn't beat me...*
Show

...to Sotha Sil, all three of ALMSIVI would have graced my mantle.  I put Dagoth Ur there instead.


Making black gems was tiresome in Oblivion, so I did less of it there, but Skyrim has a gem-filling shout that I spammed until I had everything I needed (including the corrupted Star) to max out my homemade dragon plate suit.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> That doesn't work because lesser deadra have black souls (when they're said to have vestiges instead of souls) and they're as removed from the Aedra as one gets. Meanwhile the Minotaurs have white souls despite being descendants of Kyne's nephew.


There have been instances of mortals becoming Daedra (Banished Cells 2, Dragonstar Arena, Rose Petal Bastion).

----------


## Spore

> That doesn't work because lesser deadra have black souls (when they're said to have vestiges instead of souls) and they're as removed from the Aedra as one gets. Meanwhile the Minotaurs have white souls despite being descendants of Kyne's nephew.


Yea, my theory crashes and burns. But aren't daedra formed from the souls of daedra worshippers? Or are they just free with the daedric realm?

----------


## Vinyadan

I think the distinction is merely an engine one: NPCs have black souls, creatures have normal souls. Almalexia, Vivec and Dagoth Ur, as well as Dremora and Daedroth, all were creatures in Morrowind, so they had capturable souls. In Oblivion, Dremora instead were an NPC species, so they had black souls. In Skyrim, Dremora are NPCs, while the Falmer are creatures (with an exception in Dawnguard, which I haven't played). Vampires are NPCs in all three games, so they have black souls in Oblivion and Skyrim.

Lorewise, with things standing as they did in Morrowind, I liked the idea that Arkay had granted protection on the souls of the humanoids, and that Mannimarco in Oblivion had found a way to break that protection. What needs explanation is why Dremora and Golden Saints later also got protected souls: maybe Arkay was tired of necromancers using them for nefarious purposes, maybe it was their Princes, maybe it's the soultrap spell itself that was different in Morrowind.

By the way, this should also be a minor difference between Morrowind and Morroblivion (dremora in Morroblivion are NPCs).

----------


## Fyraltari

> There have been instances of mortals becoming Daedra (Banished Cells 2, Dragonstar Arena, Rose Petal Bastion).


The who, the what and the when, now? Also, if we're talking mortals-turned-daedra, my go-to example would be the Second Sheogorath. In any case 



> Yea, my theory crashes and burns. But aren't daedra formed from the souls of daedra worshippers? Or are they just free with the daedric realm?


That's the first time I've heard of Deadra being made of mortal souls, do you have a source on that? Because I'm pretty sure the lesser daedra are simply minor et'Ada (like the Elhnofeys or the Magan-Ge) who didn't follow Lorkhan's plan but weren't powerful enough to create Daedric planes. Then again, most of the lore about Daedras is wild specualtion from Tamrielic mages and priests and is probably msotly inaccurate. It's implied that the term "Daedra" might cover several very different kind of beings, for example the Knights of Order are usually considered Daedras, but they have hearts of Order instead of Daedric Hearts.

----------


## Grim Portent

> The who, the what and the when, now? Also, if we're talking mortals-turned-daedra, my go-to example would be the Second Sheogorath.


Umaril the Unfeathered might count as well. Pretty sure his pact with Meridia made him more daedra than mer.


As for what daedra are, I think them just being minor et'Ada is the most sensible answer. Though it is the elven answer, and while they know a lot about the metaphysics of their world I'm not sure they're intended to be completely correct. Souls that wind up in Oblivion seem to remain as the immortal souls of mortals rather than becoming daedra. The Nightshade ghosts who serve Nocturnal, the ghosts in the Shivering Isles, the tormented Mythic Dawn members living in Paradise.

It is implied in Oblivion and The Shivering Isles that the space outside the realms of the Daedric Princes isn't pleasant for daedra, they can't really live in the chaos of Oblivion itself, which imo would lend credence to the idea that they are native to Aetherius like the other et'Ada, but left it behind to follow the Daedric Princes into their own realms. The lesser daedra just lack the power to shape anything from the formless chaos and can be left adrift.

----------


## DigoDragon

> Who here has actually used Black Souls?


This one has on occasion used a black soul for enchanting weapons, but assures you they were all terrible beings; bandit leaders, assassins, Dremora, and people who talk in the theater.

----------


## veti

> _Morrowind_ did, however, allow you to soul trap a number of things which either presumably would have black souls or which later games explicitly classify as having black souls - Vivec, Almalexia, Dremora, Golden Saints, possibly some others - which if taken at face value raises some questions about how, exactly, souls get classified as 'white' or 'black' in-universe.


Arkay's protection was meant for mortals, so it's not unreasonable that it may be withdrawn when mortals somehow change themselves into something else. That would cover the Tribunal, and may also account for Skyrim's Hagravens.

Daedra are harder to explain. There's no getting away from it, something changed after Morrowind. There are some interesting conjectures above about what that might have been. 

As for vampires - I think the clue is that vampirism can be cured, even if the subject is centuries old (see Serana). That suggests vampires are actually mortals who are temporarily afflicted by a curse/disease, like lycanthropes, rather than permanently changed into something else. 

I absolutely use the heck out of all kinds of soul gems. The easiest way to fill them is the conjuration perk that auto-applies soul trapping with conjured weapons, plus the trusty Bound Bow. I do try to ensure that only the deserving are trapped, but fortunately there's plenty of them around - Miraak cultists, Blackblood marauders, necromancers, and of course all the Thalmor you can eat.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Arkay's protection was meant for mortals, so it's not unreasonable that it may be withdrawn when mortals somehow change themselves into something else. That would cover the Tribunal, and may also account for Skyrim's Hagravens.


What about the giants, goblin-ken (goblins and ogres), and minotaurs? Does Arkay not care about them? It can't be because they don't worship him since neither do the Dunmer and Orsimer.

Edit: 


> there is nothing consistent from game to game either in-world or in terms of mechanics as to whether the act is truly evil.


Do you really need the game to tell you whether using persons as batteries is bad?

----------


## Grim Portent

> What about the giants, goblin-ken (goblins and ogres), and minotaurs? Does Arkay not care about them? It can't be because they don't worship him since neither do the Dunmer and Orsimer.


Presumably he doesn't. The Divines aren't exactly omnibenevolent, and neither are the races who worship them in various aspects. Arkay is an evil god in the old Nordic pantheon at the very least, and is plausibly evil to some extent in his truest self, the meric and imperial pantheons just don't acknowledge those aspects.

To some extent it can be assumed that the metaphysics changes from race to race and depends somewhat on which version of Arkay is in vogue among the mortals. The Nine Divines are the imperial interpretation of the Aedra, not accurate depictions of them in their totality, and it seems that the effects of this interpretation flow back into the Aedra in some fashion. Arkay, or the specific iteration of him who effects the world we play in, is the imperial version and cleaves to their social expectations which place giants, minotaurs, falmer and goblins as sub-human beasts.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Soul trapping is generally an inconvenient enough process that I dont bother with it a ton.


Skyrim makes it super-easy. Give your companion a soul-trapping weapon and a bunch of soul gems. Or use summoned weapons and max out that perk track.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> As for what daedra are, I think them just being minor et'Ada is the most sensible answer. Though it is the elven answer, and while they know a lot about the metaphysics of their world I'm not sure they're intended to be completely correct.


I don't think *anyone* is intended to be completely correct regarding the metaphysics and cosmology, and the ones that are potentially in a position to be correct *and* inclined to talk about it are deeply unreliable (Sheogorath, Vivec maybe).

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> The who, the what and the when, now?


ESO group content.

----------


## Lurkmoar

Gonna be honest, even though I have no qualms using black soul gems, I never get the Black Star, even though it's easily superior to Azura's Star.

Azura knows how to hold a grudge. 

Funnily enough, in Skyrim, I rarely enchant a weapon, simply because with maxed out Smithing and Alchemy (along with Enchanted Smithing gear and Potions to max Enchanting to make stronger Fortify Alchemy gear to make stronger Potions)... and I don't even Fortify Restoration to break the game into tiny pieces to hit harder then a dragon. And stopping to use soul gems to recharge a weapon kind of breaks my combat flow.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Gonna be honest, even though I have no qualms using black soul gems, I never get the Black Star, even though it's easily superior to Azura's Star.
> 
> Azura knows how to hold a grudge.


Eh, Skyrim is a game and its not as if we'll ever get a canonical confirmation of what the Dragonborn's fate is in the next game, so it might as well be consequence-free. they want me to fear Azura's Wrath, make her do something in game to me to earn it. otherwise my headcanon can and might as well be "and the Dragonborn beat up Azura when she tried to curse her for making the Black Star and the Dragonborn kept on using black souls for her enchanting, the end.". No I don't care what happens to NPC's, they are scripted and just more bark without actually biting me for my actions.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Eh, Skyrim is a game and its not as if we'll ever get a canonical confirmation of what the Dragonborn's fate is in the next game, so it might as well be consequence-free. they want me to fear Azura's Wrath, make her do something in game to me to earn it. otherwise my headcanon can and might as well be "and the Dragonborn beat up Azura when she tried to curse her for making the Black Star and the Dragonborn kept on using black souls for her enchanting, the end.". No I don't care what happens to NPC's, they are scripted and just more bark without actually biting me for my actions.


Hey now, there's no need to dis-spell the illusion of choice!  :Small Big Grin: 

If only the follower you can get from that choice was better.

----------


## Fyraltari

> "and the Dragonborn beat up Azura when she tried to curse her for making the Black Star


That's not really how Azura goes about getting revenge. Just look at what happened to Morrowind and the Tribunal.

----------


## Rynjin

Azura would get along well with Callowans.

"For small slights, long prices."

----------


## veti

> Azura knows how to hold a grudge.


That, and I just kinda like Azura. She was very nice to me back in Morrowind. I want to be on her side. 




> Funnily enough, in Skyrim, I rarely enchant a weapon, simply because with maxed out Smithing and Alchemy (along with Enchanted Smithing gear and Potions to max Enchanting to make stronger Fortify Alchemy gear to make stronger Potions)... and I don't even Fortify Restoration to break the game into tiny pieces to hit harder then a dragon. And stopping to use soul gems to recharge a weapon kind of breaks my combat flow.


With how overpowered smithing is, enchanting weapons really feels pointless. Is it really worth going to all that hassle, tracking charges, refuelling the weapon etc., just to raise your damage by something like 20%? And then there's no way to turn it off when fighting the 80% of enemies who die so quickly that it makes no difference anyway, or the 30% who are resistant to this type of damage ...

I added a small mod purely to nerf smithing. It works, in that it's weaker than vanilla - but it's still so insanely OP that I can't resist maxing it out on practically every character.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Gonna be honest, even though I have no qualms using black soul gems, I never get the Black Star, even though it's easily superior to Azura's Star.
> 
> Azura knows how to hold a grudge.


My Dunmer went for it, because were talking about the Prince who specializes in prophecy - theres at least a 50% chance Azura arranged for that outcome on purpose. Were giving her artifact a powerup after all!

----------


## Imbalance

> Do you really need the game to tell you whether using persons as batteries is bad?


It's a game with definable rules, so yeah.  Persons are 1's and 0's.  The game gives the option to use them as power ups, the games' lore presents those who oppose the practice as just as morally bankrupt as those who promote it, and is entirely rife with moral ambiguity by design.  Every character I have played has engaged with every path to victory that the world and its moral guardians permit with zero concurrent consequences, apart from the kill-on-sight penalty for committing too many blatant murders within sight of the guards.  I have slain so many Daedra that for all I know I could have sent Azura herself to the Soul Cairn.  The adventures provide absolutely no reasons for me nor my character to have qualms about it, nor is there any reward for adherence to outside-of-game codes of conduct.

This sort of thing has become so morally ambiguous in games that even Mario now employs a body-stealing haunted hat to force others do his bidding.

Edit:  Further, as pertains to TES, the very nature of the fortelling of the scrolls is that no matter what course of action I choose to take, it is the correct and fateful way to do it.  After all, "without the hero, there is no Event."

Edit 2:  I can wryly admit that the game-ending A-bomb glitch may be a direct consequence of how I had chosen to play Oblivion.  Taking your time, enjoying the scenary, advancing to the head of every guild?  Hurry up - the prophecy said you should be able to do all that in under 400 game hours. :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Fyraltari

> It's a game with definable rules, so yeah.  Persons are 1's and 0's.


It's a _roleplaying_ game, pretending they're not is part of the appeal.



> The game gives the option to use them as power ups, the games' lore presents those who oppose the practice as just as morally bankrupt as those who promote it, and is entirely rife with moral ambiguity by design.


A) The games very clearly portrays the Order of the Black Worm, and most necromancers, as worse people than the other mages, or most groups really.

B) The setting being morally grey doesn't mean you shouldn't pass moral judgement. Quite the opposite. You are in control of your character's actions, you get to decide whether said character engages in certain behaviours or not.




> Every character I have played has engaged with every path to victory that the world and its moral guardians permit with zero concurrent consequences, apart from the kill-on-sight penalty for committing too many blatant murders within sight of the guards.  I have slain so many Daedra that for all I know I could have sent Azura herself to the Soul Cairn.  The adventures provide absolutely no reasons for me nor my character to have qualms about it, nor is there any reward for adherence to outside-of-game codes of conduct.


So you are saying that if the game doesn't give you a reason to care, you won't. If that's intended as a criticism of the writing, I tend to agree. However, I don't think we should expect games to judge every choice we make. For one it often ends up being crude and lacking nuance, for two in the case of TES where power fantasy is part of the appeal it might unnecessarily get in the way of the fun.

----------


## Imbalance

> It's a _roleplaying_ game, pretending they're not is part of the appeal.


Agreed, but not _having to_ pretend is also greatly appealing.




> A) The games very clearly portrays the Order of the Black Worm, and most necromancers, as worse people than the other mages, or most groups really.


The Dunmer of Morrowind unanimously agreed, on the urging of fake gods, to turn their late relatives into a wall, and felt pretty righteous about it.  Later they let all manner of souls be fed into a machine to keep a meteor from falling.




> B) The setting being morally grey doesn't mean you shouldn't pass moral judgement. Quite the opposite. You are in control of your character's actions, you get to decide whether said character engages in certain behaviours or not.


Exactly, or even all the behaviors at once, then decide after the fact which sins to atone for, but only in post-adventure headcanon.




> So you are saying that if the game doesn't give you a reason to care, you won't. If that's intended as a criticism of the writing, I tend to agree. However, I don't think we should expect games to judge every choice we make. For one it often ends up being crude and lacking nuance, for two in the case of TES where power fantasy is part of the appeal it might unnecessarily get in the way of the fun.


Nah, I care, but for me a large part of the enjoyment is checking out all of the features that the devs deigned to build into it.  The writing only serves as the framework - the story is what the player will have done.  The game could (and some have) provide tangible consequences for branching choices, thus quantifiable judgements can be hard-coded.  The processing power does exist for the 1's and 0's to judge you, and there are enjoyable experiences to be found within the parameters of those games.  TES has historically _not_ really done that, because it _wants_ to be grey in order to remove moral obstacles between the player and their fun unless the player chooses to impose them on themselves.  Why else would Uriel Septim VII send out so many heroes without truly knowing their character, only that they've been prophesied to be the only individual who can save Tamriel?

----------


## veti

> The Dunmer of Morrowind unanimously agreed, on the urging of fake gods, to turn their late relatives into a wall, and felt pretty righteous about it.  Later they let all manner of souls be fed into a machine to keep a meteor from falling.


That's one of the instances where their decision did come back to bite them. And hard. Indeed, I see the whole story as a morality play, describing exactly how retribution strikes. 

(Also, I don't think there's any evidence that the decision was "unanimous". Did they even ask everybody?) 




> Why else would Uriel Septim VII send out so many heroes without truly knowing their character, only that they've been prophesied to be the only individual who can save Tamriel?


What other choices did he have, exactly?

----------


## Fyraltari

> Agreed, but not _having to_ pretend is also greatly appealing.


That's not really possible.






> The Dunmer of Morrowind unanimously agreed, on the urging of fake gods, to turn their late relatives into a wall, and felt pretty righteous about it.


Wait, did the dunmer as a whole do anything? I thought it was just the Tribunal who erected the Ghostfence.




> Later they let all manner of souls be fed into a machine to keep a meteor from falling.


That's in the books, right? Again how much control did the dunmer people have over that? Morrowind isn't a democracy.





> Exactly, or even all the behaviors at once, then decide after the fact which sins to atone for, but only in post-adventure headcanon.


What's this about atoning? If you want to play an evil bastard you can, if you don't want to you can as well. It sounds like you want the game to punish the player for misbehaving, but there aren't really anybway for the game to do that to a high-level character (yeah sure, try to throw my uber-mage/warrior in jail, let's see what happens) short of having NPCs refuse to speak to you, essentially soft-locking you out of the game.




> Nah, I care, but for me a large part of the enjoyment is checking out all of the features that the devs deigned to build into it.  The writing only serves as the framework - the story is what the player will have done.  The game could (and some have) provide tangible consequences for branching choices, thus quantifiable judgements can be hard-coded.  The processing power does exist for the 1's and 0's to judge you, and there are enjoyable experiences to be found within the parameters of those games.


And that's entirely valid. However...




> TES has historically _not_ really done that, because it _wants_ to be grey in order to remove moral obstacles between the player and their fun unless the player chooses to impose them on themselves.


I really don't think that has to do with the setting being morally grey. _Deus Ex_, _Dishonored_ and _Fallout_ have morally grey worlds and they're all about consequences for your actions.

Hell, in _TES_ most of the grey morality is in the lore or background quests. The main quests and faction quests tend to present clear good/evil conflicts.

Ultimately they're sandbox power fantasies, that's why the game doesn't set out to punish you for any behaviour. And that's a fine thing to be.

Could TES VI have more consequences for the player's actions? Sure, but it doesn't have to. And if it does go that way, I wish it'd go the full route and have NPCs approve of things other disapprove and so on rather than one of those stupid karma meters.




> Why else would Uriel Septim VII send out so many heroes without truly knowing their character, only that they've been prophesied to be the only individual who can save Tamriel?


He did that only once.

_Arena_: Ria Silmane picked the Eternal Champion, because they were there and because they had already opposed Jagar Tharn's tyranny. A reasonnable choice Uriel had no say in 

_Daggerfall_: Uriel sent the Imperial Agent, an old friend of his, to retrieve a letter and investigate a ghost. That's it.

_Morrowind_: Okay, he just had a random prisoner pardonned and sent to Vvardenfel based on a prophecy.

_Oblivion_: He met the Hero of Kvatch in the last half-hour of his life, he wasn't going to do a background check. Also, it's the literal end of the world.

----------


## Grim Portent

> _Morrowind_: Okay, he just had a random prisoner pardonned and sent to Vvardenfel based on a prophecy.


Given the fatality rate on failed Nerevarines I'd say being exiled to Morrowwind under the nominal purpose of being the latest attempt to fulfill the prophecy doubles as a delayed execution. The most reasonable expectation is that any given person sent is going to die, so their criminal history is irrelevant.

Which depending on what the Nerevarine actually did might be more unethical than pardoning a serial killer to try and fulfill the prophecy, if they were a pickpocket or something then being sent to die at the hands of Dagoth Ur's servants is kind of unfair.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Given the fatality rate on failed Nerevarines I'd say being exiled to Morrowwind under the nominal purpose of being the latest attempt to fulfill the prophecy doubles as a delayed execution. The most reasonable expectation is that any given person sent is going to die, so their criminal history is irrelevant.
> 
> Which depending on what the Nerevarine actually did might be more unethical than pardoning a serial killer to try and fulfill the prophecy, if they were a pickpocket or something then being sent to die at the hands of Dagoth Ur's servants is kind of unfair.


I'm not sure Uriel knew about the failed Nerevarines or that they weren't just crooks or delusionnal, there's been what, a dozen in four thousand years?

Also, I don't think he knew about Dagoth Ur at all. I think the part of the prophecy he was most interested in was the fall of the Tribunal.

----------


## Grim Portent

Given that he himself had prophetic visions for his much of his life I think he'd invest the time to learn about the prophecy, especially after the Imperial Simulacrum. Old man Uriel was not one to take half measures, despite being something of an *******, and he had a lot of strong ties in Morrowind that could tell him the basic issues with Dagoth Ur running around even if they skipped a few details.

Now whether he'd care more about Dagoth Ur than about taking the Tribunal down is another matter, and I think his priority was the fall of the Tribunal. But the defeat of Dagoth Ur, or whatever his agents and allies in the province told him was behind Corprus and the need for the Ghost Fence, would likely have been a bonus given his desire to increase the spread of Imperial culture and colonies into the province, something a zombie plague and a fallen god would impede.

----------


## Vinyadan

I think Uriel put a lot of trust in the Nerevarine. He exposed his spy network to him, and he sent him a gift worth 12,000 drakes. I don't believe he simply saw this as a belated execution.

In a way, Uriel mirrors Nerevar, another great man from the ancient past whose life conditions yours but which you'll never meet. And you and Azura are the channel between these two.

But in Morrowind it is also clear that Uriel has a lot of problems on his hands. He's old, sick, and the people wants to destroy his heirs as fakes. Far away Cyrodiil and Morrowind both are involved in an "end of an era" narrative, where the gods are already losing their power, the Heart will be destroyed, and there seems to be no suitable emperor after this one.

Going beyond Morrowind, if Uriel shared the same perceptions as the people in the End of Time cult, who expected the Oblivion crisis as a ripple from the decadence of the Tribunal gods, then he likely knew that allowing the Nerevarine prophecy to be realised was going to be a point of no return. On the other hand, the Tribunal had not managed to recover access to Red Mountain in centuries, and they were certainly going to lose, sooner or later. But an Oblivion crisis, if it really was bound to follow the fulfillment the Nerevarine prophecy, needed Uriel dead or demoted, and his heirs off the throne. So it was a deeply personal decision, which ended up touching everything he cared for: his life, his Empire, his sons, his dynasty.

He certainly got a nice portrait in Oblivion. The worries and the foresight are there, but in Morrowind he was "harsh, unyielding" and unpopular, which I didn't really see in Oblivion. If anything, he was remarkably agreeable with a random prisoner (an effect of foresight, or just a Roy Batty moment when death was near).

EDIT: If I had to say why Uriel went with it, I'd say the Akulakhan. Dagoth wanted to use it to rule all of Tamriel while spreading corprus and blight.

----------


## Keltest

> That's not really possible.


Sure it is. How many otherwise noble players have modded the game specifically to allow them to send Nazeem hurtling into some flavor of horrific draconic doom?

----------


## Lord Raziere

I dunno what you guys do, but I just suck Nazeem's blood to kill him and get vampire powers out of it. quick, and beneficial to me beyond the annoyance-swatting factor by improving my sneak as well, no need for elaborate displays of revenge. getting extra with nazeem's death is something that is more of a streamer thing to me, if your gonna show off have an audience after all.

----------


## DigoDragon

Apparently when my Steam client last updated, it reset some settings, allowing Skyrim to try and update. I stopped that, but for a moment in the game my keyboard wouldn't respond to inputs except for console commands. Toggling ShowRaceMenu on and then just clicking done got my keyboard running again.

Just mentioning it in case someone else experiences that.





> I dunno what you guys do, but I just suck Nazeem's blood to kill him and get vampire powers out of it.


I'm on a no junk food diet. XD

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> He certainly got a nice portrait in Oblivion. The worries and the foresight are there, but in Morrowind he was "harsh, unyielding" and unpopular, which I didn't really see in Oblivion.


I only went through Morrowind once and it was a while ago, so I will ask: was he unpopular _in general_, or in Morrowind specifically? Because I can absolutely see the outlander-hating, generally prideful Dunmer people being resentful of being ruled by an outlander and having to toe the Imperial lines, no matter how good a ruler he actually was.

----------


## Vinyadan

> I only went through Morrowind once and it was a while ago, so I will ask: was he unpopular _in general_, or in Morrowind specifically? Because I can absolutely see the outlander-hating, generally prideful Dunmer people being resentful of being ruled by an outlander and having to toe the Imperial lines, no matter how good a ruler he actually was.


I think it was a problem in general. I don't remember which race, faction, or location had the "Uriel Septim" topic (which reported on him this way:_ "a strong and effective ruler, but harsh and unyielding in personality,  and private and secretive by nature, he has never been popular with the  people_"), but there were Imperial legionaries in Gnisis plotting his murder, although they might have been outliers.

Storywise, you can see that he is secretive with the handling of your own story: it's not like the Nerevarine or his handlers get any more info than they strictly need...

----------


## veti

> Apparently when my Steam client last updated, it reset some settings, allowing Skyrim to try and update.


I would advise updating it now. The early issues with AE have been resolved, all the mods I take notice of have been updated, you can safely remove the unwanted CC content, and what's left is a small but noticeable improvement in performance.

And aesthetics. Trees, for instance, look much better now - don't need a mod for that any more.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I think it was a problem in general. I don't remember which race, faction, or location had the "Uriel Septim" topic (which reported on him this way:_ "a strong and effective ruler, but harsh and unyielding in personality,  and private and secretive by nature, he has never been popular with the  people_"), but there were Imperial legionaries in Gnisis plotting his murder, although they might have been outliers.
> 
> Storywise, you can see that he is secretive with the handling of your own story: it's not like the Nerevarine or his handlers get any more info than they strictly need...


Some of that might be due to Jagar Tharn, though by Morrowind its been almost thirty years since he was ousted.  :Small Confused:

----------


## GloatingSwine

> _Daggerfall_: Uriel sent the Imperial Agent, an old friend of his, to retrieve a letter and investigate a ghost. That's it.


He sent the Imperial Agent to recover the control rod and power source for the Numidium in order to restore his reign after the Imperial Simulacrum. He just doesn't tell them that at the start of the story.

Though anything that happens *before* the Warp in the West can't really be applied to things after it, because some or all of its effects were retroactive (the apotheosis of both Mannimarco and Tiber Septim/Talos, the consolidation of powers in the Iliac Bay, the status of Orsinium and the Orcs, etc).

----------


## Eldan

> Wait, did the dunmer as a whole do anything? I thought it was just the Tribunal who erected the Ghostfence.


It's quite burried in the background, but it's mentioned that ghost fences, plural, aren't really a new thing. Dunmer used to have them around their estates, or ancestral graves. The ancestors of poor families would sacrifice themselves to keep their families safer from the various ashland dangers, and nobles would have giant fences powered by their retainers. 

If I remember correctly, the Tribunal kind of, well, confiscated all the dead on Vvardenfell to powre the big ghost fence.

----------


## Spore

> My Dunmer went for it, because were talking about the Prince who specializes in prophecy - theres at least a 50% chance Azura arranged for that outcome on purpose. Were giving her artifact a powerup after all!


Prophecy maybe, but in the principal divide between aedra and daedra, I feel Azura manipulates fate rather than predict it. The aedra are set in stone, their presence is immutable and firm. The daedra personify change and alteration, in a sense they give mortals (and as such the player) free will, and Azura as one of the fewer benevolent daedra feels like somewhat in the middle. She knows the strands of fate that pull a story and time into a direction but she has just enough power to manipulate you into an outcome.

But I feel much of her power is just bravado, she cannot fully control you nor fate itself. But this is just me with my worldbuilding theories based on nothing else but my want for symmetry in cosmic forces and my basic understanding of Morrowind lore.

Plus, I feel any theory is viable when it comes to the Elder Scrolls because much of the stuff was made up by a writer that is now gone. And it is the one writer I consider the "father" of the franchise.

----------


## Fyraltari

> He sent the Imperial Agent to recover the control rod and power source for the Numidium in order to restore his reign after the Imperial Simulacrum. He just doesn't tell them that at the start of the story.
> 
> Though anything that happens *before* the Warp in the West can't really be applied to things after it, because some or all of its effects were retroactive (the apotheosis of both Mannimarco and Tiber Septim/Talos, the consolidation of powers in the Iliac Bay, the status of Orsinium and the Orcs, etc).


Having not played _Daggerfall_, I don't know whether Uriel intended to set you on the trail of the Totem of tiber septim or if it just kind of happened, but the point remains that the Imperial Agent isn't a random nobody Uriel tasked with this. They're an old friend.



> It's quite burried in the background, but it's mentioned that ghost fences, plural, aren't really a new thing. Dunmer used to have them around their estates, or ancestral graves. The ancestors of poor families would sacrifice themselves to keep their families safer from the various ashland dangers, and nobles would have giant fences powered by their retainers. 
> 
> If I remember correctly, the Tribunal kind of, well, confiscated all the dead on Vvardenfell to powre the big ghost fence.


Okay, I will concede that Dunmer society sucks in many way, but I will maintain that the Worm Cult is worse.



> The daedra personify change and alteration, in a sense they give mortals (and as such the player) free will


*Unmovingly stares in Jyggalag*

Also Akatosh is the embodiment of the passing of time, without which alteration is impossible. Plus Lorkhan totally counts as an Aedra in my book.




> But I feel much of her power is just bravado, she cannot fully control you nor fate itself. But this is just me with my worldbuilding theories based on nothing else but my want for symmetry in cosmic forces and my basic understanding of Morrowind lore.


Obviously all the gods (and their worshippers) in TES oversell their influence and power. Azura can't just will you to die, she has to put some effort into it. But still, make her into an enemy of yours is a risky move.




> Plus, I feel any theory is viable when it comes to the Elder Scrolls because much of the stuff was made up by a writer that is now gone. And it is the one writer I consider the "father" of the franchise.


If you mean Kirkbride he was still involved up to Skyrim, and I suspect he will be too for Elder Scrolls VI, whenever they start actually working on it.

----------


## InvisibleBison

> Also Akatosh is the embodiment of the passing of time, without which alteration is impossible.


I don't think this is correct. Akatosh is the embodiment of linear time specifically, and so limits the kinds of changes that can occur. It's not a coincidence that Dragon Breaks, when Akatosh's influence over reality is suspended, tend to be periods of drastic change.

----------


## Keltest

> Obviously all the gods (and their worshippers) in TES oversell their influence and power. Azura can't just will you to die, she has to put some effort into it. But still, make her into an enemy of yours is a risky move.


I mean, is it? The Tribunal got to live as literal gods for however many hundreds of years. If the Nerevarine was Azura's revenge, she kind of dropped the ball there.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I don't think this is correct. Akatosh is the embodiment of linear time specifically, and so limits the kinds of changes that can occur. It's not a coincidence that Dragon Breaks, when Akatosh's influence over reality is suspended, tend to be periods of drastic change.


Nothing that happens during the Dragon Breaks lasts, like Cyrodiil turning into an egg during the Middle-Dawn. It is only when linear time is reestablished that these have actual effects. That's why, according to those who have a positive view of Lorkhan, creation had to happen for souls to be able to better themselves. If everything happens at once, nothing can change. That's the great irony of chaos: complete chaos ends up being uniform and static.



> I mean, is it? The Tribunal got to live as literal gods for however many hundreds of years. If the Nerevarine was Azura's revenge, she kind of dropped the ball there.


The Tribunal were gods, precisely, they were much harder to harm than regular mortals or Heroes.

----------


## Alcore

> TES 6 question:
> 
> Would you like to see Attributes back, keep it like the Perk system in Skyrim or Hybridize it?
> 
> I don't miss Speed from Oblivion for instance when I played a heavy Orc warrior...


If I were to make 6 I would


Use the skills, leveling and class mechanics of TES 3

The magic system of TES 4. Also make the spells get steadily stronger with usage/level.

The sheer size of TES 2

The combat of TES 5

And probably the graphics of TES 3 or 4
(The sheer size of the game world would make skyrim level graphics as clumbersome).


Dont reinvent the wheel. Use the best of the best from each version. Also; have scaling enemy level with an on/off button. In Skyrim, for instance, you must train smithing to be stronger than a guard and bandit or wait for high levels. Need enchanting or alchemy to be stronger than most monsters. Need all three to be heroic. 

They never let you be awesome. Your only just good enough. Much like some GMs flooding village militias with level 16s because the party is 20.

----------


## halfeye

> If I were to make 6 I would
> 
> 
> Use the skills, leveling and class mechanics of TES 3
> 
> The magic system of TES 4. Also make the spells get steadily stronger with usage/level.
> 
> The sheer size of TES 2
> 
> The combat of TES 5


Erm, maybe.




> And probably the graphics of TES 3 or 4
> (The sheer size of the game world would make skyrim level graphics as clumbersome).


Nope, nope, no. The graphics of 3 were horrible, good for their time, but compared to something modern like Fallout 4, completely rubbish. The grass in 4 was an attrocity, it could either pop in at close range, or at medium range and no further. The fact that you were always loosing loot in the grass or less retrievably in walls in 4 was why the loot in skyrim was pickable from the corpses even if they dropped it.

Machines and algorithms have improved since Skyrim, what was hard then would be easier now. If crypto-currencies crash hard enough decent graphics cards might become affordable too.




> Dont reinvent the wheel. Use the best of the best from each version. Also; have scaling enemy level with an on/off button. In Skyrim, for instance, you must train smithing to be stronger than a guard and bandit or wait for high levels. Need enchanting or alchemy to be stronger than most monsters. Need all three to be heroic. 
> 
> They never let you be awesome. Your only just good enough. Much like some GMs flooding village militias with level 16s because the party is 20.


You didn't mention water, and so far there hasn't been a game where the water wasn't rubbish, they need to make new good water.

----------


## Vinyadan

To put things in perspective, Morrowind is 20. Today, you can create realistic surfaces and simulate bumps by leveraging a modern engine (with normal and parallax maps), while Morrowind had to use more detailed objects and character models. It also wasn't particularly well optimised, as it didn't use atlassing. Most noticeably, at least for me, it had no occlusion culling: if you are facing a house in Balmora, and the whole city is behind it, then the game will render everything behind the house. Morrowind also used way too many particle effects, to the point that there were perceivable slow downs when using a shrine and even casting certain spells, not to say anything about the propylon chambers...
I also don't think that Morrowind lighting would be acceptable today. It was really blocky, plus assets didn't block light, which meant bight bleed and problematic shadows. Plus, stuff like grass and distant land is pretty cool for open world games. I am actually very surprised at how light water reflections and animated grass are in a modded Morrowind (in Oblivion, unless I screwed something up, they are really heavy with distant land enabled).
And then there is the question of what resolution to aim for, and how that affects visuals (also, with upscalers like dlss and fidelityfx becoming normal for gpu companies, resolution probably won't be a big problem for future players).

----------


## veti

There is no earthly reason why TES6 shouldn't have graphics that are at least as good as those of Skyrim or FO4. The computational saving of simplifying them would be minimal.

"The size of Daggerfall" - yeah, not going to happen, and arguably shouldn't anyway. We've seen "open world games" range up to hundreds of square miles, and by now there's a pretty clear consensus about this - being bigger doesn't make it better. There's a sweet spot, probably somewhere around 30-50 square miles (i.e. somewhere between Breath of the Wild and GTAV), where it's as big as one player can reasonably handle.

"The magic system of Oblivion" - really? While I appreciate the simplicity of casting, what I chiefly remember is the frustration at how limited and weak the effects were in comparison to Morrowind. Even the biggest, most magicka-hungry attack spells were - well, not significantly more effective than the weapons, which seemed to be mostly made of polystyrene.

Where I would most like to see some development effort spent would be on the AI. Yes, Ms Bandit, the noise might have been your imagination, but the arrow sticking out of your friend's ear certainly isn't, so perhaps you shouldn't be going back to exactly the same patrol route you followed before.

----------


## Eldan

> Okay, I will concede that Dunmer society sucks in many way, but I will maintain that the Worm Cult is worse.


I'm not actually sure that's sucking. There's a few books on the Dunmer view on the entire thing. They see it as the older generations protecting their families, and the families in turn worship their ancestors with elaborate shrines and tombs.

----------


## Keltest

> "The magic system of Oblivion" - really? While I appreciate the simplicity of casting, what I chiefly remember is the frustration at how limited and weak the effects were in comparison to Morrowind. Even the biggest, most magicka-hungry attack spells were - well, not significantly more effective than the weapons, which seemed to be mostly made of polystyrene.


I think they meant more having a dedicated spell slot that you could cast independently of any physical weapons you may or may not have drawn. Being a spellsword in Oblivion means giving up all the big two handed spells, fiddling with the menus to equip and unequip your stuff, and not being able to dual cast or dual wield spells.

In particular, this makes staves questionably useful for actual casters, since your own spells will almost always be better.

----------


## Aeson

> Nope, nope, no. The graphics of 3 were horrible,  good for their time, but compared to something modern like Fallout 4,  completely rubbish.


Personally, I like the way _Morrowind_ looks better than I like the more 'realistic' look of quite a few more modern games.




> Being a spellsword in Oblivion means giving up all the big two handed  spells, fiddling with the menus to equip and unequip your stuff, and not  being able to dual cast or dual wield spells.


Skyrim, you mean.




> The magic system of TES 4. Also make the spells get steadily stronger with usage/level.


The only things stopping _Morrowind_'s magic system from being outright superior to _Oblivion_'s are the lackluster access to Restore Magicka effects at low level in _Morrowind_,  because Bargain/Cheap potions were nearly worthless for a full caster  even at level 1 and better potions or the ingredients to make your own  could be difficult to obtain depending on how wealthy your characters  were and whether or not you knew where to find the restocking vendors,  and inadequate base magicka for anyone who didn't take at least one  magicka bonus from their race and birthsign.

(I realize that  casting failure chance is not especially popular, but, personally, I  like that the game allowed you to take a chance on casting more potent  spells than you could reliably pull off; it does a pretty good job of  making fatigue actually relevant to a caster, which neither of the later  games' systems do; and unless maybe you were an exceptionally bad  caster a visit to a spellmaker could pretty much always give you a spell  that you were guaranteed to be able to cast if you didn't want to risk  something fizzling at a bad time.)

----------


## GloatingSwine

> I mean, is it? The Tribunal got to live as literal gods for however many hundreds of years. If the Nerevarine was Azura's revenge, she kind of dropped the ball there.


Their entire species got changed into a different one...

Azura's revenge was changing the Chimer into the Dunmer, with the loss of a great deal of their magic and power.

The status of the Tribunal after this largely reflects their ability to accept and understand the truth of the world.  Almalexia is unchanged because she lives so deep in the stories of her godhood that she cannot distinguish truth. Vivec lives on the line between truth and story, he lies incessantly but he knows that his lies are lies. Sotha Sil accepted the truth of the change as part of his understanding of the mechanics of the world.

Not the only time she's done that either, allegedly. The Khajiit used to be mer somewhat similar to the Bosmer.




> Personally, I like the way Morrowind looks better than I like the more 'realistic' look of quite a few more modern games.


Morrowind has better *art direction* than Oblivion or Skyrim, but not better *graphics*. There's a lot you can do with mods to drag it out of the dark ages though.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I'm not actually sure that's sucking. There's a few books on the Dunmer view on the entire thing. They see it as the older generations protecting their families, and the families in turn worship their ancestors with elaborate shrines and tombs.


Imean that part definitely sucks:



> nobles would have giant fences powered by their retainers.



But also, Dunmeri culture is very xenophobic, theocratic (and the gods they worship...), fueled by slavery and permeated by social darwinist ideas. It sucks in many ways.



> Their entire species got changed into a different one...
> 
> Azura's revenge was changing the Chimer into the Dunmer, with the loss of a great deal of their magic and power.
> 
> The status of the Tribunal after this largely reflects their ability to accept and understand the truth of the world.  Almalexia is unchanged because she lives so deep in the stories of her godhood that she cannot distinguish truth. Vivec lives on the line between truth and story, he lies incessantly but he knows that his lies are lies. Sotha Sil accepted the truth of the change as part of his understanding of the mechanics of the world.


Or Almalexia is the past, Vivec the present and Sil the future of the Dunmeri. Or Almalexia is in denial about murdering Nerevar (and therefore rejects the punishment), Vivec admits to it but justifies it (half-accepting the punishment) and Sil is regretful over it (taking the full punishment). Or...

Also, are you sure the Dunmer are less powerful than the Chimer and if so if that's the result of the curse or of "growing soft" thanks to having living gods in their corner?



> Not the only time she's done that either, allegedly. The Khajiit used to be mer somewhat similar to the Bosmer.


According to Khajiiti myths, they were formless until Azurah gave some of them shapes, and Y'ffer then turned the rest into the Bosmer. Azurah's actions aren't supposed to be a punishment though.

----------


## Caelestion

> You didn't mention water, and so far there hasn't been a game where the water wasn't rubbish, they need to make new good water.


The water in Morrowind was amazing for its time.  It's still pretty good now.

----------


## Spore

> Morrowind has better *art direction* than Oblivion or Skyrim, but not better *graphics*. There's a lot you can do with mods to drag it out of the dark ages though.


In this case, how would you guys feel if TES 6 had an very atypical artstyle? I am not talking as far as cellshaded or artsy black-and-white, and frankly I know too little of artstyles as a whole to recommend a fitting one, so I will just put up a cartoony World of Warcraft style for debate.

What if TES 6 had cartoon graphics? Would you rebel?

----------


## Rynjin

A bit. Cartoony looking fantasy games like Fable have always looked cheap to me.

The game doesn't need to be photorealistic, but cartoony is too far.

----------


## Rater202

Honestly, all I want to know regarding TES6 is "where is it and what are they replacing shouts with"

----------


## Rynjin

High Rock is pretty much locked in. Though "Tamriel" is a potential option if they decide to go big or go home.

I would imagine (and hope) they dont replace Shouts with anything. It was a one-off mechanic in one game, and not a particularly interesting one.

----------


## Rater202

> High Rock is pretty much locked in. Though "Tamriel" is a potential option if they decide to go big or go home.
> 
> I would imagine (and hope) they don't replace Shouts with anything. It was a one-off mechanic in one game, and not a particularly interesting one.


You can't go from "you're a demigod with a more or ess unique power" to "you're an ordinary dude whose only special because destiny said so" in terms of game release. By making The Lasr Dragonborn someone of such significance with a power that few can use and none as well as you they've raised the bar significantly.

At bare minimum, the game has to have a category of powers/spells that the players gets but most NPCs don't.

If it was set in Hammerfel then it could be those reality-bending sword techniques in the Redguard legends. Hammerfall also is known to have had both Dwener and Aeleid settlements and a population of Nedes prior to a genocide o there'd potentially be plenty of variety of dungeons to explore.

But if they're setting it in High Rock I don't know what that entails other than potentially a return to Daggerfell.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> High Rock is pretty much locked in.


In the mind of the Internet, at least.

The one trailer we've seen didn't look much like High Rock geography, it was scrubland and sandy rock more like southern Hammerfell or northern Elsweyr.

(I don't think Elder Scrolls should adopt a WoW style exaggerated art style, because I don't think it lies within Bethesda's strengths to create one, and it has consistently stuck to some kind of grounded despite variation within that.)

----------


## Rynjin

Shehai is interesting in a sense but really is little different from Summon Sword in the grand scheme.

And the teaser could be Hammerfell, yeah. I'm inclined to believe it's both since High Rock is pretty small.

----------


## Fyraltari

> You can't go from "you're a demigod with a more or ess unique power" to "you're an ordinary dude whose only special because destiny said so" in terms of game release.


Yeah, you can.

Sure shouts were fun, but in practice they weren't that useful, magic archery and swordplay remained the name of the game.


Edit: How many ESO players complained that you no longer had a unique power no NPC could use?

----------


## Eldan

> In this case, how would you guys feel if TES 6 had an very atypical artstyle? I am not talking as far as cellshaded or artsy black-and-white, and frankly I know too little of artstyles as a whole to recommend a fitting one, so I will just put up a cartoony World of Warcraft style for debate.
> 
> What if TES 6 had cartoon graphics? Would you rebel?


IT would be a difficult balance. Like, if I saw a trailer for, I don't know, an Impressionist RPG that is made to look like a watercolour painting? Oh man would I be all over that.

On the other hand, it's not just a new game, it's an Elder Scrolls game, and I'd still want it to be noticeably in the same tradition as previous Elder Scrolls games.

----------


## Eldan

> In the mind of the Internet, at least.
> 
> The one trailer we've seen didn't look much like High Rock geography, it was scrubland and sandy rock more like southern Hammerfell or northern Elsweyr.
> 
> (I don't think Elder Scrolls should adopt a WoW style exaggerated art style, because I don't think it lies within Bethesda's strengths to create one, and it has consistently stuck to some kind of grounded despite variation within that.)


At least one analysis I've seen actually pretty much _did_ lock that trailer in as being the Illiac bay coast in geography, including some unusual landmarks, like a certain crater and a peculiarly shaped bay.


As for power uniqueness.... even shouting wasn't that unique. Grey beards, Dragon Priests and Draugr had it, at least, as did some dragons. Rare, but not unique. (Still think there should have been more voice users. And more magic in general, the Nords were at times quite magical people.) 

Plus, four games with no unique powers and one with, I don't think it's necessary. It's always been about the unique destiny, not the unique power.

----------


## Rater202

> Yeah, you can.
> 
> Sure shouts were fun, but in practice they weren't that useful, magic archery and swordplay remained the name of the game.
> 
> 
> Edit: How many ESO players complained that you no longer had a unique power no NPC could use?


ESO is an MMO. By definition you're not special, you're just oe of many people playig out the exact same story in the exact same time.

TEs6 will theoretically be a single-player game and, following the trend, will be about the PC being some random nobody o turns out to be of cosmic importance.

On Uniqueness: Only a relatively small number of people can shout, and nobody else can do it as well as you... Except for Mirak but I think killing him and absorbing his soul means that you're the better Dragonborn.

And shouts not being all that is 1: Subjective and 2: Something that could be fixed with better integration.

----------


## veti

How often do you actually use Shouts, typically? I don't think any of my characters have used them what you could call "routinely". Maybe once per level or less. Sometimes much less. 

My current favourite is Ice Form. When I discovered that worked on multiple targets - well, I haven't looked back. But even so, it's never been an every-fight thing - I've always thought of it as pretty much the weapon of last resort, only for when I'm in serious trouble.

Frankly I would prefer a hero who was a bit less Marked By The Gods and a bit more Brave Little Tailor. I loved the portion of Morrowind where I was, theoretically, an outlaw, and was quite disappointed that the Ordinators in Vivec didn't attack me even if I went up and spoke to them.

----------


## Rater202

> How often do you actually use Shouts, typically? I don't think any of my characters have used them what you could call "routinely". Maybe once per level or less. Sometimes much less.


I used them all the time, so maybe tha'ts where I'm coming from.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> Edit: How many ESO players complained that you no longer had a unique power no NPC could use?


Point of order: In ESO you *do* have a unique power no NPC can use. The Vestige's soul is claimed by Molag Bal and they can't die (and there are some quests where the fact that you are walking around without your soul is the reason that you are uniquely able to proceed, or are unaffected by whatever soul-destroying shenanigans are supposed to be occurring*).

The resurrection mechanic for players is, in fact, canonically happening.

*Sometimes they remember you get your soul back at the end of the main quest. Harrowstorms don't affect you (except by summoning lots of things to punch you very hard) but dragons can hit you with Soul Tear.


(Shouts other than Dragonrend weren't all that useful, effects were too limited and cools were too long, but then also in vanilla Skyrim magic is pretty weedy as well.)

----------


## Vinyadan

> You can't go from "you're a demigod with a more or ess unique power" to "you're an ordinary dude whose only special because destiny said so" in terms of game release. By making The Lasr Dragonborn someone of such significance with a power that few can use and none as well as you they've raised the bar significantly.


To tell the truth, I didn't like that. Just being a stranger in a strange land slowly raising your status through deeds sounds more interesting than being the protagonist because you have X mechanical power. The Nerevarine had to fight hard to be recognised as such, and wasn't even necessarily certain of being the embodiment of Nerevar in the end; but his deeds were undeniable and his title of Hortator also denoted the recognition of moral qualities. The Champion of Cyrodiil became a hero because he entered a burning city and fought off the daedra. The Dragonborn just _is_ the Dragonborn, nothing to do about it. A good example: the guards will go "woah!" when you absorb your first dragon soul, but they have likely killed it themselves as they are at least lvl 20. That is _their_ moment of glory (the first dragon killed by men, since when?), but the story requires that everyone is in awe about your soulsucking and wordshouting abilities instead.

----------


## Fyraltari

> ESO is an MMO. By definition you're not special, you're just oe of many people playig out the exact same story in the exact same time.


Really? Because I thought you were the special person who escaped Coldharbour and ended up using Akatosh's power to pummel Molag Bal into paste. Just because it's an MMO doesn't mean you're not being unique.

In terms of gameplay, can you do in ESO something the NPCs can't do? And if not, why would it be more of a problem in a single-player game?




> TEs6 will theoretically be a single-player game and, following the trend, will be about the PC being some random nobody o turns out to be of cosmic importance.


So was _Skyrim_.




> On Uniqueness: Only a relatively small number of people can shout, and nobody else can do it as well as you... Except for Mirak but I think killing him and absorbing his soul means that you're the better Dragonborn.


Yeah. So?




> And shouts not being all that is 1: Subjective and 2: Something that could be fixed with better integration.


"Fixed" implies it's a problem. It's not. Being a dragonborn is just one way one can be powerful on Tamriel, not the ultimate trump card. Wulfarth Ash-King and Tiber Septim habe lost fights against non-dragonborns, so did Miraak who was created specifically for _Skyrim_.

The Thu'um is ultimately just a form of magic (probably related to tonal architecture) and many of its abilities are redundant with spells. Mastering the Thu'um isn't the reason The Last Dragonborn is important, it's because when they kill dragons they have the common decency to stay dead.

There's no reason for TES VI to replace V's gimmick with something else.

----------


## Keltest

As far as WoW's graphics, they are the way they are mostly to keep engine requirements down so your grandma with a 15 year old computer can still play the game if she feels like it. A hypothetical ES 6 is unlikely to cleave to that goal.

----------


## Fyraltari

About the graphics, I wouldn't want them to change artstyle, so no "cartoony" designs. But I don't, and have never, care for photorealistic graphics in gaming. That does nothing but gulp down memory and processing power for almost no gain. I'd be happy if they stayed at the level of vanilla _Skyrim_. But of course, they'll make it so we can count all the hair on the arms of every bandit, so I don't expect to be able to play the game on release the 5/5/55.




> Point of order: In ESO you *do* have a unique power no NPC can use. The Vestige's soul is claimed by Molag Bal and they can't die (and there are some quests where the fact that you are walking around without your soul is the reason that you are uniquely able to proceed, or are unaffected by whatever soul-destroying shenanigans are supposed to be occurring*).


Okay, but that's not a power you can _use_ it's a passive. It doesn't change the way you play the game.

But now, I'm curious, do ennemies acknowledge it when they've killed you before? And how do they justify Vilain McBadguy restarting his entire ritual when you fail to interrupt it?

Edit:



> A good example: the guards will go "woah!" when you absorb your first dragon soul


Well, all the flashy lights went into you. That's woah-worthy.



> but they have likely killed it themselves as they are at least lvl 20.


Did they? Maybe, I'm more aggressive than the usual player, but I generally land the killing blow on that fight. Speaking of, does it bother anyone else that for every dragon fight mandated by the main quest, you've got someone backing you? These guards, Delphine, Paarthurnax, the ancient Heroes. I think Miraak is the only dragon-related villain you beat up yourself (and even then Herma-Mora finishes him off for you).



> That is _their_ moment of glory (the first dragon killed by men, since when?)


I think since the late Second Era, when Cyrus the Restless killed Naafalilargus/Nafahlar.

----------


## Keltest

> About the graphics, I wouldn't want them to change artstyle, so no "cartoony" designs. But I don't, and have never, care for photorealistic graphics in gaming. That does nothing but gulp down memory and processing power for almost no gain. I'd be happy if they stayed at the level of vanilla _Skyrim_. But of course, they'll make it so we can count all the hair on the arms of every bandit, so I don't expect to be able to play the game on release the 5/5/55.


Agreed. I think Skyrim vanilla is already kind of an ugly game with all the dirt and everything visible on everything. I'd just as soon have something closer to ESO which is a little more stylized but also much prettier.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> But now, I'm curious, do ennemies acknowledge it when they've killed you before? And how do they justify Vilain McBadguy restarting his entire ritual when you fail to interrupt it?


Sometimes they get surprised that something isn't killing you when it should be. They didn't put anything in for having to restart a fight though.

----------


## InvisibleBison

> Speaking of, does it bother anyone else that for every dragon fight mandated by the main quest, you've got someone backing you? These guards, Delphine, Paarthurnax, the ancient Heroes. I think Miraak is the only dragon-related villain you beat up yourself (and even then Herma-Mora finishes him off for you).


That doesn't particularly bother me. Mirmulnir and Sahloknir are the only two of those that I regularly fight, and when I do so I'm generally low-level enough that I appreciate the backup. And when I do do the other fights, I'm generally high enough level that the NPCs aren't making a significant contribution.

----------


## Spore

> IT would be a difficult balance. Like, if I saw a trailer for, I don't know, an Impressionist RPG that is made to look like a watercolour painting? Oh man would I be all over that.
> 
> On the other hand, it's not just a new game, it's an Elder Scrolls game, and I'd still want it to be noticeably in the same tradition as previous Elder Scrolls games.


But Elder Scrolls artstyle did switch. Arena and Daggerfall are old dungeon crawlers with dark fantasy aesthetic. Morrowind is very surreal. Oblivion emulates old oil paintings. Skyrim is more gritty and dirty. 

I can see Highrock looking like a romantic or "post impressionist" landscape painting (if I get the epochs correct)




> You can't go from "you're a demigod with a more or ess unique power" to "you're an ordinary dude whose only special because destiny said so" in terms of game release. By making The Lasr Dragonborn someone of such significance with a power that few can use and none as well as you they've raised the bar significantly.


Why not? Final Fantasy 14's narrative goes like this.
*Spoiler*
Show

ARR (2.0): You have the echo (you cannot die in battle) and you are blessed by the head goddess. You murder false deities summoned by monstrous races and then stop the evil empire (tm) from siccing their god slaying machine on the world (because that is your ****ing job)
HW (3.0): You still have the echo. And by god, even ancient super technology can stop you murdering false deities.
SB (4.0): Suddenly you're some dude in a political ploy trying to destroy evil empire (tm) finally. Sandwiching them from both sides. You still murder some false deities, but this time you are more or less a political assassin for hire.
ShB (5.0) You are transported to the not-evil mirror universe, where the lawful good sin eaters are evil. You murder the angels of destruction. 
EW (6.0) You fight despair incarnate after discovering your goddess was just some chick who decided her race of immortal super beings was having it too nice.


6.1 onwards. You are some kind of adventurer. You're powerful, yes, but your old story is done. I mean the story DID start with fighting actual gods but still.

----------


## veti

> Speaking of, does it bother anyone else that for every dragon fight mandated by the main quest, you've got someone backing you?


There are at least two dragons in Skuldafn that you have to solo, and unless you're very lucky you'll also have draugr whaling on you at the same time.

Then there's the one at Saering's Watch in Dragonborn, you don't get any (mandatory) help for that (companion is optional).

----------


## Spore

> There are at least two dragons in Skuldafn that you have to solo, and unless you're very lucky you'll also have draugr whaling on you at the same time.
> 
> Then there's the one at Saering's Watch in Dragonborn, you don't get any (mandatory) help for that (companion is optional).


It kinda makes sense. If you as the dragonborn die in a fight (you have the Thu'um means you have a CHANCE, but you are not immortal) the world is screwed. Which reminds me how utterly helpless dragons are against a destruction mage with lightning spells.

Contrary to the box art showing you the heavily armored (as in, they use heavy armor) berserker nord dude, I feel in lore and in mechanics, Skyrim's best bet to stop Alduin is someone who is just very very good at destruction magic.

So in absence of the dragonborn, J'zargo would save the world.  :Small Smile:

----------


## mjp1050

> But Elder Scrolls artstyle did switch. Arena and Daggerfall are old dungeon crawlers with dark fantasy aesthetic. Morrowind is very surreal. Oblivion emulates old oil paintings.


Oh, is _that_ what they were trying to doing with Oblivion? That explains why every single surface in that game has some sort of sheen to it.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> On Uniqueness: Only a relatively small number of people can shout, and nobody else can do it as well as you... Except for Mirak but I think killing him and absorbing his soul means that you're the better Dragonborn.


Nitpick: _Mora_ killed Miraak, not the player character.




> And shouts not being all that is 1: Subjective and 2: Something that could be fixed with better integration.


Meh, the next game could mash a lot of those effects in by making them normal magic. There isn't anything stopping them but there's no _need_ for another Chosen One superpower.




> How often do you actually use Shouts, typically?


Depends on the Shout. And the character. My Khajiit used Aura Whisper almost constantly, and Ethereal Sprint is useful for dropping down cliffs. My conjurer I keep forgetting she can Shout, but she's not very far into the main quest and anyway her summons do most of the fighting.




> Point of order: In ESO you *do* have a unique power no NPC can use. The Vestige's soul is claimed by Molag Bal and they can't die (and there are some quests where the fact that you are walking around without your soul is the reason that you are uniquely able to proceed, or are unaffected by whatever soul-destroying shenanigans are supposed to be occurring*).


This. The PC is a "paragon" Soul Shriven - they have some kind of Anuic property other than their soul that makes them different from other Soul Shriven.

Also, Moon Hallowed.




> Okay, but that's not a power you can _use_ it's a passive. It doesn't change the way you play the game.


Clearly you haven't heard of blood porting.  :Small Wink: 

More seriously there's a quest in Coldharbour that requires you to kill yourself.

----------


## Resileaf

> Nitpick: _Mora_ killed Miraak, not the player character.


Miraak died and I was in the general vicinity. Therefore I claim the credit.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Miraak died and I was in the general vicinity. Therefore I claim the credit.


By the Nine! You killed Emperor Uriel VII!

----------


## Grim Portent

> By the Nine! You killed Emperor Uriel VII!


And Martin Septim and Mehrunes Dagon!

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> And Martin Septim and Mehrunes Dagon!


I dont think Dagon is dead.

You brutally maimed Mehrunes Dagon!

----------


## Rater202

Regarding Mora: He only kills Miraak after the Dragonborn definitively defeats him. The whole thing was a kill steal done to assert his dominance.

Herma Mora being a petty little bastard* changes nothing: For all intents and purposes, we killed Miraak. And then immeidatly absorbed his soul and... As I recall his soul is the equivalent of 5-10 dragon souls, plus however many he jacked from you between triggering the questline and killing him, meaning it's entirely possible to be a stronger dragonborn than him before you even learn Bound Will or Dragon Aspect.

Furthermore, if you complete Dragonborn before completing the main quest of the core game, you can mention it to Shor and he'll flat ou say that Mora was bluffing and has no authority over you which just reinforces the fact that he stole your kill as a power play to convince you that you were in his power.

*See also, his scheming for millennia to learn an interesting way to skin a horker and then extracting the knowledge lethally for really no reason.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Herma Mora being a petty little bastard* changes nothing: For all intents and purposes, we killed Miraak. And then immeidatly absorbed his soul and... As I recall his soul is the equivalent of 5-10 dragon souls, plus however many he jacked from you between triggering the questline and killing him, meaning it's entirely possible to be a stronger dragonborn than him before you even learn Bound Will or Dragon Aspect.


I always thought it'd have been great if Miraak used the shouts you have unlocked, to give youba taste of your own medicine.




> Furthermore, if you complete Dragonborn before completing the main quest of the core game, you can mention it to Shor and he'll flat ou say that Mora was bluffing and has no authority over you which just reinforces the fact that he stole your kill as a power play to convince you that you were in his power.


You mean Tsun, right? Shor isn't present when you get to Sovngarde. Also, this is the first time I've heard of this dialog (not saying it doesn't exist, I haven't really looked for it).
But also, I don't remember Herma-Mora claiming dominion over your soul, just that you were his new champion and given that you had just rid him of an uppitty servant and delivered unto him secrets he's been trying to get for a long while, he has a point.

----------


## Keltest

I also never have seen that dialogue, nor can I find any record of it on the wikis. Are you sure it isnt from a mod Rater?

----------


## Rater202

Yeah, Tsun. There are a lot of names in this franchise and it's hard to keep them straight.

As I recall, Mora specifically claims that you'll be replacing Miraak someday... Though considering that Mora couldn't control Mirraak either and basically had to co-opt your efforts after you head to Solthheim to investigate after followers of Miraak's tried to assassinate you, and that even in the main game he had to lie to get one of his artifacts out of a vault it somehow got trapped in I don't think Mora is all that powerful to begin with.

Edit: Okay,  remember reading about it somewhere bu now I can't find it.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I don't think Mora is all that powerful to begin with.
> 
> Edit: Okay,  remember reading about it somewhere bu now I can't find it.


Mora, much like Azura who we discussed upthread, isn't dangerous because of his raw power*, but because of how clever he is.

*Which as a Daedric Prince is still as formidable as it gets.

----------


## Keltest

> Mora, much like Azura who we discussed upthread, isn't dangerous because of his raw power*, but because of how clever he is.
> 
> *Which as a Daedric Prince is still as formidable as it gets.


As we have seen with the Skaal, the trick with the Daedra is to just not talk to them at all. Mora is still bound by the barriers we made permanent in Oblivion, so the only ways he can actually come after you are either if you invoke him directly or he convinces somebody else who invoked him to go after you. The best he could do is send his cultists after you, at which point youre basically just dealing with a group of probably-mages. Still potentially dangerous, but not unusually so by Tamriel's standards.

----------


## Rater202

> Mora, much like Azura who we discussed upthread, isn't dangerous because of his raw power*, but because of how clever he is.
> 
> *Which as a Daedric Prince is still as formidable as it gets.


I meant by the standards of a prince.

Think about it: He claims that he's known about Mirakk's plans all along and there's clearly nothing stopping him from physically interacting with and essentially torturing Miraak to death at any time(especially since Miraak is within Apocrypha throughout the story) and yet he chooses to co-opt the Last Dragonborn's own efforts and only intervenes directly after Miraak is already defeated.

While it's certainly possible that this was just an elaborate plan to finally learn how to skin a Horker, the fact that Mora holds up his end of the bargain after getting the secrets of the Skal instead of just killing everyone and fricking offhighly likely given his reputation of killing even faithful servants after they are no longer useful to himsuggests that he needed the Dragonborn to defeat Miraak for some reason or another.

----------


## Lurkmoar

Or that Mora just loves the drama of the First and Last Dragonborn fighting.

----------


## Fyraltari

> As we have seen with the Skaal, the trick with the Daedra is to just not talk to them at all. Mora is still bound by the barriers we made permanent in Oblivion, so the only ways he can actually come after you are either if you invoke him directly or he convinces somebody else who invoked him to go after you. The best he could do is send his cultists after you, at which point youre basically just dealing with a group of probably-mages. Still potentially dangerous, but not unusually so by Tamriel's standards.


Tell that to Storn.



> I meant by the standards of a prince.


I don't think we've got any way to really rank the Princes in terms of power. We know that Jyggalag was mightiest (and even then, it was probably just his library giving him an edge) and Peryite weakest, but beyond that...




> Think about it: He claims that he's known about Mirakk's plans all along and there's clearly nothing stopping him from physically interacting with and essentially torturing Miraak to death at any time(especially since Miraak is within Apocrypha throughout the story) and yet he chooses to co-opt the Last Dragonborn's own efforts and only intervenes directly after Miraak is already defeated.
> 
> While it's certainly possible that this was just an elaborate plan to finally learn how to skin a Horker, the fact that Mora holds up his end of the bargain after getting the secrets of the Skal instead of just killing everyone and fricking offhighly likely given his reputation of killing even faithful servants after they are no longer useful to himsuggests that he needed the Dragonborn to defeat Miraak for some reason or another.


Or that he has further uses for the Last Dragonborn. Which is essentially what Miraak and Hermaeus Mora tell you at the end of the questline. Hermaeus Mora engineered a situation such that you had to give him what he wanted to accomplish your goals. He will most likely do it again. He will give you knowledge and power as long as you keep giving him the secrets he craves. But should you one day go against his wishes he will come up with way to destroy you, preferably by the hand of some other up-and-coming hero who Mora will have bribed with the needed knowledge necessary to take you down in exchange for traditionnal Reachmen recipes or whatever.

The question is, when that day come, will you be hard enough to escape his slimy clutches? It's possible, after all Daedric Princes love to talk a big game, but mortals have outsmarted them before (Nocturne, Mephala, Clavicus Vile, even Mora himself) so you might be skilled enough to do it. Bit remember, Miraak thought he was too.

----------


## Keltest

> Tell that to Storn.


You mean Storn who specifically consented to talk to Mora, which was what Mora needed to actually get his secrets?

----------


## Rater202

Miraak also wasn't exactly as powerful as he thought he was.

while in term of gameplay you only gain knowledge of one word per soul, in lore absorbing a ragon's soul adds that dragon's power to your own.

Mirak starts the game with a maximum of 10 dragon souls and that's presumably including his own.

If we assume that you do the DLC in order and that you are at a minimum making a serious effort to learn the shouts if not 100% completing each aspect of the game, then you're going to have well over 60 souls at a minimum by the time you et foot on Solthheim.

Miraak, being how old he is and how he was empowered by Mora, was certain strong, but as a Dragonborn, even as the First Dragonborn, he's nothing compared to the Last Dragonborn.

----------


## Fyraltari

> You mean Storn who specifically consented to talk to Mora, which was what Mora needed to actually get his secrets?


I mean Storn who was faced with an enemy Mora created who was so dangerous he had to deal with Mora or see everything he held dear be destroyed. Storn and his predecessors did exactly what you proposed they refused to deal with the Daedra in any capacity. But it wasn't a pack of mages coming to take their secrets by force they had to face, because that's not how Mora does things. What they faced was a destroyer they couldn't beat and to whom they had nothing to offer and a saviour who could help them... On the condition they give Mora what he wanted.

Now, it's true that if Storn hadn't agreed to Mora's offer he most likely wouldn't have gotten those secrets, but I doubt that would habe conforted the Skaals much, toiling in Miraak's temple.

Storn "consented" to Mora's offers in the same sense that a starving man "consents" to become a slave for a loaf of bread a day. A choice under duress isn't really a choice.

----------


## DigoDragon

> So in absence of the dragonborn, J'zargo would save the world.


Just don't tell him that. His ego is big enough. XD

But he really is a great companion... not counting the part where he tried to get you killed.

----------


## Keltest

> I mean Storn who was faced with an enemy Mora created who was so dangerous he had to deal with Mora or see everything he held dear be destroyed. Storn and his predecessors did exactly what you proposed they refused to deal with the Daedra in any capacity. But it wasn't a pack of mages coming to take their secrets by force they had to face, because that's not how Mora does things. What they faced was a destroyer they couldn't beat and to whom they had nothing to offer and a saviour who could help them... On the condition they give Mora what he wanted.
> 
> Now, it's true that if Storn hadn't agreed to Mora's offer he most likely wouldn't have gotten those secrets, but I doubt that would habe conforted the Skaals much, toiling in Miraak's temple.
> 
> Storn "consented" to Mora's offers in the same sense that a starving man "consents" to become a slave for a loaf of bread a day. A choice under duress isn't really a choice.


Yeah, but in spite of his claims, Mora didnt really instigate any of that. He goes really hard trying to convince you that free will is an illusion, but at any point you have the capacity to just shove off and... not do what he wants you to, and oops, there goes his entire plan, and he can't stop you. He's an opportunist.

So yes. Their protection against Mora works right up until the point where they decide to stop using it due to outside reasons.

----------


## Grim Portent

> Yeah, but in spite of his claims, Mora didnt really instigate any of that. He goes really hard trying to convince you that free will is an illusion, but at any point you have the capacity to just shove off and... not do what he wants you to, and oops, there goes his entire plan, and he can't stop you. He's an opportunist.


Shoving off to ruin Mora's plans just means letting Miraak come to rule the world. Without Mora he's impossible* to defeat and will just grow in power as his temples are rebuilt and his ability to project his power expands. It's not exactly a viable alternative any more than letting Alduin eat the world is.


*Bend Will is presented as something that can only be prevented from working on the Last Dragonborn themselves by learning it, and only two people know it. Without Mora's help Miraak can make the Dragonborn drop to his knees with a word anytime he wants.

----------


## Mark Hall

> How often do you actually use Shouts, typically? I don't think any of my characters have used them what you could call "routinely". Maybe once per level or less. Sometimes much less.


Whirlwind Sprint. Just walkwalkwalkSHOUTwalkwalkwalkSHOUT to get through the dungeon while carrying ridiculous amounts of stuff.

If you're going to give me a special ability, make it the ability to make an extradimensional space where I can carry all my ****.  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I meant by the standards of a prince.


Disagree; we know hes in the top half of Daedric Princes because he was in the half that Sotha Sil initially made a pact with to stay out of Nirn.




> Whirlwind Sprint. Just walkwalkwalkSHOUTwalkwalkwalkSHOUT to get through the dungeon while carrying ridiculous amounts of stuff.
> 
> If you're going to give me a special ability, make it the ability to make an extradimensional space where I can carry all my ****.


Yes to both of these points. Bring back Feather or make Fortify Carry Weight castable.

----------


## Rater202

> Disagree; we know hes in the top half of Daedric Princes because he was in the half that Sotha Sil initially made a pact with to stay out of Nirn.


So my Morowwing knowledge isn't as good as my Oblivion and Skyrim knowledge, so correct me if Sothas Sil as explcitly bargaining with the stronger half, but... That by itseld doesn't mean he's powerful, that just means that Sothas Sil didn't want him in Nirn. Again, unless there's details I'm missing, I only know what you just said in regards to this topic.

I think the God whose thing is "knows most things, wants to know everything else, is willing to casually murder even his faithful followers when they are no longer useful to him" is a deity even a mad-man wouldn't want to have direct access to the mortal world regardless of how powerful he is by the standards of deities. Especially since Mora is the only Prince who doens't bother with a comprehensible form that mortal can identify with or relate to.

There's also the note that Mora presents himself as being an all-knowing chess master despite the fact that he's demonstrably not, so even if Sothas Sil was dealing with the stronger half if he just believed Mora's presentation of himself(what are the odds that he'd have witnessed the kind of things the Last Dragonborn did, the things that present Mora as at the very least not as all-knowing as he claimed)

----------


## Keltest

> Shoving off to ruin Mora's plans just means letting Miraak come to rule the world. Without Mora he's impossible* to defeat and will just grow in power as his temples are rebuilt and his ability to project his power expands. It's not exactly a viable alternative any more than letting Alduin eat the world is.
> 
> 
> *Bend Will is presented as something that can only be prevented from working on the Last Dragonborn themselves by learning it, and only two people know it. Without Mora's help Miraak can make the Dragonborn drop to his knees with a word anytime he wants.


Which gives Mora a strong bargaining position in this particular instance, but really doesnt speak to his power to affect mortals in general. The game doesnt give us any way forward with the quest short of bargaining with Mora, but that doesnt mean that in some hypothetical alternate timeline that Miraak is otherwise invincible or anything like that, and frankly the fact that failure is even theoretically an outcome would really indicate that Mora is not nearly as omniscient as he would like you to believe.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Yes to both of these points. Bring back Feather or make Fortify Carry Weight castable.


Bah. Let me reach into other dimensions to carry a ridiculous amount of crap.

And bring back Mark and Recall. And Levitate.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> So my Morowwing knowledge isn't as good as my Oblivion and Skyrim knowledge, so correct me if Sothas Sil as explcitly bargaining with the stronger half, but... That by itseld doesn't mean he's powerful, that just means that Sothas Sil didn't want him in Nirn. Again, unless there's details I'm missing, I only know what you just said in regards to this topic.


It's hard to really rank the strength of the Daedric Princes, but we know that Mehrunes Dagon and Molag Bal are the heaviest hitters and Peryite is near the bottom.

The Coldharbour Compact wasn't just a bargain though. There's a pretty strong implication that it was a threat, and one that Sotha Sil was able to make good on. When Mehrunes Dagon manifested himself and tried to invade Mournhold at the end of the First Era he got smashed and the ways between the Deadlands and Nirn were shut.

(I personally think that there's something significant about the Clockwork City and Throne Aligned that make this possible).

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> So my Morowwing knowledge isn't as good as my Oblivion and Skyrim knowledge, so correct me if Sothas Sil as explcitly bargaining with the stronger half, but... That by itseld doesn't mean he's powerful, that just means that Sothas Sil didn't want him in Nirn. Again, unless there's details I'm missing, I only know what you just said in regards to this topic.





> *You mentioned a compact with Sotha Sil?/Can you tell me more about this compact with Sotha Sil?*
> [snip]
> *What about the other Daedric Princes? Aren't there more than eight?*
> "Many more, but the Princes bound by the Coldharbour Compact stand above their lesser kith. None can match my beauty or Molag Bal's horrors. Dagon makes an art of destruction. On it goes.





> Bah. Let me reach into other dimensions to carry a ridiculous amount of crap.
> 
> And bring back Mark and Recall. And Levitate.


Yes, yes, yes and yes. And I want a summonable mount in the base game too!

----------


## Rater202

> Yes, yes, yes and yes. And I want a summonable mount in the base game too!


Okay, that makes it seem like less an issue of raw power and more an issue of what they were Princes _of._

----------


## Fyraltari

> Miraak also wasn't exactly as powerful as he thought he was.
> 
> while in term of gameplay you only gain knowledge of one word per soul, in lore absorbing a ragon's soul adds that dragon's power to your own.
> 
> Mirak starts the game with a maximum of 10 dragon souls and that's presumably including his own.
> 
> If we assume that you do the DLC in order and that you are at a minimum making a serious effort to learn the shouts if not 100% completing each aspect of the game, then you're going to have well over 60 souls at a minimum by the time you et foot on Solthheim.
> 
> Miraak, being how old he is and how he was empowered by Mora, was certain strong, but as a Dragonborn, even as the First Dragonborn, he's nothing compared to the Last Dragonborn.


Yes, The Last Dragonborn is stronger than Miraak. Not only do you beat Miraak and three dragons but you also beat the guy who beat Miraak way back when.

So?



> Yeah, but in spite of his claims, Mora didnt really instigate any of that.


Didn't he? Where do you think Miraak learned to use the All-Maker stones to brainwash the whole of Solstheim? How do you think he knew there was another dragonborn around to antagonize?



> He goes really hard trying to convince you that free will is an illusion, but at any point you have the capacity to just shove off and... not do what he wants you to, and oops, there goes his entire plan, and he can't stop you.


Yeah but if you do that, Miraak turns Solstheim into his temple and it's too late to stop him. Also, that would be running away from a fight. Something that's antithetical to your draconic soul.




> So yes. Their protection against Mora works right up until the point where they decide to stop using it due to outside reasons.


Just ignore the fact that the "outside reason" wears a mask fashionned after Mora's effigy and lives inside Mora's domain.




> Which gives Mora a strong bargaining position in this particular instance, but really doesnt speak to his power to affect mortals in general. The game doesnt give us any way forward with the quest short of bargaining with Mora, but that doesnt mean that in some hypothetical alternate timeline that Miraak is otherwise invincible or anything like that


If Miraak is allowed to escape his ritual comes into play and does... Something bad to the world ("And when the world shall listen / And when the world shall see / And when the world remembers / That world shall cease to be") and become a god or something to that effect. So it's in the dragonborn's best interest to kill him before he leaves Apocrypha. While in Apocrypha you can only reach him once Mora has given you the third word of Bend Will. SPlot contrivance? Yes, but not only. Apocrypha is Mora's domain, he shapes it as he wills. Mora is purposefully keeping you away from Miraak. Even if the game allowed you to try and scale his tower, Mora would fold pace so that you'd end up at the bottom again or something, because he's _railroading you into accepting his bargain_. 

So what's it going to be, are you going to take his deal and get a sweet power upgrade, or are you going to let this guy molest the island, abandon these people to whatever gruesome fate he has in store for them, and let him get away with sending assassins after you just because you don't want Hermaeus Mora to learn thr correct way to skin a horker?



> and frankly the fact that failure is even theoretically an outcome would really indicate that Mora is not nearly as omniscient as he would like you to believe.


Of course Mora's not omniscient, if he were he'd already know the Skaal's secrets. But he's an immortal very powerful being, who'se been collecting all manner of arcane knowlede for millenia, specializes in scrying the tides of Fate and is related to daddy-Akatosh in some way. Tread carefully.

----------


## Rater202

> Yes, The Last Dragonborn is stronger than Miraak. Not only do you beat Miraak and three dragons but you also beat the guy who beat Miraak way back when.
> 
> So?


So the Last Dragonborn has better odds of getting away with telling Mora to piss off than Miraak did.

Considering that Mora, for all his bluster,didn't do anything about Miraak until after you got involved and even then only after you already defeated him did he actually punish Miraak, I'd say the LAst Dragonborn's odds are pretty good.

I mean, the Hero of Kvatch killed the Mightiest of the Deadric Princes within said Prince's own realm as a mere mortal cosplaying a Prince(you do not actually become Sheogorath until after this.) An actual Demigod with several score dragons worth of raw power backing him up, including the aggregate power of someone who got away with betraying Mora for centuries?

----------


## Lord Raziere

> So the Last Dragonborn has better odds of getting away with telling Mora to piss off than Miraak did.
> 
> Considering that Mora, for all his bluster,didn't do anything about Miraak until after you got involved and even then only after you already defeated him did he actually punish Miraak, I'd say the LAst Dragonborn's odds are pretty good.
> 
> I mean, the Hero of Kvatch killed the Mightiest of the Deadric Princes within said Prince's own realm as a mere mortal cosplaying a Prince(you do not actually become Sheogorath until after this.) An actual Demigod with several score dragons worth of raw power backing him up, including the aggregate power of someone who got away with betraying Mora for centuries?


problem is, with how much knowledge-seeking the Last Dragonborn does (the shouts can count as well as seeking the black books, as well as the things they do at the college) its possible that this might result in mantling Hermaeus Mora.

especially since if you kill Hermaeus Mora I'd imagine it'd become real tempting to seek the knowledge of Apocrypha yourself without his interference, so to begin seeking the knowledge held within when Hermaeus Mora is dead....and to take control of Apocrypha....that would probably make you become Hermaeus Mora.

so sure, they can win but at what cost?

----------


## Rater202

> problem is, with how much knowledge-seeking the Last Dragonborn does (the shouts can count as well as seeking the black books, as well as the things they do at the college) its possible that this might result in mantling Hermaeus Mora.
> 
> especially since if you kill Hermaeus Mora I'd imagine it'd become real tempting to seek the knowledge of Apocrypha yourself without his interference, so to begin seeking the knowledge held within when Hermaeus Mora is dead....and to take control of Apocrypha....that would probably make you become Hermaeus Mora.
> 
> so sure, they can win but at what cost?


Considering that apparently, the Hero of Kvatch is only acting like Sheogorath for funzies/to honor the previous when you run into him in Skyrim, the cost is pretty low.

(though tha'ts an actor statement, not an authorial one.)

But I wasn't talking about necessarily killing Mora. Just being theoretically able to is presumably enough to get away with telling him to piss off.

----------


## Fyraltari

> So the Last Dragonborn has better odds of getting away with telling Mora to piss off than Miraak did.
> 
> Considering that Mora, for all his bluster,didn't do anything about Miraak until after you got involved and even then only after you already defeated him did he actually punish Miraak, I'd say the LAst Dragonborn's odds are pretty good.


1) There's always a bigger fish. There's absolutely no guarantee that somebody else won't show up later who can take the dragonborn in a fight. Say thirty years after the event of the game a random redgard shows up seeking vengeance against the dragonborn who killed their parents in one of their many many fights. Of course to take down such a legend that avenger would need some special power. Alas, if only the secret of the ancestral weapon of the Yokudan, the all-mighty Pankratosword were not lost to the world! Or if only there was someone who knew the secret and who were willing to bargain for it. Some sort of collector of esoteric and forgotten lore, perhaps?

2) Raw might isn't all that matters. The dragonborn still need to sleep (in theory). All it takes is one trusted friend, one skilled burglar getting into your bedroom with a letter opener and you'll be partying it up with Shor and Ysgramor. Wuulfarth Ash-King was, arguably, even mightier than the Last Dragonborn and what good did it do him in his new carrer as a glorified battery?




> I mean, the Hero of Kvatch killed the Mightiest of the Deadric Princes within said Prince's own realm as a mere mortal cosplaying a Prince(you do not actually become Sheogorath until after this.)


Err, no? For one Jyggalag is very much alive, he chats you up after the fight. For two, he was mid-transformation at that moment and therefore running at half-strength at best. For three, you're almost done Mantling Sheogorath at this point (All of the Isles have sworn loyalty to you, you're wielding his staff, you've maintained  the mecanisms of the place, you've relieved the events of Arden-Sul's life who is related to Sheogorath's origins in some way). This fight is the Deadric esuivalent of a guy having an argument in his head.



> An actual Demigod with several score dragons worth of raw power backing him up, including the aggregate power of someone who got away with betraying Mora for centuries?


Say how long has Miraak actually been going rogue (for as much as "long" majes sense in Oblivion), because I got the impression this was a relatively recent thing and that in the meantime he had been earning his stay in Apocrypha.

----------


## Rater202

> Err, no? For one Jyggalag is very much alive, he chats you up after the fight. For two, he was mid-transformation at that moment and therefore running at half-strength at best. For three, you're almost done Mantling Sheogorath at this point (All of the Isles have sworn loyalty to you, you're wielding his staff, you've maintained  the mecanisms of the place, you've relieved the events of Arden-Sul's life who is related to Sheogorath's origins in some way). This fight is the Deadric esuivalent of a guy having an argument in his head.


Counterpoint: You don't actually gain any of Sheogorath's power until after his point. You're Walking like the Mad God, but he isn't Walking like you yet. He can't, he's too busy walking like Jyggalag, being that he's returned to being Jyggalag.

You don't properly become Sheogorath until you're the only one who _can_ be Sheogorath. Because once you defeat Jyggalag and the cycle of the Greymarch is broken the orignal Sheogorath is just flat out gone forever except in the form of Jyggalag's memories of being cursed into that state.

Furthermore: Jyygalag refers to himself as wandering the Waters of Oblivion. Which is also how the Saint and Seducers describe themselves in between the points where they are slain and when they reform. Jyggalag is about as dead as a Deadra can be: Which as I understand t is more dead than an Aedra can be, but significantly less dead than a mortal can be. He'll presumably regain physical form _eventually_, but.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Counterpoint: You don't actually gain any of Sheogorath's power until after his point. You're Walking like the Mad God, but he isn't Walking like you yet. He can't, he's too busy walking like Jyggalag, being that he's returned to being Jyggalag.


If we follow this logic the HoK never becomes Sheoggorath because Sheo is forever walking like Jyggalag, now.




> You don't properly become Sheogorath until you're the only one who _can_ be Sheogorath.


And he's nit properly Jyggalag yet, so it evens out.





> Furthermore: Jyygalag refers to himself as wandering the Waters of Oblivion. Which is also how the Saint and Seducers describe themselves in between the points where they are slain and when they reform. Jyggalag is about as dead as a Deadra can be: Which as I understand t is more dead than an Aedra can be, but significantly less dead than a mortal can be. He'll presumably regain physical form _eventually_, but.


That's less dead and more "in the time-out box". Dude's fine. Better than he's been in literal ages, in fact.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Yes, yes, yes and yes. And I want a summonable mount in the base game too!


Arvaak was the best part of all DLC.




> Considering that apparently, the Hero of Kvatch is only acting like Sheogorath for funzies/to honor the previous when you run into him in Skyrim, the cost is pretty low.


I've mentioned it before, but when I ran through all the games recently, I decided that all of the heroes were the same person.

The Eternal Champion became the Agent. The Agent was sent to Morrowind as the Nerevarine. The Nerevarine returned to Cyrodil and became the Hero of Kvatch, who became Sheogorath... who woke up on the border of Skyrim, getting arrested.

And I attribute it to a curse from Jagar Tharn, just before you killed him.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Okay, that makes it seem like less an issue of raw power and more an issue of what they were Princes _of._


Stand above their lesser kith is pretty clear on what shes talking about, actually.




> Say how long has Miraak actually been going rogue (for as much as "long" majes sense in Oblivion), because I got the impression this was a relatively recent thing and that in the meantime he had been earning his stay in Apocrypha.


I had been under the impression hed been doing it for a while, but that Mora had just been allowing it - I acknowledge its been a while since I played through Dragonborn though.

----------


## Rater202

> Stand above their lesser kith is pretty clear on what shes talking about, actually.


By itself, yes.

But followed by "none match my beauty" etcetera is makes it seem like "stand above the rest" refers to domains, not raw power. Those domains put them above the other princes.

Ang again, even if it is raw power what are the odds that Sotaas Sil saw the kind of things we saw that prove that Mora isn't as powerful or all-knowing as he claims he is.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Ang again, even if it is raw power what are the odds that Sotaas Sil saw the kind of things we saw that prove that Mora isn't as powerful or all-knowing as he claims he is.


Pretty high. Sotha Sil is an alumnus of the Psijjic Order, a living god, a scientific genius and experienced traveller of Oblivion. I say he's much more aware of the nature of the Aurbis and its residents than any other on Tamriel.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Pretty high. Sotha Sil is an alumnus of the Psijjic Order, a living god, a scientific genius and experienced traveller of Oblivion. I say he's much more aware of the nature of the Aurbis and its residents than any other on Tamriel.


Adding to that, he correctly predicted Almalexia was going to murder him centuries before it happened.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Adding to that, he correctly predicted Almalexia was going to murder him centuries before it happened.


However, the quote you pulled to justify the Princes included within the Compact being mightier than the others is not from Sotha Sil, but (I'm guessing), from Azura. Talking themselves up is expected from the Princes. We would need another source as to why Sil dealt with these eight and not the others. Maybe had no leverage on the others.

It may be that these eight are of particular interest to the Dunmer: Molag Bal, Malacath, Sheogorath and Mehrunes Dagon, that's the entire House of Troubles included ; Azura and Boethia that's two of the Good Daedra, why is Mephala not included? maybe there is no pact the web-Spinner cannot find a loophole in ; Hircine and Herma-Mora that is more difficult to explain, but the two of them have a particular presence on Solstheim, was it already part of Morrowind at the time?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> However, the quote you pulled to justify the Princes included within the Compact being mightier than the others is not from Sotha Sil, but (I'm guessing), from Azura. Talking themselves up is expected from the Princes. We would need another source as to why Sil dealt with these eight and not the others. Maybe had no leverage on the others.


Themselves sure, but not _each other._

Also he loops in Mephala and Clavicus Vile during the Summerset main quest. So, not an issue of having no leverage.

Solstheim SFAIK was Nord up until the Nords gave it to the Dunmer after the Red Year. That said it hasnt been added in ESO yet, and with the Ebonheart Pact in effect, I would say its ambiguous as to whose hands its in as of the Second Era.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Themselves sure, but not _each other._


I can totally see Azura talk a colleague up to trash-talk another.




> Also he loops in Mephala and Clavicus Vile during the Summerset main quest. So, not an issue of having no leverage.


Huh. I haven't played any ESO, so I don't know much about what goes on over there. Maybe the situation changed somehow.




> Solstheim SFAIK was Nord up until the Nords gave it to the Dunmer after the Red Year. That said it hasnt been added in ESO yet, and with the Ebonheart Pact in effect, I would say its ambiguous as to whose hands its in as of the Second Era.


Oh right, it being introduced in a _Morrowind_ DLC tripped me up. Yeah, I guess there's no connection there.

----------


## Imbalance

> Bah. Let me reach into other dimensions to carry a ridiculous amount of crap.
> 
> And bring back Mark and Recall. And Levitate.


And spears.  And throwing weapons.  And separate armor pieces.  And damage attribute spells.




> Arvaak was the best part of all DLC.
> 
> 
> 
> I've mentioned it before, but when I ran through all the games recently, I decided that all of the heroes were the same person.
> 
> The Eternal Champion became the Agent. The Agent was sent to Morrowind as the Nerevarine. The Nerevarine returned to Cyrodil and became the Hero of Kvatch, who became Sheogorath... who woke up on the border of Skyrim, getting arrested.
> 
> And I attribute it to a curse from Jagar Tharn, just before you killed him.


I get along with this headcanon.  Only, I'd say that the time line is not necessarily so linear for the Hero.  CHIM's been playing more racing games lately, but will likely dip back into Skyrim before starting Oblivion again.

----------


## Eldan

Not too far from canon, if you consider that they are all incarnations of the Hero Archtype, and at least share powers.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Arvaak was the best part of all DLC.
> 
> 
> 
> I've mentioned it before, but when I ran through all the games recently, I decided that all of the heroes were the same person.
> 
> The Eternal Champion became the Agent. The Agent was sent to Morrowind as the Nerevarine. The Nerevarine returned to Cyrodil and became the Hero of Kvatch, who became Sheogorath... who woke up on the border of Skyrim, getting arrested.
> 
> And I attribute it to a curse from Jagar Tharn, just before you killed him.


I think I have asked you before, but then how do you headcanon the Last Dragonborn and Sheogorath's meeting? Or the Hero of Kvatch not being able to wear the Amulet of Kings?

----------


## Rater202

> I think I have asked you before, but then how do you headcanon the Last Dragonborn and Sheogorath's meeting? Or the Hero of Kvatch not being able to wear the Amulet of Kings?


I believe it's pseudo-canon that there's more than one kind of Dragonborn and that the Septims were the other kind.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I believe it's pseudo-canon that there's more than one kind of Dragonborn and that the Septims were the other kind.


The dragonblood versus the dragon soul, yes I know. Except that The Last Dragonborn uses their blood to open Sky Haven Temple, strongly indicating that they posses the dragonblood as well.

It seems to me that, with the exception of Reman I and Tiber Septim, the Dragonborn Emperors were not true dragonborns, but simply received a portion of the blessing of Miraak and the others, that being the dragonblood which is all that's needed to wear the Amulet and lit the dragonfires.

----------


## Keltest

> The dragonblood versus the dragon soul, yes I know. Except that The Last Dragonborn uses their blood to open Sky Haven Temple, strongly indicating that they posses the dragonblood as well.
> 
> It seems to me that, with the exception of Reman I and Tiber Septim, the Dragonborn Emperors were not true dragonborns, but simply received a portion of the blessing of Miraak and the others, that being the dragonblood which is all that's needed to wear the Amulet and lit the dragonfires.


Given the absence of dragons and the fact that they already have an empire conquered, I dont know that there would actually be any way to tell the difference. Maybe see if Martin and Uriel collected random assortments of crap to haul around everywhere they go?

----------


## Eldan

I mean, from a purely outside perspective, this is just another case of "We changed the background between games". Until Skyrim, being dragonborn didn't come with powers. Until Morrowind, Cyrodiil was a jungle. Same thing. 

Funnily enough, the Septims aren't even descended from Tiber Septim directly. They are descended from his brother, because Tiber's line died out very early when his son and/or Grandson (sources disagree) Pelagius I was assassinated after only three years on the throne.

----------


## Keltest

> I mean, from a purely outside perspective, this is just another case of "We changed the background between games". Until Skyrim, being dragonborn didn't come with powers. Until Morrowind, Cyrodiil was a jungle. Same thing. 
> 
> Funnily enough, the Septims aren't even descended from Tiber Septim directly. They are descended from his brother, because Tiber's line died out very early when his son and/or Grandson (sources disagree) Pelagius I was assassinated after only three years on the throne.


Which is a little hard to square with the loading screen message that says they are directly descended.

----------


## Grim Portent

We've done the Dragonborn (LDB and Miraak) vs Dragonborn/Dragonblooded (Septim dynasty) vs Dragon-Born (Nerevarine) discussion a few times before haven't we?

As I recall we've never really had any evidence for them being the same thing or for them being the same/similar names used for various different concepts.

Personally I favour them being different things, it's not like people are infallible in universe, sometimes they use the wrong terms to describe things or use conversational language to talk about things. It's really a matter of personal interpretation until we get more evidence, which we likely won't given that all the various Dragonborn are going to be dead or missing in the next game.


Meta answer is of course that the Skyrim version of Dragonborn was made to make the Thu'um (which I think was mentioned in prior background elements) usable as a gameplay mechanic and to do a Chosen One plot, so it not fitting in with prior lore isn't something to get hung up on.

----------


## Keltest

Worth pointing out, the Blades at least seem to think its the same thing. The Dragonguard, their predecessors, served the various emperors precisely because they were Dragonborn.

----------


## Mark Hall

> And spears.  And throwing weapons.  And separate armor pieces.  And damage attribute spells.


The Fort Firemoth in Morrowind became INCREDIBLY easy if you have a Damage Intelligence spell. It shut down casters so hard, by making them dumb as a post.

As an aside from all the Lore talk, has anyone else played Blades? I started it a couple days ago and am enjoying it, but I also haven't gotten far and am not engaging with online features.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> As an aside from all the Lore talk, has anyone else played Blades? I started it a couple days ago and am enjoying it, but I also haven't gotten far and am not engaging with online features.


I played it a little bit years ago. It was really shallow and repetitive, has it gotten better?

----------


## Mark Hall

> I played it a little bit years ago. It was really shallow and repetitive, has it gotten better?


Nah, shallow and repetitive is a pretty good description.

----------


## DigoDragon

> Bah. Let me reach into other dimensions to carry a ridiculous amount of crap.


I just got a hold of this magical backpack from the Legacy of the Dragonborn; +200 carry weight and I can pull myself into it where there's a tent with a bed and storage space. Never have to go home for days.

----------


## Mark Hall

> I just got a hold of this magical backpack from the Legacy of the Dragonborn; +200 carry weight and I can pull myself into it where there's a tent with a bed and storage space. Never have to go home for days.


I am weird about mods.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Nah, shallow and repetitive is a pretty good description.


Pity.  :Small Frown: 




> I just got a hold of this magical backpack from the Legacy of the Dragonborn; +200 carry weight and I can pull myself into it where there's a tent with a bed and storage space. Never have to go home for days.


Reminds me of a different mod (I want to say it was called Bags and Bandoliers but its been ages so I might be wrong) that let you craft extra carry space - little satchels and belt pouches and so on. It was useful and had the added benefit of letting you customize your outfit more, so for example my assassin could have a little bandolier of poisons over his armor. Something like that would be cool in Elder Scrolls 6.

----------


## Lord Raziere

I got a mod to have like 70,000 carry weight long time ago, +200 is nothing to me. even though its real hard to go through the menus to get what I want, I still prefer it to having to do constant inventory management every few minutes.

----------


## Rynjin

I don't go quite that far, but I do make use of the Deep Storage spell that Apocalypse provides.

----------


## Eldan

I use the "Summon Chest" spell in every Elder Scrolls game.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Which is a little hard to square with the loading screen message that says they are directly descended.


Since _A Brief History of the Empire_ is still in the game and isn't modified, I take it as the loading screens going for clarity before accuracy.



> Worth pointing out, the Blades at least seem to think its the same thing. The Dragonguard, their predecessors, served the various emperors precisely because they were Dragonborn.


Well Reman I was a full-on dragonborn and, I think, he went dragon-hunting with them. I guess they just got used to serving under the Emperor from then on. It's notnlike there was much else for them to do with only three surviving dragons (Nafaahlar, Mirulmnir and Paarthunax) and generally no other dragonborn around to compete with the Emperor for their loyalty*. Note that they kept serving the Empire under the Medes who don't even pretend to be dragonblooded until the Great War. 

Does anyone know what they were up to under the Akaviri Potentates, Longhouse Emperors and generally the whole Interregnum?



> As an aside from all the Lore talk, has anyone else played Blades? I started it a couple days ago and am enjoying it, but I also haven't gotten far and am not engaging with online features.


Talking about a game in a gaming thread? How novel!

*And now I wonder what would have happened if Mankar Camoran had just strolled into Cloud Ruler Temple with the Amulet of Kings around his neck claiming the Blades were honour-bound to obey him.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Does anyone know what they were up to under the Akaviri Potentates, Longhouse Emperors and generally the whole Interregnum?


Short answer: they splintered.

Slightly longer answer:
At least part of them started the spy network that eventually became the Blades of the Third Era. (Imperial City DLC)Some of them continued the long tradition of Dragon slaying after a Dragon infestation occurred in Elsweyr (Northern and Southern Elsweyr DLCs)Our friend from the Remanada, Chevalier Renald, continued to look for a Dragonborn. (Moongrave Fane dungeon DLC)

----------


## Keltest

> Well Reman I was a full-on dragonborn and, I think, he went dragon-hunting with them. I guess they just got used to serving under the Emperor from then on. It's notnlike there was much else for them to do with only three surviving dragons (Nafaahlar, Mirulmnir and Paarthunax) and generally no other dragonborn around to compete with the Emperor for their loyalty*. Note that they kept serving the Empire under the Medes who don't even pretend to be dragonblooded until the Great War.


Well, is there any actual evidence of the Septims not being full Dragonborn then? So far as I'm aware the games never actually draw any kind of distinction.

----------


## Eldan

As far as I know, there's no evidence of any septims ever shouting or slaying dragons, after Tiber himself. The Voice was always referred to as the power of the Nords, and the Septims were very bound to Cyrodiil. 

Of course, this is partially once again old lore weirdness. The first edition guide to the Empire also said there were dragons nesting in White-Gold Tower, with the implication that one of the reasons the Empire has a dragon as their emblem is that they have literal dragons guarding the Imperial City. Daggerfall says that some of the temples of Akatosh keep dragons, too, in Cyrodiil.

----------


## Keltest

> As far as I know, there's no evidence of any septims ever shouting or slaying dragons, after Tiber himself. The Voice was always referred to as the power of the Nords, and the Septims were very bound to Cyrodiil. 
> 
> Of course, this is partially once again old lore weirdness. The first edition guide to the Empire also said there were dragons nesting in White-Gold Tower, with the implication that one of the reasons the Empire has a dragon as their emblem is that they have literal dragons guarding the Imperial City. Daggerfall says that some of the temples of Akatosh keep dragons, too, in Cyrodiil.


There also werent many dragons after Tiber, were there?

----------


## GloatingSwine

> There also werent many dragons after Tiber, were there?


Technically there was supposed to be one in Daggerfall, but he was cut content. Sprite is still in the files though.

The problem with dragons though is that there aren't any until suddenly there are. And then things get *really* inconvenient.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> As far as I know, there's no evidence of any septims ever shouting or slaying dragons, after Tiber himself.


That doesnt mean much though. The _player character_ never did any Shouting or dragon slaying pre-Skyrim, and look how that turned out.

----------


## InvisibleBison

> That doesnt mean much though. The _player character_ never did any Shouting or dragon slaying pre-Skyrim, and look how that turned out.


Have any of the pre-Skyrim player characters been established to be dragonborn?

----------


## Fyraltari

> Short answer: they splintered.
> 
> Slightly longer answer:
> [LIST][*]At least part of them started the spy network that eventually became the Blades of the Third Era. (Imperial City DLC)


They worked for the Reachmen?



> Well, is there any actual evidence of the Septims not being full Dragonborn then? So far as I'm aware the games never actually draw any kind of distinction.


Most of the Emperors didn't really behave like someone with an obsessive need to conquer and dominate. Only one of thr Septim (Uriel V) even tried to expand the Empire after Tiber even though Pyandonea and Thras are pretty close. Hell, Antochius had defeated the Maormer navy and he didn't attempt to conquer their land? They habe coffers that produce gold out of nothing!



> Originally Posted by Kareeah_Indaga
> 
> 
> That doesnt mean much though. The _player character_ never did any Shouting or dragon slaying pre-Skyrim, and look how that turned out.
> 
> 
> Have any of the pre-Skyrim player characters been established to be dragonborn?


I think Kareeah_Indaga means that The Last Dragonborn went their entire life without doing anything Thu'um related until Helgen.

Edit: Also, about your question: we know for a fact the Agent (from _Daggerfall_) can't be Dragonborn because in the (cut?) ending where they try to use the Numidium for themself, they can't control it. Likewise the Champion of Cyrodiil cannot wear the Amulet of Kings, so they aren't dragonborn either. Meanwhile the Nerevarine is said to be "dragon-born" but that's likely prophecy-speech for "born in the lands of the Empire".

Edit2: Oh, and Cyrus the Restless kills Nafaalilargus* without absorbing his soul, so he's not dragonborn either, but he's already the Hoon Ding, so whatever.

*Would be nice if he'd show up in TESVI

----------


## Keltest

> Most of the Emperors didn't really behave like someone with an obsessive need to conquer and dominate. Only one of thr Septim (Uriel V) even tried to expand the Empire after Tiber even though Pyandonea and Thras are pretty close. Hell, Antochius had defeated the Maormer navy and he didn't attempt to conquer their land? They habe coffers that produce gold out of nothing!


Most of the emperors already conquered and dominated. Hence the title. Being Dragonborn doesnt make them stupid or anything, every single expedition to Akavir has ended disastrously, and the Empire has always had plenty of problems at home.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Most of the emperors already conquered and dominated. Hence the title.


I mean not really? For all the talks of Tiber Septim's exploits, the Empire is less an absolute monarchy and more a confederation of semi-independent states who are at actual war with one another half of the time. And that's even before you factor in that Hammerfall and Morrowind both had special freedoms that the other provinces don't enjoy and that imperial officials have no clue what's going on in most of the Black Marsh.

If the emperors had dragonsouls I'd expect most of them to have tried a lot harder to impose Imperial rule and curtail the powers of the local kings and jarls and whatnot.



> Being Dragonborn doesnt make them stupid or anything, every single expedition to Akavir has ended disastrously,
>  and the Empire has always had plenty of problems at home.


Yep, all one of them did. They only ever teied once.

And I brought up Thras and Pyandonea for a reason, you know. They are both far more accessible (if memory serves, it was the lack of supply lines that really doomed Uriel V's expedition) and less powerful. Thras was utterly trounced by the All-Flags Navy and that was before the Empire. An Emperor could easily have organized an attempt to conquer it with the combined might of Tamriel. This would have been a great way to tie the Provinces together, even, common ennemy and all.

And like I said, Antiochus (one of Potema's brothers) had already beaten the Pyandonean fleet and yet didn't push his advantage. He was content with a defensive war. Add to that that both the Sloads and the Maormer are recurring threats to the Altmer and the Empire would even habe had the backing of the largest internal opposition group to this.

----------


## Mark Hall

I maintain that all of the emperors are Dragonborn, just without any dragons around to absorb the souls of; urges can be controlled, after all, and I think "I am Emperor of an entire continent" might satiate the dragonish desires a bit. There are counter arguments, to be sure, but until the WOG says otherwise, that's my position.

----------


## Keltest

> I maintain that all of the emperors are Dragonborn, just without any dragons around to absorb the souls of; urges can be controlled, after all, and I think "I am Emperor of an entire continent" might satiate the dragonish desires a bit. There are counter arguments, to be sure, but until the WOG says otherwise, that's my position.


Ditto. Running an empire, even one that isnt an absolute monarchy, takes time and energy.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I maintain that all of the emperors are Dragonborn, just without any dragons around to absorb the souls of; urges can be controlled, after all, and I think "I am Emperor of an entire continent" might satiate the dragonish desires a bit. There are counter arguments, to be sure, but until the WOG says otherwise, that's my position.


Completely reasonnable, have a nice day.

----------


## Vinyadan

Before I read the info that was posted earlier from ESO, I assumed the Blades from Skyrim to simply be impostors: that they were in the Secret Service, it got axed, and, instead of disbanding, they reinvented the purpose of their order to justify its survival by "rediscovering" a whole new mythology. After all, none of the books about the Dragonguard were around in the Third Era, so it could have been a later fabrication.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> They worked for the Reachmen?


How in the Mundus do you get that from what I wrote??? Regardless, no, not as far as Im aware at any rate.




> I think Kareeah_Indaga means that The Last Dragonborn went their entire life without doing anything Thu'um related until Helgen.


Yes, this.

----------


## Fyraltari

> How in the Mundus do you get that from what I wrote??? Regardless, no, not as far as Im aware at any rate.


For a few decades before the beginning of ESO, Cyrodiil and "the Empire" were ruled by the Longhouse Emperors, a dynasty of Reachmen (the high point of the Reach's history, really), so if the Blades were building the Empire's secret service at the time...

----------


## Keltest

> Before I read the info that was posted earlier from ESO, I assumed the Blades from Skyrim to simply be impostors: that they were in the Secret Service, it got axed, and, instead of disbanding, they reinvented the purpose of their order to justify its survival by "rediscovering" a whole new mythology. After all, none of the books about the Dragonguard were around in the Third Era, so it could have been a later fabrication.


I kind of hated that sudden shift to be honest. It felt really out of left field. The Blades were actually always dragon hunters for hundreds of years after the dragons vanished to the point where they kill dragons just for the sake of it 2 minutes after they return and prove themselves sapient?

And to try and rope you into it as if you need their help and not the reverse? What is with that?

----------


## Fyraltari

> I kind of hated that sudden shift to be honest. It felt really out of left field. The Blades were actually always dragon hunters for hundreds of years after the dragons vanished to the point where they kill dragons just for the sake of it 2 minutes after they return and prove themselves sapient?
> 
> And to try and rope you into it as if you need their help and not the reverse? What is with that?


I think it makes sense. For the first time in twenty years, Esbern and Delphine get to believe that the Order they dedicated their lives to, and whose members likely included many of their friends who died, that Order, rather than being an abject, pointless, failure that will die in shame with them, has a purpose.
They're not going to let go of it easily.

Edit: It does come out of nowhere and is absolutely not explained in the game, though.

----------


## Rater202

I'm just kind of ticked that the game just assumes that you'll do what they say and kill PArthunaax. The only way to resolve that Quest is to do it.

and they're supposed to be the ones sworn to sere you? Yeah? You do all the work to rebuild them and then they make an unreasonable demand and there's nothing you can do about it.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> I'm just kind of ticked that the game just assumes that you'll do what they say and kill PArthunaax. The only way to resolve that Quest is to do it.
> 
> and they're supposed to be the ones sworn to sere you? Yeah? You do all the work to rebuild them and then they make an unreasonable demand and there's nothing you can do about it.


there is a reason why one of the most popular quest skyrim mods on Nexus is a mod to simply NOT kill Paarthurnax. literally all it does, but its second only in popularity to legacy of the dragonborn which is one of the largest skyrim mods ever made.

----------


## Eldan

> Have any of the pre-Skyrim player characters been established to be dragonborn?


Well, no, because before the game Skyrim came out, "Dragonborn" meant "Member of the Imperial family".

----------


## GloatingSwine

> For a few decades before the beginning of ESO, Cyrodiil and "the Empire" were ruled by the Longhouse Emperors, a dynasty of Reachmen (the high point of the Reach's history, really), so if the Blades were building the Empire's secret service at the time...


They weren't working for the Longhouse Emperors or any of the other pretenders, they were working behind the scenes to keep things ready for what they regarded as a "true" emperor to return.

----------


## Vinyadan

> I'm just kind of ticked that the game just assumes that you'll do what they say and kill PArthunaax. The only way to resolve that Quest is to do it.
> 
> and they're supposed to be the ones sworn to sere you? Yeah? You do all the work to rebuild them and then they make an unreasonable demand and there's nothing you can do about it.


All of Skyrim is littered with quests that could only be completed by doing something I didn't like. You find an orphan in an empty house doing dark rituals, and you can't do anything about it, except killing an old woman for him. You meet the Redguards looking for the woman, and you can't do any investigation, you just have to trust one side without any reason. You want to quest as a warrior, you'd better be ready to be a furball. Molag Bal just entraps you. And in general, frequently the game pushes evil behaviour as your only choice if you want either to see the end of the narrative on a quest, or gain some mechanical advantages. See daedric quests like Dagon's, Namira's, Boethiah's, Mephala's, Molag Bal's.




> Well, no, because before the game Skyrim came out,  "Dragonborn" meant "Member of the Imperial family".


I more or less understood it as "someone who has the divine mandate to rule". The Empire is represented as something sacred, both through how it defined itself (the empire is law- the law is sacred) and through its history, with Saint Alessia and her covenant with Akatosh, then with Talos becoming a true god, and also though Uriel's wisdom and premonition, and even through something barely noticeable like the fact that, according to the Dunmer Temple, Dagoth Ur had to seriously consider the Empire in his plans and had reason for anxiety in the fact that the Nerevarine had been selected and sent by the Emperor himself. Imperial succession even grants mortals safety from the Daedra; overall, the Empire as an entity becomes transcendent and surpasses its mere political and administrative functions.
More or less concidentally, the symbol of the Empire is a dragon, Talos looked like a dragon to the Nords, Akatosh is a dragon, all things that lead to calling the rightful emperor "dragonborn" instead of, I don't know, "purpleborn".

----------


## Rater202

> All of Skyrim is littered with quests that could only be completed by doing something I didn't like. You find an orphan in an empty house doing dark rituals, and you can't do anything about it, except killing an old woman for him. You meet the Redguards looking for the woman, and you can't do any investigation, you just have to trust one side without any reason. You want to quest as a warrior, you'd better be ready to be a furball. Molag Bal just entraps you. And in general, frequently the game pushes evil behaviour as your only choice if you want either to see the end of the narrative on a quest, or gain some mechanical advantages. See daedric quests like Dagon's, Namira's, Boethiah's, Mephala's, Molag Bal's.


Yeah, but those are sidequests. You don't have to do the things to trigger them.

Te main quest of the game brings you into contact with both the Greybeards and the Blades, and then makes you choose between them... And doens't give you the option to choose one of them.

----------


## veti

> Yeah, but those are sidequests. You don't have to do the things to trigger them.


Well, many of them are very hard to avoid.

The Redguards, for instance, accost you when you return to Whiterun after killing the first dragon. You've got bigger things on your mind, but they forcegreet you anyway. Vigilant Tyrannus is as bad - if you walk up the main street of Markarth, there's no avoiding him. (You can avoid him by religiously avoiding that street, but that requires extra, excuse the pun, vigilance and foreknowledge.) There's that stupid dog in Falkreath, And so on. The place is littered with quest hooks that embed themselves in your journal and will. Not. Let. Go. until you do some damn' stupid thing to get rid of them. That's why I went to the trouble of writing a mod to simply delete them from the game.

'Paarthunax' is a sidequest too. You absolutely don't have to do it to complete the main quest. Yes, it does hook itself into your journal and will sit there forever, but it will have plenty of company.

----------


## Vinyadan

The funny part is that, when Ranis Athrys (the Mages Guild steward in Balmora) gave you morally questionable orders, Morrowind gave you the option to let your targets live and finish the quests by lying, and then to ruin her by declaring her a spy. Let's assume you faked Paarthurnax's death. How are the Blades going to verify the truth of what you said? They didn't even know P. existed. And, if your lie was revealed later, you have some pretty good argument to put forward for it: not pitting two allies against each other at a time of dire need for Skyrim.

----------


## Triaxx

Am... am I the only person capable of just ignoring the existence of quests? Just... yeah, not doing that, and continuing on with whatever I was actually doing?

That said I'll admit to using the console to disable the Redguard chumps and the one in Markarth that bugs me after I've saved the lady from the jerk. Fear my god like powers to left-click>disable people from existence!

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Am... am I the only person capable of just ignoring the existence of quests? Just... yeah, not doing that, and continuing on with whatever I was actually doing?


No, my first ever Skyrim character responded to that quest by never speaking to the Blades _or_ the Greybeards ever again and running off to join the Thieves Guild. Its just Bethesda trying to force an arbitrary binary choice into the game with no meaningful consequences, since you dont need _either_ group anymore at that point - dragons spawn often enough you dont need the dragon hunting quests for souls, and there are a finite number of Shouts in the game so if you poke around in enough ancient Nord ruins youll find them eventually.




> Let's assume you faked Paarthurnax's death. How are the Blades going to verify the truth of what you said? They didn't even know P. existed.


Youd need to get Paarthurnaxs buy-in for that because he leaves the mountain at the end of the main quest. Pretending you killed him would require him to lay low and/or take off for distant parts of Nirn. Otherwise there would be non-zero odds the Blades would find out by running into him.

----------


## Caelestion

The dog in Falkreath is particularly bad.  The blacksmith won't even talk to you until you talk to the dog, because heaven forbid that you _insult_ the quest writer by refusing to start that quest every damn time you play the game.

----------


## Fyraltari

The odd part is that you can tell arngeir you have no intention of killing Paarthurnax. Feels like that should end the quest right there.

Molag Bal's siqe quest is pretty terrible too, not only is there no way out once you've started it, but you get absolutely no warning of what you're getting into.

Namira's quest you can actually turn down by repeatedly telling no to the cultist who talks to you in the graveyard, but if you don't refuse from the very first dialog option, you're stuck.



> The funny part is that, when Ranis Athrys (the Mages Guild steward in Balmora) gave you morally questionable orders, Morrowind gave you the option to let your targets live and finish the quests by lying, and then to ruin her by declaring her a spy.


Imagine that, a roleplaying game where the player can make choices. What a concept.
you don't refuse from the very first dialog option, you're stuck.



> Let's assume you faked Paarthurnax's death. How are the Blades going to verify the truth of what you said? They didn't even know P. existed. And, if your lie was revealed later, you have some pretty good argument to put forward for it: not pitting two allies against each other at a time of dire need for Skyrim.


They did know about Paarthurnax actually, that book in Sky Haven Temple reads:



> Paarthurnax - The legendary lieutenant of Alduin in the Dragon War. He is now known to lair on the Throat of the World under the protection of the Greybeards of High Hrothgar. Master Araidh continues the established policy of avoiding direct confrontation with the Greybeards while waiting for an opportunity to exact justice upon him.





> Am... am I the only person capable of just ignoring the existence of quests? Just... yeah, not doing that, and continuing on with whatever I was actually doing?


No, but it's annoying. Unfinished business is what it is.

----------


## DigoDragon

> You want to quest as a warrior, you'd better be ready to be a furball.


If you play as a khajiit, you can be both. :3


I guess ignoring quests does come with the problem of having a questlog full of annoyance. Having a way to organize quests into folders or something would be useful.

----------


## Rater202

To be fair, regarding Namira's quest... It's entirely possible for you to get the Priest there as a "sacrifice..." And then slaughter all of the Cannibals in Markarth while they think they're on your side.

Now, granted, some of them are shopkeeps in the city and I'm not sure that all of them get replaced but I don't think any of them sell anything unique.

----------


## Triaxx

Do any shopkeepers sell anything unique?

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Do any shopkeepers sell anything unique?


.....I don't think so. I've played about 579 hours of skyrim, and while I can't guarantee that I've checked every merchant, I'm pretty sure I would've encountered one of them selling something unique at some point, which I doubt because their inventory tends to change like, every once in a while with new random things you can buy from them depending on rng and how leveled you are. so all the items they sell are not unique in the slightest, some are just rarer and more valuable like daedra hearts or grand soul gems. another way I'm sure there isn't anything unique to what shopkeepers sell is that, well, unique things in skyrim tend to be quest related either as a vital thing for a quest or as a reward from one. the few uniques that aren't tend to be things you find in a fixed location....that often has a quest associated with it even if its technically not related to the quest itself. a unique being sold by a shopkeep would therefore would probably to be apart of a quest and....I don't recall any quests to go buy a unique from a shopkeep. in fact I think I end up accumulating a lot of gold simply because there is nothing you can get from a shopkeep that you can't get just by looting off random enemies and dungeons, and that I hardly use the barter skill unless I actively think about it because you can heal with magic, rest off the mana then go to the next dungeon/quest or whatever and if you need potions you probably have enough acquired from other dungeons that its not a problem. shopkeeps are mainly useful for nothing but offloading junk cluttering up my inventory and maybe getting rare ores/daedra hearts for crafting depending on which one your talking about.

----------


## InvisibleBison

> Do any shopkeepers sell anything unique?


The only thing that comes to mind is master-level spell tomes, but then I recall finding one of those inside a Black Book, so maybe not.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Do any shopkeepers sell anything unique?


Yes, only two iirc. Both Dunmer. One is the pawnshop dealer that sells a unique (but pointless) named circlet. It's extremely rare(as in , for it to show up in his inventory). More annoying to get then a Necklace of Poison Resistance. 

The other is in the Dragonborn DLC, but a bug makes him equip the Glass Bow of the Staag Prince, so you need the Merchat perk to buy it from him.

All the Creation Club add ins really bloated some of the merchants, making it harder to find certain items.  It's really noticeable in Radiant Raiment.

----------


## veti

> Do any shopkeepers sell anything unique?


The merchants in Castle Dawnguard each have some wares you won't find anywhere else. And there are a couple more on Solstheim. In particular, the guy near the mushroom tower, with the pet silt strider, sells one of the doohickeys you need to explore the dwemer dungeon in the middle of the island.

As for the cannibals in Markarth - the storekeeper is immediately replaced by her assistant. There's also the dog trainer from the stables, and he isn't replaced, so if you want a dog named Vigilance - who's probably been raised on human meat - you'll be out of luck.

----------


## Vinyadan

> There's also the dog trainer from the stables, and he isn't replaced, so if you want a dog named Vigilance - who's probably been raised on human meat - you'll be out of luck.


Maybe he was raised on dog meat instead  :Small Cool:

----------


## Grim Portent

> Maybe he was raised on dog meat instead


IIRC during the feast the trainer actually comments on how his dogs are so fierce because he trains them with human meat.

Similarly the shopkeeper implies they ate her husband and the meat vendor implies he sells human meat at his stall under the pretence of it being animal meat.

----------


## GloatingSwine

This is why you should always play an Argonian. 

It's not cannibalism if you're only eating dryskins.

----------


## Fyraltari

> This is why you should always play an Argonian. 
> 
> It's not cannibalism if you're only eating dryskins.


Khajiit: It's not cannibalism if Khajiit only eats smoothskin.

Mer: Cannibalism is eating other people. Lorkhan-spawns aren't "people".

----------


## Aeson

> Khajiit: It's not cannibalism if Khajiit only eats smoothskin.
> 
> Mer: Cannibalism is eating other people. Lorkhan-spawns aren't "people".


Bosmer fundamentalist: Cannibalism? If I killed them, it's a sacred duty.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Bosmer fundamentalist: Cannibalism? If I killed them, it's a sacred duty.


What IS the position of Namira in Bosmer culture, then? Anyone know?

----------


## Rater202

> What IS the position of Namira in Bosmer culture, then? Anyone know?


Namira isn't the Prince of Cannibalism, she's the Prince of shadow spirits, repulsive creatures, and decay.

Cannibalism is just a subset of her dominion.

I imagine that in Bosmer culture she's the patron of some other taboo act of defilement since they're kind of okay with the whole eating people thing.

----------


## Fyraltari

She's the Prince of agriculture and carpentry.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> She's the Prince of agriculture and carpentry.


Both violations of the Green Pact.

Bosmer are cannibals because of Y'ffre's meat mandate and the Green Pact. The Meat Mandate also requires that a vanquished foe be eaten within three days (ie before they can rot).

Essentially, Namira is the daedra the Bosmer would normally have the least to do with.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Both violations of the Green Pact.


Yes, that's the joke. Namira is the Prince of the disgusting and the taboo. In the lands of Men, she has dominion over cannibalism because it is abhorrent to men. In Bosmer territory she'd rule over something else.

----------


## Rynjin

> All the Creation Club add ins really bloated some of the merchants, making it harder to find certain items.  It's really noticeable in Radiant Raiment.


Another really good reason not to touch the Anniversary Edition.

----------


## Mark Hall

Post-Morrowind, is there a single fortress that isn't an utter ruin?

----------


## Fyraltari

> Post-Morrowind, is there a single fortress that isn't an utter ruin?


Cloud Ruler Temple?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Post-Morrowind, is there a single fortress that isn't an utter ruin?


Fort Dawnguard? I was going to say Dragonsreach too, but Im not sure if it counts.

----------


## veti

> Post-Morrowind, is there a single fortress that isn't an utter ruin?


Well, the walled cities of both Cyrodiil and Skyrim are in reasonable shape.

There's a few castles in Skyrim that aren't too far gone. Of course there's Fort Dawnguard, which is in excellent condition, aside from the unguarded back entrance...

All the others suggest a century or two of neglect, but I think "utter ruin" is a bit harsh. Fort Greenwall, for instance, has all its architecture intact, all it's missing is the gates.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Cloud Ruler Temple?


That'll do.




> Fort Dawnguard? I was going to say Dragonsreach too, but Im not sure if it counts.


I put that more in the "city" category. Like, yes, it has fortifications (as does Riften, Solitude, Windhelm, and Markath), but they're mostly cities.

Wasn't Fort Dawnguard a ruin when you found it? Or just aggressively uninhabited?

----------


## Fyraltari

> Wasn't Fort Dawnguard a ruin when you found it? Or just aggressively uninhabited?


There's a difference?

----------


## Mark Hall

> There's a difference?


A ruin is a building that is falling down.
"Aggressively uninhabited" the building itself is fine, but the furnishings might be trashed and you need to clear out a ton of garbage.

----------


## Rynjin

> Wasn't Fort Dawnguard a ruin when you found it? Or just aggressively uninhabited?


It was a "ruin" when Istvan found it in the sense that it needed cleaning and secondary fortifications (eg. palisades) needed to be rebuilt, but the actual structure seemed in perfect condition, and gets repaired throughout the questline.

So "aggressively uninhabited" seems to fit better.

----------


## Grim Portent

Fort Dawnguard is fine when you get to it as I recall. A little rubble and a lot of garbage and crates, but the actual structure is fine.

Always bugged me that the forts throughout Skryim are ruins, the maintenance of forts and keeps throughout the land is one of the most basic military necessities of a medieval setting. There should be at least a few forts that only got left unmanned after the Great War which should be in good condition.

----------


## Keltest

Besides the Reach, I don't know if Skyrim has actually seen war since the Second Era. And the Reach checks out because both sides are destroying the forts

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Always bugged me that the forts throughout Skryim are ruins, the maintenance of forts and keeps throughout the land is one of the most basic military necessities of a medieval setting. There should be at least a few forts that only got left unmanned after the Great War which should be in good condition.


Should they _still_ be unmanned with the Civil War going on though?

----------


## Eldan

Yeah both sides of hte civil war should be trying to occupy and restore those forts, not just leave them to bandits. They'd have control of major roads and supply lines.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Besides the Reach, I don't know if Skyrim has actually seen war since the Second Era.


The War of the Red Diamond ended with the siege of Solitude.

----------


## Keltest

> The War of the Red Diamond ended with the siege of Solitude.


Which is also the only city in skyrim with a proper fort in good repair inside the city walls. Windhelm gets second place but is in rough shape.

----------


## InvisibleBison

> Yeah both sides of hte civil war should be trying to occupy and restore those forts, not just leave them to bandits. They'd have control of major roads and supply lines.


There are at least three forts that become occupied by Imperial or Stormcloak soldiers after you clear out their original inhabitants. Which I suppose suggests that neither side is capable of clearing a fort on their own, though given that the war is basically a stalemate absent the Dragonborn's intervention that does make sense.

----------


## veti

> There are at least three forts that become occupied by Imperial or Stormcloak soldiers after you clear out their original inhabitants. Which I suppose suggests that neither side is capable of clearing a fort on their own, though given that the war is basically a stalemate absent the Dragonborn's intervention that does make sense.


"Makes sense" is a bit generous, considering that your entrance exam for joining the legion is to solo a bandit fort - implying that _any_ legionary could do the job singlehanded. It's just that they... have better things to do, OK? Like, err... oh, I'm sure there's something.

----------


## Vinyadan

> "Makes sense" is a bit generous, considering that your entrance exam for joining the legion is to solo a bandit fort - implying that _any_ legionary could do the job singlehanded. It's just that they... have better things to do, OK? Like, err... oh, I'm sure there's something.


Compare Morrowind, where the first Legion missions you are likely to get are from Darius, who first asks you to have a talk with a widow to get a land deed and then orders you to cure a blighted kwama queen, to later send you to handle the liberation of a pilgrim that doesn't need to be obtained through violence. Afterwards you get some more investigative work about the poor Gnisis tax collector and the Talos Cult. In total, you don't need to kill more than 3 people (all from the Legion) and you have met a number of social realities: the settled Gnisis locals, a rogue Telvanni, the nomadic Ashlanders, the occupying Legion and the problems it faces when trying to police a complex enviroment, and two examples of serious issues that can manifest themselves within the Legion (violence against the locals and treason against the Emperor).

Skyrim instead was really into the "it's a war, it's just a series of battles" mindset. I don't think it added much on a setting level (Tullius kept saying he didn't get Nords, but that didn't really translate into anything practical, did it?). It actually felt very barebone, to the point that a few times I thought that I was playing a mod.

----------


## Grim Portent

> Should they _still_ be unmanned with the Civil War going on though?


The ones on vital roads certainly shouldn't. Letting bandits control roads during a war is an awful idea, and really the two factions should have secured all of them the moment hostilities became likely, for propoganda as well as practical reasons.

Really would have liked to see some Empire style forts, built by the Empire during the past few centuries, still in decent condition, and some ruins of ancient Nordic forts with most of them being long abandoned. Maybe one or two nordic forts that were still in good condition and in use by some of the Jarls.

----------


## Fyraltari

The whole Civil War was gravely unfinished, maybe if they hadn't pushed for the 11/11/11 release date, there would have been more soldier-occupied forts?

----------


## veti

So, last time I strolled up the road from Rorikstead towards Dragon Bridge, a Thalmor patrol came along the road from Markarth to the junction with the bandit ambush. The bandits saw them before they saw me, so I left them all to it. 

Despite my mod that doubles the number of common enemies per spawn (so, double the numbers of non-boss bandits, among others), the Thalmor handed them easily. No losses on their side.

Then they turned north, and I wondered how they'd cope with Robber's Gorge. So I hung back, just getting close enough to make sure the bandits had spawned, and waited.

They gave it a good try, but turns out three justiciars are no match for a fort with 20-odd bandits.

So there's one data point. I doubt if a Legion or Stormcloak patrol would have done any better.

----------


## DigoDragon

> There are at least three forts that become occupied by Imperial or Stormcloak soldiers after you clear out their original inhabitants. Which I suppose suggests that neither side is capable of clearing a fort on their own, though given that the war is basically a stalemate absent the Dragonborn's intervention that does make sense.


I just assumed the soldiers were opportunists; they see the Dragonborn slay every bandit in the fort, and after running off with some loot, the soldiers clean up the bodies and settle in. Why bother with the effort of fighting bandits when I do the job for free? Wasn't like I was going to come back anyway.  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Fyraltari

> So, last time I strolled up the road from Rorikstead towards Dragon Bridge, a Thalmor patrol came along the road from Markarth to the junction with the bandit ambush. The bandits saw them before they saw me, so I left them all to it. 
> 
> Despite my mod that doubles the number of common enemies per spawn (so, double the numbers of non-boss bandits, among others), the Thalmor handed them easily. No losses on their side.
> 
> Then they turned north, and I wondered how they'd cope with Robber's Gorge. So I hung back, just getting close enough to make sure the bandits had spawned, and waited.
> 
> They gave it a good try, but turns out three justiciars are no match for a fort with 20-odd bandits.
> 
> So there's one data point. I doubt if a Legion or Stormcloak patrol would have done any better.


I'm not sure that's really representative if you double the numbers of one side of the fight.

Also, Thalmor patrols are for harassing the weak and helpless, not conquering forts or fighting crime.

----------


## Mark Hall

Still one of my favorite bits in Skyrim is what I call "Rage Across Skyrim".

Become a werewolf, and just carve a bloody swath across the Whiterun province of murdered bandits. Kill everyone, no loot grabbed, just so much death that I fill up my perks.

----------


## Grim Portent

Ah, a werewolf rampage is always fun.

I remember back before Dawnguard when being a werewolf for ages became trivial, running from Markarth to the far end of Falkreath in one transformation. Killed every Forsworn, Bandit, rogue wizard, Thalmor and Imperial soldier on the way, as well as a few bears and a dragon.

Was rather cathartic.

----------


## Imbalance

I have an old Morrowind save on original Xbox, I'm in Vivec's chamber with the Ring of Hircine.  I slip it on and we fight to the death, one on one.  It's a pretty even match, the room full of magic, nowhere to take cover, just mash and slash and hope that I hit him enough times before the spells finish me.  Great stress relief.

----------


## WritersBlock

Seeing the discussion from a page ago about Vigilant Tyranius and all those forcegreet quest annoyances I would like to mention what could be the worst ones of all. Riften, Just Riften....  :Sigh: 

Being forcegreet accosted by that thug of Maven's shortly after you talk or bribe your way past the guard to even enter the town in the first place and then you finally decide to do some see what is at the market stalls and then Brynjolf comes up just out of nowhere and... well you get the idea. 

And man that thieves guild questline is a whole other can of worms the farther along you go. (Mary Sue Karliah, and the whole Nightingale mess)

----------


## Mark Hall

> Seeing the discussion from a page ago about Vigilant Tyranius and all those forcegreet quest annoyances I would like to mention what could be the worst ones of all. Riften, Just Riften.... 
> 
> Being forcegreet accosted by that thug of Maven's shortly after you talk or bribe your way past the guard to even enter the town in the first place and then you finally decide to do some see what is at the market stalls and then Brynjolf comes up just out of nowhere and... well you get the idea. 
> 
> And man that thieves guild questline is a whole other can of worms the farther along you go. (Mary Sue Karliah, and the whole Nightingale mess)


The Companions and the Thieves Guild were two quests where I'd like the option to say "Yeah, I don't want to join you in your particular brand of life-altering bull****, but can I help you out, anyway?" Why do I have to become a werewolf to help you fight the werewolf hunters? Why do I have to become a Nightingale to chase that bastard down?  You go drink weird blood and swear daedric oaths, I just want to hit people with a sword.

(I lie. I totally want to be a werewolf. But, like, I shouldn't HAVE to be a werewolf)

----------


## Keltest

> The Companions and the Thieves Guild were two quests where I'd like the option to say "Yeah, I don't want to join you in your particular brand of life-altering bull****, but can I help you out, anyway?" Why do I have to become a werewolf to help you fight the werewolf hunters? Why do I have to become a Nightingale to chase that bastard down?  You go drink weird blood and swear daedric oaths, I just want to hit people with a sword.
> 
> (I lie. I totally want to be a werewolf. But, like, I shouldn't HAVE to be a werewolf)


The Nightingale one at least makes a little sense because you need Nocturnal's support to counter the powers that Mercer has given himself, at least in theory.

----------


## Fyraltari

> The Companions and the Thieves Guild were two quests where I'd like the option to say "Yeah, I don't want to join you in your particular brand of life-altering bull****, but can I help you out, anyway?" Why do I have to become a werewolf to help you fight the werewolf hunters? Why do I have to become a Nightingale to chase that bastard down?  You go drink weird blood and swear daedric oaths, I just want to hit people with a sword.
> 
> (I lie. I totally want to be a werewolf. But, like, I shouldn't HAVE to be a werewolf)


At the end of the day, the Thieves' Guild is a Daedric Cult to Nocturne and they don't really pretend they aren't, so pledging your soul to her at the end of the questline makes sense.

It would have been nice if upon learning the Companions were lead by werewolves, ypu had the option to join the Silver Hand instead. Add in the idea that's floating around that the Silver Hand is a successor organisation to the Companions who refused Hircine's Gift and you'd have had a nice alternate questline of bringing the organisation back to its roots.

----------


## Rater202

> At the end of the day, the Thieves' Guild is a Daedric Cult to Nocturne and they don't really pretend they aren't, so pledging your soul to her at the end of the questline makes sense.
> 
> It would have been nice if upon learning the Companions were lead by werewolves, ypu had the option to join the Silver Hand instead. Add in the idea that's floating around that the Silver Hand is a successor organisation to the Companions who refused Hircine's Gift and you'd have had a nice alternate questline of bringing the organisation back to its roots.


The problem with that is that the Silver Hand as presented are um... Sociopathic serial killers? They target the companions knowing full well that the companions can control themselves... Most werewolves are cursed, not willingly monsters, and they also kill Kajet and possibly other beast men.

They employ torture and other excessively cruel means of killing their targets...

Like, I'm not much one to talk since I favor the Dark Brotherhood but the Silver Hand are presented as being complete monsters... IIRC they even skinned a Werewolf, or talked about skinning one.

----------


## Grim Portent

> The problem with that is that the Silver Hand as presented are um... Sociopathic serial killers? They target the companions knowing full well that the companions can control themselves... Most werewolves are cursed, not willingly monsters, and they also kill Kajet and possibly other beast men.
> 
> They employ torture and other excessively cruel means of killing their targets...
> 
> Like, I'm not much one to talk since I favor the Dark Brotherhood but the Silver Hand are presented as being complete monsters... IIRC they even skinned a Werewolf, or talked about skinning one.


They have werewolf pelts and titles like 'the Skinner', so they definitely skin werewolves to take their hides as trophies.

----------


## Fyraltari

> The problem with that is that the Silver Hand as presented are um... Sociopathic serial killers? They target the companions knowing full well that the companions can control themselves... Most werewolves are cursed, not willingly monsters, and they also kill Kajet and possibly other beast men.
> 
> They employ torture and other excessively cruel means of killing their targets...
> 
> Like, I'm not much one to talk since I favor the Dark Brotherhood but the Silver Hand are presented as being complete monsters... IIRC they even skinned a Werewolf, or talked about skinning one.


Yes, I know, and I think that's boring. In game, they're just another bandit group, but with silver sword (they attack you even if you've got ****-all to do with the Companions).

But there's the theory floating around that they were intended to be a splintered group of the Companions but, as with many things in this game, it was dropped durong development. (They seem just as fixated on getting Wuuthrad as the Companions, they alledgedly have a higher-than-usual chance of carrying copies of _The Song of the Return_, i.e. "Ysgramor rules, Falmer drools, the book" and they even more alledgedly can sometimes be heard shouting "Ysgramor would be disappointed in you" in battle (I suspect a Mandela effect on that one).)

And frankly this would have made them much more interesting. You can even keep the problematic elements, TES is full of morally-gray choices and Ysgramor himself was a grade-A douche. Then you'd have to choose between the "purer" hateful Silver Hand and the arguably more honorable but corrupted Companions.

Edit: I don't remember them targeting Khajiit?

----------


## DigoDragon

> The Nightingale one at least makes a little sense because you need Nocturnal's support to counter the powers that Mercer has given himself, at least in theory.


Me: "Alright, Mercer is dead and I got the magic key. This'll let me use all those crazy powers Mercer got to use!"

Nocturnal: "..."

Me: "This'll let me use all those crazy powers Mercer got to use, right?"

----------


## Fyraltari

> Me: "Alright, Mercer is dead and I got the magic key. This'll let me use all those crazy powers Mercer got to use!"
> 
> Nocturnal: "..."
> 
> Me: "This'll let me use all those crazy powers Mercer got to use, right?"


Nocturnal: "Reusable lockpick. Take it or leave it."

----------


## Rater202

> Nocturnal: "Reusable lockpick. Take it or leave it."


That you don't even get to keep, unlike literally every other game where it appears.

Although even then, Frey's crazy powers were "the standard Nightingale powers, but he unlocked the limiters that made it so he cold only have one at a time."
He also used to open a puzzle door without a claw.

So you're really not missing out on that much... Unless you assume that it could have been used to unlock your potential as a Dragonborn.

Not gonna lie, I don't like it when a game teases me with Godlike Power but then doens't deliver mechanically.

----------


## Keltest

> That you don't even get to keep, unlike literally every other game where it appears.
> 
> Although even then, Frey's crazy powers were "the standard Nightingale powers, but he unlocked the limiters that made it so he cold only have one at a time."
> He also used to open a puzzle door without a claw.
> 
> So you're really not missing out on that much... Unless you assume that it could have been used to unlock your potential as a Dragonborn.
> 
> Not gonna lie, I don't like it when a game teases me with Godlike Power but then doens't deliver mechanically.


Mercer unlocking his Nightingale powers like that was, I believe, the results of a few decades of study and practice with the Key. Even if you choose to follow in Mercer's path (which is, quite evidently, something that Nocturnal will take personally), its not something you would see in the game's time frame.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Not gonna lie, I don't like it when a game teases me with Godlike Power but then doens't deliver mechanically.


You must have loved the end of _Shivering Isles_.

----------


## Rater202

> You must have loved the end of _Shivering Isles_.


I can feel the sarcasm.

Yeah, it was a bit annoying to have my power as a ascended Prince to be "use this artifact that needs to be recharged in a specific manner and change the weather in this one specific map once a day for a minor boon related to the random weather pattern."

I just have to assume that this is the bare minimum and you will slowly grow to gain the full power as you adjust to the Mantel and it adjusts to you on a time scale.

Skyrim is worse about it: As a Dragnborn you're supposed to be just kind of better than other people but you cans till die to bandits even after your tenth dragon... Which is supposed to add that dragon's power to your own.

what's worse is when they teas godlike power but then snatch it away from you without warning. The auger tells you that you need to use the Eye and staff of Magnus to fullfill your destiny(which is apparently something bigger than just being Dragonborn since you don't need to have progressed this far as a mage to clear the main quest, just get in the door) and then the Psidjics jump in and steal the eye out from under you right before you get a chance to use it.

Like I swear to God that TES6 is gonna have either a main plot point or a faction questline touching on the fact that something really bad happened becuase the Lasst Dragonborn wasn't powerful enough to solve some threat.

----------


## Keltest

> I can feel the sarcasm.
> 
> Yeah, it was a bit annoying to have my power as a ascended Prince to be "use this artifact that needs to be recharged in a specific manner and change the weather in this one specific map once a day for a minor boon related to the random weather pattern."
> 
> I just have to assume that this is the bare minimum and you will slowly grow to gain the full power as you adjust to the Mantel and it adjusts to you on a time scale.
> 
> Skyrim is worse about it: As a Dragnborn you're supposed to be just kind of better than other people but you cans till die to bandits even after your tenth dragon... Which is supposed to add that dragon's power to your own.
> 
> what's worse is when they teas godlike power but then snatch it away from you without warning. The auger tells you that you need to use the Eye and staff of Magnus to fullfill your destiny(which is apparently something bigger than just being Dragonborn since you don't need to have progressed this far as a mage to clear the main quest, just get in the door) and then the Psidjics jump in and steal the eye out from under you right before you get a chance to use it.
> ...


I mean, youre using a fairly loose definition of "can" there. I never lose to bandits. Worst case scenario, I Fus Ro Dah them off a cliff and carry on my merry way. Its always trolls or dragons or traps or something that get me.

----------


## Rater202

> I mean, youre using a fairly loose definition of "can" there. I never lose to bandits. Worst case scenario, I Fus Ro Dah them off a cliff and carry on my merry way. Its always trolls or dragons or traps or something that get me.


I have lost track of the number of times I've been taken out from almost full health by a bandits arrow.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Me: "Alright, Mercer is dead and I got the magic key. This'll let me use all those crazy powers Mercer got to use!"
> 
> Nocturnal: "..."
> 
> Me: "This'll let me use all those crazy powers Mercer got to use, right?"


What crazy powers did Mercer get to use?

----------


## Divayth Fyr

> What crazy powers did Mercer get to use?


He somehow opened the huge vault doors and carried out all the loot the guild accumulated without anyone noticing ;)

----------


## Fyraltari

> I just have to assume that this is the bare minimum and you will slowly grow to gain the full power as you adjust to the Mantel and it adjusts to you on a time scale.


Jyggalag says as much, and _Skyrim_ confirms it.




> Skyrim is worse about it: As a Dragnborn you're supposed to be just kind of better than other people but you cans till die to bandits even after your tenth dragon... Which is supposed to add that dragon's power to your own.


You're clearing forts all by yourself before level 5, though. What more do you want? Besides being a dragonborn hardly makes you invicible: Miraak and Wulfarth both fell in battle.

Edit: also you do get power from each dragon you kill. You unlock a new word.

----------


## Vinyadan

The Silver Hand is bizarre in its rabid aggression against anyone and in its cruelty against prisoners. To me, they would only make sense if they were an exceptionally unhinged Daedric cult.

----------


## WritersBlock

On the subject of Shivering Isles, I remember reading a reddit post where Michael Kirkbride pretty much said that the ending to shivering isles never even happened or something close to that effect. Massive facepalm from me on that one. Then again Bethesda's writing has been really bad from Oblivion onwards for the most part.

I would try to find and link the reddit post but am not sure what the policy on that would be. (If it is allowed or not)

----------


## Keltest

> The Silver Hand is bizarre in its rabid aggression against anyone and in its cruelty against prisoners. To me, they would only make sense if they were an exceptionally unhinged Daedric cult.


Why can't they be an exceptionally unhinged regular cult? Or bandits with a gimmick?

----------


## Lord Raziere

A fudgemuppet video actually pointed out that there is evidence to suggest that the Silver Hand, may in fact be (or intended to be) the Companions that decided they didn't want to be werewolves and are trying to kill them and reclaim the spirit of the guild, but that cut content kinda made the Silver Hand just this weird faction that comes out of nowhere with no explanation of why it exists.

----------


## DigoDragon

> Nocturnal: "Reusable lockpick. Take it or leave it."


This artifact would be worth a lot more if this were an early Zelda game. XD





> I have lost track of the number of times I've been taken out from almost full health by a bandits arrow.


At what level are you getting killed? I would have that issue up until around level 9 I think. Then I could actually take an arrow to the knee and survive it. Usually.





> He somehow opened the huge vault doors and carried out all the loot the guild accumulated without anyone noticing ;)


Also that Dwemer building he collapses to block your way to follow him.





> The Silver Hand is bizarre in its rabid aggression against anyone and in its cruelty against prisoners. To me, they would only make sense if they were an exceptionally unhinged Daedric cult.


Probably.

I agree with the earlier remark made that the Silver Hand is just a bandit faction equipped with silver swords. I don't remember them having unique dialogue related to the companions, and their "leader" is just a randomly generated leveled thug.

----------


## Fyraltari

> The Silver Hand is bizarre in its rabid aggression against anyone and in its cruelty against prisoners. To me, they would only make sense if they were an exceptionally unhinged Daedric cult.


A cult to who?
Besides, Daedric worshippers hardly have a monopoly on the crazy. Look at the Dark Brotherhood or the Order of the Black Worm.



> On the subject of Shivering Isles, I remember reading a reddit post where Michael Kirkbride pretty much said that the ending to shivering isles never even happened or something close to that effect. Massive facepalm from me on that one. Then again Bethesda's writing has been really bad from Oblivion onwards for the most part.
> 
> I would try to find and link the reddit post but am not sure what the policy on that would be. (If it is allowed or not)


Yeah, some obcure texts (and I think ESO?) have been leaning in the direction that the events of SI didn't break the Grey March, they are how the Grey March normally plays out: Sheogorath feels
 himself getting Jiggy with it again so he finds a mortal to replace him and once that's done, his power leaks (I guess) from Jyggalag to the New Sheo, with Old Sheo/Jyggalag left as much weaker creature. In this view of things, Haskill was the Sheo before the one we meet and Arden Sul was the very first mortal to get the job.

I don't like this at all because it makes the expansion kind of pointless and directly contradicts what Jyggalag says at the end. True, Arden Sul remains kind of unexplained this way, but that's par the course for the Sul family.

----------


## Rater202

I think that the thing with the Obscure texts is that they're only semi-canon though.

----------


## Fyraltari

> A fudgemuppet video actually pointed out that there is evidence to suggest that the Silver Hand, may in fact be (or intended to be) the Companions that decided they didn't want to be werewolves and are trying to kill them and reclaim the spirit of the guild, but that cut content kinda made the Silver Hand just this weird faction that comes out of nowhere with no explanation of why it exists.


Yeah, that's where I heard the theory.



> I think that the thing with the Obscure texts is that they're only semi-canon though.


Oh, definitely, but they're hugely influential. Heimskr straight-up quotes _From the Many-Headed Talos_.

----------


## Keltest

> Oh, definitely, but they're hugely influential. Heimskr straight-up quotes _From the Many-Headed Talos_.


On the other hand, SI directly contradicts it, so I feel its safe to say theyre not canon in that respect.

----------


## veti

> Seeing the discussion from a page ago about Vigilant Tyranius and all those forcegreet quest annoyances I would like to mention what could be the worst ones of all. Riften, Just Riften....


There are three scenes that play in parallel on the short walk from the gate to the Bee &  Barb, and they get real old. But one of them gives you the chance to win an easy favour point, and only one involves a forcegreet, so I'm wracked with indecision about which one(s) to strip out...

Nearly all the cities seem to have some kind of irritant when you first enter them. I'd say Riften would have to share the crown for "most annoying" with Markarth and Falkreath. (And since I've cured those two, I suppose I really should do Riften too.)

----------


## Grim Portent

I wonder why they decided to do these set piece intros in more or less all the towns, they weren't a thing in Oblivion at all as I remember, though I think they happened with basically every settlement in FO3, then again in FO4.

I think you walk in on a conveniently timed dialogue scene in almost every city* in Skyrim, and it's just not really necessary. Markarth has the forsworn agent murder attempt, Falkreath has guard telling you about Barbas, Whiterun has the guard telling you the city is closed because dragons (how do they know when they haven't been told about Helgen yet?) whathisface talking to Adrianne about swords for the Legion, and the Alik'r being stopped by the guards, Riften has the guards at the gate, Maul, Saphire's extortion and Brynjolf, Windhelm has the racism at the gates thing, Dawnstar has the discussion between the Jarl and the former Imperial Legion people and the discussion about nightmares in the tavern, Morthal the people complaining about the Jarl leading into the vampire quest, Solitude the execution, Winterhold has the conversation about the one guy being a jobless alcoholic.

Not all plot hooks I suppose, though a lot of them do lead into quests or contribute context to quests.


*And several locations inside the cities as well.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I wonder why they decided to do these set piece intros in more or less all the towns, they weren't a thing in Oblivion at all as I remember, though I think they happened with basically every settlement in FO3, then again in FO4.
> 
> I think you walk in on a conveniently timed dialogue scene in almost every city* in Skyrim, and it's just not really necessary. Markarth has the forsworn agent murder attempt, Falkreath has guard telling you about Barbas, Whiterun has the guard telling you the city is closed because dragons (how do they know when they haven't been told about Helgen yet?) whathisface talking to Adrianne about swords for the Legion, and the Alik'r being stopped by the guards, Riften has the guards at the gate, Maul, Saphire's extortion and Brynjolf, Windhelm has the racism at the gates thing, Dawnstar has the discussion between the Jarl and the former Imperial Legion people and the discussion about nightmares in the tavern, Morthal the people complaining about the Jarl leading into the vampire quest, Solitude the execution, Winterhold has the conversation about the one guy being a jobless alcoholic.
> 
> Not all plot hooks I suppose, though a lot of them do lead into quests or contribute context to quests.
> 
> *And several locations inside the cities as well.


Well like you said some are plot-hooks for sidequests, some are just a way to establish what the city's like. "This is Markarth, safest city in the Reach. *Immediate terrorist attack*" is very memorable.

Also




> (how do they know when they haven't been told about Helgen yet?)


The people of Riverun saw Alduin fly about. By the time you get to Whiterun, they don't know that Helgen's gone, but they do know there's at least one dragon in the area.

----------


## Grim Portent

Yeah, but Riverwood saw Alduin all of ten minutes ago, and mostly don't even believe they saw him, and specifically send the Dragonborn to tell the Jarl.

Like, we are specifically presented as the person who's telling Whiterun about dragons being back, but they already know. Hell, the conversation in Balgruuf's throneroom implies they already know about Helgen being attacked somehow as I recall.

----------


## Keltest

I will say, Skyrim does a much better job of making the cities have personality than Oblivion did. Morrowind gets 2nd place just because the different Great Houses and factions all have such overt influence on things like the architecture, but I think i'd be hard pressed to really remember one Hlaalu city from another, for example.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I have lost track of the number of times I've been taken out from almost full health by a bandits arrow.


What kind of gear are you using? Any mods that would make them tougher than usual?




> Also that Dwemer building he collapses to block your way to follow him.


Also also, that bit at the end where he forces Karliah and Brynjolf to fight each other.




> Like, we are specifically presented as the person who's telling Whiterun about dragons being back, but they already know. Hell, the conversation in Balgruuf's throneroom implies they already know about Helgen being attacked somehow as I recall.


Yup, they just need your eyewitness confirmation. They dont have cameras, after all.

----------


## Resileaf

It's the difference between "Our guards on the watchtower think they saw something that looked like a dragon in the direction of Helgen" and "This eyewitness sent by the Legion/a respected citizen of Riverwood has seen the dragon destroy Helgen".

----------


## veti

> Like, we are specifically presented as the person who's telling Whiterun about dragons being back, but they already know. Hell, the conversation in Balgruuf's throneroom implies they already know about Helgen being attacked somehow as I recall.


The whole script just screams "continuity foul-up" at the beginning. (And many later points as well.) Remember Hadvar? "I have to find General Tullius and join the defence" - moments later, hey, there's Tullius, but Hadvar completely ignores him and escorts you to the keep instead. Later he tells Alvor "I need to get back to Solitude and let them know what's happened" - as if Tullius himself hadn't been there and witnessed the whole thing in person - before settling down to skulk in Alvor's house for the rest of the game (unless you do join the legion).

I suspect there was probably a decent script at one point, but it got so chopped and changed that by the end no-one could be bothered trying to put it together and check that the finished product made sense.

----------


## Keltest

> The whole script just screams "continuity foul-up" at the beginning. (And many later points as well.) Remember Hadvar? "I have to find General Tullius and join the defence" - moments later, hey, there's Tullius, but Hadvar completely ignores him and escorts you to the keep instead. Later he tells Alvor "I need to get back to Solitude and let them know what's happened" - as if Tullius himself hadn't been there and witnessed the whole thing in person - before settling down to skulk in Alvor's house for the rest of the game (unless you do join the legion).
> 
> I suspect there was probably a decent script at one point, but it got so chopped and changed that by the end no-one could be bothered trying to put it together and check that the finished product made sense.


Its hard to hear, but Tullius actually explicitly orders Hadvar to go to the keep. He doesnt know if Tullius survived Helgen or not because of the way you had to get out.

----------


## Anteros

> They have werewolf pelts and titles like 'the Skinner', so they definitely skin werewolves to take their hides as trophies.


I'm not sure the guy walking around in the dragon bone armor is in the best position to criticize this.

----------


## Rynjin

> I'm not sure the guy walking around in the dragon bone armor is in the best position to criticize this.


Yeah but like dragons are evil monsters who eat people so it's fine

----------


## Rater202

> I'm not sure the guy walking around in the dragon bone armor is in the best position to criticize this.


The Dragon's body is just a vessel for their divine essence. It's like looting armor of a guy you just killed.

----------


## veti

> The Dragon's body is just a vessel for their divine essence. It's like looting armor of a guy you just killed.


Couldn't you say the same to defend cannibalism?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Yeah but like dragons are evil monsters who eat people so it's fine


I view it more like a message to the rest of the dov to take me seriously - they see me show up wearing the scales of their dead brethren, then they have that one last chance to apologize for setting my merchants and farmers on fire and/or flee. If they still choose to pick a fight knowing others have tried and failed, well, they were warned.

----------


## Rater202

> Couldn't you say the same to defend cannibalism?


No.

A dead Dragon isn't dead unless killed by another dragon. It's just an empty vessel while the dragon's soul, the actual dragon, was elsewhere.

----------


## Fyraltari

> No.
> 
> A dead Dragon isn't dead unless killed by another dragon. It's just an empty vessel while the dragon's soul, the actual dragon, was elsewhere.


Uh, no? Alduin has the power to resurrect dragons sure, but that's it. Likewise a dead Nord's soul is elsewhere (in Sovngarde/Aetherium).

In fact, as a dragonborn if you've killed the dragon whosr bones you're wearing, that soul isn't anywhere anymore. Besides your tummy, that is.

----------


## Rater202

> Uh, no? Alduin has the power to resurrect dragons sure, but that's it. Likewise a dead Nord's soul is elsewhere (in Sovngarde/Aetherium).
> 
> In fact, as a dragonborn if you've killed the dragon whosr bones you're wearing, that soul isn't anywhere anymore. Besides your tummy, that is.


We're explicitly told that the only way to kil a Dragon is if a Dragonborn/other Dragon does it.

We are told that the reason for this is becuase when a Dragonborn kills a dragon, they absorb their soul presenting their ressurection.

If something is only considered dead if it can't be resurrected, and can only be prevented from resurrecting by its soul being absorbed by another of their kind, then "death" for them is completly different from "death" for us.

Throw in the fact that Dragons, per Pathunax, experience time in a way that humans(even a Dragonborn) can't comprehend and the physical body is basically a meat robot being used as an avatar by the actual Divine entity.

It makes sense that a Dragon's body wouldn't have the same significance to them as a human body would to a human.

Like, briging backa  dragon just requires the right shout and there's no evidence that ti's a power unique to Alduin... Two of the words in it are even worlds that the Dragonborn canonically uses.

----------


## Fyraltari

> We're explicitly told that the only way to kil a Dragon is if a Dragonborn/other Dragon does it.
> 
> We are told that the reason for this is becuase when a Dragonborn kills a dragon, they absorb their soul presenting their ressurection.
> 
> If something is only considered dead if it can't be resurrected, and can only be prevented from resurrecting by its soul being absorbed by another of their kind, then "death" for them is completly different from "death" for us.
> 
> Throw in the fact that Dragons, per Pathunax, experience time in a way that humans(even a Dragonborn) can't comprehend and the physical body is basically a meat robot being used as an avatar by the actual Divine entity.
> 
> It makes sense that a Dragon's body wouldn't have the same significance to them as a human body would to a human.
> ...


No one ever brought back a dragon besides Alduin. If any dragon could do it, they would have handily won the Dragon War. His return is the entire reason the other dragons are coming back.

According to the Atlas of dragons, a dragon called Grahkrindrog perpetrated a great slaughter in Winterhold and Eastmarch in the Second Era. If he could bring other dragons back, why wouldn't he have done it?

And you're ignoring my point about the fact that the dragons you kill to wear their bones are definitely dead.

I really don't see why the ability to be resurrected suddenly mean that the body is more of a "meat robot" than it already is. The soul of the dragon is inside his body just like with mortals. And unlike mortals there is no known dragon ghosts, so it seems like death is actually _more_ of a hurdle for them.

----------


## Keltest

> We're explicitly told that the only way to kil a Dragon is if a Dragonborn/other Dragon does it.
> 
> We are told that the reason for this is becuase when a Dragonborn kills a dragon, they absorb their soul presenting their ressurection.
> 
> If something is only considered dead if it can't be resurrected, and can only be prevented from resurrecting by its soul being absorbed by another of their kind, then "death" for them is completly different from "death" for us.
> 
> Throw in the fact that Dragons, per Pathunax, experience time in a way that humans(even a Dragonborn) can't comprehend and the physical body is basically a meat robot being used as an avatar by the actual Divine entity.
> 
> It makes sense that a Dragon's body wouldn't have the same significance to them as a human body would to a human.
> ...


Pretty sure we've had this conversation before. Theres more to a shout than just saying the words, and theres at least one canonical example of a mortal without any sort of special metaphysics happening to his soul beforehand being resurrected by another entity.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> We're explicitly told that the only way to kil a Dragon is if a Dragonborn/other Dragon does it.
> 
> We are told that the reason for this is becuase when a Dragonborn kills a dragon, they absorb their soul presenting their ressurection.
> 
> If something is only considered dead if it can't be resurrected, and can only be prevented from resurrecting by its soul being absorbed by another of their kind, then "death" for them is completly different from "death" for us.


The only difference is that it's considerably easier for Dragons to get a new physical incarnation than it is for anyone else. The soul canonically exists independently of the body for everyone they just go to a relevant afterlife and it's *usually* a one way trip. (And we've visited at least two of them, Sovngarde and The Far Shore). At least physically. Ghosts and spirits have been known to pop in from time to time to see how the world is going and/or stick their oar in. (Dunmer culture is pretty much based on it).

Except not always, because Argonian souls come from and return to the Hist.

----------


## Rater202

> No one ever brought back a dragon besides Alduin. If any dragon could do it, they would have handily won the Dragon War. His return is the entire reason the other dragons are coming back.
> 
> According to the Atlas of dragons, a dragon called Grahkrindrog perpetrated a great slaughter in Winterhold and Eastmarch in the Second Era. If he could bring other dragons back, why wouldn't he have done it?
> 
> And you're ignoring my point about the fact that the dragons you kill to wear their bones are definitely dead.
> 
> I really don't see why the ability to be resurrected suddenly mean that the body is more of a "meat robot" than it already is. The soul of the dragon is inside his body just like with mortals. And unlike mortals there is no known dragon ghosts, so it seems like death is actually _more_ of a hurdle for them.


And you're either misising or misunderstanding my own point.

A Dragon is not a mortal.

A Dragon is an enteral, immortal, infinite existence that transcends human understanding of time and space. Paarthunx flat out says that any given dragon exists in multiple times in space across multible timelines simultaniously.

The whole reason dRagonrend works is becuase using it takes the Dov and shoves them itno the same tiny box that mortals exist in, if only briefly, and it makes them freak the **** out.

The sheer fact that Dragons exist in such a way means that physical existence is nothing to them. The Dragon's body is just the avatar that they're using in this time and place, of no more significance to them than the Last Dragonborn is to the guy playing Skyrim.

The only time destroying the body is a big deal is if another Dragon does it, since that would allow the other Dragon to eat the dragon whose body was just killed. Otherwise, killing the body doesn't kill the dragon.

Compared to mortals, who exist in one time and one place at a time, in one timeline, can be properly killed by just about anything, and barring coming back as an undead or extreme efforts/divine intervention, once they're dead they're dead for good... Unless you count Undeat, but tha'ts hardly the same thing as proper life.

So making armor out of dragon bones is mor like stealing clothes off a bandit you just killed more thna it it is making the man's skin into leather, for how singificant it is to a dragon. I'm arguing from the alein perspective of a being who does not comprehend the world the way we do.

The fact that the Dragons the alst Dragonborn killed are properly dead is irrelevant to how much a given dragon would value its body or how a dragon would view dragonbone armor.

----------


## Fyraltari

> And you're either misising or misunderstanding my own point.
> 
> A Dragon is not a mortal.
> 
> A Dragon is an enteral, immortal, infinite existence that transcends human understanding of time and space. Paarthunx flat out says that any given dragon exists in multiple times in space across multible timelines simultaniously.


I'm going to need a quote on that. Checking his dialog on the UESP, he says that dragons can't understand the concept of Mortality, that's how dragonrend works, but he says nothing about them living in multiple timelines or inhabiting several bodies at once.

You are proposing that dragons live in different timelines and that having their soul eaten destroys them in all of them. But if that were true, then dragons would die randomly all the time because one of their other self in another timeline just got killed by a dov. 

What the game shows is that ALduin, and Alduin alone has the power to resurrect dragons, but that doesn't work if they've been killed by another dov because then their soul is straight-up gone. There's no mention of them having spare bodies in other realities.

----------


## Triaxx

Admittedly Alduin is a direct aspect of the God Of Time and so normal rules on 'dead' don't exactly apply to him. Neither his own death nor that of other dragons, given his resurrection shout is literally Rewind. Or load last checkpoint.

----------


## veti

> And you're either misising or misunderstanding my own point.
> 
> A Dragon is not a mortal.
> 
> A Dragon is an enteral, immortal, infinite existence that transcends human understanding of time and space. Paarthunx flat out says that any given dragon exists in multiple times in space across multible timelines simultaniously.


Paarthunax says a lot of things, but I can't recall that anywhere in his dialogue. He himself seems quite wedded to the idea of linear time.




> "It is true I am old..."
> "It has been long since I held tinvaak with a stranger. I gave in to the temptation to prolong our speech."
> "I know little of what has passed below in the long years I have lived here."


Another witness: 



> "For countless years I've roamed the Soul Cairn, in unintended service to the Ideal Masters.
> Before this, I roamed the skies above Tamriel."
> "There was a time when I called Tamriel my home, but those days have long since passed."


Paarthunax does have another interesting quote about mortal souls: _"Mortals have greater affinity for this Word than the dov. Everything mortal fades away in time, but the spirit remains. Ponder the meaning of spirit. Unslaad zii. Where mortal flesh may wither and die, the spirit endures."_

This suggests to me that, in his estimation at least, mortals are actually _less_ attached to their bodies than dragons are, because the mortal body is by nature merely a temporary vessel whose spirit is _expected_ to outlast it, whereas in the immortal dov, body and spirit are permanently attached to one another.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Paarthunax says a lot of things, but I can't recall that anywhere in his dialogue. He himself seems quite wedded to the idea of linear time.


Which makes sense. Linear Time is his father.

----------


## Imbalance

Meh.  After a certain point, the game only respawns soulless dragons, if the thing about wearing their bones convicts you.

----------


## WritersBlock

Has anyone ever had a cave bear appear in Dragonsreach? Because I walked into Dragonsreach, heard a cave bear, and Farengar was fighting one when I went to his workspace.

----------


## Resileaf

I can only assume that a mod you have sneaked that in, but if not... This is one of the most awesome glitches I've heard of.

Any game will be made better by the sudden appearance of a bear.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> I can only assume that a mod you have sneaked that in, but if not... This is one of the most awesome glitches I've heard of.
> 
> Any game will be made better by the sudden appearance of a bear.


I've played Condemned 2 and I disagree. That bear was ****ing _terrifying_.

----------


## Resileaf

You were playing a horror game and the game was more horrifying as a result, as such your game was made better by the inclusion of a bear.  :Small Cool:

----------


## Vinyadan

> A cult to who?
> Besides, Daedric worshippers hardly have a monopoly on the crazy. Look at the Dark Brotherhood or the Order of the Black Worm.


I'd say Molag Bal fits the bill: putting people into cages and being cruel to them, plus he has his own monsters.

By the way, I found how the Nord handled the killer in the Hircine quest really cool. They put the werewolf in jail, but they didn't kill him or torture him (although I don't remember if they knew he was a werewolf; probably they weren't clear on what he could do, given how he got away).

----------


## InvisibleBison

> By the way, I found how the Nord handled the killer in the Hircine quest really cool. They put the werewolf in jail, but they didn't kill him or torture him (although I don't remember if they knew he was a werewolf; probably they weren't clear on what he could do, given how he got away).


Did they actually sentence him to imprisonment, or was he just being held until they decided what to do with him?

----------


## Keltest

> Did they actually sentence him to imprisonment, or was he just being held until they decided what to do with him?


He hadn't been sentenced yet, at least formally. Everybody and their cat knew he was going to be executed though, including him.

----------


## Rater202

So what happened is that Sinding stole th eRing of Hircine in order to get better control of his transformations, but Hircine was pissed by the theft and cursed him so that the Ring would instead make him transfer randomly and lose control of himself.

In this state, he killed a girl...

and instead of immediately being put down as a monster he was imprisoned and tried for murder.

...And _without_ the ring, he seems to be able to transform at will, maintain hat state indefinitely, and even talk in wolf form...

And he says that he tried to explain that he wasn't in control of his actions but the Townsfolk didn't believe him...

So... Okay, maybe they knew he was a werewolf and assumed he had control of it? But... He's not a native, he was in town looking for a beast to hunt to appease Hircine and lift the curse which... Unless he was in town for a while and just got really lucky with not having a forced change?

...But if he can control himself as well as we see then why did he need the ring in the first place?

----------


## Lord Raziere

according to the wiki I can find, Sinding is NOT control of his werewolf form. if he is spared, he can encountered as a werewolf, fighting a local hold guard sometimes or feasting on bandits when you go to kill a camp. he in fact specifically says Bloated Man's Grotto is a place he can live away from people to keep them safe.

and you can still possibly encounter him fighting a guard so......he is not in control. his werewolf transformations may not all be lucid as he is at that moment.

----------


## Grim Portent

The idea with Sinding seems to be that normal werewolves, such as him, transform against their will during the Full Moon and become ravening beasts which aren't mindless, but extremely bloodthirsty to the point of having little self control.* Being presented with something that brings out their predatorial instincts also makes them transform if they can't stop themselves. Some seem to lose themselves to their lycanthropy completely and stop changing back.

Sinding thought the Ring of Hircine would essentially cure him of the uncontrollable bloodthirst part of lycanthropy, making him safe for normal people to be around at all times, rather than only sometimes. Hircine, feeling insulted by this, made his curse more intense to the point that in situations that Sinding would normally be able to suppress his bestial drives he would now be overwhelmed by the curse.

Sinding attributes his killing of a child to her being helpless and vulnerable, easy prey, which brought his hunting instincts out and forced a transformation. It's not clear to me if the town knew he was a werewolf, or if they found him after he'd killed and partially eaten the girl and turned back and just assumed he was a perverted serial killer. His fate either way would be to get locked up until they were ready to execute him, presumably by hanging or decapitation, the guards of Falkreath may be rather corrupt, but when it comes to something like this they seem to be interested in maintaining the appearance of the Jarl's Justice.


To be short about it, I think Sinding despite having a great deal of control over his normal transformations would still kill and eat 'innocent' people during the Full Moon or in times where his willpower wavered, and thought the ring would help him essentially stop being a werewolf at all, only for it to make him snap even more and kill someone he can truly never forgive himself for. After _Ill Met By Moonlight_ he concludes that isn't possible for him, and chooses to live in the wilderness to minimise contact with those he would feel bad for hunting in the hopes of never being around them when in an uncontrolled state.

*The Dragonborn only changes at will and retains control for gameplay reasons. Or at least I presume so, it's possible they intended there to be something special about their inner wolf.

----------


## Fyraltari

> The idea with Sinding seems to be that normal werewolves, such as him, transform against their will during the Full Moon and become ravening beasts which aren't mindless, but extremely bloodthirsty to the point of having little self control.* 
> 
> *The Dragonborn only changes at will and retains control for gameplay reasons. Or at least I presume so, it's possible they intended there to be something special about their inner wolf.


All lycanthropy* strains, like all vampiric strains, are different in many ways. Some transform at will, some every night, some only when the moons are right. Some are in control when transformed, some are not, most are much more bloodthirsty when transormed. The strength and weaknesses associated with the disease, and whether they're still present when not in beast-form, also vary a lot.

I think that in-universe, the Companions, much like the Volkihar just got lucky on what their curse entails.

*Which on Tamriel included other werebeasts, like werebears, wereboars, werevultures and maybe the fabled weresharks.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I think that in-universe, the Companions, much like the Volkihar just got lucky on what their curse entails.


It might be a willpower thing too. The Companions dont turn everyone as soon as they join, maybe theyre doing some vetting behind the scenes to avoid turning anyone who couldnt take it. They do need to keep the whole werewolf thing quiet, after all.

----------


## Rater202

As I recall, the first of the companons to become werewolves were turned willingly by some ritual done with the Glenmoril Coven.

I imagine that a willing transformation or a Blessing from Hrcine or one of his followers is going to be differant from something meant as an active curse, y

----------


## Grim Portent

Probably, but there is an implication that the Companions don't have full control of their lycanthropy either.

Aela says you gave them more trouble than Farkas did on his first transformation, implying he went on a rampage as you are intended* to do, and Vilkas references the 'call of the Blood' while he's talking to Kodlak, so there's some degree of compulsion to their werewolf nature even if we don't see much of it.


I suspect that the lack of werewolves being rampaging beasts in the base game might be a time crunch coding issue, or possibly a pathfinding issue. Before the DLCs we only see werewolves transform in scripted scenes the player can't interact with, Farkas vs the Silver Hand and Sinding vs the jail bars. Other than the Silver Hand base with the caged werewolves I don't think there's even any hostile werewolves in the game until DLC related random encounters, and they all happen in the open world. Sinding even gets a bit wonky trying to path through his grotto sometimes, so the lack of werewolf rampages might be down to them just being awkward to fit into maps designed around bandits.

*Who didn't kill a bunch of Whiterun guards and Heimskr on their first transformation?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> *Who didn't kill a bunch of Whiterun guards and Heimskr on their first transformation?


I think I just ran for the exit. The main exit, as I didnt realize at the time there was a back door.

I do love that you included Heimskr specifically in your rampage though.  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Keltest

> I think I just ran for the exit. The main exit, as I didnt realize at the time there was a back door.
> 
> I do love that you included Heimskr specifically in your rampage though.


Whiterun gets much more peaceful once he dies or gets locked in his house forever by the civil war.

----------


## DigoDragon

> Also also, that bit at the end where he forces Karliah and Brynjolf to fight each other.


Oh yeah! Geez you really start from training wheels when you get that artifact.





> Has anyone ever had a cave bear appear in Dragonsreach? Because I walked into Dragonsreach, heard a cave bear, and Farengar was fighting one when I went to his workspace.


 :Small Eek:  That's new.

I once had a generic Stormcloak soldier appear in my bedroom in Proudspire after I took an 8-hour rest. He then left the house and was mauled by the city guard.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Who didn't kill a bunch of Whiterun guards and Heimskr on their first transformation?


I remember being stuck around Jorrvaskr for some reason.



> Whiterun gets much more peaceful once he dies or gets locked in his house forever by the civil war.


Am I the only one here who likes Heimskr?

----------


## Mark Hall

> Am I the only one here who likes Heimskr?


Wouldn't say I like him, but I don't have any reason to hate him, either.

----------


## Keltest

> Wouldn't say I like him, but I don't have any reason to hate him, either.


I dont habitually murder him the way I do Nazeem, but only because I can avoid him easier.

----------


## Kantaki

> I think I just ran for the exit. The main exit, as I didnt realize at the time there was a back door.
> 
> I do love that you included Heimskr specifically in your rampage though.


To be fair, he _is_ kind of annoying. :Small Amused: 
But no, never rampaged during that first transformation.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I once had a generic Stormcloak soldier appear in my bedroom in Proudspire after I took an 8-hour rest. He then left the house and was mauled by the city guard.


I had an enormous great white shark fall out of the sky near one if the Whiterun giant encampments, but that was from a mod.




> Am I the only one here who likes Heimskr?


He earned my ire when I asked him about Talos and he told me to go read a book. Hes a terrible priest.

----------


## WritersBlock

I have no problem with Heimskr either, Whiterun just would not be the same to me without him.

I keep Nazeem around for one reason, I have the Inigo follower mod and Inigo has some great interactions with him.

----------


## veti

> Am I the only one here who likes Heimskr?


Yes. Yes, you are. I don't... _dislike_ him exactly, but I do go out of my way to avoid him if you see what I mean. Man's a loony.




> I had an enormous great white shark fall out of the sky near one if the Whiterun giant encampments, but that was from a mod.


Wait, there's a sharknado mod?

I think the first time I transformed into a werewolf, I got killed by the guards while trying to figure out how to switch back to FP perspective. That's the biggest reason I still don't like playing a werewolf, the forced over-the-shoulder thing. Drives me nuts.

----------


## Fyraltari

I mean, "like" may be a bit strong but he's... endearingly colourful. Whiterun just isn't Whiterun without the loony bellowing a sermon he himself barely comprehends at the breaking point of his vocal cords.




> I think the first time I transformed into a werewolf, I got killed by the guards while trying to figure out how to switch back to FP perspective. That's the reason I still don't like playing a werewolf, the forced over-the-shoulder thing. Drives me nuts.


Urg, so annoying. And it's the same for the Vampire Lord form. Just why?

----------


## Rynjin

And as far as I know there's no good mod for that either, weird.

----------


## WritersBlock

Eh, I pretty much stay in 3rd person mode all the time since I downloaded the true directional movement mod. (Actual 8 way movement and targeting enemies)

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Wait, there's a sharknado mod?


Truthfully I dont think that was intentional on the part of the mod author. Its stated purpose was to add sharks to the game (and an unfinished island house) and for the most part it just replaced the Slaughterfish with sharks in the water.




> That's the biggest reason I still don't like playing a werewolf, the forced over-the-shoulder thing. Drives me nuts.


Second this.

----------


## Spore

> Urg, so annoying. And it's the same for the Vampire Lord form. Just why?


My personal guess is that vampire lords and werewolves make visuals glitch.

----------


## Grim Portent

I think it might also be to do with map design. Werewolves get stuck on things when you can see your arms and feet, trying to squeeze past chairs and tables when you can't see your giant model knocking into them would be rather obnoxious.

----------


## Rynjin

It's not really a mechanical issue, as there are already first person mods for Werewolf and Vampire Lord forms that work fine.

The reason I said there aren't any good ones is that they're incompatible with any other mods that touch ANY of the Werewolf or Vampire Lord records, meaning you have to choose between first person gameplay or the things that actually make those forms fun.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

If anyone has been wanting to try ESO, theyve got another free play event running from now until the 29th.

----------


## veti

In the eternal quest to make Skyrim a bit - different, I've been trying to come up with some extra rules to impose on myself. Sort of a nuzlocke option for Skyrim.

Rules such as "no fast travel", picking a set of skills that should never increase, avoiding the more offensive exploits - these are obvious, I've been using these (with variations) for years. Now I'm trying to come up with a coherent ruleset that is simultaneously more restrictive, but still allows reasonable freedom in how you choose to play the game.

This is how I'm thinking so far:
Don't grind crafting (Smithing, Enchanting, Alchemy). Developing these skills "normally" is fine, but if any of them are ever one of your top 3 best skills, you've done it wrong.Only one follower at a time (unless a quest explicitly requires you to take more). "Bonus" followers, such as dogs, *do* count. (So if you pick up Barbas, send Lydia home until you get rid of him.)When you have a quest in your journal, do it as soon as possible. There should not be more than 5 main items and 5 miscellaneous objectives in the journal. (Journal items that aren't "objectives", such as tracking markers for modded NPCs, don't count. Using mods or exploits to prevent or delay quests appearing is fine. Once they are there, however, treat them with the urgency they all seem to demand.)Level up as soon as reasonably possible. No "holding" the level, for the free regen it gives you in combat.Only use manual saves, never auto saves. Make no more than 1 save per level.If you're careless enough to get a follower killed, they're dead. Mourn them and move on. No reloading just for that.Your _total_ "fortify (magic school)" (i.e. reduce casting cost) for any given magic school should never exceed 50%. Ditto elemental resistances.
Thoughts? Suggestions?

----------


## WritersBlock

Sounds like you might enjoy that "Requiem, roleplaying overhaul" mod.

Well there is a chance that the latest for Skyrim that came out of nowhere broke that mod into pieces like it did so many others, so that may not be an option any more.

----------


## Rynjin

> In the eternal quest to make Skyrim a bit - different, I've been trying to come up with some extra rules to impose on myself. Sort of a nuzlocke option for Skyrim.
> 
> Rules such as "no fast travel", picking a set of skills that should never increase, avoiding the more offensive exploits - these are obvious, I've been using these (with variations) for years. Now I'm trying to come up with a coherent ruleset that is simultaneously more restrictive, but still allows reasonable freedom in how you choose to play the game.
> 
> This is how I'm thinking so far:
> Don't grind crafting (Smithing, Enchanting, Alchemy). Developing these skills "normally" is fine, but if any of them are ever one of your top 3 best skills, you've done it wrong.Only one follower at a time (unless a quest explicitly requires you to take more). "Bonus" followers, such as dogs, *do* count. (So if you pick up Barbas, send Lydia home until you get rid of him.)When you have a quest in your journal, do it as soon as possible. There should not be more than 5 main items and 5 miscellaneous objectives in the journal. (Journal items that aren't "objectives", such as tracking markers for modded NPCs, don't count. Using mods or exploits to prevent or delay quests appearing is fine. Once they are there, however, treat them with the urgency they all seem to demand.)Level up as soon as reasonably possible. No "holding" the level, for the free regen it gives you in combat.Only use manual saves, never auto saves. Make no more than 1 save per level.If you're careless enough to get a follower killed, they're dead. Mourn them and move on. No reloading just for that.Your _total_ "fortify (magic school)" (i.e. reduce casting cost) for any given magic school should never exceed 50%. Ditto elemental resistances.
> Thoughts? Suggestions?


Clearly if you're going for a Skyrim "Nuzlocke" your main character should also have permadeath. Use Proteus and put any "dead" characters in the retirement home, then make a new one.

Using this you can also do stuff like make a new character for each guild questline without sacking overall game progress if you like to maintain a persistent worldstate of sorts.

(It can also help alleviate the tedium that can sometimes come with having a locked-in skillset. I really enjoyed my last character, a paladin who wasn't allowed to sneak or use ranged weapons/magic (besides offensive Restoration magic) at all, but it DID get old after a while and I started trying to shake things up towards the end of my run through Vigilant.)

----------


## Mark Hall

> [*]Don't grind crafting (Smithing, Enchanting, Alchemy). Developing these skills "normally" is fine, but if any of them are ever one of your top 3 best skills, you've done it wrong.


If you get a buildable house, "no grinding Smithing" is going to get hard.

----------


## Vinyadan

Skyrim is now on GOG, and the promoted features are...

*GOG notice about the DRM-free version*
compatibility with most mods via Nexus Mods Vortex v1.6.12 and newercompatibility with Skyrim Script Extender (SKSE) modsgame version rollback and disabling automatic updates available

----------


## WritersBlock

That is FANTASTIC news!. First the first of the 2 Crossbell games in the Trail's/Kiseki series released 2 days ago in the west (And an epic level PC port to boot) and now this. From what I am hearing this will be the definitive Skyrim experience. Because lets be honest, the Steam version has been a complete disaster at times if you use lots of mods.

----------


## Rynjin

> That is FANTASTIC news!. First the first of the 2 Crossbell games in the Trail's/Kiseki series released 2 days ago in the west (And an epic level PC port to boot) and now this. From what I am hearing this will be the definitive Skyrim experience. Because lets be honest, the Steam version has been a complete disaster at times if you use lots of mods.


Not really? It's surprising to me that people still don't know you can disable auto-updates on Steam too. I only update when I know all my mods have been updated too. I JUST updated to AE a couple of weeks ago.

----------


## Anteros

> Clearly if you're going for a Skyrim "Nuzlocke" your main character should also have permadeath. Use Proteus and put any "dead" characters in the retirement home, then make a new one.
> 
> Using this you can also do stuff like make a new character for each guild questline without sacking overall game progress if you like to maintain a persistent worldstate of sorts.
> 
> (It can also help alleviate the tedium that can sometimes come with having a locked-in skillset. I really enjoyed my last character, a paladin who wasn't allowed to sneak or use ranged weapons/magic (besides offensive Restoration magic) at all, but it DID get old after a while and I started trying to shake things up towards the end of my run through Vigilant.)


Characters can die in Skyrim?  Are you sure?  I guess maybe from glitches or fall damage...but those aren't going to feel like good ways to lose a character.  Actual death from losing a fight is basically non-existent.

----------


## Rynjin

> Characters can die in Skyrim?  Are you sure?  I guess maybe from glitches or fall damage...but those aren't going to feel like good ways to lose a character.  Actual death from losing a fight is basically non-existent.


It definitely happens with my current mod setup. Wildcat, Valhalla, Deadly Dragons,  Ultimate Deadly Encounters (especially...a lot of the added enemy types are busted as ****), etc. add a lot of extra difficulty.

You still become an unstoppable god of destruction late game, but for the first 30-40 levels or so getting your ass kicked is a common occurrence. You have to invest a lot in defenses to survive.

I also have some mod that I've had for YEARS and I don't know what it is that adds a really broken spell to all Necromancer and Conjurer type NPCs of any level that as far as I can tell does untyped damage (or maybe Poison/Disease damage, which isn't easily resisted), and the damage appears to be exactly 100, so low levels you have to play the cover and run game any time a Necromancer shows up or they just gargleblast you instantly.

I think it might be one of the disease spells added by either Ordinator or Apocalypse that got added to NPCs via ASIS or whatever the modern equivalent of it is that I'm using.

----------


## InvisibleBison

> Characters can die in Skyrim?  Are you sure?  I guess maybe from glitches or fall damage...but those aren't going to feel like good ways to lose a character.  Actual death from losing a fight is basically non-existent.


Low level characters can be pretty fragile, especially on higher difficulties. I've certainly had single-digit level characters die to greatsword-wielding bandit thugs or apprentice necromancers.

----------


## Resileaf

> Low level characters can be pretty fragile, especially on higher difficulties. I've certainly had single-digit level characters die to greatsword-wielding bandit thugs or apprentice necromancers.


Or giants, or the frost troll on the way to High Hrothgar, or to a badly-timed sync kill from a dragon.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Or giants, or the frost troll on the way to High Hrothgar, or to a badly-timed sync kill from a dragon.


My first-ever Skyrim death was to a Giant. I was level 12 or thereabouts.

While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?

----------


## Imbalance

> My first-ever Skyrim death was to a Giant. I was level 12 or thereabouts.
> 
> While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?


Lol the bear.

And, yeah, even in a full suit of legendary smithed and enchanted dragon plate at level 60-something I still find ways to get killed in unmodded Skyrim.  Gosh, I must really suck at playing. :Small Sigh:

----------


## Fyraltari

> My first-ever Skyrim death was to a Giant. I was level 12 or thereabouts.
> 
> While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?


The frost troll, I think. I had just killed a dragon! Surely a troll, would be no problem, right?

----------


## DigoDragon

> While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?


I'm fairly sure my first death was against the bandits in cave north of Whiterun. The cave where you get the Transmute ore spell. 

I got ganged up on by the leader and two mooks while being pretty low level. ^^ on my second try I managed to lure out the bandits one at a time to get through it.

----------


## Keltest

Add me to the list of frost troll victims. That thing is more dangerous in melee than a dragon.

----------


## Mark Hall

> While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?


Without question, the unmodded UI.

----------


## Spore

I died to a spiraling rib cage and Skyrim's wonky physics engine trying to loot the mage robes.

The undead are less deadly than not animated bines...

----------


## WritersBlock

I think mine was to the player.kill console command mid-whirlwind sprint to launch my character off the top of High Hrothgar.

----------


## Rynjin

> My first-ever Skyrim death was to a Giant. I was level 12 or thereabouts.
> 
> While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?


If I remember correctly, it was the same as many people's first death: the High Hrothgar frost troll.

The game softballs encounters hard up to that point, but just ASSUMES most people will **** off from the main quest for a while after Mirmulnir I guess?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I think mine was to the player.kill console command mid-whirlwind sprint to launch my character off the top of High Hrothgar.


I am irrationally glad to hear I am not the only one to have tried this.  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Lord Raziere

> While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?


I've played skyrim for 500+ hours, and a vanilla game on console before I had a computer, I do not remember. after a while, all the deaths blur together, become very rare because I am OP, or sometimes occur repeatedly because I get caught in strange situations.

----------


## halfeye

> My first-ever Skyrim death was to a Giant. I was level 12 or thereabouts.
> 
> While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?


I don't remember. That's so many playthroughs ago. Might have been anything, possibly on the way out of Helgen? Might have been a sabrecat near Whiterun, could have been a bear in that cave on the way to the way to High Hrothgar, could have been in the dungeon near that village. That frost troll certainly got me on some playthroughs, maybe on the first, but if so it almost certainly wasn't the first.

----------


## mjp1050

> My first-ever Skyrim death was to a Giant. I was level 12 or thereabouts.
> 
> While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?


I died to some bandits in one of the forts around Helgen. I decided to go exploring instead of going to Riverwood.

----------


## Rater202

I don't quite recall my first death, but "the mother flipping Ice Troll" sounds right.

On most of my playthroughs, I'd blitz right past the damn thing and let the Greybeards handle it.

If it wasn't the troll then I either did something stupid and got hit by a trap, or like, I got taken out by an arrow.

They warn you about the arrow in the knee. No one warns you about an arrow in the eye.

----------


## Batcathat

I think my first death might've been a saber tooth tiger. At the very least, I remember dying very early (and quickly) to one of those. It might also have been falling from something high, I feel like that accounts for a disproportionate amount of death (at least until I unlock the invincibility shout and can jump down cliffs without fear).

----------


## veti

I'm not sure if it was the first death, but I remember taking the advice to "join the mages college in Winterhold" seriously. So I set off from Whiterun to get there, and promptly got eaten by a sabre cat.

If I'd made it far enough, the necromancers at Fort Kastav would certainly have done the job. Those bastards are way harder than any bandits.

----------


## Fyraltari

> If I remember correctly, it was the same as many people's first death: the High Hrothgar frost troll.
> 
> The game softballs encounters hard up to that point, but just ASSUMES most people will **** off from the main quest for a while after Mirmulnir I guess?


I'm pretty sure that troll is there precisely to tell players that have only focused on the main quest so far to go explore and do some stuff.

----------


## Grim Portent

> I'm pretty sure that troll is there precisely to tell players that have only focused on the main quest so far to go explore and do some stuff.


That's always how I've understood it's presence.

Though Skyrim is a bit weird about level-gating areas, in that it basically doesn't at all because of the scaling, except that the area around Dawnstar and Winterhold is very dangerous because the northern variants of various creatures are more dangerous despite both areas also having borderline nothing to do in them.

----------


## Anteros

> I'm pretty sure that troll is there precisely to tell players that have only focused on the main quest so far to go explore and do some stuff.


Not sure why since you can easily kill it with the basic fire spell you get at the start and sun tzu's brilliant strategy of backing up slowly while the ai is too dumb to not stand in the stream of fire.

----------


## Vinyadan

I don't even remember that troll. I do remember that the game used to feel brutal however, possibly as a result of too much crafting.

----------


## Rynjin

> I'm pretty sure that troll is there precisely to tell players that have only focused on the main quest so far to go explore and do some stuff.


The problem is it's a weird place to do that. Narratively speaking the best spot for a break is right AFTER you meet the Greybeards.

----------


## factotum

> The problem is it's a weird place to do that. Narratively speaking the best spot for a break is right AFTER you meet the Greybeards.


Yeah, but how would that work as part of the game? There's no particular route you have to take when leaving High Hrothgar, so how would they put a "booby trap" monster there to catch you on the way out?

----------


## Rynjin

> Yeah, but how would that work as part of the game? There's no particular route you have to take when leaving High Hrothgar, so how would they put a "booby trap" monster there to catch you on the way out?


You make Ustengrav a higher level dungeon.

----------


## veti

> You make Ustengrav a higher level dungeon.


And Arngeir could have warned us about it. Told us to take some time to prepare. Like Caius Cosades, who actually tells you to goof off for a few levels when you first talk to him.

----------


## Triaxx

My first character decided to be a mage so he immediately buzzed off to Winterhold. And going overland, hopped over a rise to investigate a map symbol, which turned out to be a giant camp. And so he got a few frequent flier miles for his first death. :D

----------


## Fyraltari

> You make Ustengrav a higher level dungeon.





> And Arngeir could have warned us about it. Told us to take some time to prepare. Like Caius Cosades, who actually tells you to goof off for a few levels when you first talk to him.


Yeah, that would have been a better idea.

----------


## Kesnit

> While were on the subject, what was everyone elses first death?


Maybe not my first death, but the one I remembered and that impacted my play for years after...

Frostflow Lighthouse, near Winterhold. I was playing a heavy armor wearing, sword-and-board, not much magic or archery Orc. I got to the end of the tunnels, where all the chaurus are. I quickly realized I couldn't kill them with melee (because they overwhelmed me), so had to wait until they appeared and shoot them from the ledge. Between my low archery and the fact they would regen if they wandered too far from me, it took FOREVER to kill them all.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Between my low archery and the fact they would regen if they wandered too far from me, it took FOREVER to kill them all.


Oh, that reminds me of the funniest thing that ever happened to me in this game:



> Originally Posted by Lurkmoar
> 
> 
> Orchander, the guy that's literally immune to magic and teleports can be chumped so easily when questing for Spellbreaker.
> 
> 
> I remember the one time I fought him. I was going for a necromancer build and was fairlyblow-level. None of my magic could hurt him and I only had the one crappy sword. So while I could damage him, I couldn't damage him fast enough to overtake his healing. But since all my magic was good for was healing me, he couldn't hurt me so bad that I couldn't heal back to 100% mid-fight as well. So we were locked in a stalemate. The fight went on for long enough that I level up twice solely from the increases in One-Handed (and the occasional Restoration) until the game glitched and froze my character's arm mid-swing which is when I called it a day.

----------


## Vinyadan

Similar experience with Oblivion willowisps. Between the fact that they were invisible and that they had absorb health spells, fights with them lasted incredibly long.

----------


## WritersBlock

A distressing number of fights in Oblivion lasted incredibly long thanks to the awful scaling. I think the willowisp's damaged stats as well.

----------


## Mark Hall

I 100% did not level in Oblivion except as entirely necessary, until I had absolutely obscene skill levels.

----------


## Spore

> I 100% did not level in Oblivion except as entirely necessary, until I had absolutely obscene skill levels.


Oh god, yes. I have been burnt by that in my first run when Bandits eventually ran up to rob me off my approximately 300 gold and legendary items whilke wearing the equivalent of a small house worth in armor themselves.

----------


## veti

What I remember from Oblivion is my weapons wearing out sometimes faster than the enemy's health bar. Of course the longer you fight, the blunter your sword gets, and the less damage it does.

To say nothing of the times I inadvertently wandered into town naked, because I hadn't realised my armour was worn out.

----------


## WritersBlock

At least the high level bandits and marauder's are a GREAT source of gold from selling all that ebony, glass, and daedric equipment they use.

----------


## Spore

> At least the high level bandits and marauder's are a GREAT source of gold from selling all that ebony, glass, and daedric equipment they use.


You scoff in the face of the Daedric Prince; "Why should I serve you when I can just slaughter Bob over there?"

----------


## Taevyr

Except for my first forays into oblivion on PS3, I always played with one or more mods for the level system. Tried staying low-level at first, but I didn't like not feeling the progression as much.

----------


## Batcathat

I never even tried the unmodded level system in Oblivion. I didn't start playing it until Skyrim came out (but was too demanding for my computer at the time, so I figured Oblivion was the next best thing) so there was plenty of helpful information about what mods to install to keep things more reasonable.

----------


## halfeye

After the first couple of runs in Oblivion, I took to using the "main skills you don't actually intend to use much" approach. Worked fine, in fact made you OP by quite a bit.

----------


## veti

> After the first couple of runs in Oblivion, I took to using the "main skills you don't actually intend to use much" approach. Worked fine, in fact made you OP by quite a bit.


Yup, you and probably at least 50% of players who got as far as starting a third character.

Which is why I experienced a moment of panic when Skyrim wouldn't let me choose "primary" skills at all...

----------


## Mark Hall

> Oh god, yes. I have been burnt by that in my first run when Bandits eventually ran up to rob me off my approximately 300 gold and legendary items whilke wearing the equivalent of a small house worth in armor themselves.


They're poor because they can't find anyone who can afford to buy even one piece of their gear.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> They're poor because they can't find anyone who can afford to buy even one piece of their gear.


Welcome to Skyrim where the economy is made up and the coins don't matter. no one buys anything, you just go to your dungeon farm and kill a few draugr or bandits that randomly generates things to get what you need. if the RNG doesn't provide you with food, your out of luck.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> You scoff in the face of the Daedric Prince; "Why should I serve you when I can just slaughter Bob over there?"


Serve Boethiah, then you can do both.  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Yora

Been making some good progress in Morrowind the last two weeks, and man, this game is long.

I thought I might try to complete doing all Fighters Guild, Mages Guild, House Redoran, and Tribunal Temple quests, but looking up the quest lists for the game, I barely did half of them yet. And my character is getting closed to being maxed out already.
And of course I still could do it all over again trying to do all the Telvani and Thieves Guild quests instead. Given that it has taken me to get this far into the game even though I got it on release, I probably won't.  :Small Amused: 

Similarly, I am feeling like starting a second playthrough of Skyrim, since I completed the Dragonborn and Civil War questlines in my first playthrough three years ago.  :Small Big Grin: 
Last time I played a Bosmer archer in the Companions and College, mostly doing stuff in Whiterun, Eastmarch, and Hjaalmarch, and the Pale. I only briefly passed through the Rift a few times without really exploring, and I think I might never have actually been to the Reach. Don't remember doing quests in Solitude either. So I think a Breton thief with illusion magic might be fun, doing Thieves guild and Dark Brotherhood stuff (and not getting involved with the civil war at all, that one really sucked).

Any suggestions what to plan or look out for with a thief type character in Skyrim?




> Welcome to Skyrim where the economy is made up and the coins don't matter. no one buys anything, you just go to your dungeon farm and kill a few draugr or bandits that randomly generates things to get what you need. if the RNG doesn't provide you with food, your out of luck.


In Morrowind, I am currently finding all kinds of weapons and shields with values of 20,000 to 80,000 gold, but to my knowledge there are only a few smiths that have more than 2,000 gold at hand at any moment. The value on these items seems a bit like a joke. Looks cool when you find them and see all the zeros, but it's actually impossible to get more than a fraction of that money for them.

----------


## GloatingSwine

There's one merchant in Morrowind who has 10000 to buy things with. (It's a mudcrab, obviously).

----------


## Batcathat

> Any suggestions what to plan or look out for with a thief type character in Skyrim?


In my experience, playing sneaky in Skyrim is very fun (granted, that's the type of character I almost always play when possible) and pretty easy, especially when you max out the sneaking perks. So nothing in particular to look out for, if I remember correctly (but it's been a few years, so I might be forgetting something).

I've always found illusion magic in the Elder Scrolls games (well, the two I've played) as a bit of a heartbreaker, since it's never as useful as I imagine it should be, but that might just be my expectations being too high.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> In Morrowind, I am currently finding all kinds of weapons and shields with values of 20,000 to 80,000 gold, but to my knowledge there are only a few smiths that have more than 2,000 gold at hand at any moment. The value on these items seems a bit like a joke. Looks cool when you find them and see all the zeros, but it's actually impossible to get more than a fraction of that money for them.


I dont remember if this works in Morrowind specifically, but my usual solution to that problem is to buy a bunch of stuff from the merchant (generally Soul Gems, crafting materials and potions of Fortify Carry weight) so they have more gold, then sell the expensive thing to get the gold back.

----------


## Yora

> In my experience, playing sneaky in Skyrim is very fun (granted, that's the type of character I almost always play when possible) and pretty easy, especially when you max out the sneaking perks. So nothing in particular to look out for, if I remember correctly (but it's been a few years, so I might be forgetting something).


It's super fun. Been doing that all the time with my archer.

In contrast, I found stealth to feel really pointless in Morrowind. But with the cool backstabbing and stealth shots in Skyrim, you get so much more use out of it.

The thing with magic in Elder Scrolls games for me has always been that I never really practiced it because at lower skill levels it doesn't really do anything that I already do better without it. The only four spells I've been using in Morrowind are heal self, levitate, almsivi intervention, and on rare occasion water walk. And I only have a chance to succeed at them because of training, not of practice.
Curious to see if it makes a difference if I really try to find and create opportunities to practice utility spells in Skyrim as much as possible.

----------


## WritersBlock

I just use the construction set to add some more gold to a couple of merchants.

I HATE that Bethesda does not include the Creation Kit/Construction Set with Skyrim like they did with the last 2 games.  :Small Furious:

----------


## Batcathat

> The thing with magic in Elder Scrolls games for me has always been that I never really practiced it because at lower skill levels it doesn't really do anything that I already do better without it. The only four spells I've been using in Morrowind are heal self, levitate, almsivi intervention, and on rare occasion water walk. And I only have a chance to succeed at them because of training, not of practice.
> Curious to see if it makes a difference if I really try to find and create opportunities to practice utility spells in Skyrim as much as possible.


I've never focused that much on magic either, but my last playthrough of Skyrim I decided to change that and focused almost entirely on conjuration which was quite fun. I discovered that there are few problems in life that a pair of Dremora Lords can't solve.  :Small Amused:

----------


## Rynjin

> I HATE that Bethesda does not include the Creation Kit/Construction Set with Skyrim like they did with the last 2 games.


They...do though.

----------


## Resileaf

> There's one merchant in Morrowind who has 10000 to buy things with. (It's a mudcrab, obviously).


There's also a museum in Mournhold where the custodian will buy your artifacts for something approaching its real value.

Not that you'll have anything to buy with that money anyways.

----------


## Aeson

There's also the mercantile master-trainer, Ababael Timsar-Dadisun, who can be found at the Zainab Camp, buys almost everything, and has 9000 gold.

----------


## Imbalance

> Not that you'll have anything to buy with that money anyways.


Two words:  custom spells

----------


## Vinyadan

> In Morrowind, I am currently finding all kinds of weapons and shields with values of 20,000 to 80,000 gold, but to my knowledge there are only a few smiths that have more than 2,000 gold at hand at any moment. The value on these items seems a bit like a joke. Looks cool when you find them and see all the zeros, but it's actually impossible to get more than a fraction of that money for them.


The one place where I have found such things to matter is in Ghostgate, where you can buy glass and ebony items, so it's useful to have such incredibly valuable items available as coin.

----------


## Aeson

> Two words:  custom spells


Or custom enchantments - enchanters charge exorbitant rates, but if you're not inclined to engage in exploits they're about the only practical way to make constant-effect items with nontrivial effect magnitudes and they can be convenient for making other items as well, especially if you don't want your character to be a skilled enchanter themselves.




> The one place where I have found such things to matter is in Ghostgate, where you can buy glass and ebony items, so it's useful to have such incredibly valuable items available as coin.


High-value items are also useful for recovering gold from enchanters (and maybe spellmakers, if there's one that trades in the right item types, though I think most of them either don't deal in goods or only deal in alchemy goods).

----------


## Mark Hall

> In Morrowind, I am currently finding all kinds of weapons and shields with values of 20,000 to 80,000 gold, but to my knowledge there are only a few smiths that have more than 2,000 gold at hand at any moment. The value on these items seems a bit like a joke. Looks cool when you find them and see all the zeros, but it's actually impossible to get more than a fraction of that money for them.


If you have Tribunal, it can be worth it to hit that early, because that's where the big money merchants are at. As was mentioned, the "buy everything they have so they can afford the one thing you have" method works, too.

----------


## veti

> Any suggestions what to plan or look out for with a thief type character in Skyrim?
>  .


The most satisfying part of the whole game is getting back (just a little bit) at Maven Black-Briar. There are three ways to do that, and two of them start with talking to Louis Lechance in the Bee & Barb in Riften. 




> They...do though.


No, it's a separate download. Until very recently you had to download it directly from Bethesda's own servers, signing up to a whole separate account to do so. 

It's only about a year ago, if I remember correctly, that it was finally made available on Steam.

----------


## Rynjin

> The most satisfying part of the whole game is getting back (just a little bit) at Maven Black-Briar. There are three ways to do that, and two of them start with talking to Louis Lechance in the Bee & Barb in Riften. 
> 
> 
> No, it's a separate download. Until very recently you had to download it directly from Bethesda's own servers, signing up to a whole separate account to do so. 
> 
> It's only about a year ago, if I remember correctly, that it was finally made available on Steam.


This seems like a semantic difference. The tool is easily and readily available.

----------


## veti

> This seems like a semantic difference. The tool is easily and readily available.


WritersBlock was complaining specifically that you don't get it bundled with the game, which you did for previous ES games. For Skyrim - not only was it not included with the game download (or disc, for that matter, if you bought the game that way), it wasn't even available on the same account. Signing up to a whole separate service - and installing a whole separate download manager - is a non-trivial burden.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> WritersBlock was complaining specifically that you don't get it bundled with the game, which you did for previous ES games. For Skyrim - not only was it not included with the game download (or disc, for that matter, if you bought the game that way), it wasn't even available on the same account. Signing up to a whole separate service - and installing a whole separate download manager - is a non-trivial burden.


Wasn't it also not available until some time after the game came out (admittedly a moot point now)?

----------


## Rynjin

> Wasn't it also not available until some time after the game came out (admittedly a moot point now)?


From what I remember the CC came out about a year after Skyrim's initial release.

Edit: I was wrong, it was 3 months.

----------


## veti

So... All my Skyrim saves have disappeared. Except autosaves.

In-game, all my characters are still there, but each one has only two (or occasionally three, for some reason) autosaves that can be loaded.

In the saves folder, there are 'autosave' files by the hundreds, but no others at all.

Even more perplexingly - when I make a new save, in game, it doesn't seem to exist. Isn't in the saves folder, doesn't show up in the "load" menu.

I haven't updated the game lately (Steam says it needs updating, I say mind your own business - I checked the release notes for the new version, seems to be all CC crap.) I did download Proteus, on Rynjin's suggestion, but I haven't yet installed it much less activated it.

Any ideas? Similar experiences?

Edit: I *suspect* Vortex, which boasts of its feature to separate saves by profile. But I can't find out where it stores saves.

----------


## Rynjin

If you search a character's name in File Explorer it might come up.

----------


## veti

> If you search a character's name in File Explorer it might come up.


Good suggestion. But nothing found. Looks like the files really have - gone. I _thought_ the C: drive was showing more free space than I remembered.

But I also scanned the disc using Disk Drill, and it found - absolutely nothing recently deleted from the saves folder. (A bunch of stuff I deleted manually, several months ago, does show up.)

That's... discouraging. But the inability to make new saves is even worse. Even quicksaves just vanish into the ether.

----------


## Keltest

> Good suggestion. But nothing found. Looks like the files really have - gone. I _thought_ the C: drive was showing more free space than I remembered.
> 
> But I also scanned the disc using Disk Drill, and it found - absolutely nothing recently deleted from the saves folder. (A bunch of stuff I deleted manually, several months ago, does show up.)
> 
> That's... discouraging. But the inability to make new saves is even worse. Even quicksaves just vanish into the ether.


Silly question, have you restarted your computer since you noticed this problem?

----------


## Rynjin

> Good suggestion. But nothing found. Looks like the files really have - gone. I _thought_ the C: drive was showing more free space than I remembered.
> 
> But I also scanned the disc using Disk Drill, and it found - absolutely nothing recently deleted from the saves folder. (A bunch of stuff I deleted manually, several months ago, does show up.)
> 
> That's... discouraging. But the inability to make new saves is even worse. Even quicksaves just vanish into the ether.


Have you tried installing or downloading something else to your C drive? It could be the drive itself is faulty and is having trouble writing new files.

----------


## factotum

Or it might not be the drive at all. I had a problem (albeit with a different game) many years ago where saved files kept getting corrupted and I, at first, thought that was the drive dying too, but then replacing it had no effect. I eventually (after much testing) found the problem was actually a faulty memory module--it was causing single-bit errors in high memory areas, and since the system tended not to use those when it was under light load, they didn't show up until I really started stressing it by playing the game.

----------


## veti

> Silly question, have you restarted your computer since you noticed this problem?


Actually, no. I'll do that shortly, but I've also updated the game in the meantime (at this point, what do I have to lose?), so I'll never know if that was the problem...




> Have you tried installing or downloading something else to your C drive? It could be the drive itself is faulty and is having trouble writing new files.


Yep, I downloaded and installed Disk Drill with no issues. Also, the autosaves have no trouble.




> Or it might not be the drive at all. I had a problem (albeit with a different game) many years ago where saved files kept getting corrupted and I, at first, thought that was the drive dying too, but then replacing it had no effect. I eventually (after much testing) found the problem was actually a faulty memory module--it was causing single-bit errors in high memory areas, and since the system tended not to use those when it was under light load, they didn't show up until I really started stressing it by playing the game.


That's a daunting thought, but it doesn't seem to match my symptoms. It wouldn't explain, for instance, why saves from weeks or months ago have vanished. Nor why the autosaves are still fine.

OK, clearly this isn't a common problem that lots of people have seen before. The trouble is, there are so many shells and utilities wrapping around Skyrim (Steam, Vortex, SKSE, ReShade, FNIS, SSELODGen, and several more whose names I can't even remember at this point) that it's entirely possible no-one else in the world has the same configuration I do. 

I'll let y'all know if I find something that works.


Edit: Turns out my mistrust of the new update was well placed. It's another volley by Bethesda in their campaign to hamstring independent modding. I thought there'd be only minor changes after last year's fiasco, but no, they've gone to town on... adding a new (_completely pointless_) menu item - and they've broken a lot of mods to do it. 

And the update (and reboot) have done no good at all. Even playing a completely vanilla game, with all files verified, no mods, no SKSE, launched through Steam - I still can't make saves. Autosaves are fine, but they're all there is. Damnedest thing.


2nd edit: OK, so the answer was... a Windows update. I _think_ one of the security patches (applied automagically) had blocked my write access to the saves folder and, for some reason, hidden more than 2000 saves from my view. Applying the voluntary Windows patch - corrected this overzealous security.

So now my only problem is the plugins broken by the update. And of course, the CC rubbish that it shovelled back in. Again.

----------


## Vinyadan

I'm posting this here, because it was a problem that took a ridicolous amount of time to solve but was actually pretty simple, so, in case it happens to someone else...

If the grass in Oblivion disappears based on your position or camera position (for example, if the grass disappears when you get close to it), it's possible that it's due to an INI setting. In oblivion.ini, iGrassDensityEvalSize by default is set to 2, which is normal behaviour (the grass displays correctly). Set to 1, it's supposed to stop grass outside your view from rendering as a way to spare resources. This occasionally doesn't work right and it makes a patch of grass disappear when you get close to it or while you are still walking through it. 

Now we get to the weird part: iGrassDensityEvalSize accepts other numbers, too, although the results are not desirable. Set to 4, it causes glitches similar to the ones that appeared when set to 1 (that caused my problem). Set to 0, it causes a rare C++ runtime error: "This application has requested the Runtime to terminate it in an unusual way. Please contact the application's support team for more information"

Oblivion Reloaded apparently can cause a slightly similar problem, in that it can be set to substitute the normal grass with one rendered by OR. If you do so, sometimes you can see vanilla grass instead of the OR one based on camera angle (they look the same, but are in slightly different positions).

----------


## Imbalance

Is "Oblivion grass" another cute euphemism like "devil's lettuce?"  Not to be confused with the devil's fescue in Oblivion (in Oblivion) - that's harrada root.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Is "Oblivion grass" another cute euphemism like "devil's lettuce?"  Not to be confused with the devil's fescue in Oblivion (in Oblivion) - that's harrada root.


"Find him! And don't smoke the Grass... of Oblivion!"

----------


## veti

I noticed today that someone, somewhere, has fixed the Skyrim bug that prevents soul gems from updating their value or stacking correctly when they're filled. 

It's certainly not a mod I've installed for that purpose (though I would have done if I'd thought of it, and found the mod - it's always rated in my personal list as "mildly irritating"). It might have been smuggled into my game under cover of some larger mod. Or it might actually have been fixed in the last update to the base game, although that would seem out of character for Bethesda.

Anyone else observed this? Or can anyone definitely confirm that it's _not_ fixed in the base game as of 1.6.640?

----------


## Rater202

You know that quest in Oblivion, Caught in the Hunt, where you go to help find a guy who went missing after trying to pay off his debt, it turned out his debt collector arranged for him to be hunted for sport, you rescue him but then he gets murdered anyway?

The second time I got that quest I tried to cut the knot by killing the debt collector before heading out on the rescue, to see if his not being there would change the ending.

Instead I got a "you killed an important NPC and the quest can no longer e completed message" and a message telling me that my cold-blooded murder had cost me the right to use the artifacts of the Nine and I had to do that pilgrimage again.

...I's not the only example of Oblivion railroading you, but it's the one that I personally find the most annoying.

----------


## Keltest

> You know that quest in Oblivion, Caught in the Hunt, where you go to help find a guy who went missing after trying to pay off his debt, it turned out his debt collector arranged for him to be hunted for sport, you rescue him but then he gets murdered anyway?
> 
> The second time I got that quest I tried to cut the knot by killing the debt collector before heading out on the rescue, to see if his not being there would change the ending.
> 
> Instead I got a "you killed an important NPC and the quest can no longer e completed message" and a message telling me that my cold-blooded murder had cost me the right to use the artifacts of the Nine and I had to do that pilgrimage again.
> 
> ...I's not the only example of Oblivion railroading you, but it's the one that I personally find the most annoying.


Bad example there, because thats one of the few cases where you have no reason to see killing him as a viable solution to the problem.

----------


## Rater202

> Bad example there, because thats one of the few cases where you have no reason to see killing him as a viable solution to the problem.


Literally everything about him telegraphs that he's a bad-faith player and the missing man's wife warns you that he's dangerous.

Hell, even when he sends you on his quest to find the missing man, he more or less outright states that he's going to kill him.

----------


## Keltest

> Literally everything about him telegraphs that he's a bad-faith player and the missing man's wife warns you that he's dangerous.
> 
> Hell, even when he sends you on his quest to find the missing man, he more or less outright states that he's going to kill him.


Yes, absolutely. Which is why I didnt go with my original phrasing of "you have no reason to kill him." since you really, really do. But killing him doesnt do anything to get you to the missing guy, it doesnt make him any safer that you know of, and it actually removes a possible lead.

----------


## Rater202

> Yes, absolutely. Which is why I didnt go with my original phrasing of "you have no reason to kill him." since you really, really do. But killing him doesnt do anything to get you to the missing guy, it doesnt make him any safer that you know of, and it actually removes a possible lead.


I killed him _after_ he told me where to go and that the boat was ready.

----------


## Keltest

> I killed him _after_ he told me where to go and that the boat was ready.


And if he had lied to you or you needed more direction, you just screwed yourself.

----------


## Vinyadan

I don't remember Oblivion as particularly railroady (not in a way that made me go "Why can't I do that?!"), except for the Emperor's death right under my nose. In general, its quests were a big step up from Morrowind (to make an example, compare that invisible dude in Vivec with Aleswell, or the Brotherhood vs Morag Tong).

Thinking about it, Morrowind managed to give a lot of identity to the various settlements and gave them a story outside the player's actions. Oblivion didn't, and instead used the quests to create little stories that didn't tell the story of the settlement, but told a story inside the settlement. 
So for example Maar Gan is the historical location of the rock that Vivec got Mehrunes Dagon to throw at him instead of his followers and so we find the related shrine, complete with a daedra that lets you relive Vivec's legend by defeating him; in the present, it's also menaced by the blight and warriors of all sorts have assembled there. 
Instead, we know nothing of Aleswell's past or even of its current problems in normal times, but it gets its own story as that place where everyone turned invisible.

----------


## Imbalance

> You know that quest in Oblivion, Caught in the Hunt, where you go to help find a guy who went missing after trying to pay off his debt, it turned out his debt collector arranged for him to be hunted for sport, you rescue him but then he gets murdered anyway?
> 
> The second time I got that quest I tried to cut the knot by killing the debt collector before heading out on the rescue, to see if his not being there would change the ending.
> 
> Instead I got a "you killed an important NPC and the quest can no longer e completed message" and a message telling me that my cold-blooded murder had cost me the right to use the artifacts of the Nine and I had to do that pilgrimage again.
> 
> ...I's not the only example of Oblivion railroading you, but it's the one that I personally find the most annoying.


I remember.  It's among many reasons why Oblivion is my least favorite of the franchise.  It's still good, but I'd much rather go back to Morrowind than Oblivion.




> Bad example there, because thats one of the few cases where you have no reason to see killing him as a viable solution to the problem.


That's a dev perspective problem - killing should always be a viable solution in a sandbox game, but so should diplomacy.  I should be able to coerce the bad guy into not killing the other guy.  Game says no, that guy has to die, and I'm less OK with that than having the choice, even if the choices are still bad.

----------


## Mark Hall

> I remember.  It's among many reasons why Oblivion is my least favorite of the franchise.  It's still good, but I'd much rather go back to Morrowind than Oblivion.


If you arrived, and found his corpse, that would have felt less rail-roady. "OK, you show up, he's already dead, there's nothing you can do about it" is a far cry different "You show up, we kill him, and there's nothing you can do about it."

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

The Emperor dying under my nose I tend to give a pass because it's the tutorial, the one that irritated me was the guy in...Cheydinhal I think...who gets killed right in front of you and your control of your character gets taken away as it happens so you can't do anything.  :Small Mad: 




> If you arrived, and found his corpse, that would have felt less rail-roady. "OK, you show up, he's already dead, there's nothing you can do about it" is a far cry different "You show up, we kill him, and there's nothing you can do about it."


Going to agree with this. If they're alive and my stated goal is to save them then there should be some way to pull it off, if there can't be for whatever reason don't make it seem possible.

----------


## Mark Hall

> The Emperor dying under my nose I tend to give a pass because it's the tutorial, the one that irritated me was the guy in...Cheydinhal I think...who gets killed right in front of you and your control of your character gets taken away as it happens so you can't do anything.


Remember the Forsworn assassination in Markarth? You show up, and out of the blue, this guy pulls out a knife, goes into "attack stance", and, if you're quick enough, you can kill him before he kills that Imperial spy nice lady?

That's how such a thing should be played out. Let me stand between the poor bastard and the guys who mean to kill him. Make it so I have to be willing to sacrifice my HP if I want to win... but make it possible to win.

----------


## Rater202

> Remember the Forsworn assassination in Markarth? You show up, and out of the blue, this guy pulls out a knife, goes into "attack stance", and, if you're quick enough, you can kill him before he kills that Imperial spy nice lady?
> 
> That's how such a thing should be played out. Let me stand between the poor bastard and the guys who mean to kill him. Make it so I have to be willing to sacrifice my HP if I want to win... but make it possible to win.


Compare the quest in Oblivion, where you get hard coded to the floor for a second so a scripted fight can play out.

Mother****er let me toss a firebolt at the bastard about to do the murdering.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Remember the Forsworn assassination in Markarth? You show up, and out of the blue, this guy pulls out a knife, goes into "attack stance", and, if you're quick enough, you can kill him before he kills that Imperial spy nice lady?
> 
> That's how such a thing should be played out. Let me stand between the poor bastard and the guys who mean to kill him. Make it so I have to be willing to sacrifice my HP if I want to win... but make it possible to win.


Whether the Emperor lives or dies kind of makes a bigger difference to the plot than whether the Markath lady does, though.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Whether the Emperor lives or dies kind of makes a bigger difference to the plot than whether the Markath lady does, though.


I'm willing to make an exception for that, really, because it WAS the plot. They could have done it better, certainly ("One guy comes out of a secret door and OHK the Emperor, then instantly dies to a noob with a tire iron"), but it was far more essential that he die to the entire game.

----------


## Rater202

My problem with the EMperor's death is more that he lets it happen than anything else. Yeah, he foresaw his own demise but he knows that prophecy is never that straight cut.

As for handling his scripted death better: You could just have the player get swarmed with mooks that go down easily enough but there's enough of them to distract from the Emporer despawning and then when you go into the next room he spawns in on the floor dying from a stab wound and *then* he gives you his final speech and entrusts you with the Amulet.

----------


## Spore

> My problem with the Emperor's death is more that he lets it happen than anything else. Yeah, he foresaw his own demise but he knows that prophecy is never that straight cut.


I mean yes and no. The Nerevarine and the Dragonborn both could arguably have the power of CHIM basically allowing them to shape the universe to their will; or how ZP worded it: "The emperor sees the HP bar above your body and decides to die" but the Hero of Kvatch has no such legendary abilities.

But his life, or struggle against fate would inhibit Martin's willingness or ability to act unto the Oblivion Crisis. I can see a Martin Septim going: "Even if I am the descendant of the Emperor and I can hold the Amulet, why me and not the Emperor?" He is a monk in hiding for a reason. Only the emperor's death forces him to act.

----------


## veti

> But his life, or struggle against fate would inhibit Martin's willingness or ability to act unto the Oblivion Crisis. I can see a Martin Septim going: "Even if I am the descendant of the Emperor and I can hold the Amulet, why me and not the Emperor?" He is a monk in hiding for a reason. Only the emperor's death forces him to act.


Until the emperor dies, there can be no Oblivion crisis to rise to. And Martin isn't hiding, he's... been hidden, without his own knowledge. He doesn't know there's anything to hide from.

And not very effectively hidden, either. There's a reason Kvatch is targeted first.

I'm fine with "the emperor foresees his own death and knows there's no point fighting." He's an old man with a long and storied life behind him. He's... tired. He's had enough, he's done enough, it's time for someone else to step up. 

But I would have given his killer a one-shot uberweapon - maybe a kickass crossbow, or a poisoned dagger - to allow him to take down the emperor, and still be easily overpowered by the PC.

----------


## Fyraltari

> My problem with the EMperor's death is more that he lets it happen than anything else. Yeah, he foresaw his own demise but he knows that prophecy is never that straight cut.


What would you have him do? He's an 87 year old man in his pajamas armed with a kitchen knife. He only gets confirmation that this is the day he foresaw when he sees you in your jail. And there's no reason to assume that his vision told him the exact circumstance of his death, he might just have known that he would die shortly after meeting you and that's it.



> But I would have given his killer a one-shot uberweapon - maybe a kickass crossbow, or a poisoned dagger - to allow him to take down the emperor, and still be easily overpowered by the PC.


 Honestly, I don't think the weapon has to be impressive at all, just have it scripted that the Emperor gets shot by an archer from the other side of a large room as soon as he enters and the player has no realistic way to keep that from happening and it feels less like cheating 
than the teleporting assassin.

----------


## Vinyadan

I think that these are all fair points as far as a sandbox game is concerned, but Oblivion quests weren't really meant to be sandboxes: they first and foremost cared about offering you a narrative experience. That's why the Emperor dies right in front of you after having given you your mission: it's more poignant than him dying as a two-cm high pixel mush behind a grate so you can legitimately fail to save him. 
It's similar with the guy being killed for sport, it's just an emotional beat in the story of the quest (although it objectively wasn't as necessary as the Emperor dying).

Even the Dark Brotherhood questline, one of the best in TES history, actually gives you the elements to understand that something isn't right with the new messages (you can see that the style and the mood are different from the previous ones), but you don't get a way to make it right. On the other hand, this is handled well, because the organisation of the Brotherhood was meant to give no way for the executors to check on their handlers, and so it all fits within the narrative as the secrecy comes back to bite them and you are given a way to rise to the top without something like Traven killing himself (I still consider that the dumbest story beat I've seen in the series).

----------


## Resileaf

> Honestly, I don't think the weapon has to be impressive at all, just have it scripted that the Emperor gets shot by an archer from the other side of a large room as soon as he enters and the player has no realistic way to keep that from happening and it feels less like cheating 
> than the teleporting assassin.


Not teleporting, actually. A secret passage in the wall opens and the assassin emerges from it.

----------


## Spore

To be perfectly honest the Mythic Dawn does have skilled members and spellcasters. It would be no surprise to have a highly trained actual nightblade or assassin along with an Invisibility spell, enough acrobatics to scale a wall or magical summoned daedric weaponry and still be entirely within the power spectrum of the faction. That is one thing the level scaling kind of ruins along with Oblivion Gates.

If you ever entered any Oblivion Gate at Lv 1 there is a measly few skamps throwing fire at your face instead of the armies of daedra that one would expect. Ruins conquered by an ancient lich would have rickety old skeletons instead of ghosts, nether liches or high level zombies. Conversely, ghosts are extremely dangerous at Lv 1, while they are annoying cannon fodder once your sword dispenses 5 kinds of elemental damage.

I fully expected Uriel Septim to be a Lv 1 commoner with 1 HP like Titus Mede in Skyrim (which is ironically of the assassin class), but Uriel apparently has a THOUSAND hitpoints but still drops like a fly. I think the idea behind this is that you dont start a fist fighting brawl with him, kill him accidentally and softlock yourself.

----------


## Vinyadan

What I have always wondered is what sort of assault on the palace they pulled off to force the Emperor to leave his own tower and guards and escape through the sewers. Maybe he simply knew he would have been killed in a short time, possibly even by his own, and that his prisoners have a high tendency to be the main characters of his own prophecies.

The people of the City also were far from reliable. In Morrowind, you are told that the Guard charged a crowd that demanded the destruction of the Emperor's sons as suspected dopplegangers, causing many deaths.

----------


## Fyraltari

> What I have always wondered is what sort of assault on the palace they pulled off to force the Emperor to leave his own tower and guards and escape through the sewers. Maybe he simply knew he would have been killed in a short time, possibly even by his own, and that his prisoners have a high tendency to be the main characters of his own prophecies.


Since there doesn't seem to be any trace of a large assault on the White-Gold Tower or any mention of it, but Urile and the Blades accompanying him already know that his sons are attacked, I think they simply learned of the assasinations, concluded that there was very likely a few assassins hidden in the many (hundreds) of servants working within the WGT (it's not like the emperor's heir and spares wouldn't be under a lot of protection too) and decided to evacuate him to a place more easily defendable (likely Cloud Ruler Temple), failing to realize that the Mythic Dawn already knew about the secret passage and was counting on exactly this.

Because the Blades are _horrendous_ at their jobs.

Seriously, this quadruple (and likely more since Uriel's son were ll grown men presumably under pressure to produce offspring) assassination is really incredible. Ad we're never shown that the Blades were infiltrated or anything. How did the MD pull that off?



> The people of the City also were far from reliable. In Morrowind, you are told that the Guard charged a crowd that demanded the destruction of the Emperor's sons as suspected dopplegangers, causing many deaths.


This seemingly didn't stop Uriel and two guards from crossing the city to the prison because someone thought that's were the escape path should be.

----------


## Eldan

Septim's heirs are weird and wonky in the canon. His eldest, Ariella, was taken prisoner by Jagar Tharn during the Simulacrum (ES I: Arena), but it's never mentioned what happened to her and she's never brought up in another game. His three legitimate sons were said to have been replace by doppelgängers, like Uriel himself. Rumours in the third era (mentioned in a few books in Morrowind) was that they were _still_ Doppelgängers, now bound to serve Uriel himself, to make it appear he wasn't without heirs. Neither of them ever produced any children. He also had an acknowledged bastard who served as Archbishop of the religion of The One, but Uriel likely had him assassinated when he got politically unpleasant.

So, it's quite likely that Jagar Tharn actually eliminated the entire bloodline other than Martin and Uriel himself.

----------


## Spore

It is almost as if the royal advisor has enough power to ruin a kingdom. If only someone would pick up on this trope!  :Small Tongue:

----------


## Vinyadan

> Seriously, this quadruple (and likely more since Uriel's son were ll grown men presumably under pressure to produce offspring) assassination is really incredible. Ad we're never shown that the Blades were infiltrated or anything. How did the MD pull that off?


If we go the infiltration route, it's possible they spent decades (or centuries?) collecting information and trying to have people in the right position, and sprang the trap once all was in place. I'd like to assume daedric divination to find out about the prison passage, but then it could have been used to find out all the true heirs, and the ignorance of the Mythic Dawn about this is an important factor.




> This seemingly didn't stop Uriel and two guards from crossing the city to the prison because someone thought that's were the escape path should be.


I don't really remember how you enter the prison under normal conditions, so I always assumed they were directly beneath the tower. That's a good question though, the Emperor going around with robes and all would have been a big target.

Uriel is a very different monarch from Helseth, I guess: Uriel gets killed by assassins while you try to save him, but, in Helseth's Morrowind, the King himself sends assassins after you!

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I don't really remember how you enter the prison under normal conditions, so I always assumed they were directly beneath the tower. That's a good question though, the Emperor going around with robes and all would have been a big target.




Unless I'm badly misremembering, the prison is in the little circle near the top.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Septim's heirs are weird and wonky in the canon. His eldest, Ariella, was taken prisoner by Jagar Tharn during the Simulacrum (ES I: Arena), but it's never mentioned what happened to her and she's never brought up in another game. His three legitimate sons were said to have been replace by doppelgängers, like Uriel himself. Rumours in the third era (mentioned in a few books in Morrowind) was that they were _still_ Doppelgängers, now bound to serve Uriel himself, to make it appear he wasn't without heirs. Neither of them ever produced any children. He also had an acknowledged bastard who served as Archbishop of the religion of The One, but Uriel likely had him assassinated when he got politically unpleasant.
> 
> So, it's quite likely that Jagar Tharn actually eliminated the entire bloodline other than Martin and Uriel himself.


I thought the doppelganger sons thing was just a rumor in Morrowind, is there any reason to believe that actually happened? Because it seems to me like Uriel wouldn't have kept Tharn's creatures around, he'd have them beheaded and officially recognized Martin or something.



> It is almost as if the royal advisor has enough power to ruin a kingdom. If only someone would pick up on this trope!


*Spoiler: How could you not trust a face like this!?*
Show






> If we go the infiltration route, it's possible they spent decades (or centuries?) collecting information and trying to have people in the right position, and sprang the trap once all was in place. I'd like to assume daedric divination to find out about the prison passage, but then it could have been used to find out all the true heirs, and the ignorance of the Mythic Dawn about this is an important factor.


So in this theory, do you think Ocato weeded out the traitors, or would that infiltration explain their equally abysmal performance leading up to the Great War?






> I don't really remember how you enter the prison under normal conditions, so I always assumed they were directly beneath the tower. That's a good question though, the Emperor going around with robes and all would have been a big target.


It's distinct from the city proper.
*Spoiler: It's the north-easternmost zone of the city*
Show



Edit: nightbladed.
Also, I just remembered that teleportation exist in this universe, which would probably be the most secure way to travel in a crisis.




> Uriel is a very different monarch from Helseth, I guess: Uriel gets killed by assassins while you try to save him, but, in Helseth's Morrowind, the King himself sends assassins after you!


Uriel wants you dead, he doesn't send assasins after you, he just points a Prisoner in your general direction and watches the fireworks.

----------


## Rynjin

The waterfront is where the secret passage exits, but you can get INO the prison from within the guard barracks; it's how you get in when you do the Dark Brotherhood quest to kill that guy who insults you at the start of the game.

----------


## Eldan

Well, _something_ ws up with Uriels sons. They never fathered any children and we never hear of them interacting with the public much. It's suspicious.

----------


## Grim Portent

> So in this theory, do you think Ocato weeded out the traitors, or would that infiltration explain their equally abysmal performance leading up to the Great War?


My understanding is that the Mythic Dawn more or less collapsed after the Oblivion Crisis anyway. Leaderless, demoralised, scattered to the winds by hunters and finally snuffed out more or less completely, with any surviving members abandoning the cause.

It's probably just rather hard to keep spies and infiltrators out of the White Gold Tower. It's a big place, far larger in lore than in the game, so some amount of enemy agents is just a fact of life, and the Thalmor are generally built up as being really good at spying, even more than the Empire's own forces who were previously the premier spies of the setting.

That said it wouldn't be odd if the dissidents who fell in with the Mythic Dawn and the ones who sided with the Thalmor are largely the same demographics, so some overlap would be natural.



I always just kind of figured that the Mythic Dawn learned about the escape route through mundane means. Spies, rumours, old survey reports, that sort of thing. That there was an escape route in tunnels connected to the sewers was almost certainly a rumour already, and one that could be substantiated with a little digging, both literal and figurative.

As for Martin, I kind of figure Dagon could tell there was someone related to Uriel in Kvatch, but not who exactly for some reason. Probably protection from the Nine, what with Martin being a figure of prophecy and all. So rather than sending in assassins to shank him like the rest of the family he just throws an army at the problem and hopes to crush the heir indirectly.




> Well, _something_ ws up with Uriels sons. They never fathered any children and we never hear of them interacting with the public much. It's suspicious.


Goblins in disguises. Really good disguises.

Or just the simulacra thing, it's the simplest explanation given it's the one vaguely hinted at.

Or they were some flavour of personality that wasn't interested in women for one reason or another. Gay, Asexual, had a thing for Argonian maids.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> So in this theory, do you think Ocato weeded out the traitors, or would that infiltration explain their equally abysmal performance leading up to the Great War?


Ocato was assassinated ~160 years before the Great War started. The Great War was ~170 years after Oblivion. Thus most of the Blades, enemy agents, and most of the people period, for that matter - who were alive during the Oblivion Crisis would not be alive in the leadup to the Great War. (Although it's not _impossible_ thanks to mer lifespans/life extension magic etc., even with those things that was a very dangerous span - the Red Year, the Void Nights, Umbriel, even just the Empire collapsing would be problematic for survival.)

----------


## Fyraltari

> Well, _something_ ws up with Uriels sons. They never fathered any children and we never hear of them interacting with the public much. It's suspicious.


Not really? Just because we never hear of children or public interactions doesn't mean they didn't happen. In _Oblivion_ they are dead and in _Morrowind_ and _Daggerfall_ the goings-on of the Imperial Court are distant affairs, relevant to barely anyone especially in the troubled times we find these Provinces in.

The Tailors' Guild probably has just as long and storied a history as the Fighter's Guild, but since none of our heroes have any real interest in joining we never hear about them. 



> My understanding is that the Mythic Dawn more or less collapsed after the Oblivion Crisis anyway. Leaderless, demoralised, scattered to the winds by hunters and finally snuffed out more or less completely, with any surviving members abandoning the cause.


Yes, the Mythic dawn as an organization is essentially over once the crisis ended, but if they did manage to infiltrate the blades, such agents would know to lie low and would have no loyalty to the Empire or the blades, quite the opposite in fact. Could these hypothetical moles have carried out acts of internal sabotage such as purposefully botching the training of recruits, destroying key documents, stuff like that.

Far-fetched? Definitely. Maybe the Blades are just terrible at their job. 




> That said it wouldn't be odd if the dissidents who fell in with the Mythic Dawn and the ones who sided with the Thalmor are largely the same demographics, so some overlap would be natural.


I really doubt it. Besides having Elven leaders and apocalyptic desires, the groups have very little in common. The Mythic Dawn was multiracial when the Thalmor is an Elven Supremacist group. The MD didn't care about class or social origins when the Thalmor adheres rigidly to the traditional Altmeri caste system. The Thalmor are an outgrowth of the Altmeri Aedra-worship taken to extremes when the MD are Daedra-worshippers.

The Oblivion Crisis brought down Crystal-Like-Law, likely the biggest traumatism to Altmeri national identity since Tiber septim went all _Evangelion_ on their capital. I'd suspect that the Thalmor's rise to power involved a sizeable witchhunt out for Dagonites (which would also be a convenient way to get rid those who opposed them, just frame them).




> I always just kind of figured that the Mythic Dawn learned about the escape route through mundane means. Spies, rumours, old survey reports, that sort of thing. That there was an escape route in tunnels connected to the sewers was almost certainly a rumour already, and one that could be substantiated with a little digging, both literal and figurative.


So the blades just suck at keeping secrets, then?

----------


## Taevyr

> The waterfront is where the secret passage exits, but you can get INO the prison from within the guard barracks; it's how you get in when you do the Dark Brotherhood quest to kill that guy who insults you at the start of the game.


Wait, you can get in the prison from the guard barracks? I always just went back through the sewers/prologue's passage.

----------


## Rynjin

> So the blades just suck at keeping secrets, then?


Quite frankly you could shorten this sentence to just "So the Blades just suck, then?" and the answer would still be "yes".

I'm not sure if it's deliberate commentary on certain US "peacekeeping" and "intelligence" organizations or just unintentional hilarity, but it's pretty clear from events across both Oblivion and Skyrim that the Blades are a shadow of their former selves and likely have been for hundreds if not THOUSANDS of years since their heyday as dragonslayers.

It's a largely ceremonial organization that only exists because of the accomplishments of their predecessors, and the Emperor (nor any of the rest of the empire's bureaucracy) never stopped buying into their own hype. In the end, it cost Uriel his life, and almost ended the empire on two separate occasions in the last two games and Delphine's STAGGERING incompetence could have _ended the entire world_ if she'd been allowed to proceed as she wanted.

They're jumped up guards that play at being super spies, bodyguards, and elite soldiers and they suck at all three of those things. Likely in part because they try to be an organization that acts as all three things at once. No one person can be adequately trained to perform all three of those roles.




> Wait, you can get in the prison from the guard barracks? I always just went back through the sewers/prologue's passage.


Yeah. I think you HAVE to take the sewer route for the quest, but if you want you can exit via the normal prison/guard barracks area. You might be able to steal keys and slip down to that part of the prison through the barracks as well, but I'm not 100% on that.

----------


## Grim Portent

> I really doubt it. Besides having Elven leaders and apocalyptic desires, the groups have very little in common. The Mythic Dawn was multiracial when the Thalmor is an Elven Supremacist group. The MD didn't care about class or social origins when the Thalmor adheres rigidly to the traditional Altmeri caste system. The Thalmor are an outgrowth of the Altmeri Aedra-worship taken to extremes when the MD are Daedra-worshippers.
> 
> The Oblivion Crisis brought down Crystal-Like-Law, likely the biggest traumatism to Altmeri national identity since Tiber septim went all _Evangelion_ on their capital. I'd suspect that the Thalmor's rise to power involved a sizeable witchhunt out for Dagonites (which would also be a convenient way to get rid those who opposed them, just frame them).


Many, if not most, Thalmor spies aren't even Altmer (Wouldn't be that great at infiltrating the other nations if they were.) A lot aren't even elves of any kind. They aren't all in for the elven supremacy, they just want money or petty power, or just for things to change without caring what they change to.

The majority of their assets are dispossessed, poor, hiding shameful things or criminal acts, or fools who think they can gain some position of authority in the times to come. Probably a few conspiracy theorists who keep picking at things done by their local authorities while ignoring the crimes of the Thalmor because they conflict with their idea that their own immediate enemy is the most evil thing in the world.

The Mythic Dawn largely interests the same kind of people, people who are desperate, blackmailed into service, seeking power or want change of any kind. Not everyone in the cult will have really believed in the whole revolution through apocalypse thing, at least not literally, and those that did truly believe ultimately had a fate no better than the others.




> Yeah. I think you HAVE to take the sewer route for the quest, but if you want you can exit via the normal prison/guard barracks area. You might be able to steal keys and slip down to that part of the prison through the barracks as well, but I'm not 100% on that.


As I recall the door from the guard barracks to the prison is locked somehow. Don't remember the specifics, but I'm certain that the key didn't work on the door or that trying to go near during the quest made the guards go hostile automatically or something. I can't actually remember much about going to prison in the Imperial City when you got arrested either, but I seem to recall there being a seperate set of cells so you couldn't get to Dreth that way.

Was there two prison blocks perhaps? I'm certain you couldn't get back in to the original cell block at all until after the Dark Brotherhood quest, but you could lockpick out of cells when arrested so there had to be some sort of seperation unless my memory is playing up.

----------


## halfeye

> This seemingly didn't stop Uriel and two guards from crossing the city to the prison because someone thought that's were the escape path should be.


Three guards, Captain Renault dies early to give the prisoner two swords, the better of which the surviving guard takes back before sending the prisoner into the sewers.

----------


## Rynjin

> As I recall the door from the guard barracks to the prison is locked somehow. Don't remember the specifics, but I'm certain that the key didn't work on the door or that trying to go near during the quest made the guards go hostile automatically or something. I can't actually remember much about going to prison in the Imperial City when you got arrested either, but I seem to recall there being a seperate set of cells so you couldn't get to Dreth that way.
> 
> Was there two prison blocks perhaps? I'm certain you couldn't get back in to the original cell block at all until after the Dark Brotherhood quest, but you could lockpick out of cells when arrested so there had to be some sort of seperation unless my memory is playing up.


I think you're right that it's a key-locked door, which is why you can get out but not in that way. I THINK once you're in the prison block on the quest you can find the key to that gate and get back out.

Or maybe I'M misremembering lol.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Three guards, Captain Renault dies early to give the prisoner two swords, the better of which the surviving guard takes back before sending the prisoner into the sewers.


Lol, that explains how he got to the prison: with his three fastest guards, Renault, Peugeot, and Citroen. "Move aside prisoner, vroom vroom!"

----------


## Eldan

> Lol, that explains how he got to the prison: with his three fastest guards, Renault, Peugeot, and Citroen. "Move aside prisoner, vroom vroom!"


My head canon is now that Martin's middle name is Aston.

----------


## Caelestion

The _real_ incompetence is positing an early king with three (four) sons and no grandsons, and then making it a plot point that an illegitimate child is somehow more worthy of the throne than any number of countless cousins would be.  Dynasties can't be wiped out with just a couple of assassinations, unless you're restricting the throne severely, such as by agnatic succession (only sons born of sons are eligible), and even that barely failed to work in our world!

----------


## Batcathat

> The _real_ incompetence is positing an early king with three (four) sons and no grandsons, and then making it a plot point that an illegitimate child is somehow more worthy of the throne than any number of countless cousins would be.  Dynasties can't be wiped out with just a couple of assassinations, unless you're restricting the throne severely, such as by agnatic succession (only sons born of sons are eligible), and even that barely failed to work in our world!


I'm guessing it's related to fantasy fiction's weird obsession with "rightful kings" (and the return there of) and how said king is rarely "Bob, the former king's third cousin's nephew".

----------


## GloatingSwine

The succession of the emperors and who counts as one for the purposes of keeping the Dragonfires lit isn't necessarily via bloodline descent anyway. Also those cousins possibly got retconned out of existence by the second activation of the Numidium.

(Also Elder Scrolls has considerable magical nonsense when it comes to lines of descent, given that race in Tamriel is 100% matrilineal)

----------


## Rynjin

> The _real_ incompetence is positing an early king with three (four) sons and no grandsons, and then making it a plot point that an illegitimate child is somehow more worthy of the throne than any number of countless cousins would be.  Dynasties can't be wiped out with just a couple of assassinations, unless you're restricting the throne severely, such as by agnatic succession (only sons born of sons are eligible), and even that barely failed to work in our world!


Uriel is not by any means "an early king". And the cousins (eg.Titus Mede) cannot keep the Dragonfire lit.

----------


## Eldan

> The succession of the emperors and who counts as one for the purposes of keeping the Dragonfires lit isn't necessarily via bloodline descent anyway. Also those cousins possibly got retconned out of existence by the second activation of the Numidium.
> 
> (Also Elder Scrolls has considerable magical nonsense when it comes to lines of descent, given that race in Tamriel is 100% matrilineal)


If you want to know the real joke, Tiber Septim, the original dragonborn, doesn't even have any surviving descendants. His grandson Pelagius took the throne after him was assassinated, and after him the throne went to Kyntira, his cousin, who was the daughter of Tiber Septim's _brother._ 

So, the entire Septim bloodline is only dragonborn in an annoyingly vague way. And the reason there aren't a million cousins is most likely that assassination is shockingly common. The Septims assassinate each other at a drop of a hat and there's like six cults of assassins out specifically to get them.

----------


## Keltest

Since we're on the subject, does the game ever actually say that Martin is illegitimate? His status as a Septim was secret, but I don't recall the game ever saying who his mother was either way.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> If you want to know the real joke, Tiber Septim, the original dragonborn, doesn't even have any surviving descendants. His grandson Pelagius took the throne after him was assassinated, and after him the throne went to Kyntira, his cousin, who was the daughter of Tiber Septim's _brother._


Tiber Septim is far from the "original" dragonborn. He's just the first of the Septim dynasty and retroactively ascended to godhood on his death (but not until the activation of the Numidium in the Iliac Bay, when that was done he was retroactively Talos from the point of his death). St. Alessia was the first recognised as Dragonborn by Akatosh (and it's her soul in the Amulet of Kings).

----------


## Vinyadan

By the way, are there any liturgical texts for the Imperial Cult? Stuff they would read or say during service and rituals?

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Tiber Septim is far from the "original" dragonborn. He's just the first of the Septim dynasty and retroactively ascended to godhood on his death (but not until the activation of the Numidium in the Iliac Bay, when that was done he was retroactively Talos from the point of his death). St. Alessia was the first recognised as Dragonborn by Akatosh (and it's her soul in the Amulet of Kings).


I always felt there was a difference from Dragonblood(blessed by Akatosh) and Dragonborn(possessing a dragon soul).

And doesn't Miraak predate Alessia? The Dragon War occurred before the Alessian rebellion right?

----------


## Keltest

> I always felt there was a difference from Dragonblood(blessed by Akatosh) and Dragonborn(possessing a dragon soul).
> 
> And doesn't Miraak predate Alessia? The Dragon War occurred before the Alessian rebellion right?


People like to draw this distinction, but so far as I know theres no actual evidence for it in the games or lore.

And yes, Miraak is the very first Dragonborn mortal.

----------


## Rynjin

> By the way, are there any liturgical texts for the Imperial Cult? Stuff they would read or say during service and rituals?


I'm not sure where they're pulled from (I _think_ ESO?) but the Vigilant mod for Skyrim has some interesting Imperial Cult stuff.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Many, if not most, Thalmor spies aren't even Altmer (Wouldn't be that great at infiltrating the other nations if they were.) A lot aren't even elves of any kind. They aren't all in for the elven supremacy, they just want money or petty power, or just for things to change without caring what they change to.


Oh, my bad, I thought you were talking the entire Thalmor, not just their assets in enemy territory.




> The majority of their assets are dispossessed, poor, hiding shameful things or criminal acts, or fools who think they can gain some position of authority in the times to come. Probably a few conspiracy theorists who keep picking at things done by their local authorities while ignoring the crimes of the Thalmor because they conflict with their idea that their own immediate enemy is the most evil thing in the world.


But these people aren't the Thalmor's agents, they're the informants the actual agents such as Elenwen, Ancano and their underlings pay to tell them about anything interesting. I doubt the Thalmor trust them farther than they can throw them.




> The Mythic Dawn largely interests the same kind of people, people who are desperate, blackmailed into service, seeking power or want change of any kind. Not everyone in the cult will have really believed in the whole revolution through apocalypse thing, at least not literally, and those that did truly believe ultimately had a fate no better than the others.


I dunno, it's not like the Mythic Dawn went around handing pamphlets. the people who joined had to track down specific, very esoteric books and decypher the hidden instructions, you don't do that if you're not already into this stuff a lot.





> Lol, that explains how he got to the prison: with his three fastest guards, Renault, Peugeot, and Citroen. "Move aside prisoner, vroom vroom!"


I wonder if it's a _Casablanca_ reference? 



> Uriel is not by any means "an early king". And the cousins (eg.Titus Mede) cannot keep the Dragonfire lit.


I don't think Titus Mede is supposed to be a close relative of the Septims'. As a Cyrodiilic noble, he's probably a distant relation, like most of the nobility.

Also, cousins would have most likely been totally able to keep the Dragonfires up, Empress Katariah was a Dunmer, only related to the septims by marriage and nothing happened during her forty-six years of rule.



> Since we're on the subject, does the game ever actually say that Martin is illegitimate? His status as a Septim was secret, but I don't recall the game ever saying who his mother was either way.


What other reason would there be to hide his existence?

----------


## Keltest

> What other reason would there be to hide his existence?


You mean besides the exact circumstance that comes up? Remember that Uriel was kind of prophetic.

----------


## Rynjin

> I don't think Titus Mede is supposed to be a close relative of the Septims'. As a Cyrodiilic noble, he's probably a distant relation, like most of the nobility.


He's closely related enough to retain the gift of prophecy, if only to see his own death.




> Also, cousins would have most likely been totally able to keep the Dragonfires up, Empress Katariah was a Dunmer, only related to the septims by marriage and nothing happened during her forty-six years of rule.


Katariah bore an heir of Septim blood, by my recollection, which would keep things stable. I think the combination of Martin being the last conceivable heir left alive and Mehrunes Dagon attempting an invasion at the exact time that discontinuity was available is what caused the oblivion Crisis. The Dragonfires had gone out before, but it wasn't a big deal. It's likely they went out when Katariah was on the throne as well.

Or perhaps they needed to be relit some arbitrary length of time after last lighting or something or something like that. Uriel ruled for over 60 years, maybe the Mythic Dawn struck when it was time for the ritual again?

----------


## Fyraltari

> You mean besides the exact circumstance that comes up? Remember that Uriel was kind of prophetic.


I suppose that it possible, but I doubt his wife would have agreed to it. And we know he wasn't faithful. Adultery seems like the most probable hypothesis.

----------


## GloatingSwine

Jauffre is the one that calls Martin an illegitimate son.

----------


## Fyraltari

> He's closely related enough to retain the gift of prophecy, if only to see his own death.


... I don't think we know how Titus I died? And Titus II doesn't seem to have a gift of prophecy, he just thinks the Dark Brotherhood can't be stopped. And many non-Septims have the gift of prophecy.

Not that it would matter much, since Uriel is the only Septim credited with fore-knowledge and that is implied to have come from his time in Oblivion. And that by the time the Mede dynasty established itself, the dragonfires had been replaced anyway. 





> Katariah bore an heir of Septim blood, by my recollection, which would keep things stable. 
>  I think the combination of Martin being the last conceivable heir left alive and Mehrunes Dagon attempting an invasion at the exact time that discontinuity was available is what caused the oblivion Crisis. The Dragonfires had gone out before, but it wasn't a big deal. It's likely they went out when Katariah was on the throne as well.
> 
> Or perhaps they needed to be relit some arbitrary length of time after last lighting or something or something like that. Uriel ruled for over 60 years, maybe the Mythic Dawn struck when it was time for the ritual again?


The Dragonfires go extinct the moment the sitting emperor dies. That is why Jagar Tharn elected not to kill Uriel but to send him to a pocket plane of Oblivion, where the slower flow of times would ensure that that the fires would stay lit for hundreds of years.

As for Katariah 's heir...

[indent]


> When Cassynder assumed the throne upon the death of his mother, he was already middle-aged. Only half Elven, he aged like a Breton. In fact, he had left the rule of Wayrest to his half-brother Uriel due to poor health. Nevertheless, as the only true blood relation of Pelagius and thus Tiber, he was pressed into accepting the throne. To no one's surprise, the Emperor Cassynder's reign did not last long. In two years he joined his predecessors in eternal slumber.
> 
> Uriel Lariat, Cassynder's half-brother, and the child of Katariah I and her Imperial consort Gallivere Lariat (after the death of Pelagius III), left the kingdom of Wayrest to reign as Uriel IV. Legally, Uriel IV was a Septim: Cassynder had adopted him into the royal family when he had become King of Wayrest. Nevertheless, to the Council and the people of Tamriel, he was a bastard child of Katariah. Uriel did not possess the dynamism of his mother, and his long forty-three-year reign was a hotbed of sedition.
> 
> [...]
> 
> despite the Lariat Family's high position -- indeed, they were distant cousins of the Septims -- few of the Elder Council could be persuaded to accept him fully as a blood descendant of Tiber.
> 
> [.;.]
> ...


Even if we assume Katariah somehow used Cassynder to lit the Fires during her reign (which I doubt), this shows that distant cousins are acceptable heirs (it's not like Tiber Septim has any known living blood descendants, anyway) and that their seems to be no lacking of those in Tamrielic nobility , hell we know the Lariats are.

----------


## Grim Portent

> But these people aren't the Thalmor's agents, they're the informants the actual agents such as Elenwen, Ancano and their underlings pay to tell them about anything interesting. I doubt the Thalmor trust them farther than they can throw them.


The Thalmor don't even trust each other as far as they can throw each other.  :Small Tongue: 

There's hints at class resentment between the robes and the soldiers during the embassy quest.




> I dunno, it's not like the Mythic Dawn went around handing pamphlets. the people who joined had to track down specific, very esoteric books and decypher the hidden instructions, you don't do that if you're not already into this stuff a lot.


In Cyrodiil for Mankar's main cult yeah, I doubt coded instructions specific to the capital city would be relevant to an aspiring member in Skyrim or Elsweyr, and IIRC it's stated the cult was in every province. Either they were shipping agents out en masse over the years without being noticed or they had more ways of recruitment than the one that leads the Hero of Kvatch to Mankar.




Trying to figure out an internally consistent set of rules for the Dragonfires has always seemed a bit of a dead end to me. Tied to the bloodline of Alessia via the covenant of Akatosh, who lived so long ago that basically every Imperial should qualify, then tied to the Septim bloodline which is from Skyrim originally as I recall, has no clear relation to Alessia and is quite widespread, BUUUT only Uriel Septim's kids were candidates during the Oblivion crisis because reasons.

I just chalk it up to Akatosh being somewhat poetic or metaphorical when describing the purpose of the Amulet of Kings, which has then been misinterpreted or deliberately lied about by people since. A lack of reliable narrators is a thing in the Elder Scrolls franchise after all. The amulet, worn by someone destined to sit on the Imperial throne, can be used to light the dragonfires. Bloodline is not strictly relevant except in that most of the people who are supposed to be Emperor are going to be related to previous emperors, the actually important part is the implicit promise made to and by the Nine with the humans of Cyrodiil.

At the time of the Oblivion crisis Martin was the only one who could become emperor because of all the relatives of Uriel he was the only one who could or would sacrifice himself in the final moment. Destiny turning on two people and all that jazz.

----------


## Keltest

Worth pointing out, Martin is the only one they knew qualified. That doesnt mean he was the only Dragonborn at the time, just the only one we could find. Its not like the others were going around eating dragons to identify themselves.

----------


## Grim Portent

> Worth pointing out, Martin is the only one they knew qualified. That doesnt mean he was the only Dragonborn at the time, just the only one we could find. Its not like the others were going around eating dragons to identify themselves.


Well no, but it's not like his dad ate dragons either. By that point in time the qualifications were 'is part of the Septim dynasty.'

By that criteria a cousin ten times removed would be fine so long as they *shared a common ancestor with Uriel and weren't so far removed that no one would accept them politically (no good crowning a new emperor who gets assassinated immediately after all.)

EDIT: *Share Tiber Septim's family as common ancestors.

----------


## Triaxx

I mean the Amulet meant we had a pretty simple litmus test. Does it pop off? Then boom emperor material.

----------


## Resileaf

Mankar Camoran could put on the amulet himself too, right? I feel like I recall him having it on when he goes to Dagon's realm.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Mankar Camoran could put on the amulet himself too, right? I feel like I recall him having it on when he goes to Dagon's realm.


IIRC, in one of Mankar's Commentaries, he writes of breathing fire...

If he was Dragonborn, wearing the Amulet would have been easy peasy.

----------


## InvisibleBison

> IIRC, in one of Mankar's Commentaries, he writes of breathing fire...


Yes, the passage is in Book One of the Commentaries: "When my voice returned, it spoke with another tongue. After three nights I could speak fire." From the surrounding text, I think what he's saying is that he became dragonborn during a Dragon Break, but it's not at all clear.

----------


## Fyraltari

> The Thalmor don't even trust each other as far as they can throw each other. 
> 
> There's hints at class resentment between the robes and the soldiers during the embassy quest.


Considering the Third Aldmeri Dominion is based on the Third German Reich, it's indeed likely the leadership is constantly backstabbing one another.

I'm not sure the base grunts are actual members of the Thalmor though, I guess it depends how elitist they are in their recruitment process.

In the traditionnal Altmeri caste system outlines by the Pocket Guide, Warriors are right in the middle, below Wises, Artists and Princes but above Landowners, Merchants, Workers and "Beasts" (goblins and assorted slaves from "uncivilized" species).






> In Cyrodiil for Mankar's main cult yeah, I doubt coded instructions specific to the capital city would be relevant to an aspiring member in Skyrim or Elsweyr, and IIRC it's stated the cult was in every province. Either they were shipping agents out en masse over the years without being noticed or they had more ways of recruitment than the one that leads the Hero of Kvatch to Mankar.


Yeah, the numbers of the Mythic Dawn are really odd for how difficult the recruitment process we see is.







> Trying to figure out an internally consistent set of rules for the Dragonfires has always seemed a bit of a dead end to me. Tied to the bloodline of Alessia via the covenant of Akatosh, who lived so long ago that basically every Imperial should qualify, then tied to the Septim bloodline which is from Skyrim originally as I recall, has no clear relation to Alessia and is quite widespread, BUUUT only Uriel Septim's kids were candidates during the Oblivion crisis because reasons.


The way this all works is meant to be a mystery in-universe too. One text calls it "ineffable" which basically means "I give up trying to make sense". There's also some evidence that the Emperors only truly get the dragonblood once they lit the dragonfires.

It's also worth keeping in mind that Alessia is only known to have had one child, the first minotaur, meaning that no Imperial (or human) is descended from her.

Some in-universe historians also point out that it was Reman who started to use the Ritual of lighting the dragonfires as a way to legitimize rule. Most of the few texts describing Alessia's times can only be dated as far back as Reman's time as well (although they seem based on earlier material) and the history of the First Empire is extremely spotty. Doesn't help that most of it happened in a Dragon-Break. Hell, I have seen peopme theorize that the "First Empire" is an ahistorical fabrication, lumping together the various states that ruled the Imperial City over most of the First Era, to seeve Reman's propaganda. Not sure that I buy ot though.

Tiber Septim was from the kingdom of Alcair in High-Rock, not Skyrim, although the name "Hajlti Early-Beard" sounds very Nordic and Imperial propaganda always emphasized the links between him and Skyrim, probably because the Province provides a big part of Imperial military. For what it's worth C0DA (which may not even consider itself cannon) has Kyne refer to Talos as a "manmer", a Breton.




> I just chalk it up to Akatosh being somewhat poetic or metaphorical when describing the purpose of the Amulet of Kings, which has then been misinterpreted or deliberately lied about by people since. A lack of reliable narrators is a thing in the Elder Scrolls franchise after all. The amulet, worn by someone destined to sit on the Imperial throne, can be used to light the dragonfires. Bloodline is not strictly relevant except in that most of the people who are supposed to be Emperor are going to be related to previous emperors, the actually important part is the implicit promise made to and by the Nine with the humans of Cyrodiil.


That would make sense, and indeed the only time we know of that the ritual failed is in ESO when it was sabotaged by Mannimarco. Except that the Amulet refuses to let the Hero of Kvatch wear it, meaning that not everyone qualifies.




> At the time of the Oblivion crisis Martin was the only one who could become emperor because of all the relatives of Uriel he was the only one who could or would sacrifice himself in the final moment. Destiny turning on two people and all that jazz.


How would Jauffre and Ocato know that ahead of time, though?



> Worth pointing out, Martin is the only one they knew qualified. That doesnt mean he was the only Dragonborn at the time, just the only one we could find. Its not like the others were going around eating dragons to identify themselves.


But if they knew he qualified based on his ancestry (which seems to be all they had to go on until we retrieve the Amulet from Paradise) what made them rule out all the others? Obsessively keeping track of genealogy is what nobility does.



> Yes, the passage is in Book One of the Commentaries: "When my voice returned, it spoke with another tongue. After three nights I could speak fire." From the surrounding text, I think what he's saying is that he became dragonborn during a Dragon Break, but it's not at all clear.


Mankar Camoran is another can of worm entirely of his own. Some people, namely the folks at Fudgemuppet, interprest the book as meaning he used Mehrune's Razor to carve his own past, retroactively making himself a dragonborn and possibly an Altmer (or even an Ayleid) since he is one in-game even though both his parents are Bosmer.

Then again, Tiber Septim's niece, Kyntira I was queen of Silvenar in Valenwood before becoming Empress, who knows if there aren't some illegitimate Septims lurking in the Camoran family tree? After all, in _Daggerfall_, the Totem of Tiber Septim itself claims that only one of Tiber's line may control the Numidium, and Gortwog, an Orc, is able to do it.

Edit: so all in all, it just seems that the Covenant of Akatosh and Tiber Septim's bloodline (or lack thereof) has been retconned with each new game.

----------


## Spore

> I'm guessing it's related to fantasy fiction's weird obsession with "rightful kings" (and the return there of) and how said king is rarely "Bob, the former king's third cousin's nephew".


I mean in my books Martin is such a "Bob" and it works since he is the chosen one (tm). But with Skyrim and Morrowind's protagonists being chosen, and Oblivion we are escorting the chosen one, I would love for TES 6 to be just a very determined prisoner who the heroes picked up along the way. Like: "Look at that skilled handsome fellah in that cell, let's push the upcoming crisis onto them!" and then you are basically blackmailed into being the servant.




> Jauffre is the one that calls Martin an illegitimate son.


With Oblivion's release coinciding with reruns of reruns of the Fresh Prince (heh) of Bel Air in TV and Jeoffrey....I mean the butler person negging Marting, I always attributed this to some slight joking about his status as "nonofficial" heir. If you are not told as a servant WHY Martin is hidden, you will eventually start filling out blanks yourself.




> He's closely related enough to retain the gift of prophecy, if only to see his own death.


See, fate in video games is a boring thing. You usually see fakeouts or false interpretations, but ultimatively it is a "plot preview" of sorts. I wish more games did the "Soul Reaver" thing, where fate and prophecy was an incredibly strong thing (possibly perpetuated by an ancient parasitic older god feasting on the souls of those deceased in conflict) that couldn't be budged even by time travel bull manure. But something the characters still tried to rebel against. One as a servant of fate, bound but unwilling, one as a rebel outside of the grasp of fate, who was manipulated at every turn.

This could work for Elder Scrolls. You have the servant of fate (say an aspect of Akatosh) bound to knowingly repeat an endless cycle of mistakes, while you are outside of fate (maybe you escaped a soul stone once, and are "off the radar" since you aligned yourself with the Perfect Masters) trying to break the cycle.




> I mean the Amulet meant we had a pretty simple litmus test. Does it pop off? Then boom emperor material.





> Yes, the passage is in Book One of the Commentaries: "When my voice returned, it spoke with another tongue. After three nights I could speak fire." From the surrounding text, I think what he's saying is that he became dragonborn during a Dragon Break, but it's not at all clear.


From a writer's perspective, was "being a dragonborn" with a primal language translating into magic already a thing in Oblivion? We can retroactively interpret this as a dragonborn, yes. But the Elder Scrolls themselves hint at a very powerful cryptic language powerful enough to blind mortals and imbue epic magic without even touching the matter of a dragonborn. Of course the motive of "speaking fire" and "another language" heavily hint at a dragonborn.

----------


## Caelestion

> Uriel is not by any means "an early king". And the cousins (eg.Titus Mede) cannot keep the Dragonfire lit.


I meant _elderly_.  Autocorrect assassinated my post, just like Uriel VII.

----------


## Batcathat

> I mean in my books Martin is such a "Bob" and it works since he is the chosen one (tm). But with Skyrim and Morrowind's protagonists being chosen, and Oblivion we are escorting the chosen one, I would love for TES 6 to be just a very determined prisoner who the heroes picked up along the way. Like: "Look at that skilled handsome fellah in that cell, let's push the upcoming crisis onto them!" and then you are basically blackmailed into being the servant.


I would love that, since the idea of a Chosen One is probably one of my least favorite concepts and fantasy is absolutely littered with 'em. It certainly _can_ be used well and in interesting ways, but most of the time it does absolutely nothing aside from making the protagonist a little more Special. (It's rather similar to the ever present elves and dwarves in fantasy, both in the sense of "Why does every goddamn fantasy writer keep using this?" and my annoyance with them).

----------


## Spore

> (It's rather similar to the ever present elves and dwarves in fantasy, both in the sense of "Why does every goddamn fantasy writer keep using this?" and my annoyance with them).


I disagree here. Elves and dwarves are cool, but they - like any nonhuman race - MUST BE USED IN THE STORY! They need their lore, which is different from "humans with weird ears" and "underground humans beards".

Good examples include Divinity's meat eating psychic elves, Elder Scrolls' dwemer.

Bad examples are Dragon Age's dwarves which are just conservative xenophobes that happen to live underground and their elves which are loving trees, because they love them so much. Even Final Fantasy is guilty of this, where dwarves and elves are typically just "this is the mountaineer race" and "this is the wood dwelling wizard race" but several titles have notable exceptions.

If you are the chosen one, the story must at least revolve around that premise, like Baldur's Gate, where your heritage is THE central plot point.

----------


## Batcathat

> I disagree here. Elves and dwarves are cool, but they - like any nonhuman race - MUST BE USED IN THE STORY! They need their lore, which is different from "humans with weird ears" and "underground humans beards".


Sure, they can be cool. But I've already read about a thousand stories with cool elves and dwarves (and about a billion with less cool ones) so why not use some other species for a change? It's not like two out of three sci-fi stories have klingons and wookies. 




> Bad examples are Dragon Age's dwarves which are just conservative xenophobes that happen to live underground and their elves which are loving trees, because they love them so much. Even Final Fantasy is guilty of this, where dwarves and elves are typically just "this is the mountaineer race" and "this is the wood dwelling wizard race" but several titles have notable exceptions.


I kind of like Dragon Age's dwarves, at least they have an identity beyond "we have beards and axes" and the creators subvert the usual dwarf tropes with characters like Varric. 




> If you are the chosen one, the story must at least revolve around that premise, like Baldur's Gate, where your heritage is THE central plot point.


Sure, that's...better, I guess. I do prefer plots without prophecies though.

(On a side note, I'm sorry for how off topic I've seen to have taken the thread.  :Small Tongue:  )

----------


## GloatingSwine

> Good examples include Divinity's meat eating psychic elves, Elder Scrolls' dwemer.


To be fair, Altmer are the only boring elves in Elder Scrolls. And that's because 99% of their personality is "smug racist".

That said, the wilder lore of the various races apart from the Dunmer doesn't make it into the mainline games which pretty much keep it vanilla*. ESO is the only one that goes into any of the others and lets all the wild and wacky aspects of them into the game.

*Bethesda largely lost interest in worldbuilding over the 2000s and quest design over the 2010s. See: Fallout 4.

----------


## Grim Portent

> Considering the Third Aldmeri Dominion is based on the Third German Reich, it's indeed likely the leadership is constantly backstabbing one another.
> 
> I'm not sure the base grunts are actual members of the Thalmor though, I guess it depends how elitist they are in their recruitment process.


I think of Thalmor as the same name being used for multiple things, which has real world precedence.

It's a political party, an international organisation of spies attached to that political party who also serve as secret police, a military division and an ideology, and a collective pejorative used by their enemies to refer to them and all their allies and assets. I'd draw direct comparisons to the Third Reich butI think it would fall afoul of forum rules, I trust that the parralels are obvious enough.

I imagine the majority of Thalmor actors in the lead up to the Great War were non-Altmeri assets. Bosmer and Khaajit quislings, and various people in the empire willing to side with the enemy for money, out of fear or because of misguided ideology.* They would all have ultimately reported to the Thalmor leadership, likely operating out of embassies in a clandestine manner similar to how they act in Skyrim. To describe these assets as Thalmor is not necessarily innacurate, we would usually refer to spies in the real world by whatever country they are spying for regardless of where they come from or if they are open supporters of their benefactor.

Being a formal member of the Thalmor is probably a requirement for any sort of important job in the Dominion, with a lot of 'in name' only Thalmor filling up low level administrative or law enforcement positions. Ideologically compatible people then get shuffled up the ladder, but the top is restricted to a very small number of really weird people who wouldn't logically work together under other circumstances. Bosmer might be allowed to be members, it depends on how close the parralels to real life history are supposed to be.


*Such as the An-Xileel. As I recall the Thalmor stirred up anti-Imperial sentiments in Black Marsh, not that it would have needed much stirring, but then couldn't exert any influence on them afterwards. Similar story with the Stormcloaks, fill a guy with so much guilt and loss that he blames himself for losing the War, fan that self hatred into a desire for redemption and let him loose to see what chaos he causes.




One of the things about prophecy in the Elder Scrolls is that they often start out really broad. The initial description of the Nerevarine boils down to 'was born in the Empire and isn't from Vvardenfell.' I think it's even stated that even the failed Nerevarine's might have been genuine 'reincarnations'* that just failed to finish the prophecy for various reasons. There's a strong element of 'it could just be a coincidence' in prophecy, and more than a few sceptics in universe who think they're bunk.

So far prophecy tends to be correct in a eucatastrophic sense rather than catastrophic. There's always someone who's in the right place at the right time to pull things out of the fire, but that person could have been anyone, and some of those anyones would have failed, in some timelines they might well have failed. There are steps to this, a waltz has to be done a certain way, but the dancer's spot was open and anyone could have stepped into it, we just happen to be the person who did and it's bloody hard to draw a line between 'chosen by fate' and 'dumb luck,' and I think the existence of two gods of time shenanigans muddy the waters further.

*'Nerevar reborn' seems to me to be more metaphorical than literal. It's not about his spirit literally returning from Aetherius in a new body to fulfill prophecy, and more about someone who can fill his shoes coming in to fix what is broken. A figurative Nerevar rather than the actual Nerevar.

----------


## Rynjin

> *'Nerevar reborn' seems to me to be more metaphorical than literal. It's not about his spirit literally returning from Aetherius in a new body to fulfill prophecy, and more about someone who can fill his shoes coming in to fix what is broken. A figurative Nerevar rather than the actual Nerevar.


Behold, mantling.

----------


## Keltest

> Yes, the passage is in Book One of the Commentaries: "When my voice returned, it spoke with another tongue. After three nights I could speak fire." From the surrounding text, I think what he's saying is that he became dragonborn during a Dragon Break, but it's not at all clear.


Even if he did, to actually breathe fire from it he would need to spend however many years meditating on the meaning of fire, which he could do without being a dragonborn, or eat a dragon to gain its understanding.

----------


## Grim Portent

'Speak fire' is extremely vague and could be interpreted as any of a number of things. My mind immediately leaps to things like 'fiery rhetoric' rather than magic.




> Roaring I wandered until I grew hoarse with the gospel. I had read the mysteries of Lord Dagon and feeling anew went mad with the overflow. My words found no purchase until I became hidden. These were not words for the common of Tamriel, whose clergy long ago feigned the very existence of the Dawn. Learn from my mistake; know that humility was Mankar Camoran's original wisdom. Come slow, and bring four keys.
> 
> Offering myself to that daybreak allowed the girdle of grace to contain me. When my voice returned, it spoke with another tongue. After three nights I could speak fire.
> 
> Red-drink, razor-fed, I had glimpsed the path unto the garden, and knew that to inform others of its harbor I had to first drown myself in search's sea. Know ye that I have found my fleet, and that you are the flagship of my hope. Greetings, novitiate, Mankar Camoran was once you, asleep, unwise, protonymic, but Am No More. Now I sit and wait to feast with thee on all the worlds of this cosmos. Nu-mantia! Liberty!


In context with the surrounding text it seems more reasonable to me that it describes Mankar becoming a great prophet after failing as a preacher. He read the Mysterium Xarxes but failed to really understand it, wandering around as an itinerant preacher and failing to gather a following. In despair at this failure he submitted himself to Dagon more fully, in humility rather than pride, achieving true understanding and was reborn as his prophet, his voice on Tamriel.

----------


## Rynjin

> 'Speak fire' is extremely vague and could be interpreted as any of a number of things. My mind immediately leaps to things like 'fiery rhetoric' rather than magic.


All that meditation really improved the quality of Mankar Camoran's next mixtape.

----------


## Eldan

I took it as a Biblical reference.

----------


## Grim Portent

> All that meditation really improved the quality of Mankar Camoran's next mixtape.


Young Scrolls needs to get on a Mankar Camoran equivalent of Dagothwave. Not sure he has enough voice lines for it, but I want it by Dagon!

----------


## Rynjin

> Young Scrolls needs to get on a Mankar Camoran equivalent of Dagothwave. Not sure he has enough voice lines for it, but I want it by Dagon!


Next LP is about to be Mankar Camoran - Profit for sure.

----------


## Lurkmoar

Stepping away from the lore aspects, I'm wondering:

What's everyone's limit when it comes to exploits? Phasing through walls with wooden bowls, flying on the Solitude stables bucket, using Pickpocket chicanery to hang on to the Jagged Crown, wearing Falmer Helmets + Circlets or Dragon Priest Masks, quicksaving punching shop keepers until they turn aggressive and reloading to refresh their stock kind of thing.

I draw the line at the duplicating glitch, selling Merchants their own stock and Fortify Restoration enchanting. Those three just feel like straight abuse.

----------


## Triaxx

I never knew about any of those. Except the Fortify loop.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> I never knew about any of those. Except the Fortify loop.


I thought everyone knew that saving/attacking shopkeeper/reloading to refresh stock trick.  :Small Big Grin: 

Practically the only reliable way to get Muffle/Waterbreathing/Poison Resist without console commands. Well, there is a guaranteed Circlet of Waterbreathing, but it's in the Temple of Auriel at the end of the Forgotten Vale. And to get there, you have to go through Blackreach AND the Soul Cairn.

----------


## veti

I know about killing shopkeepers and reloading, saw that on YouTube sometime, but I've never done it.

I'm okay with glitching, or for that matter just flat-out cheating, to get around some obstacle that feels both arbitrary and disproportionate. Arbitrary meaning there's no discernable in-game reason for it, disproportionate meaning it would take an unreasonable amount of time or effort to get around. 

For instance, when a mod adventure led me right to the bottom of Mzinchuleft, and I realised that the objective arrow was actually pointing into Blackreach... For the NPC whose trail I was following to be based there, he would have to have some way to enter Blackreach himself, which I should have found when I looted his body... So that made it both arbitrary and disproportionate (as the only official way to get the key to Blackreach involves running about the ice fields for no very well developed reason), and I just consoled in the gizmo.

But if the game is playing fair (as I see it) with me, I'll play fair with it. The only exploit I commonly use is levelling up during combat, for the complete regen.

----------


## Keltest

> I thought everyone knew that saving/attacking shopkeeper/reloading to refresh stock trick. 
> 
> Practically the only reliable way to get Muffle/Waterbreathing/Poison Resist without console commands. Well, there is a guaranteed Circlet of Waterbreathing, but it's in the Temple of Auriel at the end of the Forgotten Vale. And to get there, you have to go through Blackreach AND the Soul Cairn.


Eh? Joining the Dark Brotherhood gets you several different flavors of permanently muffled shoes.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Eh? Joining the Dark Brotherhood gets you several different flavors of permanently muffled shoes.


None that can be disenchanted though.

----------


## Spore

> I'm okay with glitching, or for that matter just flat-out cheating, to get around some obstacle that feels both arbitrary and disproportionate. Arbitrary meaning there's no discernable in-game reason for it, disproportionate meaning it would take an unreasonable amount of time or effort to get around.


Welcome to Bethesda games then. But as an aside, pressing three buttons is not disproportionate. (Quicksave, attack key, quickload)




> None that can be disenchanted though.


I get why one would want that enchantment on custom forged gear, but honestly, muffled steps is nothing you need in open combat, and vice versa I don't need legendary forged boots to get to the armor cap of 600-odd armor points (85% damage reduction). I can understand if you want your boots to match your armor, and not ruin your bronze colored dragonscale armor ruined with some black silken slippers.




> Stepping away from the lore aspects, I'm wondering:
> 
> What's everyone's limit when it comes to exploits?


I prefer modding the issue I run into with immersion friendly mods. Other than that, I push the intended design choices to their limits. An example list:

1) Modding level locked quest rewards to always give the highest reward possible. Else crafting outvalues everything.
2) Alchemist shops with 50 of each ingredient (and I will still steal some stuff off their counters because ingredients might be marked as stolen, but potions sure as heck aint).
3) Modding the thievery experience to reward actually breaking into houses more. Yes, the dock worker might not horde riches in their house but even they would have a valuable necklace family heirloom or a small stash of coinage for hard times.
4) Improving dragonshouting while removing the 0s cooldown exploit between shouts. I enjoy using the shouts, because that is what makes your character special. But a modded Speechcraft helps this more than just spamming shouts with stacked shouting equipment.
5) Killcam always. Because I just enjoy the takedowns too much even if the unarmed suplex to break their neck from sneak attack damage is entirely over the top.

The one thing I cannot mod away to my knowledge is "overly brave bandits". I don't want bandits in full dragon plate armor to rush me, but I don't want them to automatically flee me after a certain level. Maybe I just want a big more decent bandits I guess? Yes, my high level dragonborn is a demigod amongst men, but dueling a bandit captain should not end in three swings.

----------


## Imbalance

> Stepping away from the lore aspects, I'm wondering:
> 
> What's everyone's limit when it comes to exploits? Phasing through walls with wooden bowls, flying on the Solitude stables bucket, using Pickpocket chicanery to hang on to the Jagged Crown, wearing Falmer Helmets + Circlets or Dragon Priest Masks, quicksaving punching shop keepers until they turn aggressive and reloading to refresh their stock kind of thing.
> 
> I draw the line at the duplicating glitch, selling Merchants their own stock and Fortify Restoration enchanting. Those three just feel like straight abuse.


If Bethesda hasn't patched it by the time they release the GOTY edition, then it *IS* lore.  No pillow forts?  That's fair.  Nor duplicating items by dropping stacks of arrows?  Ok.  I can even see why wearing another necklace with the Gauldur Amulet might be bad.  Fine.

Reverse variable magnitude enchantments were never removed from Morrowind.  Duplicating items with scrolls in Oblivion is pure magic, see?  And of course, I *AM* the rightful king of Skyrim, wearing both the Jagged Crown and the Konahrik mask proves it.

----------


## Spore

> If Bethesda hasn't patched it by the time they release the GOTY edition, then it *IS* lore.


Aside from the copious amounts of Cliffracers in Morrowind, which fall more into meme territory than glitches, what kinds of glitches are more or less lore now? I only recall the flight/levitate, high jump and teleport spells being banned from Oblivion onwards. Because banning magic has historically always worked on wizards and mages.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Stepping away from the lore aspects, I'm wondering:
> 
> What's everyone's limit when it comes to exploits?


Too much exploitation reminds me Im playing a game, so I _usually_ stick with saving level-ups for combat where Im in over my head, and stealing raw materials so I can craft with them and sell them as legitimate goods. 

That said, I do occasionally abuse some quirks of the skill leveling system like casting that repel-undead circle while playing as a vampire, and leveling Pickpocket by robbing bandits so I wont get a bounty even if I fail. Once I had made the goal to reach max level and then I went through the whole buy all the merchants stock, sell it back to them at a loss, repeat to level up my Speech, but by that point in the game I was rolling in coin, and its too expensive, too tedious and not useful enough to repeat in most cases.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Stepping away from the lore aspects, I'm wondering:
> 
> What's everyone's limit when it comes to exploits? Phasing through walls with wooden bowls, flying on the Solitude stables bucket, using Pickpocket chicanery to hang on to the Jagged Crown, wearing Falmer Helmets + Circlets or Dragon Priest Masks, quicksaving punching shop keepers until they turn aggressive and reloading to refresh their stock kind of thing.
> 
> I draw the line at the duplicating glitch, selling Merchants their own stock and Fortify Restoration enchanting. Those three just feel like straight abuse.


Never done any of those things. Just doesn't feel fun to me, I'm here to play the game, not break it.

The closest thing I've done was eject the wooden dragon mask from my inventory while wearing it so that it would land in the alternate dimension/past whatever, making it (and all the main game dragon masks) forever irretriveable.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> I get why one would want that enchantment on custom forged gear, but honestly, muffled steps is nothing you need in open combat, and vice versa I don't need legendary forged boots to get to the armor cap of 600-odd armor points (85% damage reduction). I can understand if you want your boots to match your armor, and not ruin your bronze colored dragonscale armor ruined with some black silken slippers.


I usually get it for a follower. Most of them suck at sneaking(felt like the only one good at it was Serena), and giving them the Ebony Mail feels like overkill. Also, there's some Daedric quests I ignore when I'm playing a more moral character.




> Never done any of those things. Just doesn't feel fun to me, I'm here to play the game, not break it.
> 
> The closest thing I've done was eject the wooden dragon mask from my inventory while wearing it so that it would land in the alternate dimension/past whatever, making it (and all the main game dragon masks) forever irretriveable.


The Wooden Mask respawns though... 




> And of course, I *AM* the rightful king of Skyrim, wearing both the Jagged Crown and the Konahrik mask proves it.


All hail the king!

----------


## Fyraltari

> The Wooden Mask respawns though...


What do you mean?

----------


## Batcathat

I'm pretty conservative about using exploits, mostly because it's bad for my suspension of disbelief. I think the closest I've come in Skyrim is quick-leveling alteration by using telekinesis while fast traveling and wearing equipment to negate the Magicka cost (and even then I'm not really sure it qualifies as an exploit, since in-universe my character basically just practiced by using telekinesis non-stop on his travels, which seems pretty reasonable).

----------


## Resileaf

I don't think I ever consciously use exploits, especially since I tend to have 'narrative' playthroughs.

----------


## halfeye

> Stepping away from the lore aspects, I'm wondering:
> 
> What's everyone's limit when it comes to exploits?


Mine is around about saving the game before picking up sigil stones. I used to do it, but I felt bad enough about it that I didn't always do it more recently.

----------


## Keltest

> Mine is around about saving the game before picking up sigil stones. I used to do it, but I felt bad enough about it that I didn't always do it more recently.


I did thar out of necessity. Oblivion is fairly unstable. It would CTD if I picked one up sometimes (rather, when it entered a load screen) so I got in the habit of saving before zoning.

----------


## Rater202

The only exploit I ever did on purpose was the 100% chameleon exploit in Oblivion because I liked the Dark Brotherhood and Thieves Guild quests but was really bad at the stealth mechanic.

----------


## Resileaf

I'd say 100% chameleon is not quite an exploit since it requires some genuine work gathering the right sigil stones.

----------


## Aeson

> I'd say 100% chameleon is not quite an exploit  since it requires some genuine work gathering the right sigil  stones.


Firstly, considering that the easiest way to obtain  the right Sigil Stones is itself an exploit (save the game just before  clicking the stone and reload until you get the one you want), I don't  know that I'd say that the effort that goes into gathering the right  Sigil Stones is really a strong justification for 100% chameleon not  being an exploit.

Secondly, you don't need any Sigil Stones to achieve 100% chameleon in _Oblivion_, not even if you want to achieve 100% in the minimum number of enchantment slots. You can get:
- 35% from the Ring of Khajiiti (Meridia's Quest reward, available from lv.10)
- 30% from the Grand Ring of Shadows (random loot from about lv.14) and Crystalline Cuirass (random loot from about lv.22)
- 25% from the Ring of Shadows (random loot from about lv.9) and Cuirass of the Ranger (random loot from about lv.17)
-  Whatever remaining percentage you need from custom items enchanted with  soul gems (8%/item Petty, 11%/item Lesser, 14%/item Common, 17%/item  Greater, 20%/item Grand or Black).

Cuirass of the Ranger + Ring of Shadows + Ring of Khajiiti + an item enchanted with a Greater or stronger soul gives you 100% Chameleon in four items, as does Ring of Shadows + Ring of Khajiiti + two items enchanted with Grand or Black souls; substituting in an item or two enchanted using Sigil Stones cannot further reduce the number of slots consumed to achieve 100% chameleon, though it could potentially free a slot if you need one for a specific item that you want to include in your kit.

Chameleon Sigil Stones can  certainly help, especially if you want to hit 100% Chameleon in the  minimum number of slots without using some of the standard items, but  they're by no means required. The game provides you with eight slots for enchantments (boots, gauntlets, greaves, cuirass, helm, amulet, two rings), so if you really wanted to you ought to be able to achieve 100% chameleon with a Petty, two Lesser, and five Common souls; it might not be the most efficient use of your enchantment slots, but with 100% chameleon you probably don't really need much else in your enchantment slots, anyways.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> What do you mean?


If you stay away from the area for about 10 in game days, the Wooden Mask, the dagger in the skeleton and the note will respawn.

----------


## Vinyadan

In Morrowind, the Ring of Surrounding + the Amulet of Shadows give you 100% chameleon, which is very close to godmode, if you have the patience to use them every time you need them (I don't, and, thinking about it, one could easily mod the Amulet of Shadows to give you the useful, but much less powerful, invisibility).

I never had the patience to use the various alchemy exploits, except for the superlight potions (although it isn't like I made them on purpose).

The Duke randomly making you the head of House Hlaalu is pretty funny, though.

----------


## Spore

> If Bethesda hasn't patched it by the time they release the GOTY edition, then it *IS* lore.  No pillow forts?  That's fair.  Nor duplicating items by dropping stacks of arrows?  Ok.  I can even see why wearing another necklace with the Gauldur Amulet might be bad.  Fine.
> 
> Reverse variable magnitude enchantments were never removed from Morrowind.  Duplicating items with scrolls in Oblivion is pure magic, see?  And of course, I *AM* the rightful king of Skyrim, wearing both the Jagged Crown and the Konahrik mask proves it.


So it IS you! I am honored.

----------


## Resileaf

> Firstly, considering that the easiest way to obtain  the right Sigil Stones is itself an exploit (save the game just before  clicking the stone and reload until you get the one you want), I don't  know that I'd say that the effort that goes into gathering the right  Sigil Stones is really a strong justification for 100% chameleon not  being an exploit.
> 
> Secondly, you don't need any Sigil Stones to achieve 100% chameleon in _Oblivion_, not even if you want to achieve 100% in the minimum number of enchantment slots. You can get:
> - 35% from the Ring of Khajiiti (Meridia's Quest reward, available from lv.10)
> - 30% from the Grand Ring of Shadows (random loot from about lv.14) and Crystalline Cuirass (random loot from about lv.22)
> - 25% from the Ring of Shadows (random loot from about lv.9) and Cuirass of the Ranger (random loot from about lv.17)
> -  Whatever remaining percentage you need from custom items enchanted with  soul gems (8%/item Petty, 11%/item Lesser, 14%/item Common, 17%/item  Greater, 20%/item Grand or Black).
> 
> Cuirass of the Ranger + Ring of Shadows + Ring of Khajiiti + an item enchanted with a Greater or stronger soul gives you 100% Chameleon in four items, as does Ring of Shadows + Ring of Khajiiti + two items enchanted with Grand or Black souls; substituting in an item or two enchanted using Sigil Stones cannot further reduce the number of slots consumed to achieve 100% chameleon, though it could potentially free a slot if you need one for a specific item that you want to include in your kit.
> ...


That's still a lot more involved and requires more work than what most exploits do. If the minimum level you need to do this with random loot is 14, that's plenty of adventuring that has been done to get to this level.
I dunno, for me exploits tend to require using quirks in the programming to do something unintended/unexpected, not gather items that together are overpowered.

----------


## Eldan

I don't think I've ever really bothered with exploits.
But that's also because I use the console if I find anything too annoying to do the normal way.

----------


## Mark Hall

I try to mostly play the game as written and, IMO, intended. Aside from few mods, my biggest and most frequent concession is the console command tcl to get past things that are bull****, or get me out of places I should not be stuck.

----------


## Aeson

> That's still a lot more involved and requires  more work than what most exploits do. If the minimum level you need to  do this with random loot is 14, that's plenty of adventuring that has  been done to get to this level.


The items I listed are merely items needed to get to 100% Chameleon in  the minimum number of slots; they do not represent the earliest point at  which you can achieve 100% chameleon without using Sigil Stones.
- Black Souls are Grand-equivalent (20% chameleon per item) and readily  available from hostile NPCs at all levels, and Black Soul Gems can be looted from boss  necromancers from level 5. There are also at least half a dozen Grand Soul Gems available in fixed, accessible locations at game start, which can be turned into Black Soul Gems as soon as you can obtain them, go to one of the four altars during a Shade of the Revenant, and cast Soul Trap (min. 25 Mysticism), which means that you can at least theoretically get 100% chameleon in five slots using only custom items at level 1 as long as you can also obtain access to an enchanting service and the money to pay for it.
- The Base Ring of Shadows (20% chameleon) is available in boss loot from level 1 and random loot from level 4.
- In addition to the cuirasses I mentioned previously, there's a series  of lower-level cuirasses which provide Chameleon effects (Cuirass of the  Chameleon, 10%, random loot from lv.3; Cuirass of the Assassin, 15%,  random loot from lv.5; Chameleon Cuirass, 20%, random loot from lv.8)
- You can theoretically achieve 100% chameleon using only custom items  enchanted with Common, Lesser, and Petty Souls, probably by level 5 if  you can be bothered to get the money to pay the enchanting fees and  either obtain access to the Arcane University or set up the enchanting  table in Frostcrag Spire (or have some other access to an enchanting  service through mods).




> If the minimum level you need to do this with random loot is 14


1 - The Ring of Shadows and Grand Ring of Shadows are  more or less  functionally equivalent when combined with the Ring of  Khajiiti, as  with the Ring of Shadows and Ring of Khajiiti you need two  Grand or  three Common souls while with the Grand Ring of Shadows and the  Ring of  Khajiiti you need a Grand and a Greater or a Petty and two  Common  souls to reach 100% chameleon, so there's little real difference between  what can be done at level 10 and what can be done at level 14 with  items from random loot. Grand Souls might be difficult to obtain at  level 10, but Black Souls aren't, the fourth Mages' Guild quest after  all the recommendations teaches you how to turn Grand Soul Gems into  Black Soul Gems, and there's something like half a dozen Grand Soul Gems  in guaranteed locations at game start.

2 - You need Ascendent (lv.13-16, 25% chameleon per item) or  Transcendent (lv.17+, 30% chameleon per item) Sigil Stones to achieve  100% chameleon in the minimum number of slots while exclusively using  custom items; dropping down to Latent Sigil Stones (lv.9-12, 20%  chameleon per item) means using a minimum of five slots without  involving the Ring of Shadows and Ring of Khajiiti and doesn't do  anything that Grand or Black Souls wouldn't.

3 - There are 30 types of Sigil Stone, and only one of them provides Chameleon as an effect. No single character can close more than 60 Oblivion Gates (and, given just how repetitive and tedious Oblivion Gates become, especially if closing gates as you encounter them or at the levels where the better Sigil Stones are available, will likely close significantly fewer than that), the Sigil Stone received for closing the gate is randomly selected from the thirty types, and neither Oblivion Gates nor Sigil Stones respawn. Unless you're save-scumming for the stone you want, resorting to item duplication glitches, or engaging in some other exploit along those lines, it will be _significantly_ easier to complete a 100% Chameleon outfit using generic loot, artifacts, and Soul Gem-powered enchantments than it is to complete a 100% Chameleon outfit with multiple - or arguably even one - Sigil Stone enchantments in it.

----------


## veti

> I try to mostly play the game as written and, IMO, intended. Aside from few mods, my biggest and most frequent concession is the console command tcl to get past things that are bull****, or get me out of places I should not be stuck.


Yeah... You can't call that an exploit. "Getting stuck" isn't meant to be part of the game.




> Firstly, considering that the easiest way to obtain  the right Sigil Stones is itself an exploit (save the game just before  clicking the stone and reload until you get the one you want), I don't  know that I'd say that the effort that goes into gathering the right  Sigil Stones is really a strong justification for 100% chameleon not  being an exploit.
> 
> Secondly, you don't need any Sigil Stones to achieve 100% chameleon in _Oblivion_, not even if you want to achieve 100% in the minimum number of enchantment slots. You can get:
> - 35% from the Ring of Khajiiti (Meridia's Quest reward, available from lv.10)
> - 30% from the Grand Ring of Shadows (random loot from about lv.14) and Crystalline Cuirass (random loot from about lv.22)
> - 25% from the Ring of Shadows (random loot from about lv.9) and Cuirass of the Ranger (random loot from about lv.17)
> -  Whatever remaining percentage you need from custom items enchanted with  soul gems (8%/item Petty, 11%/item Lesser, 14%/item Common, 17%/item  Greater, 20%/item Grand or Black).


This, on the other hand, is... borderline, I feel. Where do we stand on "character plans that require careful research and planning on a wiki (or similar) to gather the stuff you need"? That seems to me at least as exploitative as sigil-stone save scumming.

(Although, looking at the list again, once you've done Meridia's quest, everything else is chance drops, so... yeah, sorry, bad example. But still, I'm curious about attitudes to this. Is "out-of-game research" within the bounds of fair play?)

What bugs me about the "chameleon" effect is that although 100% is ridiculously abusive, anything less than that has no discernable effect at all. You'd think a 90% chameleon effect would be a "pretty good" stealth boost, but nope. When I remember that ambush in Morrowind - you know, the lady who sends you diving in a pond to retrieve her ring, and when you come out you get bushwhacked by her friend who's covered with (IIRC) about 75% chameleon - she's as near invisible as makes very little difference, you have to squint pretty hard to see her before she decloaks.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Yeah... You can't call that an exploit. "Getting stuck" isn't meant to be part of the game.


After this many games, I think it's hard to argue that it isn't. ;-)

----------


## Aeson

> This, on the other hand, is... borderline, I feel.  Where do we stand on "character plans that require careful research and  planning on a wiki (or similar) to gather the stuff you need"? That  seems to me at least as exploitative as sigil-stone save  scumming.


My argument isn't that 100% Chameleon is an exploit but rather that "the  effort involved in farming Sigil Stones" is not a good argument for  100% Chameleon _not_ being an exploit, because the easiest ways  to obtain enough of the right Sigil Stones for 100% Chameleon are  exploits and there's easier ways to get to 100% chameleon without  involving Sigil Stones at all.

Also, "gathering souls to create  custom enchantments that add up to 100% chameleon, with or without quest  rewards and random loot" isn't what I'd call an example of "out-of-game  research required." Take a filled Common Soul Gem to an enchanting  altar while your character knows a Chameleon spell and you have access  to all of the information you require to determine that you can reach  100% chameleon in eight items - the game itself will tell you that  enchanting an item with a Common soul will give you 14% chameleon as a  constant effect if you think to check; multiply that by seven and you  get 98%, so seven Common souls and one more source of Chameleon gives  you 100%.




> (Although, looking at the list again, once you've done Meridia's quest,  everything else is chance drops, so... yeah, sorry, bad example. But  still, I'm curious about attitudes to this. Is "out-of-game research"  within the bounds of fair play?)


An issue with "out-of-game  research isn't fair play" is that there is a problem with distinguishing  meta-knowledge obtained by reading the wiki or similar from  meta-knowledge obtained from having previously played the game,  especially when the meta-knowledge involved is as minimal as "I need the  Ring of Khajiiti and a bunch of Grand-level souls or equivalent generic  items and Sigil Stones." I mean, fair enough, "the simple ten-step plan  for hitting 100% chameleon in five items at level 1, with specific  locations to obtain XYZ noted" is probably not something someone 'just  remembers' how to do based on having previously played the game, but  it's entirely plausible that someone remembers where and how to create  Black Soul Gems after the first time or two through the Mages' Guild  questline and is pretty sure that there's a couple Grand Soul Gems  available at a five-fingered discount in one of the Mages' Guildhalls,  and gaining access to the Arcane University enchanting service is just a  matter of completing the various Recommendation quests while gaining  access to the Frostcrag Spire enchanting service is just a lot of money.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

All this talk about 100% Chameleon via gear is making me feel like I was wasting effort making two different kinds of Chameleon potion so they would stack.

But on the subject of Oblivion Gates, that reminds me of another exploit: Water Walk works on lava, and there is at least one Gate setup where you can use this to skip past a bunch of it.

----------


## Mark Hall

> All this talk about 100% Chameleon via gear is making me feel like I was wasting effort making two different kinds of Chameleon potion so they would stack.
> 
> But on the subject of Oblivion Gates, that reminds me of another exploit: Water Walk works on lava, and there is at least one Gate setup where you can use this to skip past a bunch of it.


It's lovely. I also got to the point in Oblivion Gates where I'd speed-run them. Just "Nope, I am fighting none of you. Play with this summoned monster while I run to the top and destroy the gate."

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> It's lovely. I also got to the point in Oblivion Gates where I'd speed-run them. Just "Nope, I am fighting none of you. Play with this summoned monster while I run to the top and destroy the gate."


They really should have made the Gates more interesting. Or maybe shorter, so being repetitive wasnt so much of a drawback, but more interesting would have been better.

----------


## Mark Hall

> They really should have made the Gates more interesting. Or maybe shorter, so being repetitive wasnt so much of a drawback, but more interesting would have been better.


"We have a billion hand-crafted cave dungeons! And seven Oblivion gates, which is the focus of the entire game."

----------


## GloatingSwine

The thing you want from oblivion gates is the other godmode. Damage Reflection.

Damage Reflection and damage reduction from armour applied sequentially, and you could get about 85% of both. So you would reflect 85% of all the non-spell damage you took (and you could get to about 50-60% spell reflect as well), then you would resist 85% of any damage that actually got through the reflect.

It meant that all those late game beef wall enemies that had a billion hitpoints would just punch themselves to death if you stood next to them.

----------


## Grim Portent

My brother and I got to 100% Chameleon long before ever reading the wiki, it was just so simple after finding the Ring of Khajiiti. Slapped a few Greater/Grand souls on an outfit and spent a while goofing around with it. Once you get into the Mages Guild it's just an obvious thing to try.

Actually became a regular thing for my Oblivion runs if I was playing a thief/assassin type character. Mostly used it for Oblivion Gates and other fights that were just obnoxious, as I preferred to actually sneak and shoot or backstab things when it was possible, but Oblivion Gates were samey and irrelevant enough that I just wanted to blitz through them. Spending 10 minutes slapping an Xvilai was not fun.


Other things I would max out with enchanting were Detect Life, Fortify Acrobatics and Fortify Athletics. Each of those suits was hilarious in different ways. Not hit the skybox levels of silly, but being the fastest thing in the game and able to leap huge gaps is liberating. Detect Life was mostly used for deer hunting, I could see them from waaaay before they would render and run them down to make my health potions.


Unintuitive exploits in Oblivion are things like scroll duplication or making a stairway out of paintbrushes, but more than a few of us will have stumbled onto them by accident. I did use the bound equipment/repair exploit sometimes, but as I recall I stumbled on it by accident first with the bound helmet, and then went online looking for confirmation of what was going on before deciding to try and do it with the full set.




> It's lovely. I also got to the point in Oblivion Gates where I'd speed-run them. Just "Nope, I am fighting none of you. Play with this summoned monster while I run to the top and destroy the gate."


My version was to just run past the daedra as a speed blur. IIRC at high enough speed (somewhere between 100 and 200 maybe?) you actually run faster than fireballs travel in Oblivion. Nothing could catch me as I bounced through the gates like a pinball, leaping over lava flows and bouncing off rocks like an Argonian version of Sonic.

----------


## Fyraltari

> "We have a billion hand-crafted cave dungeons! And seven Oblivion gates, which is the focus of the entire game."


The funny thing is the cave dungeons aren't hand-crafted, they were all procedurally generated during development.

I feel like this should have been used for to give the Oblivion Gates more variety. Oblivion being the one place where alien, nonsensical architectural choices ought to be expected and all.

----------


## Aeson

> The thing you want from oblivion gates is the other godmode. Damage Reflection.
> 
> Damage Reflection and damage reduction from armour applied sequentially,  and you could get about 85% of both. So you would reflect 85% of all  the non-spell damage you took (and you could get to about 50-60% spell  reflect as well), then you would resist 85% of any damage that actually  got through the reflect.
> 
> It meant that all those late game beef  wall enemies that had a billion hitpoints would just punch themselves to  death if you stood next to them.


Honestly, by the time that  those things become an issue, I'd probably rather have 100% Chameleon  than Reflect Damage; it's not like you're going to gain much, if  anything, by killing those enemies - your relevant combat skills are  probably capped and you're probably not going to find better equipment  than what you already have - so slipping past them invisibly or using  sneak attacks to apply high-end poisons worth up to ~900 damage over  30-40 seconds is probably better for your sanity than a combat strategy  which involves actually letting them attack you.

Also, by itself,  anything much less than 100% damage reduction from armor, resistances,  and Reflect Damage probably isn't enough against at least some of those  enemies once you get to a sufficiently high level - player-character HP  is at best something like 60 + 10*level whereas some of those monsters  have something like 25*level or 30*level HP, and at a high enough level  dungeons can contain dozens of such enemies. Ignoring 85% of 85% of  incoming damage still leaves you taking 2.25 damage for every 85 damage  reflected, which means that without healing or additional outgoing damage you'll run out of HP after  about fifteen or twenty monsters beat themselves to death on you.  Moreover, Reflect Damage doesn't work against ranged or magical attacks,  enchantments, and poisons, which can limit its utility against some of  the late-game enemies that have ludicrously-large HP pools, for example  Goblin Warlords (can carry poison and come in both melee and ranged  varieties) and Gloom Wraiths (can use magical attacks - including an  Absorb Health spell that can heal them and damage you for 120 HP, can  carry poison, might be able to spawn with an enchanted weapon). Reflect  Damage certainly isn't a bad thing to have, but it also isn't an "I can  completely ignore all enemies" button.

----------


## veti

> My version was to just run past the daedra as a speed blur. IIRC at high enough speed (somewhere between 100 and 200 maybe?) you actually run faster than fireballs travel in Oblivion. Nothing could catch me as I bounced through the gates like a pinball, leaping over lava flows and bouncing off rocks like an Argonian version of Sonic.


That sounds really cool, and not really exploitative at all. Oblivion kinda forced you to think about alternative ways to deal with the insanely spongey enemies at higher levels - straight-up fighting them was never any fun, and became less so as your weapons and armour degraded. "200 speed" sounds - well, more sporting than invisibility.

Thinking about it, that might have been the point of Oblivion's insane level scaling - to encourage that sort of outside-the-box thinking.

----------


## Vinyadan

A problem with the Cyrodiil dungeons was due to Oblivion general design philosophy. While Morrowind combined smaller meshes that often used many texture files each, Oblivion used very large meshes with texture atlases (so one big texture wrapped around each mesh). This made Oblivion much lighter to run than it would otherwise have been (each Oblivion textured object had up to four/five texture maps, one for colour, one for parallax, one for normals, and one for reflections, plus a possible glow map; Morrowind had one, plus sometimes a glow map). However, large meshes also meant that you met the same scenery over and over again in dungeons. Remember that cave room with a canyon in the middle, or with raised ground at two corners? Those were, iirc, a single mesh each. It's one of the reasons I can't really bear vanilla Oblivion nowadays.

On the other hand, this design worked great in cities, where you could get large, unique buildings with reasonable performance.

----------


## halfeye

> Spending 10 minutes slapping an Xvilai was not fun.


The problem I had with those was that they didn't drop much loot, compared to the weaker daedra.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> The problem I had with those was that they didn't drop much loot, compared to the weaker daedra.


I missed the variety of monsters at higher levels. Fighting nothing but Dreugh and Minotaurs every fifteen steps gets tedious fast. Maybe if theyd mixed it up with packs of the weaker enemies - a swarm of Scamps, a pack of Clannfear or wolves, etc. Or even just throw single weak foes in and let me squash them.

----------


## Resileaf

And that is why I play with the mod that locks every zone's level.

----------


## Rynjin

I prefer the one that kind of delevels the game entirely. I think enemies still scale within their brackets (so wolves stop scaling at level 5 or whatever, when they would normally be replaced) and every enemy type that COUDL appear in an area will always have a chance of being there.

----------


## Aeson

> Thinking about it, that might have been the point of Oblivion's insane level scaling - to encourage that sort of outside-the-box thinking.


I sincerely doubt it; _Oblivion_'s level-scaling system may not work particularly well at any level, but it works well enough between levels 1 and 20 or maybe 25 if playing the game 'normally' (i.e. leveling mostly off of your combat skills), and pretty much everything in the game points to that being sort of where the developers expected you'd stop playing - Sigil Stones stop improving after level 17, loot more or less stops getting better once your character level's in the low 20s, no new monster types spawn after maybe level 25 and monster variety plummets as your level increases further, level-magnitude spells implicitly assume that level 25 is highest level a target can be (fortunately implemented as "affects everything" rather than becoming increasingly useless past level 25 - though only with 100% spell effectiveness), and your three main combat skills are probably capped or nearly capped by the time your character level reaches the mid-20s even if they're all class skills (if they're not class skills, they're probably capped or nearly capped ten or fifteen levels earlier than that). It really feels to me like the developers thought you'd stop playing by sometime around level 25, added level 30 versions of many level-scaled items as something of an afterthought in case anyone played beyond that point, and never seriously considered what would happen if someone actually kept playing the game much further than that, let alone approached a character's natural level cap of 44.5 - 52.5 or used any of the available means to go beyond that point. Additionally, the apparent dungeon design philosophy does not appear to support the idea that the developers wanted to encourage out-of-the-box thinking; the overwhelming majority of dungeons are very much "there is one path and you will take it, meeting and overcoming each encounter in order," and many of the ways to bypass areas of dungeons (e.g. skipping across the lava in certain Oblivion Gates) feel more like they're something the developers simply didn't consider than an intended solution to the dungeon.

I also don't feel that very high speed would be particularly useful for running past enemies in most dungeons - even if you don't get caught up on an enemy in one of the narrow passages so common in the game's dungeons, enemies that are aware of you will pursue, and in most dungeons you have to go out the way you came in. Even if you managed to run past everyone on the way in, that just means you have a crowd piling up behind you and probably blocking up the way out.

----------


## Triaxx

The problem of course is that is you don't level optimally Oblivion likes to deliver a swift kicking in the groinal region then laugh at you. The leveled mobs don't help. Just as I've gotten to being able to take the wolves in an area with even slight confidence, they get replaced with the faster, tougher, deadlier Timberwolves.

----------


## veti

> I also don't feel that very high speed would be particularly useful for running past enemies in most dungeons - even if you don't get caught up on an enemy in one of the narrow passages so common in the game's dungeons, enemies that are aware of you will pursue, and in most dungeons you have to go out the way you came in. Even if you managed to run past everyone on the way in, that just means you have a crowd piling up behind you and probably blocking up the way out.


Sure, but in an Oblivion Gate specifically, "getting out" isn't a problem. Let 'em follow.

I assume the character had some variety of skills for other dungeons, but I can imagine quite a lot of possible strategies benefitting from insane speed. Dodging, for one. Or stealth - skedaddle before the enemy has even decided where to start looking for you.

The main drawback for me would be, you'd need excellent reflexes and control. I might have enjoyed that sort of playstyle 30 years ago, but I doubt I could hack it now.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Sure, but in an Oblivion Gate specifically, "getting out" isn't a problem. Let 'em follow.
> 
> I assume the character had some variety of skills for other dungeons, but I can imagine quite a lot of possible strategies benefitting from insane speed. Dodging, for one. Or stealth - skedaddle before the enemy has even decided where to start looking for you.
> 
> The main drawback for me would be, you'd need excellent reflexes and control. I might have enjoyed that sort of playstyle 30 years ago, but I doubt I could hack it now.


My usual method was "Quick key Invisibility, my best summoning spell, and healing." Summon spell, invisibility, move. They focus on the monster they can see, I get moving. If I get hurt, I heal.

It's super effective, even for old man reflexes.

----------


## Vinyadan

Didn't Oblivion dungeons have a handy way out, so you didn't have to go all the way back? Or was that a Skyrim thing?

----------


## Mark Hall

> Didn't Oblivion dungeons have a handy way out, so you didn't have to go all the way back? Or was that a Skyrim thing?


I recall lots of circles leading back to locked doors, but it might just be a few examples.

----------


## halfeye

> Didn't Oblivion dungeons have a handy way out, so you didn't have to go all the way back? Or was that a Skyrim thing?


That happened sometimes, but less than half the times I think, in both.

----------


## Aeson

> The problem of course is that is you don't level  optimally Oblivion likes to deliver a swift kicking in the groinal  region then laugh at you. The leveled mobs don't help. Just as I've  gotten to being able to take the wolves in an area with even slight  confidence, they get replaced with the faster, tougher, deadlier  Timberwolves.


Depends what you mean by 'optimally.' You certainly need to be doing  something that directly improves your combat effectiveness (probably  mostly on the offensive side) reasonably significantly in order to keep  pace with level-scaling through to level 20 or 25, but you don't really  need to get 'perfect' 5-5-1 or 5-5-5 levels to keep pace with scaling  below level 20 or maybe 25.
- HP advantage from boosting Endurance  takes a lot of levels to build up to a significant degree, and from a  given starting point the difference between taking 5 Endurance per level  until capped and taking less than 5 but more than 0 Endurance per level  until capped isn't going to be very large.
- Weapon damage isn't so  strongly affected by the governing attribute (Strength for melee,  Agility for bows) as to make getting less than +5 to that attribute each  time you improve it a crippling disadvantage, or arguably even all that  noticeable a difference as long as you're not comparing something like  "no boosts since first level" to "+5 every level since first." 
-  Half the attributes in the game probably won't significantly or directly  improve a given character's combat performance, especially not below  level 20 or maybe 25 when you can reasonably expect to keep up with  scaling as long as you've been continually improving your offensive  skill of choice and one or perhaps two defensive/utility combat skills by a reasonable degree with each level.  Personality is virtually irrelevant in combat for all characters;  Intelligence more or less only matters to spellcasters; Willpower, as  component of fatigue, matters slightly to noncasters but is still mostly  only important to characters who primarily rely on spells in combat;  Strength is mostly a utility attribute if you're not a melee character;  Agility is mostly a utility attribute if you're not an archer; Endurance  is nice to have but not especially important if you're relying on  something other than your HP pool and armor/block for survival; Speed  and Luck are utility attributes.

At least within the context of  how the game scales up to level 20 or maybe level 25 getting mainly +3s  with the occasional +2 or +4 to the attributes that most matter for your  build is generally good enough. 'Perfect' levels would certainly be  better, at least as long as we're not talking about a silly comparison  that puts +5s into attributes that don't make a difference for your  build and +3s into attributes that matter, but they're not essential.




> Didn't Oblivion dungeons have a handy way out, so you didn't have to go all the way back? Or was that a Skyrim thing?


Looping dungeons are mostly a _Skyrim_ thing; _Oblivion_'s dungeons usually, but not always, require you to retrace your steps to get back out of them.

----------


## Mark Hall

> That happened sometimes, but less than half the times I think, in both.


Some exits were convenient if your health was ok, and you wanted to train Acrobatics.

----------


## mjp1050

> Didn't Oblivion dungeons have a handy way out, so you didn't have to go all the way back? Or was that a Skyrim thing?


That would be Skyrim. Oblivion made you backtrack through the entire dungeon to get out, sometimes through multiple zones. Morrowind did that too, but it wasn't as noticeable because of the smaller size of the dungeons and various teleport spells. 

Funnily enough, I remember Skyrim being _criticized_ for that back in the day, because looping dungeons don't make much sense from an in-universe perspective.

----------


## Triaxx

Some Oblivion Dungeons looped. Particularly Aylied Ruins.

----------


## Resileaf

Generally, the longer the dungeon was, the more likely it was to loop in Oblivion. Especially if it had a lot of sub-zones in it.

----------


## Rater202

I distinctly remember some caves that had hidden doors that took you right to the beginning of the cave you pulled the switch at the end in Oblivion.

----------


## GloatingSwine

Yeah, Oblivion sometimes did it, Skyrim almost always did.

----------


## Delicious Taffy

If a dungeon is long enough to take up multiple loading screens, it better have the courtesy of letting you take a shortcut back to the entrance. Some older games, I'd wind up getting lost and forgetting what I was even doing, just because there were too many layers and zones to a dungeon. Not helped by console load times, which meant that if I wanted to open a door, I'd have to be sure I really meant it, because it was gonna be a minute or two before I got to see that next room.

----------


## Grim Portent

Getting lost was certainly a problem in Oblivion that I've never had in Skyrim. While I sometimes roll my eyes at all the convenient escape routes that only open from one side, it is generally preferable to running around a 3d space with multiple floors, identical rooms and a 2d map trying to figure out which nondescript tunnel was the one that leads back out.

----------


## halfeye

> Getting lost was certainly a problem in Oblivion that I've never had in Skyrim. While I sometimes roll my eyes at all the convenient escape routes that only open from one side, it is generally preferable to running around a 3d space with multiple floors, identical rooms and a 2d map trying to figure out which nondescript tunnel was the one that leads back out.


Oblivion's maps were much better than Skyrim's.

----------


## Grim Portent

> Oblivion's maps were much better than Skyrim's.


Indeed, but it still was not good at dealing with multi-floor caves that overlapped themselves.

There's one cave that leaps to mind, part of the Fighter's Guild quests as I recall. Troll killing job I think. Tunnels that branched up and down and every which way, overlapped each other in several places on the map and was just generally a nightmare to navigate.

Skyrims dungeons tend to be simple enough that the map isn't even useful outside of two or three in the whole game.

----------


## halfeye

> Skyrims dungeons tend to be simple enough that the map isn't even useful outside of two or three in the whole game.


Nope, the maps were just that bad that you couldn't use them. Oblivion's maps didn't deal wonderfully well with multiple levels, but Skyrim's maps just weren't fit for their purpose.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

Id still rather have Mark/Recall returned to the game. Or even just the option to fast travel to the entrance once youve killed the boss. Less contrived that way.

----------


## veti

> Nope, the maps were just that bad that you couldn't use them. Oblivion's maps didn't deal wonderfully well with multiple levels, but Skyrim's maps just weren't fit for their purpose.


Still better than Fallout's...

I've had problems with Skyrim's maps, but mostly (a) only interior and (b) only in mods, I can't recall ever having a problem in a vanilla dungeon. Although the latter are mostly so simple, I hardly ever try to look at the map anyway.

The map is still useful for getting an idea of how far away your objective is, and (sometimes) spotting where you've missed a possible turning. That's about the extent of it.

----------


## Delicious Taffy

I can't remember a single occasion when I felt inclined to use the map in a Skyrim dungeon. I forgot that was even a thing until y'all brought it up.

----------


## Spore

> Id still rather have Mark/Recall returned to the game. Or even just the option to fast travel to the entrance once youve killed the boss. Less contrived that way.


If you use your imagination a bit, fast travel can be just that. Well, if you ignore that your "teleport" took as much ingame time as walking. :P

I loved Mysticism back in the days, but I can understand how locking access of fast travel behind a skill felt weird.

There is this weird obsession with providing a mode for every subset of skills.
Athletics for Warriors.
Acrobatics for Rogues
Mysticism for Mages.

Those are WILDLY different skills and ideas of traversal. But they helped with world building. Suddenly any town with a mage teleport circle was more important. Suddenly your jumpy Khajiit could enter areas differently (well, not really since you cannot bar people from areas because they cannot jump yay high) and your armored tank character is just waaaay too fast for his weight class.

I want them to return, but maybe not as skills locked to a level system but rather to quest progression. Assassins learn some sort of charged jump, and reduce their falling damage. Warriors get a dash. Mages get gradual access to a teleport network (which does not make fast travel useless, but it allows to teleport to locations not yet discovered).

----------


## halfeye

> Still better than Fallout's...


I could agree with no worse than Fallout's (at least for 3, nv + 4, haven't tried 1 or 2).




> I can't remember a single occasion when I felt inclined to use the map in a Skyrim dungeon. I forgot that was even a thing until y'all brought it up.


It's a very long time since I used them, I did once or twice.

----------


## Batcathat

> I could agree with no worse than Fallout's (at least for 3, nv + 4, haven't tried 1 or 2).


I've played both 1 and 2 quite a bit and I don't think I've ever used the map in any meaningful way. It wasn't exactly user-friendly...



Of course, the overworld where you travel between places is a map too and that one was obviously quite necessary to use.

----------


## veti

Mastering the transport options in Morrowind felt like a skill in itself. With some combination of Intervention, Mages Guilds, silt striders and boats, you could reach any "civilised" settlement in two or three stages. Those places became the hubs from which every expedition set out.

I can't remember all the details now, but I do remember my delight when I realised how far I could travel just by alternating between Divine/Almsivi Intervention.

I loved the fact that there were substantial chunks of map (the Ashlands, and inside the Ghostfence) that didn't have any such travel options - you had to get there under your own power. (Or a Mark, but that was limited to a single point.) It really helped to make those areas feel qualitatively different - wilder, remote. With fast travel, nowhere is remote.

----------


## Caelestion

Yeah, as long as you can open the map and click anywhere to instantly travel there, any other travel options will be essentially obsolete (and thus unlikely to be included outside of mods), unless players deliberately choose not to fast travel.

----------


## Triaxx

Fallout 1/2's maps were super useful. But only to know where you had and hadn't been.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Getting lost was certainly a problem in Oblivion that I've never had in Skyrim. While I sometimes roll my eyes at all the convenient escape routes that only open from one side, it is generally preferable to running around a 3d space with multiple floors, identical rooms and a 2d map trying to figure out which nondescript tunnel was the one that leads back out.


Daggerfall flashbacks. At least in Arena, the dungeons had defined floors, instead of tunnel spaghetti.

----------


## Aeson

> Suddenly your jumpy Khajiit could enter areas differently (well, not really since you cannot bar people from areas because they cannot jump yay high)


Locking access to paths or areas behind mobility skills and abilities isn't fundamentally different from locking access to paths or areas behind locked doors that require the use of a particular skill to open. Why is it okay to say "your character must be able to open a locked door in order to go here" but not "your character must be able to cross a ten-foot gap to go there, fly in order to reach this place, survive a 100-foot drop to get to that place...?"

----------


## Rynjin

> Locking access to paths or areas behind mobility skills and abilities isn't fundamentally different from locking access to paths or areas behind locked doors that require the use of a particular skill to open. Why is it okay to say "your character must be able to open a locked door in order to go here" but not "your character must be able to cross a ten-foot gap to go there, fly in order to reach this place, survive a 100-foot drop to get to that place...?"


Because one is binary and the other is not. Any character may attempt and (with enough trial and error) succeed at lockpicking in the Elder Scrolls games.

If you can't jump far enough, you simply cannot jump far enough. Trying more times will not change the outcome.

----------


## Mark Hall

> Locking access to paths or areas behind mobility skills and abilities isn't fundamentally different from locking access to paths or areas behind locked doors that require the use of a particular skill to open. Why is it okay to say "your character must be able to open a locked door in order to go here" but not "your character must be able to cross a ten-foot gap to go there, fly in order to reach this place, survive a 100-foot drop to get to that place...?"





> Because one is binary and the other is not. Any character may attempt and (with enough trial and error) succeed at lockpicking in the Elder Scrolls games.
> 
> If you can't jump far enough, you simply cannot jump far enough. Trying more times will not change the outcome.


You guys may be talking about two different things.

Aeson seems to be saying "If I can make this jump with my Acrobatics skill at X, it isn't fundamentally different than locking a door such that it requires Lockpicking of Y".

Rynjin seems to be talking about jumps that cannot, in any way, be made. Got a 120 Acrobatics thanks to an item or vampire bloodline? Still can't make that jump.

Aeson's jump is possible within the game; Rynjin's is not.

----------


## GloatingSwine

Not since Morrowind and the Levitate spell at least...

----------


## Rynjin

> You guys may be talking about two different things.
> 
> Aeson seems to be saying "If I can make this jump with my Acrobatics skill at X, it isn't fundamentally different than locking a door such that it requires Lockpicking of Y".
> 
> Rynjin seems to be talking about jumps that cannot, in any way, be made. Got a 120 Acrobatics thanks to an item or vampire bloodline? Still can't make that jump.
> 
> Aeson's jump is possible within the game; Rynjin's is not.


No, we're talking about the same thing. Remember that in Elder Scrolls (unlike Fallout) there is no such thing as "door that requires Lockpicking of Y". You can always attempt, and succeed.

----------


## Aeson

> No, we're talking about the same thing. Remember that in Elder Scrolls  (unlike Fallout) there is no such thing as "door that requires  Lockpicking of Y". You can always attempt, and succeed


In _Oblivion_ and _Skyrim_, perhaps - assuming a sufficiently-large supply of lockpicks or access to an unbreakable lockpick, at any rate - but in _Morrowind_ it's possible for a lock to be literally impossible to pick for a given combination of Security skill, Agility, Luck, and lockpick  quality, and I'm pretty sure you couldn't advance your Security skill  by repeatedly attempting to pick such a lock, either.




> If you can't jump far enough, you simply cannot jump far enough. Trying more times will not change the outcome.


Gap-crossing is a well and truly _awful_ example to claim as a binary. Consider that in _Morrowind_ you could get a different result on a second attempt by:
1. Attempting the jump again with closer-to-full fatigue, if the initial attempt was made on a low fatigue bar
2. Dropping stuff from your inventory
3.  Advancing your Acrobatics skill (which, if failed attempts are  nonlethal, is something that happens naturally if you repeat the failed  attempt enough times and aren't already at the skill cap)
4. Using a Fortify Skill spell, item, or potion to artificially raise your Acrobatics skill
5. Using a Jump spell, item, or potion
6. Using a Fortify Strength spell, item, or potion
7. Using a Levitate spell, item, or potion instead of trying to jump the gap again
I  don't recall if jump distance improved with a running start, but if it  did then that'd be another way to go and would allow you to use your  Athletics skill to supplement your Acrobatics skill.

Locked doors are significantly more of a binary check than a mere gap, especially as lockpicking is implemented in _Skyrim_ where, as far as I can recall, the unmodded game doesn't provide you with any means of opening most locks except through the use of the lockpicking skill. _Morrowind_ and _Oblivion_ at least gave you the option of using an Open effect (although most of _Oblivion_'s Open spells and enchantments don't work if the target's underwater) - and you can use Open effects from scrolls or permanent enchanted items without any investment into Alteration.

You want to open a locked door? _Morrowind_ and _Oblivion_ ask "do you have lockpicks and the skill to use them, a sufficiently powerful Open spell and the skill/magicka to cast it, or an enchanted item (consumable or permanent) with a sufficiently powerful Open effect?" _Skyrim_ says "if you don't have a lockpick, then it sucks to be you."

----------


## Imbalance

I can't remember how the progressions go, but I remember it being fairly practical in Morrowind, at least, to keep trying to make a jump because the simple act of jumping would raise the relevant skill until you were able to succeed.  Actually, provided a suitable quantity of lockpicks, I'm pretty sure you could train through an impossible door, too.  Tough luck, though, no matter how high your strength, you still can't bash the door open.

I was ninja'd.

----------


## Rynjin

> In _Oblivion_ and _Skyrim_, perhaps - assuming a sufficiently-large supply of lockpicks or access to an unbreakable lockpick, at any rate - but in _Morrowind_ it's possible for a lock to be literally impossible to pick for a given combination of Security skill, Agility, Luck, and lockpick  quality, and I'm pretty sure you couldn't advance your Security skill  by repeatedly attempting to pick such a lock, either.


Yes, I was talking about the games made in the last two decades primarily. =p






> Gap-crossing is a well and truly _awful_ example to claim as a binary. Consider that in _Morrowind_ you could get a different result on a second attempt by:
> 1. Attempting the jump again with closer-to-full fatigue, if the initial attempt was made on a low fatigue bar
> 2. Dropping stuff from your inventory
> 3.  Advancing your Acrobatics skill (which, if failed attempts are  nonlethal, is something that happens naturally if you repeat the failed  attempt enough times and aren't already at the skill cap)
> 4. Using a Fortify Skill spell, item, or potion to artificially raise your Acrobatics skill
> 5. Using a Jump spell, item, or potion
> 6. Using a Fortify Strength spell, item, or potion
> 7. Using a Levitate spell, item, or potion instead of trying to jump the gap again
> I  don't recall if jump distance improved with a running start, but if it  did then that'd be another way to go and would allow you to use your  Athletics skill to supplement your Acrobatics skill.
> ...


I don't particularly see the difference between "if you don't have a lockpick, sucks to be you" and "you don't have a potion, sucks to be you".

And all of this is aside the fact that one mechanic is out-of-the-box interactable by every character in the game of any skill level, and the other isn't. Both in the cases that you don't have a lockpick and don't have a potion, the solution becomes "come back and try again later". However potions, new spells, raising your skill level, etc. all represent much higher cost and/or time investments before you can try again than lockpicks, which are readily purchasable in large quantities for little money and are found on nearly every humanoid enemy you kill in most of the games in the franchise.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

Finally been going through Blackwood in ESO. I forgot just how obnoxious Eveli is and Ive never been keen on Lyranth so its been a bit of a slog.  :Small Sigh:

----------


## GloatingSwine

I quite liked Eveli. But maybe that's just stockholm syndrome from all the times running Black Drake Villa for Drake's Rush.

But Blackwood is the worst chapter. *Spoiler*
Show

It's just the planemeld again but in red.

----------


## Aeson

> I don't particularly see the difference between  "if you don't have a lockpick, sucks to be you" and "you don't have a  potion, sucks to be you".


The difference is that it isn't "you don't have a lockpick, sucks to be  you" versus "you don't have a potion, sucks to be you," but rather "you  don't have a lockpick, sucks to be you" versus "you don't have any one  of: a potion, a spell, a scroll, a pile of stats, et cetera; sucks to be  you."

Also, if you really don't see a difference between "if you  don't have a lockpick, sucks to be you" and "if you don't have a  potion, sucks to be you," would you mind explaining again how, exactly,  an obstacle that can only be overcome with a lockpick is less binary  than an obstacle that can only be overcome with a potion?




> And all of this is aside the fact that one mechanic is out-of-the-box  interactable by every character in the game of any skill level, and the  other isn't.


Yes, one of these mechanics is "out-of-the-box  interactable by every character in the game of any skill level." That  mechanic, however, is not lockpicking - you'll be provided with at least  one lockpick in the tutorial section, sure, but you don't just have one  in your inventory upon completing character creation and gaining  control of your character - but rather _jumping_. Characters start with the clothes on their backs, which aren't weightless and can be dropped to reduce encumbrance, and at least in _Morrowind_ and _Oblivion_  reducing encumbrance raises jump distance. What equivalent action can  your character take to raise your chances of succeeding in the  lockpicking minigames of _Oblivion_ and _Skyrim_? Oh, right, _there isn't one_.  You want to raise your odds of succeeding in the lockpicking minigame  by taking an in-game action that isn't "advance your  Security/Lockpicking skill?" You have to drink a potion or cast a spell  or put on an item with a Fortify [governing skill]/[governing attribute]  effect - in other words, exactly the same action that you're raising as  an objection to using gaps as an obstacle.

You want to jump?  Press the jump button; no equipment required. You want to open a locked  door or container? Better have lockpicks. You want to jump a large gap  at low character skill? Reduce your encumbrance and you'll jump further -  and unless you're playing an ascetic nudist pugilist or something like  thatthere'll be _something_ in your inventory that you  can drop to reduce encumbrance. You want to open a high-difficulty lock  at low lockpicking character-skill? If you're playing _Morrowind_ or aren't particularly good at the lockpicking minigames of _Oblivion_ and _Skyrim_,  you're free to break as many lockpicks as you're carrying failing to  open the lock, and (assuming a full fatigue bar) there's no in-game  action that you can take to improve your chances of successfully picking  that lock that don't involve potions, spells, enchantments, et cetera -  i.e. the only in-game "interaction" which can improve your odds of  picking a lock at low character-skill is exactly the same thing that  you're raising as an objection to using a gap as an obstacle. You want to ensure that characters have a similar chance of being able to 'interact' with a pit obstacle in a manner similar to how characters are assured of an ability to 'interact' with a lock? Hide a potion or a scroll or whatever it is that you think they need to have a chance of traversing the pit somewhere in the area; it's not like there's any shortage of conveniently-handy items stuck in dungeons for dealing with other obstacles.




> However potions, new spells, raising your skill level, etc. all  represent much higher cost and/or time investments before you can try  again than lockpicks, which are readily purchasable in large quantities  for little money and are found on nearly every humanoid enemy you kill  in most of the games in the franchise.


1. There is no  particular need for cost-equivalency between various options to overcome  an obstacle or between the methods of overcoming different types of  obstacles - especially not when it can be reasonably assumed that one  type of obstacle (e.g. a locked door or container) is significantly more  common than another type of obstacle (e.g. a pit that can only be  crossed with a Potion of Gap-Crossing).

2. If you want to talk costs...
-  Every looted lockpick you break represents a couple gold of lost income  (how much, exactly, depends on the game; the nominal value of a  lockpick is 2 gold in _Skyrim_, 3 gold in _Oblivion_, and 10 to 200 gold depending on quality in _Morrowind_)  and every lockpick you purchase is an expense of similar magnitude. How  many lockpicks does the "average" player break over the course of a  playthrough? I don't know, but given the availability of lockpicks in _Oblivion_ and _Skyrim_  I'd guess it's at least expected to be in the neighborhood of  low-hundreds, which implies a cost of several hundred gold for all the  lockpicks you'll use over the course of the game.
- A spell is a  one-time investment for something that can be used for the rest of the  game and may allow you to reduce your ongoing expenditures or supplement  your income stream. What is the real cost of a Restore Health spell you  bought for a few hundred gold and used instead of healing potions worth  thirty-five hundred gold? How about an Open spell that has allowed you  to sell every lockpick you've found since acquiring it? A few hundred  gold for a spell may be more expensive _right now_ than a couple  gold for a lockpick, but it's also an investment that can pay out much  greater returns than any single lockpick is likely to, especially with  the frequency at which the value a locked container can be summed up as  "why did I bother opening this?"
- A Potion of Gap-Crossing may or  may not be more expensive than a lockpick, but if there's five pits that  need to be traversed using a Potion of Gap-Crossing and a thousand  doors or containers that need to be picked open, is it really that bad  for a Potion of Gap-Crossing to cost eighty gold when a lockpick costs  two? If you average two lockpicks broken per lock opened, that's 400  gold in Potions of Gap-Crossing and 4,000 gold in lockpicks for a  full-completion playthrough; which obstacle is really more expensive to  overcome in the end?
-- Generally speaking, any effect that you can  get from a potion is available as both standard potions purchasable from  vendors and lootable from dungeons and humanoid enemies and custom  potions craftable from ingredients available from vendors and lootable  from dungeons and nonhumanoid enemies. If a given effect can be obtained  for eighty gold when acquired in the form of a standard potion or two  gold when acquired in the form of the ingredients to make a custom  potion providing the same effect, what's the actual cost of acquiring that  potion?

----------


## Resileaf

Is money an issue for anyone anyway in an Elder Scrolls game? There's very little you need to actually buy in that series.

----------


## halfeye

> Is money an issue for anyone anyway in an Elder Scrolls game?


Early in the game yes, late in the game no.

----------


## Vinyadan

About jumping, the Deus Ex games for example instead make a binary ability of jumping: normal vs really high. The more recent games tended to have areas that you could access if you had augmented jumping, or moving items, or hacking, and possibly some other augmentation I forget had a similar role.

In Morrowind, it's notable that a good number of questlines offer you an enchanted item of levitation when you are quite advanced in them. The Main Quest, the Wizards Guild, the Imperial Cult, and maybe more.

----------


## Rynjin

> Early in the game yes, late in the game no.


Early game, of course, being the time of the game that having a low Lockpicking skill is most likely to be an issue (since it's one of those skills you will use often enough to max as basically any character), so it having a lower cost of investment is most relevant.

@Aeson: A few hundred gold _over the course of a playthrough_ still only adds up to about the cost of a single spell, and can be paid in installments.

----------


## Triaxx

> About jumping, the Deus Ex games for example instead make a binary ability of jumping: normal vs really high. The more recent games tended to have areas that you could access if you had augmented jumping, or moving items, or hacking, and possibly some other augmentation I forget had a similar role.
> 
> In Morrowind, it's notable that a good number of questlines offer you an enchanted item of levitation when you are quite advanced in them. The Main Quest, the Wizards Guild, the Imperial Cult, and maybe more.


Original Deus Ex had one of my favorite uses of jump ever. In Hong Kong there's a point where you're ambushed in your apartment. If it's your second playthrough or you'd been spoiled you knew it was coming. My response was to break into the building across the street, climb up to the balcony, stack some chairs and then leap across the street through a blasted out window and ambush the ambushers.

Wish more games let me do that.

----------


## Aeson

> Early game, of course, being the time of the game  that having a low Lockpicking skill is most likely to be an issue* (since it's one of those skills you will use often enough to max as basically any character)*, so it having a lower cost of investment is most relevant.


Only because Bethesda, despite their professed "every build can do  everything" philosophy, couldn't be bothered to give the player any  alternative to using it and so the set of builds that can do  "everything" is really only that subset of builds that incorporates  lockpicking, which really isn't anything like a close approximation of _every_  build or even every reasonably-plausible build. Brawny McBrawn has to  be good with lockpicks because Bethesda won't give him the ability to  take a door off its hinges with that ludicrously-large warhammer he's  carrying and Magic McGee has to be good with lockpicks because Bethesda  took away his spells of opening, not because there's any natural reason  why Brawny McBrawn and Magic McGee should necessarily be good at picking  locks.

Also, why are you so stuck on cost equivalency? Getting  your ranged damage through Destruction spells isn't cost-equivalent to  getting your ranged damage through Marksman/Archery, getting your  healing through Restoration isn't cost-equivalent to getting it through  Alchemy and neither is cost-equivalent to getting it through potions  vendors (or shrine blessings or Absorb Health weapon enchantments or  resting until healed or a Constant Effect Restore Health enchantment or  whatever other method of healing you care to bring up), opening fights  with a sneak attack is strictly superior to opening fights by charging  headlong into a group of enemies, playing with companions and summoned  minions tends to make encounters easier than going solo, and so on.  There's plenty of things already in the games that aren't  cost-equivalent across all builds and playstyles; why must solutions to environmental obstacles like pits  and locked doors be any different?




> @Aeson: A few hundred gold _over the course of a playthrough_ still only adds up to about the cost of a single spell, and can be paid in installments.


Once again: If you are truly that concerned about access, you can _hide a solution to the obstacle somewhere in the neighborhood of the obstacle_. It's not like they haven't already done that with the water-breathing and levitation potions that _Morrowind_ so often hid right next to a spot where you might need one, or with the lockpicks found on so many common enemies and in or around rooms with a lot of containers in _Oblivion_ and _Skyrim_.

----------


## Rynjin

I think we're talking about two entirely different things. You're hung up on "why didn't they invest extra design and development time into increasing the number of problems to solve?".

I was just answering the question of what the difference was between the two presented obstacles in terms of how the game currently works.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> I quite liked Eveli. But maybe that's just stockholm syndrome from all the times running Black Drake Villa for Drake's Rush.
> 
> But Blackwood is the worst chapter. *Spoiler*
> Show
> 
> It's just the planemeld again but in red.


I would say second worst after Summerset, but yes it is terrible.

*Spoiler*
Show

I would also say its just the Oblivion Crisis - down to and including gathering allies to protect Bruma Fort Redmane and Dagon showing up at the end - but I will note I consider the Planemeld to be an Oblivion Crisis knockoff too, so thats just me splitting hairs.

I could have lived with that if that were the only flaw, but weve also got a preponderance of people from previous DLCs. Dont get me wrong, I like seeing NPCs come back now and again, but it should be like icing - a nice little extra if Ive played the rest of the game and not a replacement for solid content. Blackwood is nothing but a tub of icing by itself, there needs to be some cake too! And some of them are a bit contrived as to why theyre in this backwater swampland.  :Small Annoyed: 

And then on top of that its got things like being _required_ to blurt out to Eveli that Im a Dark Brotherhood assassin (to be clear, Im fine with her finding out, but it would have been a lot more natural for it to come up when we talked to Elam), merrily traipsing off to the Deadlands with the people Mehrunes Dagon is specifically after into, surprise surprise, a trap, and going along with whatever other stupid plan of the day because the plot needs me to.

Dialog is frequently clunky too. Mercenary this and Evelis friend that - who talks like this?! I know they cant exactly program the PCs name into voiced dialogue, but there are better ways to write around it!


In short Im really glad I got this on sale.

Fortunately, I have Fargrave after this for a palette cleanser.

----------


## Mark Hall

I miss being able to approach doors in multiple ways. Fallout 2 made it more or less mandatory that you blow up a door to get through, I think mostly to show you that you could blow up doors. Fallout 3 would make you pick the lock on a door with a clearly broken window next to the handle.

----------


## Rynjin

> I miss being able to approach doors in multiple ways. Fallout 2 made it more or less mandatory that you blow up a door to get through, I think mostly to show you that you could blow up doors. Fallout 3 would make you pick the lock on a door with a clearly broken window next to the handle.


It would be neat if you could do stuff like this, maybe with drawbacks. Bust a window to get in? Great; take some damage and start bleeding, or cripple your hand, or something, but you're inside. That kinda stuff. Maybe make it like a Constitution check, and if you're tough enough you can skip the damage, but if your stat is low you can still do it, just eat the drawback. Etc.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Original Deus Ex had one of my favorite uses of jump ever. In Hong Kong there's a point where you're ambushed in your apartment. If it's your second playthrough or you'd been spoiled you knew it was coming. My response was to break into the building across the street, climb up to the balcony, stack some chairs and then leap across the street through a blasted out window and ambush the ambushers.
> 
> Wish more games let me do that.


This type of game/game design philosophy is called "immersive sim" if you don't know, spearheaded by _Deus Ex_, _Thief_ and _System Shock_. It's a bit of niche genre that went through a rough time and may be makig something of a comeback (not to th epoit of being mainstream though).

I recommend looking up games by Arkane Studios for modern immersive sims.

----------


## Lurkmoar

Tin Foil hat time:

The Crimes of Jarl Balgruuf?

Ruler of Whiterun. Sitting under a dragon's skull. Stuck in the middle of the Civil War. Brother. Father of three. But where is his wife?

*Spoiler*
Show

Seriously, I've never found a reference to her anywhere. Perhaps she passed from natural causes, disease or even childbirth. Even with magicka, life is still precious in the Elder Scrolls. But the Daedric quest "The Whispering Door" throws a shadow.

Nelkir, one of Balgruuf's children, is extremely troubled. He threatens violence against his father and lets slip that his father... isn't his father. According to notes in the creation kit... he's listed as Balgruuf's brother. Nelkir will point the player towards an unused door, where the Whispering Door is actually Mephala. From there, it's a matter of lifting the key, opening the door and claiming the Ebony Blade. Quest complete. There's a journal there warning about taking the Daedric artifact though.

*Spoiler: Admontion Against Ebony*
Show



To anyone reading this: BEWARE THIS BLADE

It is hoped that the only people having access to this room should be the Jarl of Whiterun and his trusted wizard. If anyone else is reading this, please understand the magnitude of your folly, turn around, and never even speak of this room or this blade to anyone.

It has corrupted and perverted the desires of great men and women. Yet its power is without equal -- to kill while your victim smiles at you. Only a daedra most foul could have concocted such a malevolent and twisted weapon. But it appears that all who wield it end up with the crazed eyes of those wild men who roam the hills chattering with rabbits.

It is not to be trifled with. Not even the hottest fires of the Skyforge could melt it; indeed the coals themselves seemed to cool when it was placed within. We cannot destroy it, and we would not have it fall into the hands of our enemies. So we keep it, hidden, dark and deep within Dragonsreach, never to be used.

Woe be to any who choose to take it.


There have been theories before that I've seen that Balgruuf murdered his wife. I propose that he murdered his father. 

Balgruuf's age isn't listed anywhere I could find. If I were to hazard a guess, late 40s to early 50s. His father could still be in the picture. Even with how rough Skyrim is, there are plenty of elderly citizens, both men and mer. My hypothesis is that Balgruuf's father had an affair with Balgruuf's then wife. Somehow, the Ebony Blade was at the heart of it. Father died. Did Balgruuf or the wife do it? If the wife didn't die, was she exiled? I'm stumped here, there's not a whole lot of clues to go on. Even the father bit is pure conjuncture on my part. Still, that would at least explain why Nelkir is listed as a brother and how he's not Balgruuf's son... but brother.

There was originally going to be a follow up for the The Whispering Door quest where Balgruuf's three children would murder their father. It's why Hrongar has unused dialogue files for the Civil War, as he would take over duties of Jarl in Whiterun after Balgruuf's death.  

Just some scrambled thoughts I had this afternoon.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Tin Foil hat time:
> 
> The Crimes of Jarl Balgruuf?
> 
> Ruler of Whiterun. Sitting under a dragon's skull. Stuck in the middle of the Civil War. Brother. Father of three. But where is his wife?
> 
> *Spoiler*
> Show
> 
> ...


I was unaware of the Creation Kit reference, but my impression from the in-game dialog was just that

*Spoiler*
Show

Nelkir was born as a result of the Jarl having an affair. His exact words are _That he... that I'm... that I don't have the same mother as my brother and sister."_

----------


## Lurkmoar

> I was unaware of the Creation Kit reference, but my impression from the in-game dialog was just that
> 
> *Spoiler*
> Show
> 
> Nelkir was born as a result of the Jarl having an affair. His exact words are _That he... that I'm... that I don't have the same mother as my brother and sister."_


I can't believe I forgot that bit. That torpedoes that angle!  :Small Big Grin:

----------


## Vinyadan

Skyrim really had a thing for foul murder. Sacrifice your follower! Kill your friends! Eat the priest!

----------


## Lurkmoar

> Skyrim really had a thing for foul murder. Sacrifice your follower! Kill your friends! Eat the priest!


Boethiah had a cut quest where s/he demanded you murder Elisif. 

Yup, lots o' murder.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Skyrim really had a thing for foul murder. Sacrifice your follower! Kill your friends! Eat the priest!


Oblivion did too, recall. Antagonize the paladin until he beats you to deathkill and soul trap a member of every racemurder all the people locked in a house with you

----------


## Aeson

> murder all the people locked in a house with you


To be fair, that one's part of the happy-go-lucky murder cult's questline; if you weren't expecting to murder people when you went questing for the Dark Brotherhood, I don't know what to tell you.

----------


## Resileaf

Murdering someone for a Daedric Prince is basically the default. It's surprising when murder is _not_ the intent.

----------


## veti

> Murdering someone for a Daedric Prince is basically the default. It's surprising when murder is _not_ the intent.


The only Prince in Skyrim who doesn't want you to murder anyone is Sheogorath. The others differ only in whether or not the victim has done anything to deserve it.

----------


## GloatingSwine

> I would say second worst after Summerset, but yes it is terrible.
> 
> *Spoiler*
> Show
> 
> I would also say its just the Oblivion Crisis - down to and including gathering allies to protect Bruma Fort Redmane and Dagon showing up at the end - but I will note I consider the Planemeld to be an Oblivion Crisis knockoff too, so thats just me splitting hairs.
> 
> I could have lived with that if that were the only flaw, but weve also got a preponderance of people from previous DLCs. Dont get me wrong, I like seeing NPCs come back now and again, but it should be like icing - a nice little extra if Ive played the rest of the game and not a replacement for solid content. Blackwood is nothing but a tub of icing by itself, there needs to be some cake too! And some of them are a bit contrived as to why theyre in this backwater swampland. 
> 
> ...


Summerset was the weakest part of the Daedric War plotline because Vvardenfell was absolutely stuffed with content and Clockwork City is inherently interesting, and obviously it's full of Altmer and therefore disgusting by default, but the main plot there was okay, had some good spectacle in the finale, and it had a decent amount of side content like the house of revels and the murder mystery.

Blackwood is just content sparse. There's nothing good to do there.

The best of the year-long chapters is Elsweyr. Cool zones, they go mad with all the different kinds of Khajiit that never usually get to actually show up, Za'ji and Caska are super fun, and zerging down dragons is the best world event.




> The only Prince in Skyrim who doesn't want you to murder anyone is Sheogorath. The others differ only in whether or not the victim has done anything to deserve it.


Depends what you mean by murder.

Sanguine, Hircine, Malacath, and Clavicus Vile don't want you to kill anyone in particular and Hermaeus Mora's quest requires blood but it can come from people who attack you for other reasons (mostly existing).

----------


## Vinyadan

> Oblivion did too, recall. Antagonize the paladin until he beats you to deathkill and soul trap a member of every racemurder all the people locked in a house with you


Oblivion though felt very different. In part, it's possibly because it looked so cartoonish, it occasionally felt like _Tarhiel: The Game_. But the Molag Bal quest is a good example. In Oblivion, it's "go piss off a paladin until he finally has had enough and kills you". In Skyrim, it's "Help this guy clear a dangerous place, BTW now you have to kill him, then lure this other nasty guy into a cage, torture him until he changes his religion, then kill him." It's like the cruelty was the point. There also was no test of skill like in the Dark Brotherhood quests, as those rewarded you for managing to do things in a certain way and so were the setting for actual gameplay. 

The thing is, those were quite a few missions in Skyrim, and the game considered it a failure not to go through with it (except Mehrunes Dagon, I think the mission didn't count as failed if you spared Silus).

----------


## GloatingSwine

> Oblivion though felt very different. In part, it's possibly because it looked so cartoonish, it occasionally felt like _Tarhiel: The Game_. But the Molag Bal quest is a good example. In Oblivion, it's "go piss off a paladin until he finally has had enough and kills you". In Skyrim, it's "Help this guy clear a dangerous place, BTW now you have to kill him, then lure this other nasty guy into a cage, torture him until he changes his religion, then kill him." It's like the cruelty was the point. There also was no test of skill like in the Dark Brotherhood quests, as those rewarded you for managing to do things in a certain way and so were the setting for actual gameplay. 
> 
> The thing is, those were quite a few missions in Skyrim, and the game considered it a failure not to go through with it (except Mehrunes Dagon, I think the mission didn't count as failed if you spared Silus).


I mean yeah, it's _Molag Bal_. The god of schemes, domination, and the enslavement of mortals. The one they call the King of Rape (which, coincidentally, is how he made vampires).

The cruelty _is_ the point in his quest because that's what he's _about_.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Summerset was the weakest part of the Daedric War plotline because Vvardenfell was absolutely stuffed with content and Clockwork City is inherently interesting, and obviously it's full of Altmer and therefore disgusting by default, but the main plot there was okay, had some good spectacle in the finale, and it had a decent amount of side content like the house of revels and the murder mystery.


Summerset made the Psijic Order into idiots, and the combined added lore for Phynaster, Syrabane, the stars, and the Altmer obsession with numbers were, respectively: one daily quest, a song, _nothing_, and a single note in a point of interest. The entire island is essentially one biome, with one (generic, human-looking) architectural style. And they used up the entire rest of Summerset to make the zone, so unless they pull a High Isle like they did with the Bretons, there is no good place to add more to all the stuff they left out. The Psijic skill line quest is boring and repetitive, and cemented that the Psijic Order are idiots instead of keeping it limited to lets-go-make-a-pact-with-Daedric-Princes-what-could-go-wrong Ritemaster Iachesis and his immediate circle. Nocturnals design was bland and, worse, _horribly pixelated_. (A major choice in Vvardenfell also has a high chance of being retconned depending on what you chose, rendering it even more meaningless than usual.) The zone itself is _tiny_. We simultaneously have people complaining about all these newcomers while admitting that there were newcomers here the entire time.

Summerset was terrible. They had _years_ to build up to it and they dropped the ball HARD. Blackwood, at least, didnt retroactively ruin everything that came before it.




> The best of the year-long chapters is Elsweyr. Cool zones, they go mad with all the different kinds of Khajiit that never usually get to actually show up, Za'ji and Caska are super fun, and zerging down dragons is the best world event.


I thought it was middling, but I was too busy being irritated that they dragged in Dragons as yet _another_ Skyrim callback instead of doing something unique to the Khajiit, but I was happy to see the cute little Alfiq at last.

----------


## Vinyadan

To tell the truth, Molag Bal's quest was mostly badly written, in many ways. The game that gives you many options to solve the same problem now decides you have to kill Tiranus, for example. Incidentally, the Vigilants of Stendarr also aren't really well-written (they almost aren't written at all, for what I remember of the main game). The quest's logic also turns on itself: Molag Bal can lock you inside, but won't lock the priest inside. He can move items, but won't just magically whack the priest on his head with the mace. The smart solution to this riddle is that this is Oblivion's quest all over again, except it is the Dragonborn's soul that is being angled at, and the priest is just an extra playing the role that had been of the Hero of Kvatch. It's a fascinating theory, but I doubt it (many quests request you engange in gratuitous cruelty to be completed).

My point overall is that Skyrim is a game, and the game supposedly isn't _Cruelty Simulator_. So did the quest engage me with an interesting narrative? Nope, it was about a cardboard Vigilant and dreary people I couldn't care less about. Did it offer interesting gameplay? Not really, it actually locked you out of options without creating a challenge through limitations. It was only notable for how displeasant it was, and didn't even say anything new about Molag Bal. To make a comparison, I liked the one with Hermaeus Mora a lot more: at least, it was surprising, and connected to much other lore.

----------


## Lurkmoar

At least there was movement and effort (as poorly done as it was) with House of Horrors.

Mephala's quest, you talk to a kid, knick a key and open a door.  :Small Yuk:

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> To tell the truth, Molag Bal's quest was mostly badly written, in many ways. The game that gives you many options to solve the same problem now decides you have to kill Tiranus, for example. Incidentally, the Vigilants of Stendarr also aren't really well-written (they almost aren't written at all, for what I remember of the main game). The quest's logic also turns on itself: Molag Bal can lock you inside, but won't lock the priest inside. He can move items, but won't just magically whack the priest on his head with the mace. The smart solution to this riddle is that this is Oblivion's quest all over again, except it is the Dragonborn's soul that is being angled at, and the priest is just an extra playing the role that had been of the Hero of Kvatch. It's a fascinating theory, but I doubt it (many quests request you engange in gratuitous cruelty to be completed).
> 
> My point overall is that Skyrim is a game, and the game supposedly isn't _Cruelty Simulator_. So did the quest engage me with an interesting narrative? Nope, it was about a cardboard Vigilant and dreary people I couldn't care less about. Did it offer interesting gameplay? Not really, it actually locked you out of options without creating a challenge through limitations. It was only notable for how displeasant it was, and didn't even say anything new about Molag Bal. To make a comparison, I liked the one with Hermaeus Mora a lot more: at least, it was surprising, and connected to much other lore.


Excellent points here.

I was also disappointed in the lack of presence the Vigilants had. Youd think with them being an organization of do-gooders the player would have at least been allowed to join them. They have a headquarters already! (At least until level 10, I think.) Theres plenty of possibility there: root out Daedra worshippers inside the order, help people afflicted with plague or wounded in a Dragon attack, clear out doomsday cultsbut no, they occasionally show up as a random encounter, and some of their people get cameos wherein they get steamrolled by vampires in the Dawnguard questline. And theres the guy in the Molag Bal quest as you mentioned. And I think thats it?

----------


## Keltest

I think the vigilants are written to be kind of a disaster on purpose. Nobody seems to take them seriously except themselves, they have no major purpose in the game except as a random encounter, and they get demolished, constantly, by all the fights they pick. This isnt a government funded group or a guild that only (nominally) accepts the most elite of the elite, theyre just a bunch of randos who decide that daedra are bad and go around picking fights about it. It makes a certain amount of sense, after all. Not every organization in the game is competent enough to actually achieve any of their goals. We see a glimpse of a couple other groups like that in the College questline, and the Silver Hand of course are basically bandits that also fight werewolves.

----------


## Rater202

Not gonna lie, th eVigelents of Stendar rubbed me the wrong way.

Not every Deadra worshiper is evil and some of the Deadra could even be considered benevolent. Likewise, not every vampire or werewolf is a murderer or even dangerous on their own. In fact, one could argue that most vampires and werewolves are objectively victims.

And worshipers of the God of Mercy being the ones hunting down and killing such beings or people...



> Sanguine, Hircine, Malacath, and Clavicus Vile don't want you to kill anyone in particular and Hermaeus Mora's quest requires blood but it can come from people who attack you for other reasons (mostly existing).


Hircine wants you to kill the werewolf, and only backs off if you kill all the other hunters he sent to kill the Werewolf since he finds that amusing.

Clavicus Vile flat-out asks you to murder Barbas.

----------


## Keltest

> And worshipers of the God of Mercy being the ones hunting down and killing such beings or people...


Could be thats why theyre all so ineffectual.

----------


## Rater202

> Could be thats why theyre all so ineffectual.


I was referring more to the hypocrisy, how is hunting down and murdering someone because they worship a different god from you, are suffering from a disease or curse, or are magic user who isn't part a church or college supposed to be merciful?

But yes, that's another aspect of it.

My literal first thoughts when I found the Vigilents was that I was expecting I'd end up having to fight a hole bunch of them. My immediate first thought was "relgious hyprocitrites taking ancient tragedy out of context to justify their hate crimes."

----------


## Grim Portent

I imagine it's more a matter of them being a bunch of vigilantes and people who weren't cut out to be priests. They aren't exactly the Knights of the Nine, made of champions gathered to the banner of a legendary hero, they're a rag tag bunch of Stendarr worshippers who picked up maces and hammers and decided to have a bash at fighting cults in the aftermath of the Oblivion Crisis, who have then gone for a long time without any proper threats to fight. I'm not sure if they're even sponsored by the Church of Stendarr or just a bunch of weirdos getting their funds from charity.

Hobbyist monster hunter monks, rather than professional soldiers or heroes.


Stendarr worshippers have a history of intolerance, the quest for Namira in Oblivion involved a bunch of priests of Stendarr forcing light and preaching on a bunch of gollum-esque cultists who lived as vermin in service to Namira.

----------


## Rynjin

> And worshipers of the God of Mercy being the ones hunting down and killing such beings or people...


They don't hunt down people, or at least they're not considered such by Stendarr's teachings. Daedra are pure evil and incapable of good, and lycanthropes, vampires, and undead are also considered "abominations".

I think the primary source for this is ESO these days, but this idea was around before that point as well.

Now, the questionable part (and what makes the Vigilants poor worshipers) is that they not only kill daedra, undead, and lycanthropes...but anyone who allies with them or uses abilities associated with them for any reason. That is where the fanaticism goes beyond the pale.

----------


## Vinyadan

My impression was that the Vigilants were supposed to be unrelatable zealots, so the player was meant to be happy when they got the stick (so, all the time). However, at least in the main game, I didn't see enough writing to really give them a colour, and I mainly consider them unfinished (there's actually some cut dialogue, in which they would have asked you to randomly give up your daedric artifacts). It's also possible that they were becoming too annoying and were left out to avoid duplicating more appealing meanies like the Thalmor.

With better writing, they might have been a less fortunate version of the Ordinators: visually impressive holy warriors that will fight for you should need arise, active both as a normal police force and against really fearful enemies of the people of Vvardenfell like Dagoth Ur, but also showing that they are repressive and unhinged. This however needs to be grounded in lore, and the Ordinators do not exist in a vacuum, instead being part of the Temple, with a connection to the House system and a bad relationship with the Legion. People say that they are the one who are sent when really bad stuff like vampires show up, showing that the community agrees with at least the protective part of their role, while observing their limits (the unpatrolled wilderness and Daedric shrines, for example).

I don't remember anything of this for the Vigilants in Skyrim. They just happen to be out there. No idea if anyone even ever mentions them.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> And worshipers of the God of Mercy being the ones hunting down and killing such beings or people...


I feel obligated to point out this is perfectly in line with Stendarr in previous games. Remember his Knights of the Nine quest? Cursing an entire family line because their ancestor screwed up once?

----------


## Resileaf

The gods of the Elder Scrolls verse, Daedric or otherwise, are pretty generally quite awful. You don't have to dig very far in the lore to realize that Tamriel is one hell of a crapsack universe that can sometimes give Warhammer Fantasy a run for its money.

----------


## Fyraltari

The Vigilantes of Stendarr are cleraly inspired by various withchunting and heretic-burning groups in history. It's not mentionned anywhere in the games but I always assumed they were a knightly order dedicated to Stendarr and backed by his church, like the Knights of the Hour for Akatosh. In _Daggerfall_, his knightly order was called "The Crusaders", which gives off similar vibes.

But I think they get a bad rep. For one Isran deemed them too weak, which means the Dawnguard is likely supposed to be even more extreme than them. Their belief that all Deadra are evil is the basic doxa of the Imperial Cult, shared by most people who are really into the divines. And while calling them inherently evil is probably a bridge too far, they are right that the Daedra are very dangerous. Martin's backstory is that their shared worship of Sanguine, one of the least hostile Daedra, got a friend of his killed. Meridia and Azura, the dadra most likely to be called good have quite the body count etc. Also, in cut content they requested you turn over any Daedric artifact you possess, but given how those artifacts always seem to be involved in some horrible ****, I can hardly fault them. Like, if a dude is walking atound with Mehrunes' Razor or Molag Bal's Mace, something very wrong is going on.

As for their perceived hypocrisy, Stendarr is the god of mercy true, but he is the patron of the Imperial Legion and his Nordic counterpart, Stuhn, is the God of Ransoming Prisoners. With Shezzar being sidelined, Stendarr was the main warrior god of the Eight, until Talos showed up. A worshipper of Stendarr is just as true to their chosen deity when they give medication to the sick as to when they bash an evildoer's face in. And to most people in Tamriel (excepting Dunmer, Khajiit and Orcs) Daedra worshippers _are_ evil-doers. Like, yeah, maybe this worshipper of Boethiah is just really into self-help but they're just as likely to be the kind to stab you in the face to reaffirm their own existence.

----------


## Grim Portent

Mercy in the context of Stendarr can also mean ending someone's suffering, as in Oblivion they sought to bring light and salvation even to those who didn't want it. For the more overtly hostile daedra cultists, necromancers and so on who react to missionaries or attempted charity with hostility the only mercy that they can receive is death (in the eyes of the devout of the Nine anyway.)

Stendarr's tenets require that his followers attempt to minister to the needy and defend them from supernatural evils, whether they want it or not.

----------


## Mark Hall

> And worshipers of the God of Mercy being the ones hunting down and killing such beings or people...


Canonically, there's tons of types of werewolves and vampires.

Sure, the werewolves of Skyrim all act voluntarily... they're just hairy versions of the Companions (which is nice, because most of them are Companions). The werewolves of Iliac Bay have to feast on innocents.

----------


## Vinyadan

The werewolf in Hircine's quest also seemed to have serious problems with self-control.

----------


## Rater202

> Canonically, there's tons of types of werewolves and vampires.
> 
> Sure, the werewolves of Skyrim all act voluntarily... they're just hairy versions of the Companions (which is nice, because most of them are Companions). The werewolves of Iliac Bay have to feast on innocents.


And if the monster hunters were acting in mercy they'd be looking into containment and cures.

----------


## Grim Portent

> And if the monster hunters were acting in mercy they'd be looking into containment and cures.


Cures are rare, esoteric knowledge that usually involve dealing with evil forces* anyway. If you presume werewolves and vampires to be suffering from their curse, and more or less incurable, the only treatment is to kill them, the threat they pose to other people notwithstanding. There is no palative care that is preferable to being dead, especially since time is not on the side of containment.

*In the eyes of Stendarr. Or his worshippers at least.


Obviously from our perspective, as someone who is in full control of their vampirism/lycanthropy/daedra worship/necromancy we are inclined to view such things as fine, indeed I generally consider several of the daedric cults to be pretty harmless most of the time, but guys like Sinding, the Volkihar, feral vampires/werewolves, werebears and so on indicate that the majority of people who are subject to one of the curses winds up a monster with questionable free will.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I generally consider several of the daedric cults to be pretty harmless most of the time


Which ones?

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Cures are rare, esoteric knowledge that usually involve dealing with evil forces* anyway. If you presume werewolves and vampires to be suffering from their curse, and more or less incurable, the only treatment is to kill them, the threat they pose to other people notwithstanding. There is no palative care that is preferable to being dead, especially since time is not on the side of containment.
> 
> *In the eyes of Stendarr. Or his worshippers at least.


Lets not forget that in Skyrim the cure for vampirism at least involves killing someone _else_ and sacrificing their soul to Oblivion. And even if you pick a victim who arguably deserves that fate, youre powering up a Daedra with it.

----------


## Grim Portent

> Which ones?


Cults of Malacath, Azura, Sanguine, Sheogorath, Nocturnal and Meridia for the most part. The non-murder culty ones. Or the ones with less murder cultishness anyway. Each is still an ******* in one way or another, Malacath probably the least so, but they are within what I would consider broadly acceptable boundaries most of the time. They aren't so bad that I would object to a temple to any of them existing within a town, being largely in line with the more primal/hostile aspects of the Aedra.

Someone like Dagon or Mephala I'd be much more hostile towards being established in a society. Secrecy and murder, and natural disasters and revolutions while not always inimical to society, are generally worse than decadence, madness or theft.



The only daedric prince I consider be unnacceptably evil is Molag Bal, the others can all be fine in the right circumstances provided they restrain their desire to spill sapient blood to their own followers, or to consenting challengers, or limit themselves to reasonable actions for their portfolio. For example, I don't resent Hircine for making his own followers fight to the death in hunts, they kind of accepted that was part of the deal, I do hold it against him when he drags uninvolved people in like in Bloodmoon.

That said, Hircine's hunts aren't much worse than the Arena in Oblivion, which at one point threw convicted criminals at you by dangling freedom in front of them, which is non-consensual bloodsports as well.

----------


## Fyraltari

If I remember correctly, it's true in lore (and known in-universe) that once infected by either vampirism or lycanthropy, you have three-day window to pray the cure away before the transformation happens. Meaning that many consider vampires and werebeast to have made a conscious choice to become creatures that have a need for murder.

This, of course, ignores the fact that it's entirely possible to catch the disease unknowingly or to have no mean to make it to a temple in time (I'm not sure whether free-form prayer would do the trick).

After some research, this book mentions the three-day period of grace, the notion that vampirisim is assumed to be a conscious choice, and even a legend according to which Imperial vampire hunters deliberately obfuscate cures for vampirism.

----------


## Grim Portent

Infection can certainly be considered a sign of a lack of piety, three days of night terrors would drive many to their local chapel after all. In theory a regular church goer is more or less immune to vampirism or lycanthropy because they should be praying often enough to be cured before the condition takes hold, so anyone who does turn is a heathen or immoral wastrel of some sort.

That point of view does condemn everyone who isn't a god-botherer though, so it's not a very moral one. It's not like being a regular attendee of the various religious bodies in Tamriel is a prerequisite for being a good person.



When it comes to vampires/werewolves and cures it's not as simple as locking them up and curing them. Cures are not simple matters, and in the case of Skyrim to cure a vampire involves killing someone else and consigning their soul to Oblivion, hardly a morally acceptable deed. The cure from Oblivion is more acceptable, but involves the knowledge of a witch who is the last of her coven, plants from Oblivion, the blood of an Argonian and the ashes of a strong vampire, hardly an easy thing to bring about. In Morrowind it requires the direct intervention of Molag Bal.

There is broadly speaking no known way to cure a vampire without killing someone else and/or trafficking with daedric knowledge, neither of which is acceptable to a servant of the Nine.

Werewolves on the other hand can be cured by burning the heads of witches in a sacred pyre in a remote tomb and then fighting the spirit contained in the werewolf, which is probably unique to the Companions bloodline anyway, or by a ritual from Morrowind which involves killing another person and using their body to host your wolf spirit so you can kill it, also involves witches.

So... more murder to cure one person. Trading one soul for another in essence. Not an acceptable bargain if you want to remain morally upstanding. It seems reasonable to assume this is kind of an unavoidable price to remove such potent daedric curses, werewolves and vampires are something of a step between men and daedra, to cure one is to free it's soul from the clutches of a daedric prince.

----------


## halfeye

> If I remember correctly, it's true in lore (and known in-universe) that once infected by either vampirism or lycanthropy, you have three-day window to pray the cure away before the transformation happens.


Or (in Oblivion and Skyrim, for vampirism at least), drink a potion of cure disease. Once the disease of vampirism has taken hold it might be a lot rougher, but potions reliably worked for me when taken in time.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Or (in Oblivion and Skyrim, for vampirism at least), drink a potion of cure disease. Once the disease of vampirism has taken hold it might be a lot rougher, but potions reliably worked for me when taken in time.


Yeah, but I'm not sure how much potions of cure diseases are meant to be a pure game mechanic versus an actual thing in lore.

Like, it's kind of hard to picture the knahaten flu laying waste to entire populations if there are panaceas like that laying around.

----------


## Vinyadan

Concerning the book, it's Vampires of Vvardenfell, where the Temple is said to educate the poor. Given that vampires are well-known to the population, that potions of cure common disease, healers, scrolls, spells and shrines are quite common (and iirc free of charge for people in the Temple, as well as mentioned in lore and dialogue), and that there are three in-game days and three forms of instant teleport, with two aimed on locations of healing altars, it's not too crazy to assume that quite a few people (players...) went through with it voluntarily. It doesn't help just how horrible vampires are. If you are alive, there is only one vampire that won't attack you on sight, and he's actually worse news than the rest combined. If you are a vampire and get to talk to vampires of your clan, iirc they have absolutely no redeeming qualities, and other vampires will still attack you. For a commoner, they are powerful creeps that will occupy family tombs, kidnap, imprison, enthrall, and murder people (the Aundae in particular might have kidnapped and turned a vampire hunter, but the game doesn't care to explain that; but it's interesting that Galur Rithari surrendered to the Aundae hoping for honourable treatment and was made a vampire instead).

The one good vampire seemed to be Galur Rithari, who still had to make a favour to Molag Bal to return normal; slavery to Molag Bal's wishes is probably the other reason why the Temple hides information about a cure, the first one being to discourage adventurers from trying vampirdom.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Yeah, but I'm not sure how much potions of cure diseases are meant to be a pure game mechanic versus an actual thing in lore.
> 
> Like, it's kind of hard to picture the knahaten flu laying waste to entire populations if there are panaceas like that laying around.


Im going to speculate that curing the Flu via potions doesnt give you any resistance to the disease, and that it spread fast enough to outpace anyones potion-making attempts. (Plus the non-zero possibility of running out of ingredients/not having access to the right ingredients in your part of the world.) Because we have records of at least one person using Clannfear claws to cure the Flu and Clannfear claws have the Cure Disease trait in Oblivion. Also, how many of these cures had been _discovered_ back then?

----------


## Fyraltari

> Im going to speculate that curing the Flu via potions doesnt give you any resistance to the disease, and that it spread fast enough to outpace anyones potion-making attempts. (Plus the non-zero possibility of running out of ingredients/not having access to the right ingredients in your part of the world.) Because we have records of at least one person using Clannfear claws to cure the Flu and Clannfear claws have the Cure Disease trait in Oblivion. Also, how many of these cures had been _discovered_ back then?


Your first link states that "normal curative spells and elixirs were inconsistent in their ability to cure the flu." And I am sure people keep dying of disease in the lore. So I think it's safe to say that "cure diseases" magics do exist in Tamriel but the 100% effectiveness and ability to cure _any_ disease shown in game is probably just for ease of gameplay and that, much-like real medicine, a given disease requires a specific treatment whose effectiveness may not even be guaranteed.

----------


## Delicious Taffy

> more appealing meanies like the Thalmor.


I've never understood the appeal of the Thalmor, personally. To me, they're just ******* Gestapo elves in hoods who wanna kill everyone Just Because, say racist BS every other sentence, and generally have nothing going for them aside from being Something That's Not Bandits for us to kill.

I haven't played any of the games before _Oblivion_ (which I never got to finish), so maybe the Thalmor are more interesting in those, but _Skyrim_'s incarnation of them is pretty dull.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I've never understood the appeal of the Thalmor, personally. To me, they're just ******* Gestapo elves in hoods who wanna kill everyone Just Because, say racist BS every other sentence, and generally have nothing going for them aside from being Something That's Not Bandits for us to kill.


Hey now, there (maybe) wanting to kill the world is rooted as much in extreme gnostic mysticism than racism.
I think part of the appeal is that:
A) Unlike random bandits, you now for sure they definitely deserve what you dish out to them.
B) They're about as much of a threat than Daedric Princes without having divine allies or even a central leader (as far as we know).
C) They have legitimate grievances against the Empire in general, and Tiber Septim in particular which is a nice counterpoint to the in-game mainstream opinion of fawning over him.
D) They might actually be right, metaphysically speaking.




> I haven't played any of the games before _Oblivion_ (which I never got to finish), so maybe the Thalmor are more interesting in those, but _Skyrim_'s incarnation of them is pretty dull.


They're a _Skyrim_ creation.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Your first link states that "normal curative spells and elixirs were inconsistent in their ability to cure the flu." And I am sure people keep dying of disease in the lore. So I think it's safe to say that "cure diseases" magics do exist in Tamriel but the 100% effectiveness and ability to cure _any_ disease shown in game is probably just for ease of gameplay and that, much-like real medicine, a given disease requires a specific treatment whose effectiveness may not even be guaranteed.


It also says people were throwing around fake components (and how well would a potion work without half the ingredients*? Or worse, with one of the ingredients substituted for something that might outright counteract the ones that are supposed to be there?), but I don't think we have enough data to say one way or another in this instance.

Also IIRC didn't Morrowind have different 'levels' of disease? Normal and Blight?

*I am aware of the Master-level skill perk in Oblivion, I am assuming alchemists of that quality are relatively rare.




> A) Unlike random bandits, you now for sure they definitely deserve what you dish out to them.


For me personally? This. Sometimes I don't want to be frustrated that the guy I'm trying to kill would have been a perfectly wonderful person if Bad Thing X hadn't happened, or they hadn't otherwise been forced down a dark path due to circumstances. Such villains have their place, but sometimes I just want to stab bad guys in the face and not feel obligated to navel-gaze about the unfairness of the world.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Also IIRC didn't Morrowind have different 'levels' of disease? Normal and Blight?


Yeah, but the blight isn't a normal disease, it's a physical manifestation of Dagoth Ur's power and conection to the heart of Lorkhan.

----------


## Vinyadan

Morrowind has three tiers of disease: common diseases, which can be  cured by cure common disease; blight diseases, which can be cured by  cure blight disease; and corprus, for which there is no cure. While the  blight is abnormal in that it originates from Dagoth Ur, it wouldn't be  too odd, if, once in a while, other diseases popped up that cannot be  cured by cure common disease. These new diseases could be natural  (result of evolution) or magical or even daedric, in this setting all  are possible. That flu could have existed in two strains, one curable by normal means, the other incurable, sharing the same symptoms.

Potions are also costly. According to Crassius,  50 gold was likely more than what a farmer renting his home owned in  Morrowind. Cure common disease in Morrowind cost 20 gold, twice as much  for a scroll. If more than one person in a commoner's household got  sick, things would have gone downhill fast. Add to this that even  Morrowind had iirc an apothecary that was hoarding cure blight  disease potions instead of selling them, and this is an inefficient, greedy world that probably wouldn't have known how to handle a serious wave of disease. 




> I've never understood the appeal of the Thalmor, personally. To me, they're just ******* Gestapo elves in hoods who wanna kill everyone Just Because, say racist BS every other sentence, and generally have nothing going for them aside from being Something That's Not Bandits for us to kill.


Yup, they're appealing to kill. I think it's all they have, to the point that they will turn hostile after a while if you are nearby, so you get to kill them without attacking them first (the game cheekily gives you what it expects/invites you to want).

I agree that they aren't written well. Skyrim's writing in general is pretty bad, as far as I am concerned. My theory is that writers didn't have time to properly develop their ideas. The dragon going "what are you doing back there?!" and spitting flames when Farengar started poking at him was pretty funny, however.

----------


## Resileaf

Something to note about the Thalmor, is that their intense hatred becomes a lot more understandable if you know the lore behind the Empire's conquest of their lands. Tiber Septim sent a reality-breaking giant robot to destroy Summerset Isle and its cities, in a battle (if you can even call it that) that broke time in such a way that the devastation lasted an instant and an eternity at the same time. 

They are still first-grade jerkholes. But I get where they come from.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Something to note about the Thalmor, is that their intense hatred becomes a lot more understandable if you know the lore behind the Empire's conquest of their lands. Tiber Septim sent a reality-breaking giant robot to destroy Summerset Isle and its cities, in a battle (if you can even call it that) that broke time in such a way that the devastation lasted an instant and an eternity at the same time. 
> 
> They are still first-grade jerkholes. But I get where they come from.


And because of High-Elven lifespan, the older Thalmor members in Skyrim actually lived through that.

----------


## Keltest

> Something to note about the Thalmor, is that their intense hatred becomes a lot more understandable if you know the lore behind the Empire's conquest of their lands. Tiber Septim sent a reality-breaking giant robot to destroy Summerset Isle and its cities, in a battle (if you can even call it that) that broke time in such a way that the devastation lasted an instant and an eternity at the same time. 
> 
> They are still first-grade jerkholes. But I get where they come from.


Theyre just jealous that they didnt get to it first. Unironically even.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Theyre just jealous that they didnt get to it first. Unironically even.


To what? Numidium? Because I don't think the Altmer were even really aware of it until Hjalti came a-knocking.

----------


## Keltest

> To what? Numidium? Because I don't think the Altmer were even really aware of it until Hjalti came a-knocking.


Yeah. And it kills them that they werent able to use it to break reality in their favor instead. Its not like they would have moral qualms about its use. Theyre just angry it was used _on them._

----------


## Mark Hall

Methods of curing lycanthropy, according to UESP:

1) Dealing with witches of Glenmoril Wyrd; they sacrifice an innocent, give the body lycanthropy, then resurrect the innocent. You then have to kill the sacrifice again.
2) Be a Green Pact Bosmer, find the Silvenar
3) Give someone else lycanthropy (that person has to be a hereditary lycanthrope who is not a lycanthrope now)
4) Cut the head off a Glenmoril Witch, summon one's inner beast, then destroy the spirit. Note that this requires some powerful magic... the example we have involves traveling to the tomb of Ysgramor, which is not something you do on a lark.

Methods of curing vampirism, according to UESP
1) A task from Molag Bal. While some Daedra are "not all that bad", Molag Bal is not one of them.
2) Molag Bal supposedly got the cure from Vaermina, so she might also offer a cure. However, like Molag Bal, she is not a nice Daedric Prince.
3) Find and kill the bloodfather. That works for some versions of vampirism.
4) Special bath in Purgeblood salts.
5) Potion from witches of Iliac Bay. Involves an ingredient from Oblivion, the blood of an Argonian, and the ashes of a powerful vampire.

Assuming you can't cure the disease before onset of symptoms, it is pretty hard to cure either, once you have them.

----------


## Vinyadan

Also, one thought for the Gray Prince  :Small Frown:

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> Something to note about the Thalmor, is that their intense hatred becomes a lot more understandable if you know the lore behind the Empire's conquest of their lands. Tiber Septim sent a reality-breaking giant robot to destroy Summerset Isle and its cities, in a battle (if you can even call it that) that broke time in such a way that the devastation lasted an instant and an eternity at the same time.


Gotta disagree, I could see being mad at Tiber Septim, but the people running the Empire by Skyrim are unrelated. It's not even the same dynasty at this point.




> Also, one thought for the Gray Prince


Yeah his fate is sad. Such a waste!

----------


## GloatingSwine

Remember that the default personality of a high elf is "smug racist". The Thalmor are just the ones that are sufficiently motivated racists to get up in arms about it.

Hell, in ESO most of the Auridon storyline is about how racist the high elves are and that's when you're _on their side_ (because the extra racist ones don't like Ayrenn, and she still wants to rule the world because she thinks she's better than everyone else because she's a high elf).

----------


## Fyraltari

> Yeah. And it kills them that they werent able to use it to break reality in their favor instead. Its not like they would have moral qualms about its use. Theyre just angry it was used _on them._


The Numidium is the creation of a bunch of blasphemers powered by the heart of their great religious enemy. I do not share your conviction that they would have wanted to use it instead of grinding it to pieces.

I am also unconvinced that it _could_ be used to attain the goal of recreating the Dawn.

Also, the Numidium is very esoteric lore. Even the Warp in the West, a confidential Blade document, avoids referring to it by name. Most elves likely know that Tiber used some sort of secret sorcery to defeat them but wouldn't have a clue to exactly what, since the people it was actually used on would be too dead to testify.

The sapiarchs might now for sure, but not the rank-and-file or even the ones we actually see in _Skyrim_.

----------


## Aeson

> Dealing with witches of Glenmoril Wyrd; they sacrifice an innocent, give the body lycanthropy, then resurrect the innocent. You then have to kill the sacrifice again.
> ...
> 5) Potion from witches of Iliac Bay. Involves an ingredient from Oblivion, the blood of an Argonian, and the ashes of a powerful vampire.


It bears mentioning that in _Daggerfall_ there's a quest to deliver a potion from a witches' coven to a Mages' Guildhall; the potion that you're asked to deliver is labeled "pure water" in your inventory and is a cure for both lycanthropy and vampirism. It's unclear if this is the same potion that you get from Melisande in _Oblivion_, but I'm a bit dubious that a mixture containing blood, bloodgrass, garlic, nightshade, and vampire ashes could be mistaken for 'pure water,' and given the lack of in-game information as to what went into creating the _Daggerfall_ potion I don't think it's too likely that the name was meant to be ironic, either.

Also, speaking of Molag Bal and vampirism, it's interesting that the story of Molag Bal spawning the first vampire on a defeated foe is "peculiar to Morrowind, appearing nowhere else in Imperial lore" according to _Vampires of Vvardenfell_ and yet seems to be a very common origin story for strains of vampirism in the more recently released games.

----------


## Keltest

> The Numidium is the creation of a bunch of blasphemers powered by the heart of their great religious enemy. I do not share your conviction that they would have wanted to use it instead of grinding it to pieces.
> 
> I am also unconvinced that it _could_ be used to attain the goal of recreating the Dawn.
> 
> Also, the Numidium is very esoteric lore. Even the Warp in the West, a confidential Blade document, avoids referring to it by name. Most elves likely know that Tiber used some sort of secret sorcery to defeat them but wouldn't have a clue to exactly what, since the people it was actually used on would be too dead to testify.
> 
> The sapiarchs might now for sure, but not the rank-and-file or even the ones we actually see in _Skyrim_.


The Thalmor are hypocrites of the highest order. What is it that makes you think they have the principals to not use a superweapon if they were able to obtain it?

----------


## Fyraltari

> The Thalmor are hypocrites of the highest order.


Example? 



> What is it that makes you think they have the principals to not use a superweapon if they were able to obtain it?


They haaaaaaaate Lorkhan.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> The Thalmor are hypocrites of the highest order. What is it that makes you think they have the principals to not use a superweapon if they were able to obtain it?


Agreed. If you want an example of them trying to get a superweapon to use, look no further than Ancano trying to use the Eye of Magnus. Never mind that it was used by the Nords first, you know the people with the biggest hard on for killing elves, never mind that its completely unclear _how_ the Eye of Magnus would help with the overall Thalmor goal, they still went after it.

oh and lest we forget, the only time laying a high elf makes them friendly to you is when you wear their clothes during an infiltration mission, otherwise they just attack you like everyone else, so their whole thing about high elven supremacy is just an excuse to champion the high elves that join them and screw over all the ones that don't.

----------


## Fyraltari

> Agreed. If you want an example of them trying to get a superweapon to use, look no further than Ancano trying to use the Eye of Magnus. Never mind that it was used by the Nords first, you know the people with the biggest hard on for killing elves, never mind that its completely unclear _how_ the Eye of Magnus would help with the overall Thalmor goal, they still went after it.


Yeah, of course they're down for magical superweapons. But that's the Eye of _Magnus_, not the Eye of _Lorkhan_, they like Magnus. He did what they aim to do (nope out of the Mundus).




> oh and lest we forget, the only time laying a high elf makes them friendly to you is when you wear their clothes during an infiltration mission, otherwise they just attack you like everyone else, so their whole thing about high elven supremacy is just an excuse to champion the high elves that join them and screw over all the ones that don't.


Yes, racial supremacist don't like those they perceive as "racial traitors", that's nothing new, not is it hypocritical. The Summerset Isles were historically closed to outsiders to avoid being "tainted", as far as extreme traditionalists like the Thalmor go, Altmer who willingly choose to live on mainland Tamriel are corrupted beyond redemption.

----------


## Resileaf

> Gotta disagree, I could see being mad at Tiber Septim, but the people running the Empire by Skyrim are unrelated. It's not even the same dynasty at this point.


Be that as it may, the Empire and the Nords ascended him to Godhood. As far as the Thalmor are concerned, Tiber Septim annihilated their homeland and was rewarded with divinity for it and just about every human worships him. That kinda stuff will leave generational scarring and if there's one thing that every elf, no matter the setting, has in common, it's long-lasting grudges.

----------


## Spore

> The Thalmor are hypocrites of the highest order. What is it that makes you think they have the principals to not use a superweapon if they were able to obtain it?


I think every faction in Skyrim aside from the "chosen ones" of both player fame and the Emperor's line are hypocrites one way or another. The Thalmor are just very outspoken about their hypocrisy, their racism, their slavery and their ... well everything else.

----------


## Grim Portent

Other than the standard hypocrisy that comes with being racial and religious supremacists I can't actually think of much hypocrisy from the Thalmor myself.

They don't decry espionage performed by their enemies while lauding their own, or advocate for involving commoners in decision making while only actually listening to the nobility or anything along those lines. Not that I recall anyway, IIRC they mostly criticise their enemies for being bad at things they both do rather than saying it's wrong for others to do the same things.

They don't really deny the horrible things they do and the horrible things they are, because to them they aren't horrible, and they wouldn't be conceptually horrible (sort of, they would consider it terrible if the things they do were done to them, but they would also consider it the natural result of them not being in a position of power) if they were happening the other way around because it's how things are supposed to be, and how they percieve things to have been prior to their takeover of Summerset anyway.


Of course we don't actually know much about them. For all the significance they have in Skyrim there's still very little interaction with them or primary lore about them, they're just vaguely Nazi/Soviet themed authoritarians who're supposed to align with previously hinted at Altmer lore.

----------


## Spore

There are two options, for me anyway.

Either their evil is based on good intentions (the Fable 3 way of forming a villain; I'm evil NOW so we survive the cosmic horror that comes LATER) or just fantasy villain evil (for example the Worm King manipulating the kingdoms towards war so his acolytes have enough corpses for their undead army).

Both ideas would conclude in a finale that could include the player in solving the crisis. Problems like "these high elves are just racist because they are objectively better but fewer in number so if their enemies ever find out they could just flood them with armies, they are so hosed" don't exactly create a scenario where a player character could intervene cleanly. Like, without game mechanics, a mage can wipe out battalions, but all it takes is one errant arrow or a single poisoned dagger to the heart and they're gone. And if I take their constitution in Morrowind or Oblivion (rather than the normalized Skyrim one) they are kinda fragile.

----------


## veti

> Other than the standard hypocrisy that comes with being racial and religious supremacists I can't actually think of much hypocrisy from the Thalmor myself.


Game lore certainly paints them as hypocrites:



> The exile of the great seer-mage Rynandor the Bold was the final doubt that I could not ignore. You see, Rynandor was one of the very few who survived the collapse of the Crystal Tower - I saw some of his bravery and heroics with my own eyes. It was his leadership and sorcery that made the daedra pay such a high price for their destruction of the Crystal Tower.
> 
> The Thalmor besmirched his name when he had the audacity to publicly doubt and question their role in ending the Oblivion Crisis on Summerset Isle. Rynandor made the mistake of ignoring the consensus gentium, trusting instead to logic and facts. The shrewdness of the Thalmor, however, was not such to allow something as trivial as the truth stand in their way.


Then there's the Thalmor assassins you meet in-game, who carry notes saying "kill your target and don't implicate us" (hey, a note saying "don't implicate me, lol Elenwen" is the _least incriminating thing ever_). Ancano in the College, who keeps professing to be a humble advisor to the archmage, yet still misses no opportunity to put down everyone else in the place and attempts to coerce the player, before conspiring to acquire the power to (in his own words) "unmake the world". Valmir at Forelhost, who tricks passers-by (humans, and therefore inferior) into going on a dungeon crawl he (the superior one) doesn't want to. And of course Elenwen, who schmoozes with her human guests while looking forward to attending the torture in the dungeon of a victim who is not accused of any crime, not even Talos worship, but _might_ know something. 

Yeah, I think it's reasonable to say there's hypocrisy going on.

----------


## Rater202

> And of course Elenwen, who schmoozes with her human guests while looking forward to attending the torture in the dungeon of a victim who is not accused of any crime, not even Talos worship, but _might_ know something.


I still hate that you're not allowed to pull out the dossiers you can find during that mission, or the notes found onf thalmor assassins, or anything lse like that out at any point in time later.

Like, if you're in the Imperial Legion and a highly ranking one at that you should be able to show Tulius that Thalmor assassin notes.

Or Maybe Ulric would like to see that Elwen admitted in writing that she gaslit him and that she's actively egging on his rebellion s that it will weaken Skryrim and thus all of human-controlled Tamriel for a later invasion.

This is the kind of **** that should have come up at the truce negotiation, as well. Show every major authority in Skyrim proof that the Thalmor Ambassador is doing all kinds of crimes and acting against th Empire in times of Truce.

Everyone knows ti's happen but now there's proof.

----------


## Keltest

> I still hate that you're not allowed to pull out the dossiers you can find during that mission, or the notes found onf thalmor assassins, or anything lse like that out at any point in time later.
> 
> Like, if you're in the Imperial Legion and a highly ranking one at that you should be able to show Tulius that Thalmor assassin notes.
> 
> Or Maybe Ulric would like to see that Elwen admitted in writing that she gaslit him and that she's actively egging on his rebellion s that it will weaken Skryrim and thus all of human-controlled Tamriel for a later invasion.
> 
> This is the kind of **** that should have come up at the truce negotiation, as well. Show every major authority in Skyrim proof that the Thalmor Ambassador is doing all kinds of crimes and acting against th Empire in times of Truce.
> 
> Everyone knows ti's happen but now there's proof.


"Hey, I illegally broke into your embassy without telling anybody and with no official support by either side. Nobody else knows I did this and I have no proof I actually found these there." It works for Delphine because she sent you there and she basically trusts your interests at that point, but she also doesnt really care. She already wants the Thalmor out.

Thats not actually that compelling. Neither side actually trust the Thalmor to begin with. They know they dont have their best interests at heart.

----------


## Rater202

> "Hey, I illegally broke into your embassy without telling anybody and with no official support by either side."


Ah-ah-ah-ah.

You had an invitation. You were a guest at that party and there are about a dozen witnesses to that fact.

If the bitch was going to invite people into her home, she should have hidden her incriminating evidence better instead of leaving it somewhere where a guest on the way to the lavatory could find it by accident.

Also, handwriting.

also, even if the dossiers are out, which is unlikely because Ulfric hates Elowen and Tulius knows she's up to something but can't prove it, there are still the letters on the bodies of thalmor assassins.

----------


## Keltest

> Ah-ah-ah-ah.
> 
> You had an invitation. You were a guest at that party and there are about a dozen witnesses to that fact.
> 
> If the bitch was going to invite people into her home, she should have hidden her incriminating evidence better instead of leaving it somewhere where a guest on the way to the lavatory could find it by accident.
> 
> Also, handwriting.
> 
> also, even if the dossiers are out, which is unlikely because Ulfric hates Elowen and Tulius knows she's up to something but can't prove it, there are still the letters on the bodies of thalmor assassins.


Which might matter if they attacked Tullius or something, but they didnt, and you already hate the Thalmor, so...

----------


## Fyraltari

> "Hey, I illegally broke into your embassy without telling anybody and with no official support by either side. Nobody else knows I did this and I have no proof I actually found these there." It works for Delphine because she sent you there and she basically trusts your interests at that point, but she also doesnt really care. She already wants the Thalmor out.
> 
> Thats not actually that compelling. Neither side actually trust the Thalmor to begin with. They know they dont have their best interests at heart.


Okay, but the Legion would definitely profit from having Ulfric's dossier copied a hundred times and spread around the province ro undermine Stormcloak support. Sure, the Stormcloaks would immediately dismiss it as Imperial lies, but it would hurt their credibility nonetheless, not to mention shake Ulfric pretty hard.

Contrarywise, as a Stormcloak, you would want to give this to Ulfric to help him heal from his guilt, since it states plainly that the Imperial City fell before he talked.

And in both cases (and the neutral) having it written by the Thalmor themselves that they wish for the civil war to continue is a sound basis to start peace negotiations. Secret ones, that don't involve the Thalmor.

----------


## Keltest

> Okay, but the Legion would definitely profit from having Ulfric's dossier copied a hundred times and spread around the province ro undermine Stormcloak support. Sure, the Stormcloaks would immediately dismiss it as Imperial lies, but it would hurt their credibility nonetheless, not to mention shake Ulfric pretty hard.
> 
> Contrarywise, as a Stormcloak, you would want to give this to Ulfric to help him heal from his guilt, since it states plainly that the Imperial City fell before he talked.
> 
> And in both cases (and the neutral) having it written by the Thalmor themselves that they wish for the civil war to continue is a sound basis to start peace negotiations. Secret ones, that don't involve the Thalmor.


I have a sneaking suspicion that the Legion is restricted from overtly declaring the Thalmor the enemy, or at the very least dont want to intentionally provoke them at this point.

----------


## Fyraltari

> I have a sneaking suspicion that the Legion is restricted from overtly declaring the Thalmor the enemy, or at the very least dont want to intentionally provoke them at this point.


Sure. But they don't have to do either of these things to do what I suggested. And Tullius doesn't think he's sneaky enough to get away with it, that's what the Penitus Oculatus is for (that and protecting the Emperor).

----------


## InvisibleBison

> If the bitch was going to invite people into her home, she should have hidden her incriminating evidence better instead of leaving it somewhere where a guest on the way to the lavatory could find it by accident.


She did. She put them in a locked safe in a different building from where the party was taking place. The player only finds them because they're ransacking the place looking for evidence the Thalmor are involved in bringing back dragons. A genuine lost guest would have zero chance of accidentally stumbling across them.

----------


## Rater202

> She did. She put them in a locked safe in a different building from where the party was taking place. The player only finds them because they're ransacking the place looking for evidence the Thalmor are involved in bringing back dragons. A genuine lost guest would have zero chance of accidentally stumbling across them.


...I was trying to imply that "I stumbled across them on the way to the lavatory" would be the Dragonborn's excuse for how they found them.

Not saying that it was what actually happened.

She knows it's a lie and Dragonborn knows that it's a lie, but it's not like she can prove that the Dragonborn's story was false without actively confirming that the dossiers are real, in which case whatever crimes the Dragonborn committed to get them become immaterial.

All she can do is deny that they're real, but you can't prove a negative and both sides know for a fact that she's up to something and just needs the evidence.

----------


## veti

> ...I was trying to imply that "I stumbled across them on the way to the lavatory" would be the Dragonborn's excuse for how they found them.


Come to think of it, _is_ there even a lavatory in the embassy?

Maybe that's just a reflection on how far I had to look to find it...

----------


## Keltest

> ...I was trying to imply that "I stumbled across them on the way to the lavatory" would be the Dragonborn's excuse for how they found them.
> 
> Not saying that it was what actually happened.
> 
> She knows it's a lie and Dragonborn knows that it's a lie, but it's not like she can prove that the Dragonborn's story was false without actively confirming that the dossiers are real, in which case whatever crimes the Dragonborn committed to get them become immaterial.
> 
> All she can do is deny that they're real, but you can't prove a negative and both sides know for a fact that she's up to something and just needs the evidence.


Why not? Your story requires you to have been trespassing in Dominion territory and, frankly, murdering a bunch of her agents. All she has to do is say you did kill her elves but didnt find the dossier there and youre hosed.

----------


## Rater202

> Why not? Your story requires you to have been trespassing in Dominion territory and, frankly, murdering a bunch of her agents. All she has to do is say you did kill her elves but didnt find the dossier there and youre hosed.


1: You already have a flawless cover story: You were in her home because you were invited to one of her parties.

2: She's never going to admit that because it would disprove the Thalmor's innate superiority.

Literally, any possible reaction she has is a  loss for her or for the Dominion.

----------


## Keltest

> 1: You already have a flawless cover story: You were in her home because you were invited to one of her parties.


...No. There was a guard and everything. Thats not a cover story, thats you admitting to being on the scene.




> 2: She's never going to admit that because it would disprove the Thalmor's innate superiority.
> 
> Literally, any possible reaction she has is a  loss for her or for the Dominion.


She literally just has to say you murdered a bunch of elves, which you did, and then faked a bunch of evidence after you escaped. And then get to execute you.

----------


## veti

On an unrelated note...

If you've always wished Skyrim was made by Bioware, there's a newish mod you should try. _Warden of the Coast_ is actually couched as the modder's job application to Bioware.

I've finished my first playthrough now, and I have to say it's very, very good. Witty writing, some wonderful characters, a great plot hook, multiple callbacks to Oblivion, professional-quality voice acting, multiple endings, romance options, you name it. Not perfect of course, but an amazing piece of work. And bonus points for making the player actively work with Vaermina, I always appreciate getting a more sympathetic take on an unappreciated faction.

Top tip for when you play it: every character has a loyalty quest, make sure you've done _all_ of them before progressing the main quest. Each one has at least two parts. Be nice to your crew, and it will be repaid. There is a "good" ending for everyone (except one person who's gonna die no matter what, but even that person gets to go out a hero if you play it right).

I also suggest keeping the dremora in your party most of the time. His commentary is... enlivening.

Reservations: the map sucks, you have to manually level up your companions (which is a total drag and completely pointless anyway), and there are a few - only a few, mind - places where you have to pick up the idiot ball to proceed. But it's totally worth picking up.

(Oh, and theoretically you can start the quest immediately after completing 'The Way of the Voice', at level 5. But don't. You'll want a few more dragon shouts and a few more levels under your belt.)

----------


## Rater202

> She literally just has to say you murdered a bunch of elves, which you did, and then faked a bunch of evidence after you escaped. And then get to execute you.


And the Thalmor aren't going to admit that one random human/lesser elf murdered there way through their Ambassador's guards. The innate superiority of pureblooded Altmer untainted by the lands outside the Summerset Isles are a defining part of their narrative.

Admitting that an unarmed guest(You didn't have weapons on you when you came in) could do that would shatter all their credibility. Killing you isn't worth it to undermine their position to the entire world.

Assuming you did kill them, by the way. Its' possible to sneak past them to my knowledgeif you're an Altmer you can walk right past if you smuggle in some Thalmor robes of your own.

----------


## Keltest

> And the Thalmor aren't going to admit that one random human/lesser elf murdered there way through their Ambassador's guards. The innate superiority of pureblooded Altmer untainted by the lands outside the Summerset Isles are a defining part of their narrative.
> 
> Admitting that an unarmed guest(You didn't have weapons on you when you came in) could do that would shatter all their credibility. Killing you isn't worth it to undermine their position to the entire world.
> 
> Assuming you did kill them, by the way. Its' possible to sneak past them to my knowledgeif you're an Altmer you can walk right past if you smuggle in some Thalmor robes of your own.


The Thalmor aren't stupid. They know that other races can kill them. Thats literally the premise of the White Gold Concordant, and thus their entire presence in Skyrim.

And you cant escape without killing at least two guards, the room with the dossiers in it is locked with unpickable locks and two guards have the key and automatically engage you.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> And the Thalmor aren't going to admit that one random human/lesser elf murdered there way through their Ambassador's guards. The innate superiority of pureblooded Altmer untainted by the lands outside the Summerset Isles are a defining part of their narrative.


Except we know they treat their non-mage lowly footsloggers poorly so Elenwen (being of higher rank and better breeding) will have no trouble whatsoever doing exactly that. Remember that even in Summerset some Altmer are considered better than others, shes under no obligation to act like the inferior bloodlines are as good as she is, especially since they failed at their primary job. 




> Admitting that an unarmed guest(You didn't have weapons on you when you came in) could do that would shatter all their credibility. Killing you isn't worth it to undermine their position to the entire world.


Friendly reminder that at this point in the game, your vocal cords are lethal weapons and everyone knows it.

----------


## Lurkmoar

The dossier refers to Ulfric as an asset. Not an agent. 

It's reasonable to believe that the Thalmor instigated the Civil War via the White-Gold Concordant treaty banning Talos worship. The same dossier is also very empathically against the Stormcloaks actually winning. The Thalmor want both the Empire and Stormcloaks to keep the war going to exhaust both of them. If the player does the Season Unending quest and don't kick Elenwen out, she's pleased that the war is going to be prolonged. As far as strategy, spycraft and long term planning go, the Thalmor are top dogs.

The dossier is worth nothing, without additional collaborating evidence. Not even regarding the illicit method in obtaining the dossier. And even if such evidence is forthcoming, it won't change the material conditions on the ground: the Empire is still rebuilding strength that has been weakened from all the way back in Arena. And it's doing it badly, with Morrowind having dealt with a massive volcanic eruption and an invasion from Black Marsh, Valenwood and Elsweyr have been snatched up by the Aldmeri Dominion, Hammerfell seceded and Skyrim is gripped with civil war. Practically all the mainline games are about the Empire in decline, I wouldn't be surprised if TESVI begins or ends with the Septim Empire breaking apart for good.

As far as the Thalmor being hypocrites, at the very least, a large portion of them seem to be a-ok with Daedra, considering what they were up to during the Battle of the Red Ring...

----------


## Resileaf

Showing the dossiers to Ulfric and Tullius wouldn't change a thing. Tullius would go "Yeah, duh, of course the Thalmor want to extend the war. You're not telling me anything I didn't already expect but it's not like I can just up and leave and let Ulfric win his rebellion" and Ulfric would go "Well, if they are helped by our rebellion lasting long, we'll just have to defeat the Empire quicker" and nothing would change.

----------


## veti

> Showing the dossiers to Ulfric and Tullius wouldn't change a thing. Tullius would go "Yeah, duh, of course the Thalmor want to extend the war. You're not telling me anything I didn't already expect but it's not like I can just up and leave and let Ulfric win his rebellion" and Ulfric would go "Well, if they are helped by our rebellion lasting long, we'll just have to defeat the Empire quicker" and nothing would change.


That's possible, but not certain. It may be that one or both of them are more imaginative than you're giving them credit for.

Personally, I can see Ulfric reaching out to Tullius with a proposal that looks something like "if you keep your troops out of our way, we'll kick the Thalmor out of Skyrim and then make no further attempt to secede from the Empire. When the Thalmor complain, tell them they're welcome to keep sending Justiciars as per the terms of the Concordat, but you can't control us and can't guarantee their safety in Skyrim. Of course if they try to invade _they_ will be in breach of the Concordat, and Talos worship will be restored throughout the Empire."

The war remains officially a stalemate, with no one in overall control of Skyrim, but the two sides stop fighting. The Empire gets to keep its province, with its taxes and its troops, and Ulfric effectively shares power with an official Imperial governor in Skyrim, who might be Tullius or whoever else the Empire wants to appoint.

----------


## halfeye

> That's possible, but not certain. It may be that one or both of them are more imaginative than you're giving them credit for.


They are software, they don't have intentionality.

----------


## Batcathat

> They are software, they don't have intentionality.


Isn't that kind of a useless perspective in this kind of discussion? It's like saying the Thalmor aren't racist since they're following their programming. It's _true_, but kind of meaningless.

----------


## Fyraltari

> She's never going to admit that because it would disprove the Thalmor's innate superiority.


Assuming you're not playing as Altmer, the Thalmor has no issue with saying the other races are better at violence than they are. Men being brutish savages is a big part of their rhetoric. They claim Elves to be wiser, more civilized, closer to the Aedra, things like that. Elenwen could spin that in her sleep: "We invite the elite of Skyrim to a nice dinner party and one of those ingrates uses our good graces to sneak in a murderer and defame us, this behaviour is precisely the reason why Tamriel needs a the benevolent, but firm guidance of an enlightened hand like ours."




> Isn't that kind of a useless perspective in this kind of discussion? It's like saying the Thalmor aren't racist since they're following their programming. It's _true_, but kind of meaningless.


*Sotha Sil weeping in the distance*

----------


## Delicious Taffy

> They are software, they don't have intentionality.


There's no difference between saying this and saying "Shut up, none of this is real, stop talking about it!".


On-topic though, I do wish we'd been able to finish the Civil War side story without the cliche, hamfisted "pick the red team or the blue team" BS. No matter which side you choose, there's no tangible difference to your raw gameplay experience. One of two towns will have a little more collision-free rubble you can just walk through, some guys will be racist at you in a slightly different way, and you won't see the other ending. That's it. You still have all the shops and quests and resources available in those towns. It's exactly as cosmetic as the different faction armor you'll get from the quests, and I kinda dislike that.

----------


## halfeye

> Isn't that kind of a useless perspective in this kind of discussion? It's like saying the Thalmor aren't racist since they're following their programming. It's _true_, but kind of meaningless.


It depends how deep you are nesting the quotes. The Thalmor are written as racists, that's one deep, you head of into what would be speculation in real life and you're five or six deep, and that's different IMO.

----------


## Rynjin

> They are software, they don't have intentionality.


The people that wrote them do have intentionality, so this point and the later one are moot. It's not meaningless to speculate about the internal lives of fictional characters by any means. It's entertaining if nothing else.

----------


## Lurkmoar

> There's no difference between saying this and saying "Shut up, none of this is real, stop talking about it!".
> 
> 
> On-topic though, I do wish we'd been able to finish the Civil War side story without the cliche, hamfisted "pick the red team or the blue team" BS. No matter which side you choose, there's no tangible difference to your raw gameplay experience. One of two towns will have a little more collision-free rubble you can just walk through, some guys will be racist at you in a slightly different way, and you won't see the other ending. That's it. You still have all the shops and quests and resources available in those towns. It's exactly as cosmetic as the different faction armor you'll get from the quests, and I kinda dislike that.


Civil War was supposed to have been more dynamic, but it was cut. Probably a combo of the 11/11/11 deadline and programming issues. Nuance is hard, yo.

----------


## Vinyadan

> Civil War was supposed to have been more dynamic, but it was cut. Probably a combo of the 11/11/11 deadline and programming issues. Nuance is hard, yo.


For me, the biggest thing to show it is that there is no High King after the war. You recover the Crown, but someone puts it away in a locker and never mentions it again. When I played, I actually struggled to remember whether the combat missions were from a mod or part of the game, because they really aren't very inspired.

----------


## Resileaf

> That's possible, but not certain. It may be that one or both of them are more imaginative than you're giving them credit for.
> 
> Personally, I can see Ulfric reaching out to Tullius with a proposal that looks something like "if you keep your troops out of our way, we'll kick the Thalmor out of Skyrim and then make no further attempt to secede from the Empire. When the Thalmor complain, tell them they're welcome to keep sending Justiciars as per the terms of the Concordat, but you can't control us and can't guarantee their safety in Skyrim. Of course if they try to invade _they_ will be in breach of the Concordat, and Talos worship will be restored throughout the Empire."
> 
> The war remains officially a stalemate, with no one in overall control of Skyrim, but the two sides stop fighting. The Empire gets to keep its province, with its taxes and its troops, and Ulfric effectively shares power with an official Imperial governor in Skyrim, who might be Tullius or whoever else the Empire wants to appoint.


Ulfric has consistently shown himself to be one of the dumbest, most unreasonable characters in the game. He does not admit mistakes, he does not accept compromises. He's also power-hungry and will accept nothing less than complete control of Skyrim.

----------


## Fyraltari

> will accept nothing less than complete control of Skyrim.


He literally does in seasons unending, though?

----------


## Rater202

> He literally does in seasons unending, though?


1: That's temporary, the civil war starts again as soon as you complete the main quest.

2: Both Ulfric and Tullius use the whole thing for power plays and land grabs. I'm slightly sympathetic to Ulfric since here since his first demand is to get rid of the bitch that tortured him and gaslit him into thinking he was the reason the empire lost the war against the Thalmor but yeah, neither of them come across very well there.

----------


## veti

> Ulfric has consistently shown himself to be one of the dumbest, most unreasonable characters in the game. He does not admit mistakes, he does not accept compromises. He's also power-hungry and will accept nothing less than complete control of Skyrim.


You could say very much the same, mutatis mutandis, of Tullius. Neither side shows much sense.

But, on the basis that people don't generally get to be leaders by being genuinely stupid, I prefer to assume that this is posturing for political reasons. Neither of them wants to be the first to hint at compromise, because it would cost them support, and that's the one currency neither of them can afford.

An externally applied shock could change that. Revelations about Ulfric's personal history and motivation might cause people to reassess their loyalty - either way. Knowing that, Ulfric might be motivated to propose an alternative that preserves his own status. And he'd also be able to put "Guaranteed future of Talos worship in Skyrim" on his resume.

----------


## halfeye

> The people that wrote them do have intentionality, so this point and the later one are moot. It's not meaningless to speculate about the internal lives of fictional characters by any means. It's entertaining if nothing else.


It's fine up until one person says "a" and someone else says "not a", then there is no way to resolve that. Which is where I came in.

----------


## Keltest

> You could say very much the same, mutatis mutandis, of Tullius. Neither side shows much sense.
> 
> But, on the basis that people don't generally get to be leaders by being genuinely stupid, I prefer to assume that this is posturing for political reasons.


That's remarkably optimistic of you. Tullius at least seems to recognize the whole conflict is stupid, and openly doesn't want to be there.

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

> That's remarkably optimistic of you. Tullius at least seems to recognize the whole conflict is stupid, and openly doesn't want to be there.


Yeah, for Tullius I got the impression hes caught between a rock and a hard place, politically speaking. As hes not the Emperor or a member of the Elder Council, he doesnt have the authority to just say, Okay, this is a waste of time and lives, lets just let Ulfric have the eastern half of Skyrim and go home. He has the Thalmor sabotaging his efforts to win the war quickly and decisively (witness Elenwens presence at Helgen). And if he steps down (assuming thats even something hes allowed to do) he gets replaced by someone else who will be in the _exact_ same position, except possibly with less experience and/or awareness of what the Thalmor are trying to pull. Meanwhile, his men are getting killed pointlessly as the conflict grinds on.

And then Alduin the Worldeater shows up, adding random Dragon attacks to everything else!

----------


## veti

> That's remarkably optimistic of you. Tullius at least seems to recognize the whole conflict is stupid, and openly doesn't want to be there.


That's just a way of saying he doesn't understand what the conflict is about. Rikke does, but he's just not interested when she talks about it. 



> Yeah, for Tullius I got the impression hes caught between a rock and a hard place, politically speaking. As hes not the Emperor or a member of the Elder Council, he doesnt have the authority to just say, Okay, this is a waste of time and lives, lets just let Ulfric have the eastern half of Skyrim and go home.


No, but if he could present the Emperor with a proposal that preserved Skyrim within the Empire and gave them plausible deniability over the unfortunate things that keep happening to the Thalmor - he might go for it. Or at least come back with a similarly productive counter proposal.

Tullius can't just give up, but he can negotiate.

----------


## Rater202

And if the Emperor _happened_ to be assassinated by the Dark Brotherhood, then while the Elder Council is scrambling to replace him Tullius more or less becomes in charge of the Empire in Skyrim and whatever proposal he comes up with will probably be approved as long as it sounds good.

----------


## Keltest

> That's just a way of saying he doesn't understand what the conflict is about. Rikke does, but he's just not interested when she talks about it.


He understands exactly what it's about. It's a stupid Nord pride thing, for the jarls on both sides. That's why Rikke is still with the Legion even though she was close friends with Ulfric and Galmar. Because at the end of the day she knows it's a stupid pride thing instead of actual injustice or oppression.

----------


## Aeson

> Admitting that an unarmed guest(You didn't have  weapons on you when you came in) could do that would shatter all their  credibility. Killing you isn't worth it to undermine their position to  the entire world.





> Friendly reminder that at this point in  the game, your vocal cords are lethal weapons and everyone knows  it.


I realize it's a bit late to reply to this, but it's perhaps also worth  pointing out that TES is a setting where "unarmed" doesn't really mean  that much even without thu'um - it's not like there's any strong  evidence that spellcasting requires focuses or material components, and  the fact that _Oblivion_ and _Skyrim_ characters _start_ with knowledge of at least one offensive and one healing spell regardless of background (not that _Skyrim_ allows you to decide anything about your character's background beyond their race) suggests that it's pretty common for people to at least dabble in magic regardless of any cultural stigmas around it. _Skyrim_'s  version of Bound Sword is a novice-level spell so, at least going by  game mechanics, pretty much anyone can cast it, and someone who knows it  is probably about as unarmed when naked as a person who has a sheathed  sword at their side or an axe on their belt - and then you get to the  'real' wizards, who'd probably sooner toss fireballs and lightning bolts  or summon Daedra or enchant the guards into murderous rages where  they're unable to tell friend from foe than summon up a sword with which  to strike the guards.

Anti-magic magic - especially of a type  suitable for social occasions - also seems to be largely absent from the  setting by 4E 201; Sound, Silence, Drain/Damage Intelligence, and  Drain/Damage [Skill] appear to have been lost in the centuries since _Morrowind_ and _Oblivion_  (not that most of these are particularly likely to be appropriate  things to ask people to wear to a social event) while Drain/Damage  Magicka only demonstrably exists as an instantaneous enchantment, a  side-effect of shock damage, and an effect of some poisons, and on top  of that detrimental enchantments seem to be virtually unknown so even if  the effects needed to do it are out there it's unclear that  second-/third-century Fourth Era enchanters could make a no-spellcasting  handkerchief or whatever to hand to your high-status guests as they  walk in the door.

----------


## Rynjin

> I realize it's a bit late to reply to this, but it's perhaps also worth  pointing out that TES is a setting where "unarmed" doesn't really mean  that much even without thu'um - it's not like there's any strong  evidence that spellcasting requires focuses or material components, and  the fact that _Oblivion_ and _Skyrim_ characters _start_ with knowledge of at least one offensive and one healing spell regardless of background (not that _Skyrim_ allows you to decide anything about your character's background beyond their race) suggests that it's pretty common for people to at least dabble in magic regardless of any cultural stigmas around it.


This isn't just implied in mechanics, but by characters. Several NPCs in Oblivion mention dabbling in magic just for fun, or to have something convenient (like a Light spell) at hand when they need it.

Skyrim (as a game) is the outlier, due to general stigma Nords have against magic, and a similar attitude would be present in any game set in Hammerfell.

----------


## Batcathat

> He understands exactly what it's about. It's a stupid Nord pride thing, for the jarls on both sides. That's why Rikke is still with the Legion even though she was close friends with Ulfric and Galmar. Because at the end of the day she knows it's a stupid pride thing instead of actual injustice or oppression.


I'm not a religious person, but I'm pretty sure most people who are would consider "You're not allowed to worship your god anymore" a pretty severe form of oppression. Now, I agree that staying with the empire and preparing for the next round against the Thalmor would probably be the _smart_ thing to do, but it's not like the rebellion is without cause (but yeah, pride obviously plays a part as well),

----------


## Resileaf

> I'm not a religious person, but I'm pretty sure most people who are would consider "You're not allowed to worship your god anymore" a pretty severe form of oppression. Now, I agree that staying with the empire and preparing for the next round against the Thalmor would probably be the _smart_ thing to do, but it's not like the rebellion is without cause (but yeah, pride obviously plays a part as well),


The Empire is forced to enforce that law _because_ Ulfric is throwing a fit about it. Before the rebellion started and gave an excuse for the Thalmor to basically have a permanent presence in Skyrim, the Empire was content to just wag their fingers at people who worshipped Talos and pretend they didn't hear anything (unless it was really blatant). Tullius definitely doesn't care.

----------


## Grim Portent

> The Empire is forced to enforce that law _because_ Ulfric is throwing a fit about it. Before the rebellion started and gave an excuse for the Thalmor to basically have a permanent presence in Skyrim, the Empire was content to just wag their fingers at people who worshipped Talos and pretend they didn't hear anything (unless it was really blatant). Tullius definitely doesn't care.


The rebellion didn't happen until after the Thalmor had already been allowed into the Empire.

After the White Gold Concordat the Reachmen rebelled and siezed Markarth. Ulfric arrived with a volunteer army, made a deal with the Jarl of Markarth to make Talos worship permitted in the Reach in exchange for retaking Markarth for him. When the Empire sent the Legion to Markarth Ulfric refused them entry unless they also permitted Talos worship in the Reach, which they did agree to. 

Then Thalmor found out that the Cult of Talos was openly practicing in Markarth, and the empire broke it's deal with Ulfric at the Aldmeri insistence, arrested Ulfric and allowed the Thalmor to send justicars in to watch things going forward. Ulfric gets out of jail, finds out his dad has died in the meanwhile, becomes Jarl of Windhelm and goes on to kill High King Torygg in a questionably legitimate duel as a protest against the Empire enforcing the ban on Talos worship and allowing the Thalmor to detain people. Then starts an open rebellion against the empire when they try to arrest him rather than just treating it as a regional succession matter.

The series of events is that the Thalmor presence caused* the Civil War, not the Civil War causing the Thalmor presence.

*Contributed to anyway.

----------


## Keltest

> The rebellion didn't happen until after the Thalmor had already been allowed into the Empire.
> 
> After the White Gold Concordat the Reachmen rebelled and siezed Markarth. Ulfric arrived with a volunteer army, made a deal with the Jarl of Markarth to make Talos worship permitted in the Reach in exchange for retaking Markarth for him. When the Empire sent the Legion to Markarth Ulfric refused them entry unless they also permitted Talos worship in the Reach, which they did agree to. 
> 
> Then Thalmor found out that the Cult of Talos was openly practicing in Markarth, and the empire broke it's deal with Ulfric at the Aldmeri insistence, arrested Ulfric and allowed the Thalmor to send justicars in to watch things going forward. Ulfric gets out of jail, finds out his dad has died in the meanwhile, becomes Jarl of Windhelm and goes on to kill High King Torygg in a questionably legitimate duel as a protest against the Empire enforcing the ban on Talos worship and allowing the Thalmor to detain people. Then starts an open rebellion against the empire when they try to arrest him rather than just treating it as a regional succession matter.
> 
> The series of events is that the Thalmor presence caused* the Civil War, not the Civil War causing the Thalmor presence.
> 
> *Contributed to anyway.


Depends on whether you count Ulfric's volunteer army as part of the Stormcloaks, or his insistence of Talos worship in the Reach as part of the rebellion. Different groups in the game go different ways, but very few people actually overtly deny that the crackdown came as a response to Ulfric making an issue about it. Most of the Stormcloaks either consider it a necessary provocation to defend their rights (which is the official line) or just dont talk about it.

----------


## Grim Portent

The crackdown on private worship happened after it, but the general idea seems to be that all formal worship of Talos was already banned. No temples, no warrior orders, no official priests, no state support for the previously established church.

For example, any Talos equivalent of the Vigilants of Stendarr would have been outlawed, as would the Knights of the Nine.

It wasn't exactly a situation where people who considered Talos their main god (which appears to be much more a Nord thing than an Imperial one, Imperials seem more Akatosh oriented*) could actually keep worshipping as they had before. I'm not one for faith or superstition myself, but I wouldn't consider someone praying in a cupboard or similar to be equivalent to a sermon in a church.


*Which can probably be traced back to the old Nordic pantheon being gradually taken over by the Imperial pantheon. The Nord's are very different from the ones from the time of Oblivion, but their faith is still centered around a god of men rather than the dragon god, they've just largely changed names and associations to the Imperial ones.

----------


## Resileaf

The intent of the Empire is nonetheless clear. "Give us time to catch our breath for a few years and then we'll beat back the Aldmeri Dominion for real."

Everything about the White-Gold Concordant involves the Empire accepting the terms of the treaty and only following them on paper and not in practice. Abandonning Hammerfell seems like a huge betrayal, but the Empire also proceeded to 'disband' every legion in Hammerfell at the time, allowing these completely unnaffiliated soldiers to continue helping the Redguards against the Thalmor. It's the same thing for the Talos worship ban. They let private worship happen and pretend they don't see it happen.

----------


## veti

> The intent of the Empire is nonetheless clear. "Give us time to catch our breath for a few years and then we'll beat back the Aldmeri Dominion for real."
> 
> Everything about the White-Gold Concordant involves the Empire accepting the terms of the treaty and only following them on paper and not in practice. Abandonning Hammerfell seems like a huge betrayal, but the Empire also proceeded to 'disband' every legion in Hammerfell at the time, allowing these completely unnaffiliated soldiers to continue helping the Redguards against the Thalmor. It's the same thing for the Talos worship ban. They let private worship happen and pretend they don't see it happen.


That may be their intent, but where is the evidence that they have the first idea of how to go about it?

Hadvar claims "the Empire is keeping the Thalmor out of Skyrim". I've travelled about Skyrim quite a bit, and I have to say that's not what it looks like to me. Looks more like "the Empire has given the Thalmor free run of Skyrim, and makes not the slightest effort to protect its citizens against persecution, kidnapping and summary murder by the Justiciars based on no evidence beyond - and I quote directly - 'I don't like you, I think you're a heretic.'"

First time I played Skyrim, my sympathies were with the Empire. After all, they'd done right by me in the previous games. But the more I play, the more convinced I become that Ulfric - while, undeniably, ambitious and repulsive - is also right. The Empire is dying, it needs to fall and let its provinces find their own feet.

It's the imperials who are kidding themselves. If you win the war for them, one of the last things Rikke says is "now maybe the Thalmor will back off" (not a direct quote, but that's the sentiment). Yeah... no, Rikke, no they won't. The only difference is that now there's nowhere to hide from them.

----------


## Keltest

> That may be their intent, but where is the evidence that they have the first idea of how to go about it?
> 
> Hadvar claims "the Empire is keeping the Thalmor out of Skyrim". I've travelled about Skyrim quite a bit, and I have to say that's not what it looks like to me. Looks more like "the Empire has given the Thalmor free run of Skyrim, and makes not the slightest effort to protect its citizens against persecution, kidnapping and summary murder by the Justiciars based on no evidence beyond - and I quote directly - 'I don't like you, I think you're a heretic.'"
> 
> First time I played Skyrim, my sympathies were with the Empire. After all, they'd done right by me in the previous games. But the more I play, the more convinced I become that Ulfric - while, undeniably, ambitious and repulsive - is also right. The Empire is dying, it needs to fall and let its provinces find their own feet.
> 
> It's the imperials who are kidding themselves. If you win the war for them, one of the last things Rikke says is "now maybe the Thalmor will back off" (not a direct quote, but that's the sentiment). Yeah... no, Rikke, no they won't. The only difference is that now there's nowhere to hide from them.


The plan worked great in Hammerfell, where the locals were actually facilitating it instead of actively resisting it.

----------


## veti

> The plan worked great in Hammerfell, where the locals were actually facilitating it instead of actively resisting it.


If it was a plan, which is not something I've ever seen evidence for, it didn't really "work great" because the legacy in Hammerfell is of anger at the empire's abandonment, not gratitude for its "help".

And Skyrim is being asked to put up with far worse persecution than ever pertained in Hammerfell. If the empire wants to apply the Hammerfell "solution" again in Skyrim, what's stopping it? I'm pretty sure Ulfric would be all for it.

----------


## Keltest

> If it was a plan, which is not something I've ever seen evidence for, it didn't really "work great" because the legacy in Hammerfell is of anger at the empire's abandonment, not gratitude for its "help".
> 
> And Skyrim is being asked to put up with far worse persecution than ever pertained in Hammerfell. If the empire wants to apply the Hammerfell "solution" again in Skyrim, what's stopping it? I'm pretty sure Ulfric would be all for it.


Skyrim wasnt asked to put up with ANY persecution until they started openly rabble rousing about the White Gold Concordant. Thats the point. The Nords were allowed to self police without any oversight as long as they werent openly proclaiming their defiance to the sky. Guess what they ended up doing.

----------


## Lord Raziere

> Skyrim wasnt asked to put up with ANY persecution until they started openly rabble rousing about the White Gold Concordant. Thats the point. The Nords were allowed to self police without any oversight as long as they werent openly proclaiming their defiance to the sky. Guess what they ended up doing.


TBH, I'd still totally blame the Thalmor. anyone with a knowledge of history would know what would happen and that Skyrim would openly declare defiance sooner or later no matter what was done. the Thalmor knew what it was doing when it started suppressing an important religious figure and knew they wouldn't have to do any more manipulation as long as they got that term in, it would cause a rift in humanity no matter what.

----------


## veti

> Skyrim wasnt asked to put up with ANY persecution until they started openly rabble rousing about the White Gold Concordant. Thats the point. The Nords were allowed to self police without any oversight as long as they werent openly proclaiming their defiance to the sky. Guess what they ended up doing.


Openly denying your religion makes you an apostate. Openly denying it while still practising it in secret makes you, at the very least, a hypocrite, and quite possibly an apostate as well (depending what the tenets of the religion itself have to say about it). The terms of the concordat were never meant to be observed, they were meant to bring about the collapse of the empire.

And the emperor signed it anyway. And to compound that folly, he's now trying to enforce it. The empire _should_ collapse. It would leave everyone better off.

----------


## Batcathat

Yeah, while open rebellion probably wasn't the right move from a strategic point of view, saying the Nords weren't oppressed just because the ban on their favorite god wasn't as harshly enforced as it could have been seems harsh.

But of course both sides have a point, I like that about the Skyrim Civil War since far too many plots in fantasy have very obvious good guys and bad guys. (Not that Skyrim is lacking in very obvious bad guys, but still).

----------


## Kareeah_Indaga

We should probably start looking into a new thread title.

*The Elder Scrolls XVIII: We Dont Need Your Civil War*

----------


## Yuki Akuma

It's been eleven years and people are still arguing about the Civil War and the Thalmor.

Can we please have TES6 before I die

----------


## Lurkmoar

> It's been eleven years and people are still arguing about the Civil War and the Thalmor.
> 
> Can we please have TES6 before I die


It'll probably be about 4-5 years after Starfield's release. Which was pushed back. So, maybe we'll get TES6 by 2030!

It's mind boggling to me that Bethesda still works like a small game developer(in output) when Microsoft shelled out billions for it. In fact, I'm trying to remember if they've released anything since the Microsoft acquisition, Anniversary Edition? I forget exactly if it came out before or after the purchase.

----------


## Resileaf

*The Elder Scrolls XVIII: Still talking about the Civil War*
*The Elder Scrolls XVIII: Still fighting the Civil War*

----------


## Fyraltari

> the Empire has given the Thalmor free run of Skyrim, and makes not the slightest effort to protect its citizens against persecution, kidnapping and summary murder by the Justiciars


Not true. Remember the quest to free the Gray-Mane guy held captive by the Thalmor? Turns out that if you're a Legate of the Legion, you can just talk to Tullius about it and he'll give youna written order for his release. One that the Thalmor grudgingly accept because they don't want to piss the legion off.




> The Empire is dying, it needs to fall and let its provinces find their own feet.


That much is true, Talos himself said as much in _Morrowind_. The problem of the Empire is that, as mich as they like to tout their multiculturalism and elinghtenment, it's still a Cyrodiil-(and-Skyrim-)centric colonialisy entreprise, that imposed cohesion by force as much as it did by genuinely trying to bridge the cultural gaps between the provinces. Leading to responses like the Stormcloaks and the Thalmor.

Not to mention its apalling treatment of minotaurs, goblins and other non-citizen races.




> And Skyrim is being asked to put up with far worse persecution than ever pertained in Hammerfell.


Nah man, Hammerfell was asked to cede territory. If you think the Thalmor are bad in Skyrim, imagine what they're like within their own borders.

Also, my vote for *The Elder Scrolls XVIII: Still Fighting the Civil War*.

----------


## Taevyr

While I like the civil war for thread title, we can be more creative than that! 

*The Elder Scrolls XVIII: Keep this War Civil, please*

----------


## Imbalance

As the great bard once asked:

*The Elder Scrolls XVIII:  "What's So Civil About War, Anyway?"*

----------


## Rynjin

*The Elder Scrolls XVIII: Old Enough to Go to War*

Alternatively *The Elder Scrolls XVIII: What Is It Good For?*

----------


## veti

> *The Elder Scrolls XVIII: Old Enough to Go to War*


+1 for referencing the number. Nicely done.




> Not true. Remember the quest to free the Gray-Mane guy held captive by the Thalmor? Turns out that if you're a Legate of the Legion, you can just talk to Tullius about it and he'll give youna written order for his release. One that the Thalmor grudgingly accept because they don't want to piss the legion off.


So a high ranking legion officer is able to pull strings to get a personal friend out of Thalmor custody. After the war is won, mind.

Not seeing this as evidence of the legion extending fair protection to imperial citizens.

What I do know is that if the Thalmor attack me on the open road, the Legion - if present - will stand by and do nothing. Whereas if I attack the Thalmor in the same situation, the legion supports them.

In addition, one side of the civil war has torture chambers. One side is willing to execute people, without trial, for the flimsiest of reasons. One side will settle for nothing less than the death of its enemies. One side puts _Maven "Punch Me" Blackbriar_ in charge of a major city, and supports a spineless cipher to be High Queen. 

The _other_ side is the Stormcloaks.

----------


## Grim Portent

> Not to mention its apalling treatment of minotaurs, goblins and other non-citizen races.


Bloody Alessian Order, dehumanising the minotaurs.  :Small Annoyed: 





> As the great bard once asked:
> 
> *The Elder Scrolls XVIII:  "What's So Civil About War, Anyway?"*


This one gets my vote.

----------


## Spore

> In addition, one side of the civil war has torture chambers. One side is willing to execute people, without trial, for the flimsiest of reasons. One side will settle for nothing less than the death of its enemies. One side puts _Maven "Punch Me" Blackbriar_ in charge of a major city, and supports a spineless cipher to be High Queen. 
> 
> The _other_ side is the Stormcloaks.


You think the Nordic racists are a smidge better? Think again.

----------


## veti

> You think the Nordic racists are a smidge better? Think again.


Heck yeah.

When you first arrive in Windhelm, there's a woman being verbally harassed by two civilians because of her race. That's bad, sure. But you know what's worse?

Having your freaking head cut off. That's worse. And that's the sight that greets you on your first entry to Solitude.

I don't like Ulfric or the Stormcloaks, and I think Windhelm is the most depressing place in the game (by a short head from Markarth). But the other side is far worse. It's not even close.

----------


## WritersBlock

A lot of people who play and talk about Skyrim seem to forget just how racist and horrible the Dunmer/Dark Elves are/were. FAR worse than a lot of the Nords. Play Morrowind again and listen to the garbage that spews out of a lot of the Dunmer mouth's (Well more like read, but you get the idea) Rolf or whoever that Nord in Windhelm is needs to stop though, I am sure a lot of us can agree on that.

----------


## Batcathat

This discussion kind of makes me wish there was some equivalent of the Wild Card ending from Fallout New Vegas, ie. neutralize everyone and take control yourself. I wonder if there's a mod for that?

----------


## Vinyadan

> A lot of people who play and talk about Skyrim seem to forget just how racist and horrible the Dunmer/Dark Elves are/were. FAR worse than a lot of the Nords. Play Morrowind again and listen to the garbage that spews out of a lot of the Dunmer mouth's (Well more like read, but you get the idea) Rolf or whoever that Nord in Windhelm is needs to stop though, I am sure a lot of us can agree on that.


A great thing about Morrowind writing was that you were an outsider, and you were the target, not the origin, of the hate. And you, an outlander, also were a messianic figure come to save all Dunmer, fulfill Ashlander prophecy, defeat the Devil in personal combat, make right the mistakes of their gods, and thus show in very practical terms how utterly wrong the disdain towards the outlanders is. 
You also can't join the most racist organisations (the Camonna Tong and the Sixth House) and you can't advance the main quest or rise to the top in the Houses without killing the two racist leaders (Venim and Orvas Dren).

In Skyrim, I don't see any of these elements. You won't rise to the top, you won't show that racism is wrong through your deeds, you won't take the place of Tullius or Ulfric. Instead, you bring them to victory.

----------


## Fyraltari

> +1 for referencing the number. Nicely done.
> 
> 
> 
> So a high ranking legion officer is able to pull strings to get a personal friend out of Thalmor custody. After the war is won, mind.


Personal friend? Neither the player nor Tullius have ever met the man. And that's a possibility as soon as you make Legate which happens before the end of the war.




> Not seeing this as evidence of the legion extending fair protection to imperial citizens.


Sure, but it's evidence the Legion can and will impose some limits on Thalmor authority. MEaning they don't have "a free hand". 




> What I do know is that if the Thalmor attack me on the open road, the Legion - if present - will stand by and do nothing. Whereas if I attack the Thalmor in the same situation, the legion supports them.


Can't say that I remember that happening, though I'll take your word for it, I probably just never ran into those specific situations.
In addition, one side of the civil war has torture chambers. One side is willing to execute people, without trial, for the flimsiest of reasons. One side will settle for nothing less than the death of its enemies. One side puts _Maven "Punch Me" Blackbriar_ in charge of a major city, and supports a spineless cipher to be High Queen. 

The _other_ side is the Stormcloaks.[/QUOTE]

Everyone i TES has torture chambers, including the Stormcloaks. Go ask the people of Cidhna mine how great Ulfric and his people are, too. The Legion has Maven Black-Briar, the Stormcloaks have Thognvor Silver-blood, it's a wash.

----------


## Taevyr

> As the great bard once asked:
> 
> *The Elder Scrolls XVIII:  "What's So Civil About War, Anyway?"*


This one has my vote

----------


## veti

> Personal friend? Neither the player nor Tullius have ever met the man.


The point is, he's getting released because you begged it as a special favour. (If you want to spend that kind of capital on a total stranger, that's your concern.) But he's only getting out as a favour, not because of law or justice or even mercy.




> Sure, but it's evidence the Legion can and will impose some limits on Thalmor authority. MEaning they don't have "a free hand".


OK... the Legion can get the occasional individual out of Thalmor custody. If the Thalmor haven't just killed him already. I'm having a hard time seeing that as "imposing limits". 




> Everyone i TES has torture chambers, including the Stormcloaks. Go ask the people of Cidhna mine how great Ulfric and his people are, too. The Legion has Maven Black-Briar, the Stormcloaks have Thognvor Silver-blood, it's a wash.


Cidhna Mine, lest we forget, is at the start of the game an Imperial facility in an Imperial city. Thongvor Silver-Blood is a piece of work, sure, but let's remember that for the past 25 years, the previous, Imperial-aligned, jarl of Markarth has _also_ done nothing, or at least nothing effective, to restrain Thonar or to check rampant corruption in his own city guard.

No, Markarth is a cesspit under either faction. That's a wash by itself. Maven remains to be balanced.

Edit: And I'm pretty sure there's no torture chamber in Windhelm, or in Riften. And no executioner, whiling away his free time at the inn. The Stormcloaks are the ones who repeatedly try to show clemency to their enemies: to Rikke, for instance, and to Elisif in the end (and by extension, to all the deposed jarls living in the Blue Palace). There's no such equivalence from the Empire - they make it very clear there's no alternative for Ulfric that doesn't involve dying, and no safe haven for his supporters. 

As I keep saying, Ulfric and his people are not "great". A lot of them would easily qualify as scum. All I'm saying is, they're _still_ better than the Imperials.

----------


## Resileaf

> Edit: And I'm pretty sure there's no torture chamber in Windhelm, or in Riften. And no executioner, whiling away his free time at the inn. The Stormcloaks are the ones who repeatedly try to show clemency to their enemies: to Rikke, for instance, and to Elisif in the end (and by extension, to all the deposed jarls living in the Blue Palace). There's no such equivalence from the Empire - they make it very clear there's no alternative for Ulfric that doesn't involve dying, and no safe haven for his supporters.


So I guess the Grey-Manes being specifically protected from retaliation after the battle of Whiterun in an Imperial victory while the Stormcloaks start looting, heavily taxing and outright threatening the Battleborns with complete destitution doesn't count?

----------


## Keltest

> The point is, he's getting released because you begged it as a special favour. (If you want to spend that kind of capital on a total stranger, that's your concern.) But he's only getting out as a favour, not because of law or justice or even mercy.
> 
> 
> 
> OK... the Legion can get the occasional individual out of Thalmor custody. If the Thalmor haven't just killed him already. I'm having a hard time seeing that as "imposing limits". 
> 
> 
> 
> Cidhna Mine, lest we forget, is at the start of the game an Imperial facility in an Imperial city. Thongvor Silver-Blood is a piece of work, sure, but let's remember that for the past 25 years, the previous, Imperial-aligned, jarl of Markarth has _also_ done nothing, or at least nothing effective, to restrain Thonar or to check rampant corruption in his own city guard.
> ...


Windhelm is just more subtle about it. The argonians arent allowed to enter the city at all (keep in mind its basically a tundra out there even in the warm seasons) and the Dunmer are forced to live in a ghetto, when they get any protection at all.

And if Markarth is a wash, then so is Riften, because the Stormcloak jarl sure as heck isnt doing anything to restrain Maven, considering her an honest citizen and good friend helping her with the Thieves' Guild problem.

Ulfric also, you know, murdered the king and is attempting to overthrow the legitimate government, so of course he isnt going to see any clemency. He's a rebel, a firebrand and a murderer. Ulfric spares Elisif because he wants to use her as a puppet for the appearance of legitimacy, not out of any sense of mercy.

----------


## Rynjin

> Heck yeah.
> 
> When you first arrive in Windhelm, there's a woman being verbally harassed by two civilians because of her race. That's bad, sure.


Don't forget that that's the BEST treatment of minorities in Stormcloak-controlled Skyrim. Are you forgetting the fact that it's written in actual, real law that Khajiit and Argonians _aren't even allowed to enter cities_?




> But you know what's worse? Having your freaking head cut off. That's worse. And that's the sight that greets you on your first entry to Solitude.


I can't think of a country, fictional or otherwise, that wouldn't do the exact same thing to someone that aided and abetted the assassination of a political figure.

----------


## Batcathat

> Ulfric also, you know, murdered the king and is attempting to overthrow the legitimate government, so of course he isnt going to see any clemency. He's a rebel, a firebrand and a murderer. Ulfric spares Elisif because he wants to use her as a puppet for the appearance of legitimacy, not out of any sense of mercy.


I feel like the idea that he _murdered_ the king is mostly Empire propaganda. Ulfric challenged the king to a duel, the king accepted and lost. While I find the idea of duels as part of politics rather silly, that doesn't make it murder. Ulfric's opponents seem to mean that using the Thu'um was somehow cheating, but I don't think any of them explain _why_ that would be the case, since even they don't seem to claim there was any actual rule against it.

Don't get me wrong, Ulfric has plenty of bad qualities, but calling someone murderer after they won a legitimate duel is rather questionable.

----------


## Rynjin

> I feel like the idea that he _murdered_ the king is mostly Empire propaganda. Ulfric challenged the king to a duel, the king accepted and lost. While I find the idea of duels as part of politics rather silly, that doesn't make it murder. Ulfric's opponents seem to mean that using the Thu'um was somehow cheating, but I don't think any of them explain _why_ that would be the case, since even they don't seem to claim there was any actual rule against it.
> 
> Don't get me wrong, Ulfric has plenty of bad qualities, but calling someone murderer after they won a legitimate duel is rather questionable.


Re: Shouting: I think it counts as a sucker punch at best. For someone who claims to be about honor, challenging a man to a sword fight and then blowing him apart with magic is hypocritical.

And there's also the fact that there are conflicting reports on whether Torygg actually accepted the duel or not. Ulfric certainly challenged him, and certainly killed him, but it's unclear whether he actually said he'd fight or if Ulfric took his turning down the duel as a sign of cowardice and just killed him anyway.

----------


## Keltest

> Re: Shouting: I think it counts as a sucker punch at best. For someone who claims to be about honor, challenging a man to a sword fight and then blowing him apart with magic is hypocritical.
> 
> And there's also the fact that there are conflicting reports on whether Torygg actually accepted the duel or not. Ulfric certainly challenged him, and certainly killed him, but it's unclear whether he actually said he'd fight or if Ulfric took his turning down the duel as a sign of cowardice and just killed him anyway.


The fact that Ulfric fled the city immediately afterwards, and that he was apparently being pursued, would strongly suggest that whether Torygg accepted or not, Ulfric did not follow the proper traditions when he killed Torygg.

Remember that he wasnt a criminal at that point, so if he hadnt done anything egregious, he wouldnt have to flee.

----------


## Batcathat

> Re: Shouting: I think it counts as a sucker punch at best. For someone who claims to be about honor, challenging a man to a sword fight and then blowing him apart with magic is hypocritical.


If he specifically said "let's fight to death with swords"? Sure, he'd be a liar and a hypocrite. But if it was just supposed to be a fight to death in general, there's no reason not to do it. 

Personally, I'd find anyone in a fight to the death _not_ using every resource at their disposal an idiot who deserved to lose.





> The fact that Ulfric fled the city immediately afterwards, and that he was apparently being pursued, would strongly suggest that whether Torygg accepted or not, Ulfric did not follow the proper traditions when he killed Torygg.
> 
> Remember that he wasnt a criminal at that point, so if he hadnt done anything egregious, he wouldnt have to flee.


Yeah, maybe. But it could just as strongly suggest that he fled because the king's supporters didn't accept the outcome and wanted to kill or imprison him. Saying "he ran, so he must me guilty of _something_" seems rather questionable.

----------


## Grim Portent

Or that he had no faith in the King's court to honour the old laws that are supposed to govern them.

That his duel was legal is something that seems generally accepted by the Jarls who're traditionally minded, including Balgruuf. Indeed the Empire wanting to arrest him for it is one of the points in favour of the Stormcloaks. Skyrim has it's own laws, and a contest between two Jarls is their own affair, much like a conflict between the Great Houses of Morrowind. That Ulfric was using the duel to promote secessionist values doesn't stop it being an internal matter.

That it was old fashioned, stupid and unfair is also true however. One of Torygg's advisors (the vampire wizard) holds the opinion that if Ulfric had asked him to declare independance from the Empire, the High King would have done so. Instead Ulfric challenged him to a one sided duel which he couldn't refuse (refusing seems to mean you lose legitimacy as High King and a Moot is called anyway) then killed him by knocking him off his feet with the Thu'um and stabbing him to death. Not that Torygg stood a chance anyway, a young inexperienced man against a literal war hero is not exactly a fair fight, the Thu'um just serves to rub in Ulfric's connection to the Greybeards and Nord tradition.


A big point of contention between the Loyalists and Stormcloaks is if old traditions and laws are still important, a big chunk of the loyalists are of the opinion that Empire law should come first, dismissing the old traditions as barbaric and primitive. Skyrim has changed a lot over the past few centuries, but more so in some regions than others resulting in a culture clash between the more traditional Nords (who are still very different from the Nords of Oblivion or Morrowind) and the more Imperial influenced Nords.

I would personally consider the appropriate thing to be dividing Skyrim in two, according to the desires of the Jarls, if they can't all agree on a High King, then they shouldn't be a unified state anymore. Of course the subjects of the Jarls should get a chance to challenge them in whatever manner is legal for their given status beforehand if they disagree with what the Jarl is supporting.

----------


## Keltest

> Yeah, maybe. But it could just as strongly suggest that he fled because the king's supporters didn't accept the outcome and wanted to kill or imprison him. Saying "he ran, so he must me guilty of _something_" seems rather questionable.


I mean I guess, but Nordic tradition also states that the Thu'um should not be used for war or anything like that (excepting the Dragonborn, who is blessed by the gods to do whatever they want with it). They had a whole conflict about that and everything, and Ulfric even trained with the Greybeards under that philosophy specifically under that premise.

----------


## Grim Portent

By the time of the duel he'd already broken that tenet twice, against the Dominion and the Forsworn. That he'd break it again in the duel and continue to break in it in the Civil War is consistent. A bit hypocritical, but he'd already broken the oath of pacifism when he left the Greybeards to join the Imperial Legion during the Great War, so he was hardly a good Greybeard at that point anyway.

----------


## Triaxx

"Nordic tradition also states that the Thu'um should not be used for war"

No, this is entirely a greybeard thing. Nord Tradition venerated the throats and happily used them for war. See the books at Forelhost south of Riften for references.

----------


## Divayth Fyr

At this point Greybeard tradition IS the nordic tradition. Forelhost predates Jurgen's reforms and the change to the status of Thu'um.

----------


## InvisibleBison

If you speak to Torygg in Sovngarde, he implies that Ulfric's actions during their duel may have been dishonorable in some way.

----------


## Grim Portent

Technically they are both traditions, one has just largely supplanted the other over time. Harkening back to the older defunct tradition is not a non-traditionalist stance, it's just an appeal to a different set of traditions from a previous iteration of their society.

----------


## Mark Hall

New thread!

----------


## Keltest

> Technically they are both traditions, one has just largely supplanted the other over time. Harkening back to the older defunct tradition is not a non-traditionalist stance, it's just an appeal to a different set of traditions from a previous iteration of their society.


Picking and choosing which traditions you follow when it's convenient makes you the opposite of a traditionalist. 

And let's be real, Ulfric doesn't give a toss about traditions. He says as much to Galmar when talking about the Jagged Crown.

----------

