Multiplatform The Elder Scrolls X : Thalmor or Less [Archive]

ArlEammon

2015-05-19, 06:53 PM

Thread Title suggested by me, but the Thread Title Can Be Replaced.

Previous threads:

Who's excited for Skyrim? (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=202414)
Skyrim II: A Dragon A Day Keeps The Draugr At Bay. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=222730)
Skyrim III: Get rich selling protective knee gear! (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=12323418#post12323418)
Skyrim IV: Oblivion (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=228914)
Skyrim V: Skyrim (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?243186-Skyrim-V-Skyrim&p=13225784#post13225784)
Skyrim Thread VI: Dov Riders, AWAY! (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=262708)
The Elder Scrolls VII: Do you believe in mod? (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=298127)
The Elder Scrolls: By the VIII Divines (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?329913-The-Elder-Scrolls-By-the-VIII-Divines)
It's the IX Divines You milk drinker! (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?370764-The-Elder-Scrolls-It-s-the-IX-Divines-you-milk-drinkers)

Handy things For Skyrim:
Official forums (http://forums.bethsoft.com/index.php?/forum/117-v-skyrim/)
Perk calculator (http://skyrimcalculator.com/)
Some things you need to know about Skyrim (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=12328428#post12328428)
The Wiki (http://uesp.net/wiki/Main_Page)

Mods, also for Skyrim:
Aesthetic/interface mods
Inventory Interface mod (http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=667)

Fixes
Ebony Blade fix (http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=1946)

Gameplay additions
Skyrim Online, the MMO (http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=3592)
Dragon Souls to Perk points (http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=2063)
Marriage/Companion mod (http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=2176)
No Perk Prerequisites (http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=1943)
Perk Reset (http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=1876)
Speech improving Shouting (http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=2318)

Duck999

2015-05-19, 08:38 PM

VII divines, it's the IX divines you milk drinker! (You forgot to add a link to the last thread.)

ArlEammon

2015-05-19, 09:48 PM

I'm doing something wrong. . .
:(

I ruined Skyrimas.

Edit-
I think I fixed it.

LibraryOgre

2015-05-19, 11:18 PM

I'm doing something wrong. . .
:(

I ruined Skyrimas.

Edit-
I think I fixed it.

You could've done better... but then you took an arrow to the knee.

DigoDragon

2015-05-21, 07:01 AM

Awww, I liked my Thalmor or Less joke for the title. :smallbiggrin:
Ah well, puns are an acquired taste.

I believe this would've been already mentioned in the elder scrolls threads at least once, but I'd like to mention this now: has anyone else found that the interior cells of the Dragonsreach (as in Skyrim) do not make sense at all?

It does have some weird architecture breaks yeah.

Dhavaer

2015-05-21, 07:15 AM

Using Infinite Light on that damned Gauldur archer is love.

LibraryOgre

2015-05-21, 11:41 AM

I'm getting the Skyrim itch again... I'm tempted to bull my way through the Oblivion main quest just so I can say I did it, then move on to Skyrim.

ArlEammon

2015-05-21, 12:00 PM

I'm King Torryg, Digodragon started a new thread title, that makes him Ulfric Stormcloak. Now that I'm dead, I guess I'll enter a Console Command to be General Tullius.

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-05-21, 12:07 PM

I'm getting the Skyrim itch again... I'm tempted to bull my way through the Oblivion main quest just so I can say I did it, then move on to Skyrim.

I'm having that problem too, but for me it's Knights of the Nine I need to finish. :( ESO is calling for my attention too, but I can do Writs once a day to keep that one quiet.

DigoDragon

2015-05-21, 01:07 PM

I'm King Torryg, Digodragon started a new thread title, that makes him Ulfric Stormcloak. Now that I'm dead, I guess I'll enter a Console Command to be General Tullius.

Well my day just got more complicated. :smalltongue:
So which one of you is the dragonborn?

I have this morbid curiosity to get back into Skyrim solely so I can take companions to fight giants, have the giant smash the companion into low orbit, and then wait a little bit before using the console to teleport myself to where they landed.

For science of course.

NineThePuma

2015-05-21, 01:49 PM

Thread made a page or two early before we'd thought of a title and not linked in the last thread.:smallfrown:

Continuing my thought process for a Thalmor Character I started from last thread. It's kind of a ramble though.

After some time pondering and bouncing around the idea of being an overt thalmor representative, I was forced to conclude that it wouldn't happen. The environment of skyrim just doesn't work for it. So, I thought about less overt thalmor agents. Afterall, the thalmor have spies everywhere, amirite?

So, I've got an informant and spy. Throwing together some back story, I decided she was a High Elf, rather than a Khajiit or Bosmer; I'm in the mood to play a mage, and high elves have the best start for it. Illusion, Destruction, and Conjuration all fit nicely as well; I'll probably skip out on "pure" mage and instead grab Stealth, Light Armor, and Archery as my other three major skills. Bound Bows are thematically nice and I really like them.

I'm skipping out on the vanilla start thanks to Live Another Life. This gives me a start inside the Thalmor Embassy, with a convenient journal entry that indicates that my character has been cooped up in the embassy for a while and is now being set loose with vague objectives. I can use the vague objectives. I've decided I don't want to have the main questline start early (partially because setting off the main questline will cause me to stop being friendly with the Thalmor, partially just cause I hate the early main questline), so that leaves the Brotherhood, Companions, Thieves Guild, and Winterhold questlines. I'm ruling out the Brotherhood (I don't particularly have anything against it, especially late game, but Thalmor Interests don't run in that direction, unless I'm destroying the brotherhood), and I feel like the Companions are at odds with my desired play style. So, Guild vs College.

One of these has a proven Thalmor interest, so lets look at the other one first.

The Thieves Guild: Note, Spoilers
Word on the streets of riften is that the Thieves Guild are getting their **** rekt. They're on the out. the Summerset Shadows is a rival thieves guild formed entirely of Altmer. Between the Shadows and the Guild, the Thalmor would probably want to back the Shadows and help them get better established and expand them, planting agents to turn it into an extension of the spy network. An agent being planted into the Guild would be being planted into a half dead organization that is in the process of being finished off; probably not worth the resource.

The College of Winterhold
There's already a Thalmor Agent on hand, an Advisor To The Archmage. The college is /basically/ the entire representation of mages in skyrim (well, it's the only organized group of mages that aren't cultists of some form), and it's also where any sort of organized response is going to come from from mages in general. Ancano is kind of an obvious bait though, plus he's a little... yeah.

So: the game plan;
Step 1: Prove Reliable; assist thalmor operations in Markarth
Step 2: make my way to winterhold and insert myself into the next apprentice cycle
Step 3: Review Ancaco's behavior and stability.
Step 4: Long Term infiltration

Naturally, this goes off the rails. The character will /eventually/ end up over near Helgen, and events will move quickly and once it becomes clear that they're the Dragonborn, well, there's a kill order in the works.

ArlEammon

2015-05-21, 03:03 PM

A good aligned Thalmor is perfectly plausible, Oscar Schindler and John Rabe were both very good German Human beings during World War II.

veti

2015-05-21, 03:41 PM

I believe this would've been already mentioned in the elder scrolls threads at least once, but I'd like to mention this now: has anyone else found that the interior cells of the Dragonsreach (as in Skyrim) do not make sense at all? I was trying to create a Minecraft version of it in my Realms world, and after fiddling with multiple floor plans sketched from memory I decided to reinstall Skyrim to take my own reference screenshots. And my conclusion, after several minutes of running around continuously, is that the Jarl's Quarters is a sub-plane linked to the rest of the castle by portals.

Pretty sure that's true of a lot of places in Skyrim, but for Dragonsreach in particular I don't think it's the greatest of their problems.

Answer me this: you know those rivers of water that are gushing down from Dragonsreach through the city? Well, where exactly is all that water coming from?

veti

2015-05-21, 04:22 PM

Thread made a page or two early before we'd thought of a title and not linked in the last thread.:smallfrown:

Continuing my thought process for a Thalmor Character I started from last thread. It's kind of a ramble though.

The Thieves Guild: Note, Spoilers

Word on the streets of riften is that the Thieves Guild are getting their **** rekt. They're on the out. the Summerset Shadows is a rival thieves guild formed entirely of Altmer. Between the Shadows and the Guild, the Thalmor would probably want to back the Shadows and help them get better established and expand them, planting agents to turn it into an extension of the spy network. An agent being planted into the Guild would be being planted into a half dead organization that is in the process of being finished off; probably not worth the resource.

The Summerset Shadows are so secretive that there's no discoverable trace of them anywhere in Skyrim. I strongly suspect they're all talk. Literally, in the sense that "talk is all that exists of them". The Guild may be on the ropes, but at least it has an established network of members, contacts and fences.

The Thalmor have infiltrated the guild to the extent of having at least one informant in their ranks, unless of course one takes the opportunity to kill him at the Thalmor embassy. He's just a nobody, but he's probably capable of reporting the fact that the guild has had a change of leadership and everyone's feeling better about it. I suspect the Thalmor are also tight with Maven Black-Briar, because how the heck did those fully armed and uniformed troops get into Stormcloak-held Riften's sewers? - but there's no proof of that that I know of.

ArlEammon

2015-05-21, 05:38 PM

About the Civil War.

I sympathize highly with the Stormcloaks. I don't think they're a bad faction, just too folksy, and their cause is stupid since Ulfric is at the helm of it. (Although even Ulfric isn't without his sympathetic leanings and good qualities). I would side with the Empire but knowing about their torturers, and willingness to murder innocent people, the Civil War in Skyrim is more grey morality than players ever talk about, but if you look very closely and analyze for long enough, you'll realize that while it is a grey morality type of situation, it just wasn't presented competently. As it stands, Skyrim gives the implications that nearly all Nords are racist bastards who are like a softened Klu Klux Klan, and the Empire, while harsh, is a smarter, more civilized culture, while technically true in some ways, the Imperial Legion is handling the situation rather badly.

Let's just say that the torture racks in Solitude I found far outweigh the kind of torture I found in Windhelm. Also, having mages torture prisoners of war is likely an Imperial Only thing. But the Empire still has higher merit for a rival against the Thalmor. Skyrim might hold against the Thalmor, sure, it's a very mountainous, harsh, insulated place against invaders, with a lot of hide outs, and the folk know the lay of the land far better than the Legion.

But uh, Nords are one single race of people, who won't even take advantage of the extra man power that Argonians and Dunmer can give to the Legion. They effectively segregate them with a Jim Crow style segregation, accusing them of being spies for the Imperial Legion. . . they aren't just being immoral with their racist attitudes, they won't take advantage of the Bosmer, Dunmer, Khajit, Argonian refugees as soldiers. There's no way Skyrim can expand out of it's corner in the world. Unless of course the Dragonborn was in charge, then there might be some effective leadership in control long enough to bring the Thalmor to it's knees with only Skyrim's army. ((Although, to be fair, with the Dragonborn's presumably more modern form of ethics, he would be incorporating Argonias, Khajit, Bosmer and Dunmer into Skyrim's forces against the Thalmor and enforcing racial equality laws)).

Dunmer have a lot to bring the table, just as much as all the other races but the Dunmer are the third best mages in the Elder Scroll series. Khajit are a god given gift to an army if they get low on supplies, they can fight with literal claws, rending leather, hide and MAYBE iron armor and shields, and probably their teeth as well. Argonians are a strategic nitemare for enemy martial forces since they can breathe water, and they aren't lacking in fighting power either.

NineThePuma

2015-05-21, 06:24 PM

A good aligned Thalmor is perfectly plausible, Oscar Schindler and John Rabe were both very good German Human beings during World War II.
Of course they are. I've been toying with the idea for a while. I want to play someone who believes the rhetoric and ends up having the people she loves/trusts turn on her due to circumstances beyond her control that she can't change. Makes for some fun experimentation.

The Summerset Shadows are so secretive that there's no discoverable trace of them anywhere in Skyrim. I strongly suspect they're all talk. Literally, in the sense that "talk is all that exists of them". The Guild may be on the ropes, but at least it has an established network of members, contacts and fences.

The Thalmor have infiltrated the guild to the extent of having at least one informant in their ranks, unless of course one takes the opportunity to kill him at the Thalmor embassy. He's just a nobody, but he's probably capable of reporting the fact that the guild has had a change of leadership and everyone's feeling better about it. I suspect the Thalmor are also tight with Maven Black-Briar, because how the heck did those fully armed and uniformed troops get into Stormcloak-held Riften's sewers? - but there's no proof of that that I know of.

Very true. Of course, the Shadows could be a Thalmor attempt to take over the criminal underworld... Only Linwe could tell, and he's dead now, so.

Though it's note worthy that Mercer has been in charge for ~20 years or whatever and the guild has been falling apart under his leadership. While the Thalmor have captured the guy and are torturing him for information, the guy never actually... you know, appears anywhere else until after you rescue him, so you can go and take over the entire thieves guild without him ever knowing about it. So the Thalmor information there is recent. It's very likely that they don't know all the details.

NineThePuma

2015-05-21, 06:33 PM

Sorry to double post, this popped up while my post was, lets say, pending.

About the Civil War.

I sympathize highly with the Stormcloaks. I don't think they're a bad faction, just too folksy, and their cause is stupid since Ulfric is at the helm of it. (Although even Ulfric isn't without his sympathetic leanings and good qualities). I would side with the Empire but knowing about their torturers, and willingness to murder innocent people, the Civil War in Skyrim is more grey morality than players ever talk about, but if you look very closely and analyze for long enough, you'll realize that while it is a grey morality type of situation, it just wasn't presented competently. As it stands, Skyrim gives the implications that nearly all Nords are racist bastards who are like a softened Klu Klux Klan, and the Empire, while harsh, is a smarter, more civilized culture, while technically true in some ways, the Imperial Legion is handling the situation rather badly.

Let's just say that the torture racks in Solitude I found far outweigh the kind of torture I found in Windhelm. Also, having mages torture prisoners of war is likely an Imperial Only thing. But the Empire still has higher merit for a rival against the Thalmor. Skyrim might hold against the Thalmor, sure, it's a very mountainous, harsh, insulated place against invaders, with a lot of hide outs, and the folk know the lay of the land far better than the Legion.

But uh, Nords are one single race of people, who won't even take advantage of the extra man power that Argonians and Dunmer can give to the Legion. They effectively segregate them with a Jim Crow style segregation, accusing them of being spies for the Imperial Legion. . . they aren't just being immoral with their racist attitudes, they won't take advantage of the Bosmer, Dunmer, Khajit, Argonian refugees as soldiers. There's no way Skyrim can expand out of it's corner in the world. Unless of course the Dragonborn was in charge, then there might be some effective leadership in control long enough to bring the Thalmor to it's knees with only Skyrim's army. ((Although, to be fair, with the Dragonborn's presumably more modern form of ethics, he would be incorporating Argonias, Khajit, Bosmer and Dunmer into Skyrim's forces against the Thalmor and enforcing racial equality laws)).

Dunmer have a lot to bring the table, just as much as all the other races but the Dunmer are the third best mages in the Elder Scroll series. Khajit are a god given gift to an army if they get low on supplies, they can fight with literal claws, rending leather, hide and MAYBE iron armor and shields, and probably their teeth as well. Argonians are a strategic nitemare for enemy martial forces since they can breathe water, and they aren't lacking in fighting power either.

That's actually why my theoretical reconstruction of Skyrim (written as a fanfic, though at present it is almost entirely in planning stages and I have not rambled about it at all here because I am notoriously bad at actually writing fanfic) has the stormcloaks reforging the Ebonheart Pact in some ways; the Dunmer and Argonians of Windhelm are being used to their fullest. While /some/ people are racists (Dawnstar Jarl refuses to properly utilize non-Nord troops and Ulfric is very careful to not assign him any as such) many stormcloak supporters are anti-Thalmor rather than Racists. While this is still a case of Ulfric being a dumbass, he is at least showing that he has a strong tactical and strategic sense. (Whether or not it's Galmar who's got the sense is up for debate).

veti

2015-05-21, 10:39 PM

But uh, Nords are one single race of people, who won't even take advantage of the extra man power that Argonians and Dunmer can give to the Legion. They effectively segregate them with a Jim Crow style segregation, accusing them of being spies for the Imperial Legion. . . they aren't just being immoral with their racist attitudes, they won't take advantage of the Bosmer, Dunmer, Khajit, Argonian refugees as soldiers. There's no way Skyrim can expand out of it's corner in the world. Unless of course the Dragonborn was in charge, then there might be some effective leadership in control long enough to bring the Thalmor to it's knees with only Skyrim's army. ((Although, to be fair, with the Dragonborn's presumably more modern form of ethics, he would be incorporating Argonias, Khajit, Bosmer and Dunmer into Skyrim's forces against the Thalmor and enforcing racial equality laws)).

Dunmer have a lot to bring the table, just as much as all the other races but the Dunmer are the third best mages in the Elder Scroll series. Khajit are a god given gift to an army if they get low on supplies, they can fight with literal claws, rending leather, hide and MAYBE iron armor and shields, and probably their teeth as well. Argonians are a strategic nitemare for enemy martial forces since they can breathe water, and they aren't lacking in fighting power either.

The trouble with preaching racial harmony and universal acceptance is that nobody gets to start with a clean slate.

Dunmer and Argonians hate each other, far more than the Nords of Windhelm hate either one. Bretons are regarded with understandable suspicion in the Reach because of the Forsworn. Argonians are suspicious of the Empire because they used to be a part of it, and they suspect the Imperials would like to restore that arrangement. Khajit are mistrusted by basically everyone, because half of them are thieves, and another half believe the Thalmor were responsible for restoring their moons. Bosmer are in the same boat. There's tension between Imperials and Redguards because of the Empire's abandonment of Hammerfell, and between Imperials and Nords because of the current war. As for the Orcs - well, they generally side with the Imperials because that's the only major power that's ever treated them decently.

And of course everyone hates the Altmer. (Although, if you want to talk about a really put-upon race, there's the Falmer...)

I sided reflexively with the Legion the first time I attempted the Civil War, and regretted it when I saw the contrast between Ulfric and Tullius at the end. Tullius is almost as racist as Ulfric, he just hides it better from (most of) his troops. (Actually I regretted it earlier than that, the moment I saw who took over as Jarl of Riften, but I could've got over that in the end.)

I still think the Dragonborn's most effective play to end the civil war would be to go on a genocidal rampage against the Thalmor. Butcher every last one of them in Skyrim, including most especially and most graphically Elenwen herself. Make it clear that the Thalmor's current approach - hiding behind the Legion - won't work, because the Legion can't protect them from the real threat (viz, me), which is more criminal/terrorist than military in nature. Force them to choose between "launching a full-on invasion" and "abandoning the province entirely". Either way, I think the Stormcloaks and Empire could soon patch things up under those conditions. It may involve banging the heads of Elisif and Ulfric together, but speaking as Dragonborn, I'd be happy to do that. Literally, if necessary.

Winter_Wolf

2015-05-22, 12:05 AM

I never needed an excuse to kill every Thalmor that I could (and thoroughly enjoyed assassinating the emissaries in Markarth), but the Dwemer were even bigger monsters than the extremist Altmer. One could pity the Falmer if they hadn't degenerated so far into savage beasts not particularly any better than the charus. Killing them as they appear is an act of mercy.

I played through both sides of the Civil War, and found leadership wanting on both sides. Rikke and Galmar were pretty sympathetic (yes, Galmar!), but Tullius and Ulfric. Those guys. Ugh. If Ulfric wasn't the leader, I'd have no problem siding with the Stormcloaks every time, but as it is, my characters never do the dirty work of Ulfric or Tullius in the end. Because screw those guys. :smallannoyed: Dovahkin is going to be over here saving the world so you petty jerks can kill each other over who gets to sit in the big chair. And then I'm retiring to my own estate and killing anyone from either side who comes looking to recruit/kill/tax/assimilate my stead. Turns out my computer *can* handle the Blackthorn estate mod without crapping out, so I can actually follow through with that plan.

ArlEammon

2015-05-22, 01:51 AM

The trouble with preaching racial harmony and universal acceptance is that nobody gets to start with a clean slate.

Dunmer and Argonians hate each other, far more than the Nords of Windhelm hate either one. Bretons are regarded with understandable suspicion in the Reach because of the Forsworn. Argonians are suspicious of the Empire because they used to be a part of it, and they suspect the Imperials would like to restore that arrangement. Khajit are mistrusted by basically everyone, because half of them are thieves, and another half believe the Thalmor were responsible for restoring their moons. Bosmer are in the same boat. There's tension between Imperials and Redguards because of the Empire's abandonment of Hammerfell, and between Imperials and Nords because of the current war. As for the Orcs - well, they generally side with the Imperials because that's the only major power that's ever treated them decently.

And of course everyone hates the Altmer. (Although, if you want to talk about a really put-upon race, there's the Falmer...)

I sided reflexively with the Legion the first time I attempted the Civil War, and regretted it when I saw the contrast between Ulfric and Tullius at the end. Tullius is almost as racist as Ulfric, he just hides it better from (most of) his troops. (Actually I regretted it earlier than that, the moment I saw who took over as Jarl of Riften, but I could've got over that in the end.)

I still think the Dragonborn's most effective play to end the civil war would be to go on a genocidal rampage against the Thalmor. Butcher every last one of them in Skyrim, including most especially and most graphically Elenwen herself. Make it clear that the Thalmor's current approach - hiding behind the Legion - won't work, because the Legion can't protect them from the real threat (viz, me), which is more criminal/terrorist than military in nature. Force them to choose between "launching a full-on invasion" and "abandoning the province entirely". Either way, I think the Stormcloaks and Empire could soon patch things up under those conditions. It may involve banging the heads of Elisif and Ulfric together, but speaking as Dragonborn, I'd be happy to do that. Literally, if necessary.

When I'm talking about a De-Segregated StormCloak army, I"m not talking about the army all fighting together. I'm talking more like there being squads and units of Khajit, etcetera. The divisions of the military would be "segregated", sort of like the Buffalo Soldiers of African Americans during the Civil War, if I remember correctly. But you've got to admit, the Empire won't save anyone, it's incompetent, hence the masses of refugees all running to Skyrim. If they could live in their little China Towns and Little Italies, partially left alone in peace, that's leagues better than the current situation and having to worry about harassment by either Imperials and Stormcloaks. Heck, if I remember right, Khajit aren't exactly welcome warm heartedly even in Solitude, they can only come in for a drink or a stay for the night and then have to leave. How's that for Imperial hospitality?

And I've got to say, Tullius isn't just a jerk, he's a jerk to Elisif, who is a forlorn widow trying to heal her broken heart from what she rightfully, (But incorrectly) sees as the murder of her husband, High King Torryg. I don't buy the Empire's rhetoric that he murdered High King Torryg, but I could sympathetically agree with Elisif to her face. Magic is probably not allowed in Nord duels for High Kingship, but the Thu'um is "Ancient Nord Arts", as the old songs say, and Ulfric basically loop holed through the rules of dueling.

It's worth noting that while Ulfric is heavily flawed in ethical character, he's "good enough" for Sovengarde, so I don't think his rebellion is one hundred percent self-centered. The problem is that his personality is just naturally incredibly arrogant. He viewed himself as a super hero, and kind of is/was in Skyrim for a while with his Thu'um being much stronger than ordinary Elder Scrolls magic. What Ulfric should have done was embark on a Saga/adventurer's route like the Dragonborn, who is probably a canonical Nord aristocrat, if not by birth, then certainly by the time a player gets into the main quest at all.

I could imagine Ulfric delving through Dungeons and players being him for a while before the start of the real protagonist's journey. Which is probably the only way the intro to Skyrim could get any better.

NineThePuma

2015-05-22, 02:01 AM

I am 95% sure the only unaffiliated khajiit in skyrim are, like, rng'd bandits and the light house dude. Argonian stormcloaks, sure, but khajiit no

ArlEammon

2015-05-22, 02:10 AM

I am 95% sure the only unaffiliated khajiit in skyrim are, like, rng'd bandits and the light house dude. Argonian stormcloaks, sure, but khajiit no

Argonians are only dock workers. They are like the foreigners that discriminating snobs give bad jobs to and don't pay them enough.

Feytalist

2015-05-22, 04:35 AM

I am 95% sure the only unaffiliated khajiit in skyrim are, like, rng'd bandits and the light house dude. Argonian stormcloaks, sure, but khajiit no

Those two workers in that one Dwemer ruin and the Thalmor embassy cook as well (although I guess she's... working for the Thalmor? Odd one, that), but yeah. The Dark Brotherhood even has a Shadowscale, at least, but no Khajiit.

Which is partly why I ended up playing one. I was hoping for some unique dialogue to that effect, but turns out there's basically none. Not even the Khajiit caravans acknowledge you any differently. Oh well. At least I can claw mammoths to death.

DigoDragon

2015-05-22, 07:28 AM

and the Thalmor embassy cook as well (although I guess she's... working for the Thalmor? Odd one, that)

That reminded me of a comment about fur when doing the 'To Kill an Empire' quest and you're playing as a Khajiit. Guess the Thalmor don't care about it. :smalltongue:

The_Jackal

2015-05-22, 10:23 AM

Argonians are only dock workers. They are like the foreigners that discriminating snobs give bad jobs to and don't pay them enough.

IT'S A PERIOD PIECE.

Yes, it turns out that a medieval fantasy features some examples of racism and bigotry. That's actually part and parcel of the low-fantasy genre, with, of course the exception that the in-game examples of same are far more tame than their actual historical antecedents. Plus, hey, we have economic refugees, racially skewed underclasses, and good old bigotry alive in well in the modern world, so I don't see why that means people continually try to equate Ulfric Stormcloak with John C. Calhoun.

ArlEammon

2015-05-22, 02:14 PM

IT'S A PERIOD PIECE.

Yes, it turns out that a medieval fantasy features some examples of racism and bigotry. That's actually part and parcel of the low-fantasy genre, with, of course the exception that the in-game examples of same are far more tame than their actual historical antecedents. Plus, hey, we have economic refugees, racially skewed underclasses, and good old bigotry alive in well in the modern world, so I don't see why that means people continually try to equate Ulfric Stormcloak with John C. Calhoun.

I don't know who that is, but I like Stormcloak, he's just using racism as an excuse for stronger kinship between Stormcloaks, IMHO. I doubt he's really a racist. He used to work with the Grey Beards. You know what that means.

veti

2015-05-24, 04:24 PM

I am 95% sure the only unaffiliated khajiit in skyrim are, like, rng'd bandits and the light house dude. Argonian stormcloaks, sure, but khajiit no

Since the khajit racial leadership/government is pro-Thalmor, I imagine the Stormcloaks would be even more than averagely suspicious of them. (I mean, even more suspicious than they are of Dunmer and Argonians, both of whom detest the Thalmor.)

I can think of four "aligned" khajit, and three of them are pro-Thalmor (as far as we can tell) - the cook in the embassy, the assassin in Riften and the assassin outside Windhelm are all Thalmor-ish, but on the other hand, Ri'saad talks about the last as "Thalmor filth, eh? Giving all Khajiit a bad name", so we know at least one influential khajit shares our opinion of them. The rest are mostly the travelling merchants. Are there any khajit who just live peacefully in a city and mind their own business?

I don't know who that is, but I like Stormcloak, he's just using racism as an excuse for stronger kinship between Stormcloaks, IMHO. I doubt he's really a racist. He used to work with the Grey Beards. You know what that means.

Well, sure - it means he was physically fit enough to climb the steps to High Hrothgar at least once, and (unlike Klimmek) had the self-confidence to knock on the door when he got to the top.

I think there's something very unpleasant about Ulfric's racism. His policy of "standing up for Nords and only Nords" - is weirdly anachronistic for a pseudo-dark-ages/early-medieval setting. He's basically invented a type of racism that shouldn't exist until the early-modern period.

ArlEammon

2015-05-24, 04:52 PM

Since the khajit racial leadership/government is pro-Thalmor, I imagine the Stormcloaks would be even more than averagely suspicious of them. (I mean, even more suspicious than they are of Dunmer and Argonians, both of whom detest the Thalmor.)

I can think of four "aligned" khajit, and three of them are pro-Thalmor (as far as we can tell) - the cook in the embassy, the assassin in Riften and the assassin outside Windhelm are all Thalmor-ish, but on the other hand, Ri'saad talks about the last as "Thalmor filth, eh? Giving all Khajiit a bad name", so we know at least one influential khajit shares our opinion of them. The rest are mostly the travelling merchants. Are there any khajit who just live peacefully in a city and mind their own business?

Well, sure - it means he was physically fit enough to climb the steps to High Hrothgar at least once, and (unlike Klimmek) had the self-confidence to knock on the door when he got to the top.

I think there's something very unpleasant about Ulfric's racism. His policy of "standing up for Nords and only Nords" - is weirdly anachronistic for a pseudo-dark-ages/early-medieval setting. He's basically invented a type of racism that shouldn't exist until the early-modern period.

That's because Ulfric is an intelligent man with very terminal traits of stupid. He wants "Skyrim belongs to the Nords" for all the Nord's attitude for the purposes of a unified country. Kind of like your early modern period nation state. He's smart enough to seize power, and he wisely calculated an important risk which I think was very plausibly, but not probably capable of turning in his favor. He's got the Nord fighting spirit that fights against all odds, a brutal grudge against the Thalmor, and maybe High Elves, or maybe even Elves by extension but my opinion is he's trying to win the war with that attitude. There's nothing good in that, but it can be effective in churning out the numbers for a war.

Which is a stupid thing for him to do during this time in Skyrim/Tamriel's history. Skyrim has been a loyal part of the Empire for centuries, which is something Stormcloaks point out a lot, and while Skyrim is not racially tolerant, Cyrodiil IS. With many people in Skyrim having both the bad parts AND good parts of the Empire in their lives, suddenly a member of the royal family knocks off good king Torryg in an unfair duel, (Not necessarily murder, but it's very immoral), and enforcing blatantly racist policies which are abusive to people who are native to Skyrim.

His real racism that's entirely his fault, without even having anything to do with his torture at the hands of the Thalmor, is his treatment against the Forsworn. If you thought Ulfric was bad, wait until you see an entire army of Ulfric. That's the Forsworn. They're like Native Americans/Saxons conquered by the Normans/Norse/Union army. Only it's like every single one of the Forsworn is worse than the most violent Native American Tribes ever were, even ones that wiped out towns, etcetera.

The Forsworn have revenge and grudges on their mind that are more powerful than Charlie Sheen's sex drive. They murder indiscriminately with terrorist tactics and Assyrian style psychological war fare.

Triaxx

2015-05-24, 06:30 PM

Two things that stand out to me, are that A) all things point to Torryg having been willing to join Ulfric if Ulfric had asked, and almost certainly if Ulfric had defeated him and spared his life in exchange for joining him, Torryg wouldn't have thought twice. B) Ulfric is an arrogant, self-centered, short sighted jerk, but he's not fundamentally bad. Arrogant in attempting to take on the Empire, which proved itself able to at least stalemate the Thalmor, despite having come back from a marked disadvantage. Self-centered, because he wants to be High King just because he wants the job, not because he thinks he can do it better. Nevermind the black and white morality of 'with us or against us'.

Short-sighted, for killing a potentially powerful ally, just to prove a point that most of the rest of the province was already behind him on. Not to mention he could have waited just a bit and had the chance to take his grievances up with the Emperor in person, because you know Vittoria Vici would have invited all the Jarls just as a matter of course, if only to gather more power for herself.

ArlEammon

2015-05-24, 07:06 PM

veti

2015-05-24, 07:31 PM

B) Ulfric is an arrogant, self-centered, short sighted jerk, but he's not fundamentally bad. Arrogant in attempting to take on the Empire, which proved itself able to at least stalemate the Thalmor, despite having come back from a marked disadvantage.

It seems to me that the Thalmor attitude of "we kicked the Empire's backside in the Great War" is just really, really good PR on their part. (Not "good PR" in the sense that it makes them popular, but that it creates an aura of invincibility about the Dominion.) Looking at the timeline, the Thalmor's successes have been almost entirely in the realms of PR and bluff - that's how it took Valenwood and Elsweyr - but those powers that have stood up to them militarily (the Empire, Hammerfell) have eventually kicked them right back. The White-Gold Concordat was a triumph of Thalmor diplomacy, rather than arms - and the Skyrim Civil War is another.

Really, it's hard to see a rational reason for the Empire's almost palpable fear of fighting the Thalmor. If Hammerfell alone could fight them to a standstill, then surely a stable alliance of Cyrodiil, High Rock and Skyrim united could, if it got its act together, drive them out of the continent entirely - including decapitating their puppet governments in Valenwood and Elsweyr. The fact that, so far from doing this, the Empire is doing everything in its power to appease the Thalmor and avoid that confrontation - suggests that the Empire is psychologically whipped, as much by the loss of Morrowind and Black Marsh - which had nothing to do with the Thalmor - as by any achievement of the Dominion.

ArlEammon

2015-05-24, 07:48 PM

DomaDoma

2015-05-25, 05:27 AM

He's a more competent Joffrey Lannister, without the pure evil behind the character, if he was a Nord, and a lot smarter.

A competent, smart, charismatic, halfway decent Joffrey is no longer Joffrey in any meaningful sense. Just say he's got a big ego and he really screwed the pooch at the Blue Palace; leave Joffrey out of it.

I 100% agree with Veti regarding the do-you-even-know-what-you're-asking nonsense. I'm going to say the White-Gold Concordat had a lot more to do with the Sack of the Imperial City than any military edge the Thalmor could have retained afterward. I think that makes a persuasive case for the Stormcloaks on the only balance that matters, but... honestly, I'm pretty sure the way Bethesda will get itself out of this sticky wicket is to say the Civil War (not to mention the death of the Emperor) completely did do its job at crippling Skyrim and the Empire, the Dominion swooped in, and you are now a refugee headed for Hammerfell who somehow gets imprisoned en route. It makes me sick to imagine, but there's considerably more story-based cause for it than there was for nuking Vvardenfell off-screen, so...

At this late date, you guys probably don't want to go on the record as debating Imperials versus Stormcloaks as such. Follow the Haymitch Abernathy Principle, or chances are that E3 will send you into a Lady Macbeth scrubbing session. Okay, unless they're announcing Fallout 4.

Dhavaer

2015-05-25, 05:33 AM

Okay, unless they're announcing Fallout 4.

Yes yes yes this. Please, Bethesda.

ArlEammon

2015-05-25, 01:40 PM

A Qunari conquest of Skyrim would be hilarious. Everyone's name is Sten. The same as before.

Battle reports would be very difficult to write up...

12:32 - Sten, Sten and Sten assaulted the hill under the command of Sten. they faced off against Sten Stenson, Sten Stensonson and Boris the Mighty (known to his friends as Sten.) The Stens were quickly and brutally massacred and the hill is currently in the hands of the Stens.

- Simply John. . . and mine's conversation.

Sajiri

2015-05-25, 04:27 PM

Mainly posting here just cause I keep overlooking the new thread, but whatever.

I got all psyched up for Oblivion again after I finally managed to fix that last PC issue I was having with avast, get the game downloaded on steam with all the DLC and such aaaand then I go back to work after being a housewife for the past month >_> At least until the end of this week. The money is nice and makes me less guilty after having bought it again on steam, but man I just want to play but havent had a chance to sit down and get it all set up with mods.

I'm now recalling the lack of interesting male companion mods made for Oblivion, and I thought Skyrim was bad (as in, they have their own quest/backstory/whatever, not just a pretty face). The only ones I remember (that aren't khajit or argonian) are Stoker Wolff(?) and Dai..ranath? Daivanath? Two guys with long hair, wearing black leather, looking 'pretty'...why do people never make just ordinary or tough looking companions, male or female?

DomaDoma

2015-05-26, 05:56 AM

I didn't even remember you could have non-quest-specific followers in Oblivion. Probably because I really, really don't like to get allies killed. But yeah, from what I've seen online, Oblivion does appear to be kind of The Fangirl Installment. Doesn't keep it from being my favorite, though.

Winter_Wolf

2015-05-26, 09:17 AM

I feel like I read something about my problem, once, somewhere. Sadly I can't remember at all. Basically, Markarth banners don't display the symbol of Markarth, but rather a bright neon green all caps MARKARTH diagonally from top left to bottom right. Shields still normal, but all banners are just messed up.

I hadn't played in a while, and I don't typically go into the area if I don't need to since I rather dislike just how isolated and canyon-y everything is, so I can't be completely sure what happened. All I can think of is that I recently switched over to Mod Organizer, but the load order of my mods hasn't actually changed that I can see, as I did an import of my NMM load order.

Another issue which I'm having—again—is that none of my standing stones have textures on the top, around the circular hole, or near the base. I know I at one point did fix this issue, but as I thought that would be the end of it I mostly forget how I did it. I vaguely recall fixing it that first time by downloading standing stone textures and resizing them to a lower res, and that worked. But looking again, the textures are all still there (I even re-copied the fixed textures back into that folder) and yet the problem has returned. These are obviously not game breaking, but they sure are irritating.

Well then. Apparently something went and messed with my textures while I wasn't paying attention, but at least I fixed it. Probably will forget what I did again.

Calemyr

2015-05-26, 11:08 AM

It seems to me that the Thalmor attitude of "we kicked the Empire's backside in the Great War" is just really, really good PR on their part. (Not "good PR" in the sense that it makes them popular, but that it creates an aura of invincibility about the Dominion.) Looking at the timeline, the Thalmor's successes have been almost entirely in the realms of PR and bluff - that's how it took Valenwood and Elsweyr - but those powers that have stood up to them militarily (the Empire, Hammerfell) have eventually kicked them right back. The White-Gold Concordat was a triumph of Thalmor diplomacy, rather than arms - and the Skyrim Civil War is another.

Really, it's hard to see a rational reason for the Empire's almost palpable fear of fighting the Thalmor. If Hammerfell alone could fight them to a standstill, then surely a stable alliance of Cyrodiil, High Rock and Skyrim united could, if it got its act together, drive them out of the continent entirely - including decapitating their puppet governments in Valenwood and Elsweyr. The fact that, so far from doing this, the Empire is doing everything in its power to appease the Thalmor and avoid that confrontation - suggests that the Empire is psychologically whipped, as much by the loss of Morrowind and Black Marsh - which had nothing to do with the Thalmor - as by any achievement of the Dominion.

You're right on all accounts, I think, though I'd push it a step further. The Thalmor ascended to dominance among the high elves by claiming that they ended the Oblivion Crisis. Sure, we know better (it was Sheogorath that saved the world), but the Altmer and, probably, much of the world bought the claim completely. That gave them the power at home to push for the Dominion and their new "jailbreak" initiative. To add to their legitimacy, they used any means necessary to pull Elsweyr and the Valenwood into the Dominion again, trying to use their former glory (back when the Dominion were actually pretty good guys) to power their current goals.

Everything the Thalmor do is a long game, using far more assets than simple military might to advance things. Even their failures only serve their ends. Pushed to a standstill against the Empire, they took costly standstill and recast it as 'making a god bleed', shaking everyone's faith in the empire's dominance. Break a nation's morale and you break the nation. Stripping the Empire of the Redguards was a crippling blow to the Empire - regardless of whether the Dominion actually could hold them, Hammerfell's now definitely not an asset of the Empire. Ulfric may be a loose cannon that the Thalmor cannot control, but he still did everything the Thalmor wanted him to: he gave them all the excuse to turn an almost throwaway clause in the Concordat into the foundation for a virtual secret police run by a foreign (and hostile) nation, and then may have stripped the Empire of its remaining provinces in the process. And all of this gets laid not at the Thalmor's feet, but that of an Emperor who is trying like hell to still pull out a win (using a free Hammerfell as a staging ground for a possible offensive). The only person actively working to take down the Thalmor may well get assassinated while everyone else is tearing down the Thalmor's opposition for them.

Basically, the Thalmor do not have a dominant military force, not against a united Empire. There is no united Empire now. A lot of happy accidents have happened for them, but they've capitalized on it all to neutralize every threat to their agenda. No doubt even the dragons will be useful as another tool in their arsenal.

Honestly, fighting the Thalmor is basically like fighting Light Yagami from Death Note. They even managed to get their enemy to try to kill their emperor (the equivalent of L in this) themselves.

ArlEammon

2015-05-26, 02:42 PM

You're right on all accounts, I think, though I'd push it a step further. The Thalmor ascended to dominance among the high elves by claiming that they ended the Oblivion Crisis. Sure, we know better (it was Sheogorath that saved the world), but the Altmer and, probably, much of the world bought the claim completely. That gave them the power at home to push for the Dominion and their new "jailbreak" initiative. To add to their legitimacy, they used any means necessary to pull Elsweyr and the Valenwood into the Dominion again, trying to use their former glory (back when the Dominion were actually pretty good guys) to power their current goals.

Everything the Thalmor do is a long game, using far more assets than simple military might to advance things. Even their failures only serve their ends. Pushed to a standstill against the Empire, they took costly standstill and recast it as 'making a god bleed', shaking everyone's faith in the empire's dominance. Break a nation's morale and you break the nation. Stripping the Empire of the Redguards was a crippling blow to the Empire - regardless of whether the Dominion actually could hold them, Hammerfell's now definitely not an asset of the Empire. Ulfric may be a loose cannon that the Thalmor cannot control, but he still did everything the Thalmor wanted him to: he gave them all the excuse to turn an almost throwaway clause in the Concordat into the foundation for a virtual secret police run by a foreign (and hostile) nation, and then may have stripped the Empire of its remaining provinces in the process. And all of this gets laid not at the Thalmor's feet, but that of an Emperor who is trying like hell to still pull out a win (using a free Hammerfell as a staging ground for a possible offensive). The only person actively working to take down the Thalmor may well get assassinated while everyone else is tearing down the Thalmor's opposition for them.

Basically, the Thalmor do not have a dominant military force, not against a united Empire. There is no united Empire now. A lot of happy accidents have happened for them, but they've capitalized on it all to neutralize every threat to their agenda. No doubt even the dragons will be useful as another tool in their arsenal.

Honestly, fighting the Thalmor is basically like fighting Light Yagami from Death Note. They even managed to get their enemy to try to kill their emperor (the equivalent of L in this) themselves.

Interesting conclusion. Basically true in every way. I can only hope that perhaps the Dragonborn or maybe some important person in the ES has the ability to set things right against the Thalmor. In Elder Scrolls VI, perhaps Talos himself will show the Thalmor who he is directly.

veti

2015-05-26, 07:49 PM

Interesting conclusion. Basically true in every way. I can only hope that perhaps the Dragonborn or maybe some important person in the ES has the ability to set things right against the Thalmor. In Elder Scrolls VI, perhaps Talos himself will show the Thalmor who he is directly.

... while the PC watches admiringly? Doesn't sound very likely. And if the PC was going to be a reincarnation of Talos (a la Nerevarine), the Dragonborn in Skyrim would have been the obvious protagonist to channel that storyline - the fact that they didn't do that then, makes it seem less likely that they'll do it later.

I continue to think that we've only seen an extremely one-sided view of the Thalmor, and I'd really like to see a more sympathetic take on them before they're either destroyed or tamed. I still hope TESVI is set in Summerset, or possibly Valenwood if they want to string out the storyline longer.

DomaDoma

2015-05-26, 07:57 PM

The next setting is going to be Hammerfell (unless they inexplicably decide to not have the world at stake next time around), so my money's on the HoonDing. Hopefully they'll go with a somewhat less silly-looking way of writing it, if so. Nothing says Talos can't come, too.

But if we're fantasizing about sweet, sweet karma - I really hope the game leaves room for a scenario in which Rikke executes Elenwen personally. Obviously Rikke can't be 100% canonically alive, but if there's nothing directly contradicting this, I will very fervently assume it happened.

EDIT: Veti, as long as the PC definitively sets the stage, that's totally legit.

Sajiri

2015-05-27, 12:21 AM

I know I was asking about ESO in the old thread but I never got around to playing it. Im thinking of preordering it for ps4 now but Im majorly conflicted. Aside from the big issue of (I think) no cross platform servers meaning I cant play with any of my rl friends that only have pc if I got for ps4, apparently console versions will only have voice chat. This makes no sense at all to me when the pc version has it, and you can apparently still use the keyboard for things like guild name input.

I'd just go and get the pc version, but it has no gamepad support, which I pretty much require if I want to play a game for longer than 20-30 minutes without having to stop and crying from pain in my hands and arms. The husband says he'd like to play it with me if I get it on pc, but he has a track record of trying games I get for him once then never again.

I know there was an option to transfer/copy pc characters to console...was that a temporary thing or will it be permanent? Anyone playing ESO know?

Kesnit

2015-05-27, 05:47 AM

I'd just go and get the pc version, but it has no gamepad support, which I pretty much require if I want to play a game for longer than 20-30 minutes without having to stop and crying from pain in my hands and arms.

I haven't used it, so can't speak for how well it works, but there is this (http://www.esoui.com/downloads/info1102-ControllerSupport.html) mod that adds controller support.

Sajiri

2015-05-27, 06:51 AM

I haven't used it, so can't speak for how well it works, but there is this (http://www.esoui.com/downloads/info1102-ControllerSupport.html) mod that adds controller support.

Hrm that might be useful. Typically player made mods/mapping for gamepads never seems to work out very well (though I guess thats thanks to most games having WoW-style UI and gameplay with way too many abilities), but I suppose that one doesnt look bad. Thanks :)

LibraryOgre

2015-05-27, 01:07 PM

Arrrrrgh. I had an issue with one of the Thieves Guild Quests, and wound up getting kicked out of the mage's guild. And my last proper save was a long time ago.

And I'm trying to decide if I want to stay a vampire.

ArlEammon

2015-05-27, 03:18 PM

I'm curious. Folks, are there any mods that allow for direction confrontation with the Daedric Lords?

Triaxx

2015-05-27, 03:34 PM

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-05-27, 05:38 PM

Everything the Thalmor do is a long game, using far more assets than simple military might to advance things. Even their failures only serve their ends.

What really scares me is the thought that the Dominion might have LET Hammerfall win. What do they lose in that scenario? Some territory they would have had to fight to keep anyway. Whereas by giving it up, they build up resentment inside the Empire ("See, see? We could have won if we'd just kept fighting!") and overconfidence in the Redguards, allowing them an easier win in the future—which falls in line with their tactics very well.

Also, I don't know how many of you play ESO, but in the Ali'kr Desert there's

a portal in some Ayelid ruins, specifically Salas En. (http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Thwarting_the_Aldmeri_Dominion) Where does it lead? Grahtwood, in Valenwood. (http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Passage_Denied) I give you reasonable odds our friends in Hammerfell do not remember this. I also give good odds our 'friends' in the Dominion do.

I know there was an option to transfer/copy pc characters to console...was that a temporary thing or will it be permanent? Anyone playing ESO know?

That was a temporary thing and I THINK it's over with. :sad:

(On the other hand, in Oblivion doing the Mages first means you can do the theives without any issue at all. Weird.)

It really annoyed me that there wasn't even an acknowledgement of that in-game. Something like, "Oh YOU'RE the Arch Mage? Imagine that. Well would you go bring me that staff and PRETEND it was stolen?" would have been a couple lines of dialog at most. If they wanted to get fancy they could ask you to order one of your Mages' Guild underlings to complain to the Guard Captain instead, but I'd have been happy with a short note in dialog. :(

DomaDoma

2015-05-27, 06:11 PM

I think Raminus Polus did acknowledge that, actually. Or maybe it was just the quest log. But in any event, it was acknowledged. The fact that every Oblivion side quest assumes and capitalizes on your anonymity, though... weird.

Now, Hammerfell almost certainly came by its win honestly. That doesn't mean they're anxious for another go-round after losing half the country, or that the ESO spoiler above won't come into play, but the Thalmor (or at least the Ancano strain thereof, who are probably calling more of the shots) would really like a shoreline on Iliac Bay. Talos has to go first, but no reason not to get your final puzzle pieces set up ahead of time.

...Well, that sure is something I had in the back of my head and didn't consider. Yeah, Talos worship has to be extinct, or all but, by the time Elder Scrolls VI rolls around. Why do I have to keep confirming my worst fears, I swear.

On a somewhat cheerier note: might be a chance of creating a rift between your Ancanos and your Elenwens. If Elenwen caught wind of the Eye of Magnus deal, she'd likely enough take it to the Dark Brotherhood. The end of the world does kind of limit one's opportunities to be a sadist.

ArlEammon

2015-05-27, 07:50 PM

Winter_Wolf

2015-05-27, 09:56 PM

If Hermaeas Mora and/or Nocturnal is in your pocket, it's safe to assume that they could maintain your anonymity no matter what.

Who is in whose pocket, though, really? Mora basically gets rid of minions like it's scraping something off the bottom of a shoe, using a Dragonborn shaped implement to do so. And Nocturnal doesn't strike me as particularly trustworthy, by mortal standards. Although I expect she can be trusted to claim your soul the milisecond it departs your body, because *you promised* you'd serve in her realm after dying. But I basically agree with they'd be serving their own interests by keeping you mysterious no matter what.

ArlEammon

2015-05-27, 10:32 PM

Who is in whose pocket, though, really? Mora basically gets rid of minions like it's scraping something off the bottom of a shoe, using a Dragonborn shaped implement to do so. And Nocturnal doesn't strike me as particularly trustworthy, by mortal standards. Although I expect she can be trusted to claim your soul the milisecond it departs your body, because *you promised* you'd serve in her realm after dying. But I basically agree with they'd be serving their own interests by keeping you mysterious no matter what.

Of course you're also claimed by Sovengarde, or, it's inferred that those in Sovengarde might be able to rescue the folk from Hircine's hunting ground by Kodlak. But eh, you've also got to remember that if you are with Meridia, you can claim to wield Dawnbreaker in her name. Cleansing the world of vampires, including Harkon, and Volkihar castle? Surely she'd be pleased. No promise that she'd help you, but she knows talent when she sees it. Of course she is a Daedric Prince (Ess).

Of course Hermaeas Mora only really has pawns, but with someone as powerful as the Dragonborn, it should be noted he'd be noteworthy and quite competent for a VERY long time. Also, the Dragonborn might be an Agent of both Dibella and Mara. Mara is very good, and loving, apparently not just the goddess of love although that's her main forte. Talos, well if you side with the Stormcloaks, you're siding with Talos. If you side with the Imperials, you're also siding with Talos, technically, depending on whatever the mindset of the Dragonborn is.

Of course, if you're a Vampire Lord, you can still be of good alignment, and avoid death altogether. Also, if the Dragonborn IS Talos. He's basically trolling all the Daedric Princes and just getting their pretty nice toys.

The_Jackal

2015-05-27, 11:20 PM

Someone at Bethesda REALLY doesn't like mage thieves. Skyrim has you run the risk of getting bounced from the Mages, while working for the Theives. So does Oblivion. (On the other hand, in Oblivion doing the Mages first means you can do the theives without any issue at all. Weird.)

I think it much more likely to be an attempt to visit consequences on a player that make sense within the context of the game-world.

veti

2015-05-28, 12:22 AM

...Well, that sure is something I had in the back of my head and didn't consider. Yeah, Talos worship has to be extinct, or all but, by the time Elder Scrolls VI rolls around. Why do I have to keep confirming my worst fears, I swear.

On a somewhat cheerier note: might be a chance of creating a rift between your Ancanos and your Elenwens. If Elenwen caught wind of the Eye of Magnus deal, she'd likely enough take it to the Dark Brotherhood. The end of the world does kind of limit one's opportunities to be a sadist.

Meh, Talos wasn't all that nice a guy. Bit of an egomaniac at the least. Probably a PC, in fact. If everyone in the next game only ever talks about "eight divines", I'll note it as a change, but I won't shed many bitter tears over it, because clearly the Thalmor aren't going to get the benefit they expect from that...

The Eye of Magnus plotline sets up the Psyjic Monks (they really spell it like that? seriously?) as the elephant in the room that nobody in the next game will even mention, because that'd make it too easy.

Dhavaer

2015-05-28, 01:20 AM

The Eye of Magnus plotline sets up the Psyjic Monks (they really spell it like that? seriously?)

No, they spell it 'Psijic'.

Triaxx

2015-05-28, 05:37 AM

It really annoyed me that there wasn't even an acknowledgement of that in-game. Something like, "Oh YOU'RE the Arch Mage? Imagine that. Well would you go bring me that staff and PRETEND it was stolen?" would have been a couple lines of dialog at most. If they wanted to get fancy they could ask you to order one of your Mages' Guild underlings to complain to the Guard Captain instead, but I'd have been happy with a short note in dialog. :(

Actually, the quest I was thinking of was getting the arrowhead. If you're low ranked, it's stealing and you get bounced. (And also Fathis Aren tries to murder your face off.) If you're high ranked, it's not only not stealing, but Fathis isn't bothered about you being there.

DomaDoma

2015-05-28, 06:23 AM

Calemyr

2015-05-28, 01:09 PM

Meh, Talos wasn't all that nice a guy. Bit of an egomaniac at the least. Probably a PC, in fact. If everyone in the next game only ever talks about "eight divines", I'll note it as a change, but I won't shed many bitter tears over it, because clearly the Thalmor aren't going to get the benefit they expect from that...

The Eye of Magnus plotline sets up the Psyjic Monks (they really spell it like that? seriously?) as the elephant in the room that nobody in the next game will even mention, because that'd make it too easy.

The fact that Talos is pretty much a linchpin of Nirn's continued existence, his departure would result in some fairly substantial inconvenience for all involved even if the whole plan doesn't pay off. Odds are they won't succeed in destroying him completely, and he'll just be reincarnated like (possibly) Nerevar. (That's one thing I always loved about Morrowind: Are you the Nerevarine because you achieve all the prophecies? Or are you able to achieve all the prophecies because you're the Nerevarine? Did Uriel discover the Nerevarine or create him/her? Beautiful ambiguity.)

The Psijic Monks aren't talked about in the rest of the world because they haven't officially existed for a very long time*. They just plucked their little playground in the Summerset Isles out of the world and dropped it into some extradimensional space or something like that, vanishing from the world but still keeping an eye on it. Only people with a good sense of mage history would remember the Psijics even if their name is dropped.

If the Psijic island is Shalidor's paradise from ESO, and I feel it is, then it's been missing a long time indeed as it was long lost even back then.

Triaxx

2015-05-28, 06:47 PM

I always read the Nerevarine prophecies as completing them means you are the Nerevarine, because only he/she could complete them. Therefore completing them MAKES you the Nerevarine.

veti

2015-05-28, 08:14 PM

The fact that Talos is pretty much a linchpin of Nirn's continued existence, his departure would result in some fairly substantial inconvenience for all involved even if the whole plan doesn't pay off.

Is he, though? As far as I know, that's only a theory - not even widely accepted among theologians, let alone (what passes in the ES universe for) an established law of reality.

I always read the Nerevarine prophecies as completing them means you are the Nerevarine, because only he/she could complete them. Therefore completing them MAKES you the Nerevarine.

That seems consistent with the in-game evidence, certainly.

I don't think the Nerevarine is meant to be "Nerevar reincarnated", at least as the word is normally used. The phrase used in-game is "Nerevar reborn", which is subtly different: "rebirth" is often a figurative thing, less precise than "reincarnation". I think the Nerevarine is more like "Nerevar recreated" by the combined efforts of Azura, Uriel and the PC. And arguably Vivec should get partial credit too, I always quite liked him (despite everything...).

ArlEammon

2015-05-29, 04:51 AM

Triaxx

2015-05-29, 05:24 AM

It certainly fits with the Elder Scrolls theme of making your own destiny.

My Oblivion Characters, even the Dark Brotherhood types have always been pretty nice people. Even when they were technically elves. That said, swearing away his eternal soul, and then not letting it get taken is a very Sheogorath thing to do.

DomaDoma

2015-05-29, 05:58 AM

I'm curious, since Sheogorath is the Oblivion Protagonist, is he sort of absolved of all his evilness because of saving the world previously and unwittingly become the Daedric Prince of Madness? Or is he metaphysically screwed forever?

I guess it depends on how you think the protagonist would take being Sheogorath. Me, I think mine would do poorly, especially in whatever moment of clarity made it so a finalist in a great big Westerosi free-for-all became known as "The Gibbering", and I'm still holding out an unrealistic hope that the game six protagonist will get to tell Sheogorath something along the lines of "NICE JOB SCRIBING, S'WIT."

(Wait, you're saying you killed Jeelius? Gah, some players actually do that?)

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-05-29, 05:32 PM

(Wait, you're saying you killed Jeelius? Gah, some players actually do that?)

I did; that character was villain-with-good-publicity material. I never realized how many of those Gates open until I played him; he couldn't be bothered to close them unless they were close to a city (where people would see and therefore praise him for doing so), and that--combined with very little fast travel--lead to the blasted things being every ten steps. He also took the instruction from Martin to bring back a Daedric artifact as an excuse to go and make pacts with EVERY other Daedric Prince, only to give Martin the artifact he'd already had before getting those instructions.

DomaDoma

2015-05-29, 06:35 PM

I did; that character was villain-with-good-publicity material. I never realized how many of those Gates open until I played him; he couldn't be bothered to close them unless they were close to a city (where people would see and therefore praise him for doing so), and that--combined with very little fast travel--lead to the blasted things being every ten steps. He also took the instruction from Martin to bring back a Daedric artifact as an excuse to go and make pacts with EVERY other Daedric Prince, only to give Martin the artifact he'd already had before getting those instructions.

...I won't lie, that is a pretty awesome character concept right there.

Winter_Wolf

2015-05-29, 08:36 PM

ArlEammon

2015-05-29, 08:54 PM

I know this isn't a Tech Me forum, but now Skyrim will not work at all no matter what. I've tried uninstalling mods, nothing will work. . . I've uninstalled and just re-installed. . . I verified the integrity of the game cache, and for some reason three files that it said would be revalidated, didn't.

It now says one file won't be validated. . . Mod Organizer won't work either.

veti

2015-05-29, 08:55 PM

After fixing my little issue with textures and a recent .ini mishap, I now find myself in Dawnstar for the first time with a new character. And Silus Vesuius straight up wants to murder me. I know it's a glitch or a bug of some kind and it's happened a couple times in the past but I ended up abandoning those games for reasons. Is there some way to permanently stop him going ballistic every time he sees my character's face? Google is failing me.

Not sure if this'll work, but you can try console commands:

prid 240CE
setrelationshiprank player 0

That should set him to 'neutral' towards you.

Sajiri

2015-05-29, 09:02 PM

After fixing my little issue with textures and a recent .ini mishap, I now find myself in Dawnstar for the first time with a new character. And Silus Vesuius straight up wants to murder me. I know it's a glitch or a bug of some kind and it's happened a couple times in the past but I ended up abandoning those games for reasons. Is there some way to permanently stop him going ballistic every time he sees my character's face? Google is failing me.

Not sure if it's the same bug but I've had npc's randomly want to murder me as soon as I get near, despite having no bounty or anything. I go punch a guard then pay the fine and everyone's happy

Winter_Wolf

2015-05-29, 11:15 PM

Not sure if it's the same bug but I've had npc's randomly want to murder me as soon as I get near, despite having no bounty or anything. I go punch a guard then pay the fine and everyone's happy

It worked! Gotta ask, just how did you figure that one out? When I got dumped outside the barracks I found a death hound corpse near the location where Silus tried repeatedly to kill me, and a wolf corpse in front of the inn. Guess that was just some serious vampire attack script gone wrong, but I never did find a vampire corpse in the area.

Good to know: NPCs trying to kill you for no good reason, go punch a guard in the head. Honestly I didn't expect it to work.

Sajiri

2015-05-30, 12:47 AM

It worked! Gotta ask, just how did you figure that one out? When I got dumped outside the barracks I found a death hound corpse near the location where Silus tried repeatedly to kill me, and a wolf corpse in front of the inn. Guess that was just some serious vampire attack script gone wrong, but I never did find a vampire corpse in the area.

Good to know: NPCs trying to kill you for no good reason, go punch a guard in the head. Honestly I didn't expect it to work.

I honestly dont remember how I figured that one out. I walked into the inn in whiterun and one npc kept attacking me. I went to riverwood and Hod kept attacking me, but others were fine. Since I tend to play a kleptomaniac and I get a bit spell/arrow happy in enclosed spaces I thought I MIGHT have a bounty but it didnt show it. I do remember spending a few hours trying random things til I punched a guard in the face and it worked.

Or maybe I was just mad and wanted to punch a guard in the face, and it was a happy side effect.

LibraryOgre

2015-05-30, 07:50 AM

NineThePuma

2015-05-30, 08:01 AM

Bethesda can't even make their games work right if you do different sets of quests in different orders. Now you're asking that the world state be changed globally for particular values? =V

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-05-30, 08:10 AM

...I won't lie, that is a pretty awesome character concept right there.

:smallsmile: He was kind of fun to play, too, for an evil character.

The 'good publicity' part gave me an excuse to pick up a lot of quests I would have had trouble justifying otherwise, though it did make some quests harder than they needed to be. He was a Conjuration-focused mage, but he wanted to keep it quiet that he played around with Necromancy and summoned Daedra, so those only came out if there was no one else around. This led to the rather odd circumstance of having the game get suddenly much easier for the quests where I had to leave all my NPC backup behind—because then there were no witnesses and he could unleash his true powers.

Perhaps I'm spoiled by other games (Quest for Glory did this in the 90s, people!), but I kind of wish that some of your choices from earlier games would carry over. Like, they have a default set of switches, but you could import a save game from Morrowind and it would say "Oh, the Neverarine was Telvanni? Then this happens." "Oh, you didn't do the mage's guild quests? Then this happens."

You're not the only one. :smallfrown: But between the tech differences and the existence of mods, probably not going to happen.

LibraryOgre

2015-05-30, 08:10 AM

NineThePuma

2015-05-30, 08:26 AM

Just... the bugs man. The bugs.

GloatingSwine

2015-05-30, 08:47 AM

Perhaps I'm spoiled by other games (Quest for Glory did this in the 90s, people!), but I kind of wish that some of your choices from earlier games would carry over. Like, they have a default set of switches, but you could import a save game from Morrowind and it would say "Oh, the Neverarine was Telvanni? Then this happens." "Oh, you didn't do the mage's guild quests? Then this happens."

No, they covered it in a far more metaphysical way, the concept of the Dragon Break.

Y'see all of the player choices happened, and the percieved outcome from outside that set of choices is a blend of everything that could have happened (hence all seven of Daggerfall's mutually exclusive endings being simultaneously true).

The downside is that you have to take a lot of moon sugar to realise what's actually going on.

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-05-30, 09:00 AM

The downside is that you have to take a lot of moon sugar to realise what's actually going on.

No wonder the Khajiit like it so much. :smallbiggrin:

More seriously, it will be interesting to see what happens with the Dark Brotherhood questline in Elder Scrolls VI. I expect the Emperor is going to be assassinated either way, but given the amount of plot they give for the 'join' half vs. the 'destroy' half (and the Brotherhood's popularity among the player base) they might just make the join choice canon and ignore the other possibility. :\

NineThePuma

2015-05-30, 09:07 AM

No wonder the Khajiit like it so much. :smallbiggrin:

More seriously, it will be interesting to see what happens with the Dark Brotherhood questline in Elder Scrolls VI. I expect the Emperor is going to be assassinated either way, but given the amount of plot they give for the 'join' half vs. the 'destroy' half (and the Brotherhood's popularity among the player base) they might just make the join choice canon and ignore the other possibility. :\

The destroy half is canon, Cicero found a different listener, emperor gets assassinated anyway.

Feytalist

2015-05-30, 03:38 PM

You may say I'm a dreamer... :smallwink:

But I'm not the only one :smallbiggrin:

Mass Effect did the same thing more recently, of course, but that was a more closely-connected story, and the games we releases much more closely together. I'd be willing to bet the average Skyrim player never even played Morrowind, never mind have a old save at the ready.

'course, I like the Dragon Break theory too...

NineThePuma

2015-05-30, 05:27 PM

Notably, Skyrim was /my/ first Elderscrolls game. Also notable is that it and Oblivion were on different consoles, so the back saves are much less doable.

Also also, over time, you run into the problem that Mass Effect had, where you have to trim the branches significantly. For example, Mass Effect has /details/ vary, but the end result is the same in every instance. You couldn't run off and do something random.

Forbiddenwar

2015-05-30, 05:51 PM

Time for another silly question from an elder scrolls newb. This is from someone who doesn't read guides or the wiki and just wants to play his generally good character who only steals books.

Found little boy who wanted my to kill a person running the orphanage in Rifkin. Thought I could just talk to her but after a few sentences I locked her up in a room and killed her. Some time later I went to sleep and woke up in a hut. You probably know the drill. Kill one of the NPCs and we'll let you go. My character, someone who really doesn't like being told to do anything by someone with authority, did what made perfect sense at the time. I killed the kidnapper.
Fast forward 200 game hours later I'm wondering around exploring new territory and I come across an oddly familiar shack. Inside is three bound NPCs.
I swear I spent about 10 minutes in the shack trying to figure out what was going on. It was only after stumbling across the naked body of a small human did I remember my previous actions.
My question is, is there any way to get these people home or are they just going to be bound on their knees in an abandoned hut until the end of time?

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-05-30, 05:53 PM

My question is, is there any way to get these people home or are they just going to be bound on their knees in an abandoned hut until the end of time?

Talk to them and you should get the option to release them IIRC.

Forbiddenwar

2015-05-30, 06:01 PM

Talk to them and you should get the option to release them IIRC.

Im sure I tried talking to them but there is no option to speak to them. Its probably just another bugged out quest then.

Triaxx

2015-05-30, 06:09 PM

I still am of the opinion that the best Elder Scrolls game would come from letting Bethesda go nuts with the engine, and making everything work. But turning all the writing and story creation elements over to Obsidian. I mean, just imagine TES6 with all the world design of Morrowind, with all the writing quality of Old World Blues?

Anxe

2015-05-30, 06:17 PM

I think those 3 people do just stay there forever.

NineThePuma

2015-05-30, 06:51 PM

those three people do not exist until you wake up there, and they do not exist once you leave.

ArlEammon

2015-05-30, 07:02 PM

Im sure I tried talking to them but there is no option to speak to them. Its probably just another bugged out quest then.

Use Fus Ro Dah on them. . .
sometimes using that shout fixes bugs.

Okay, so I have a question. Do the Vigilants of Stendar feel the same about Meridia worshipers?

DomaDoma

2015-05-30, 07:12 PM

Okay, so I have a question. Do the Vigilants of Stendar feel the same about Meridia worshipers?

Probably. They are all-around dim bulbs, and on my first run, I only did the Meridia quest, immediately after which I started running into them. I think you only start encountering them on the roads after you do daedric quests, right?

ArlEammon

2015-05-30, 07:13 PM

Probably. They are all-around dim bulbs, and on my first run, I only did the Meridia quest, immediately after which I started running into them. I think you only start encountering them on the roads after you do daedric quests, right?

No. You get them even if you have nothing to do with Daedric Princes.

DomaDoma

2015-05-30, 07:20 PM

No. You get them even if you have nothing to do with Daedric Princes.

This latest one, incidentally, was the Hircine quest. Which was an awesome, awesome quest, but is it too much to ask that taking the quest not wipe the coolest dead character in the game from existence? I mean, it's not like there's a paucity of dungeons to choose from...

ArlEammon

2015-05-30, 07:36 PM

This latest one, incidentally, was the Hircine quest. Which was an awesome, awesome quest, but is it too much to ask that taking the quest not wipe the coolest dead character in the game from existence? I mean, it's not like there's a paucity of dungeons to choose from...

Who? Sinding? Well, too each his own, but I consider Faralda one of the most awesome characters in the game myself.

DomaDoma

2015-05-30, 07:38 PM

Who? Sinding? Well, too each his own, but I consider Faralda one of the most awesome characters in the game myself.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Bolar%27s_Oathblade

veti

2015-05-31, 02:50 AM

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Bolar%27s_Oathblade

Cool, I never knew that.

But it seems to me that if you release a werewolf from jail, where he's waiting a richly deserved punishment, and shortly thereafter a dead body vanishes, you've got no-one to blame but yourself. He's gonna eat something, and frankly it could be a lot worse.

DomaDoma

2015-05-31, 06:03 AM

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-05-31, 08:23 AM

Which was an awesome, awesome quest, but is it too much to ask that taking the quest not wipe the coolest dead character in the game from existence? I mean, it's not like there's a paucity of dungeons to choose from...

+1 This.

As for coolest characters you actually interact with... frankly, there are a lot to choose from, but I'll go with Erandur, because he has nothing to do with the Thalmor and I can therefore count myself somewhat objective.

You realize he's a Dunmer not an Altmer right?

NineThePuma

2015-05-31, 08:32 AM

after ten days or something the place reverts to how it was before.

DomaDoma

2015-05-31, 09:25 AM

You realize he's a Dunmer not an Altmer right?

Yep. The people I scratched off on account of the Thalmor maybe affecting my judgment were Rikke, Fasendil and Balgruuf.

Landis963

2015-05-31, 10:40 AM

Re: The magically shifting cave thing: Someone could create a mod to replace the Hircine quest version with one that a) matches the original more closely and b) looks like a battle took place there. The Talos statue could have a few extra claw marks, or it could be broken, one of the mercs could have the sword on him, stuff like that.

ArlEammon

2015-05-31, 01:49 PM

They redesign the entire dungeon. No Talos shrine, nothing. It's maddening.

As for coolest characters you actually interact with... frankly, there are a lot to choose from, but I'll go with Erandur, because he has nothing to do with the Thalmor and I can therefore count myself somewhat objective.

I like Erandur to. The example of a guy who redeems himself from being what's basically a Daedric Coven/Cult of Nightmare Goddess worshipers is cool.

GungHo

2015-06-01, 10:20 AM

Bethesda can't even make their games work right if you do different sets of quests in different orders. Now you're asking that the world state be changed globally for particular values? =V

If importing saves are a problem, they could always crib from Bioware/Obsidian and have you set up some of the prior game variables as part of the prologue. They don't have to go the full on route of the DA Keep, but can even make it part of conversation options like with KOTOR2.

DomaDoma

2015-06-01, 10:27 AM

Re: Tullius' appeasement, this fic (https://www.fanfiction.net/s/10943896/1/Soldiers-Young-and-Old) offers an interesting theory. (Short, well-written and couched firmly in a Team **** This War mindset, which is why I'm linking the 'fic instead of just telling you what it has to say about Tullius. :p)

NineThePuma

2015-06-01, 03:56 PM

If importing saves are a problem, they could always crib from Bioware/Obsidian and have you set up some of the prior game variables as part of the prologue. They don't have to go the full on route of the DA Keep, but can even make it part of conversation options like with KOTOR2.

It's not that importing saves is a problem. We're left with two options for developing a game in which you import previous saves. Either nothing is assumed to be done or everything is assumed to be done but importing a save indicates your character did it.

If "nothing is assumed" then the northern half of skyrim defaults to a magically irradiated zone, if not a larger area, with all the implications thereof (potentially ending the civil war with the empire victorious by default, but it removes skyrim from the field as a united power completely). The Dark Brotherhood is essentially wiped out and on the run, nothing more than a tiny criminal sect that has been hunted to near extinction. The thieves guild (possibly just the skyrim branch, but it is strongly implied that it's the Guild across the entire continent) is dead and there are potentially a dozen competing factions vying for control of crime. The Civil War wages ever onward. Also, armageddon is slowly approaching and Dragons are running around.

Not a very pretty picture, but potentially a super fun setting in its own right. I'm not sure if it would be very Elder Scrolls to just... assume that the Dragonborn of Legend never turned up, but hey. That sounds like an awesome setting.

The OTHER default is "everything happened" and at that point... why are we importing anything? The Hero of Kvatch is assumed to have been an imperial or whatever, but his (or her) identity was consumed in the /legend/ surrounding him. The Telvanni claiming the nerevarine as One of Them and that having an impact would be interesting, but enough time has passed that they could make the claim /anyway/ and hey, maybe it's true, maybe it's not, either way it's irrelevant and it's not like the hero's around to say otherwise, so free publicity.

The key "decision points" in my mind for Skyrim are A: Civil War, and B: Join/Destroy the Dark Brotherhood. There are no other significant choices you can make with long term impa- okay, paarthenux, but you are railroaded into that decision and bethesda is NOT stupid enough to make the dragonborn follow up on it, but focusing- there's nothing that has a long term impact and leaving it vague will have lots of potential issues with potentially game changing effects.

So, assuming that you have a default of "everything happened" what are the ramifications of either point? How large scale do you expect the ramifications to be?

Now imagine all the bug testing that would have to go through flipping the switch either way and making sure all the bug testing is there.

It's not a lot, actually, but it's... a lot more than bethesda would likely bother with.

ArlEammon

2015-06-01, 04:13 PM

I know that the Dark Brotherhood is part of the setting and all, but all I have to say that Emo murdering Mafia warlock coven is, GOOD, you psychopathic souless monsters. Being raised by Falmer would be infinitely better than associating with you.

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-01, 06:16 PM

So, assuming that you have a default of "everything happened" what are the ramifications of either point? How large scale do you expect the ramifications to be?

Now imagine all the bug testing that would have to go through flipping the switch either way and making sure all the bug testing is there.

It's not a lot, actually, but it's... a lot more than bethesda would likely bother with.

Given that it would be A LOT simpler for Bethesda to just say the the war is still in progress (assuming ESVI happens within a few years of Skyrim) or have the Thalmor conquer everyone up there and wipe the history books clean afterwards (if it's longer than that)...and have Emperor Titus Mede II assassinated and just be vague about who did it...and the Greybeards are local enough (and Paarthurnax's existence secret enough) that we could probably skip hearing about Paarth's fate altogether unless the next game ALSO takes place in Skyrim...

...yeah. Still sad though. :smallfrown:

veti

2015-06-01, 06:19 PM

The key "decision points" in my mind for Skyrim are A: Civil War, and B: Join/Destroy the Dark Brotherhood. There are no other significant choices you can make with long term impa- okay, paarthenux, but you are railroaded into that decision and bethesda is NOT stupid enough to make the dragonborn follow up on it, but focusing- there's nothing that has a long term impact and leaving it vague will have lots of potential issues with potentially game changing effects.

I think you're forgetting C: Vampires with the power to blot out the sun at will.

Of the three, I think the Dark Brotherhood is the easiest to resolve. The Skyrim chapter of the Dark Brotherhood was believed to be wiped out, but it turns out that Cicero (and at least one other member) wasn't there when their hideout was raided, so they rebooted and the emperor got scragged anyway. (After all, we know that Bethesda has no problem with telling the player "neener neener, nothing you did helped anyone, wanna try again?" I feel like Charlie Brown trying to kick a football at this point.)

The Civil War doesn't lend itself to that sort of doublethink. If either side wins, they win quite quickly (the war apparently began less than a year before the start of the game), and the empire looks quite different afterwards. I can see two ways of resolving that: the next game could be either (a) concurrent with Skyrim, or (b) far enough in the future that "the empire" is relegated to history already, and nobody really cares any more. My money's on (b).

LibraryOgre

2015-06-01, 07:00 PM

I wonder how much the various guilds (Fighter's, Mage's, Theives', Dark Brotherhood, and the temples) served to maintain Imperial power.

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-01, 07:22 PM

I think you're forgetting C: Vampires with the power to blot out the sun at will.

Would anyone outside the Volkihar/Dawnguard be able to tell whose side you're on though? You can be a Vampire regardless of who you join, and I don't recall anything stopping you from having BOTH types of arrows. So it's really just 'which side did you wipe out,' and the Volkihar are Skyrim-specific (Whet-Fang was Black Marsh, I think? Not sure about Hammerfell if it ends up being there) and the Dawnguard are just starting out in Skyrim. So unless Isran wins and spreads the Dawnguard out of Skyrim for the next game (depends on how much time between the games), they can just mention the sun doing strange things and they're probably set there...

I wonder how much the various guilds (Fighter's, Mage's, Theives', Dark Brotherhood, and the temples) served to maintain Imperial power.

Mage's and Fighter's Guild, probably more than the others. Thieves' Guild...well Maven is Imperial inclined and she starts out with them in her pocket, so probably not AGAINST the Empire. Probably less for it now than when Count Umbranox was in charge. Dark Brotherhood...

...I would say only so far as the average Imperial citizen is more likely to contact them than the Morag Tong, given the Emperors they've assassinated.

NineThePuma

2015-06-01, 10:14 PM

I think you're forgetting C: Vampires with the power to blot out the sun at will.

I was ignoring the DLC deliberately, but yes.

The "best" option is that the Last Dragonborn showed up, killed Alduin, and nobody knows jack about them before they got eaten by Mora.

ArlEammon

2015-06-01, 10:39 PM

I was ignoring the DLC deliberately, but yes.

The "best" option is that the Last Dragonborn showed up, killed Alduin, and nobody knows jack about them before they got eaten by Mora.

Eh. I doubt that the Last Dragonborn is devoured by Hermaeas Mora. It could have happened and then get confirmed in Elder Scrolls VI, but the reason why I doubt it is because it would PO a lot of players. Number two, which is actually equal to number one in importance, is that this is the Elder Scrolls, while Sheogorath is an exception, many times, when a protagonist wins in the Elder Scrolls, they actually win. It's not Sanctuary, it's Tamriel. The Eternal Champion lived happily ever after and if I remember right, the Nerevarine never had a hint of meeting a horrifying fate at the end of Morrowind. (Haven't beaten Morrowind yet). I don't think I even remember what the first Elder Scrolls name is, but I don't remember their protagonists being destroyed in some way.

NineThePuma

2015-06-01, 11:00 PM

ArlEammon

2015-06-01, 11:12 PM

Mora makes long rambling statements that you /will/ be his servant and champion, whether you like it or not. The Last Dragonborn may or may not have turned into an immortal vampire in an effort to avoid dying and becoming Mora's slave, but the point I was making was that the legends are unclear.

With every hero, they've pretty much vanished off the face of the world after their game was complete. Some for no understandable reason, others for blatant ones. They're unlikely to change the trend.

It's like the Legend of Merlin saying that he had "Gone west", which was both a euphemism for dying and for someone avoiding death back in the Middle Ages. They were too great to just "shuffle off this mortal coil", so they might have did it literally, with immortality granted by the gods. Point is, with Nocturnal, maaaybe Akatosh, Talos, on the most slightest of tiny chances Magnus, but more plausibly the Psijic Monks, Hircine, Molaag Bal, Mara, Dibella, Kynareth, etceter etcetera etcetera ETCETERA (not yelling, just emphasizing for fac), among both Divines and Daedric Princes, there's no certainty that Hermaeas Mora gets his wish no matter how Xanatos-like he is.

My guess is that they do the Dragonborn's history like the Eternal Champion's or something. Or, if he is Talos like some suggest, then he's trolling all the gods, maybe not the Divines, though maybe, but certainly the Daedric Princes. Even if he snubs Meridia by keeping the sword, she just shrugs and gets what she wants anyway, all the rest of them give or somehow granted access to the Dragonborn for their weapons or other artifacts, and his soul is so entangled with everyone, if they try to figure out who the soul goes to, even Julianos and Hermaeas Mora are just going to have migraines for weeks on end trying to decide what to do.

Nocturnal herself probably won't have any access to his soul, as messed up in a web of deceit as it is, it's likely the Dragonborn fooled even Nocturnal.

veti

2015-06-02, 03:26 AM

Point is, with Nocturnal, maaaybe Akatosh, Talos, on the most slightest of tiny chances Magnus, but more plausibly the Psijic Monks, Hircine, Molaag Bal, Mara, Dibella, Kynareth, etceter etcetera etcetera ETCETERA (not yelling, just emphasizing for fac), among both Divines and Daedric Princes, there's no certainty that Hermaeas Mora gets his wish no matter how Xanatos-like he is.

Of those, Nocturnal is the only one with anything approximating a valid claim on the DB's soul. Hircine, possibly, if by some chance the DB didn't get their lycanthropy cured. (Has anyone ever not done that?) And the Night Mother, plausibly, if she's into that sort of thing. But I never gave anything that could, however optimistically, be construed as consent to serve anyone else, so they can all bite my shiny metal Skyforge Steel sword.

"Doing a god a favour because they practically begged me to" doesn't give them a permanent claim on my soul, not in my Elder Scroll anyway.

(And the Nerevarine doesn't, canonically at least, meet a horrible fate, but Morrowind - which s/he spent so much time and effort to save - did. I felt, and still feel, that was a palpable slap in the face to players of the earlier game who went on to Skyrim.)

Feytalist

2015-06-02, 04:28 AM

Of those, Nocturnal is the only one with anything approximating a valid claim on the DB's soul. Hircine, possibly, if by some chance the DB didn't get their lycanthropy cured. (Has anyone ever not done that?) And the Night Mother, plausibly, if she's into that sort of thing. But I never gave anything that could, however optimistically, be construed as consent to serve anyone else, so they can all bite my shiny metal Skyforge Steel sword.

Sithis has a claim on every member of the Dark Brotherhood's soul, if I remember the in-game dialogue correctly.

Also, yeah. All my characters are werewolves. No drawbacks, plus immunity to disease. Why wouldn't you keep it?

I seriously dislike vampirism. Annoying drawbacks, annoying facial reskin, annoying alternate form. Really, even master vampires are so wussy. Whereas playing as a werewolf in wolf form feels so visceral. That sprinting power attack takedown is really satisfying.

Winter_Wolf

2015-06-02, 08:41 AM

I'm with Feytalist.

If I bother to even get infected with lycanthropy, I tend to keep it. In Skyrim lycanthropy is a disease with literally one drawback, why would you bother to cure it unless you were seriously missing that 15% well rested bonus? How often do you actually rest in a bed in the game? My Dragonborn sleeps on his feet in armor, unless he's spending long enough puttering around his homestead that the bonus wears off anyway. For all that I could take the effect of the lover stone and be no worse off. Also there comes a point where the last thing I want is to have my skills go up faster. Game never forces you to change into a werewolf except at two scripted events, and you'll never get infected with vampire disease. My main complaint about lycanthropy is that they didn't really do as much as they could have. But then again, it's not a game about being a werewolf. And it's kind of fun to have an RP reason for mass murdering Silver Hands who otherwise seem to act like common bandits if you get to close to them anyway.

Bringing me to Aela. Man for all that I want to like her, it's just not happening. If my character goes looking for a mate, her obsession just makes her so...so...you know I don't even know the word I'm looking for here. Just unappealing. Ironically my DB was a little heartbroken that Narri (yes, that Narri) wasn't an option—I know there are mods for that, but her personality is just lost because the mods all use the generic spouse dialogues. It just seemed the most appropriate fit; convicted felon/murderhobo, hard-used cynical bar wench. Ol' Fenris was so heartbroken he abandoned his homestead at Lakeview and haunted the marshes around Windstad, started drinking heavily and working at his forge all day. He probably would have left Skyrim for Solstheim except I didn't have that DLC installed correctly and then I broke my saves with that character on account of a sorting mod which didn't work out and refused to be properly uninstalled.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-02, 09:01 AM

The Eternal Champion lived happily ever after and if I remember right, the Nerevarine never had a hint of meeting a horrifying fate at the end of Morrowind. (Haven't beaten Morrowind yet).

Dialogue in Oblivion says the Nevevarine went to Akavir.

I'm now kinda wishing that, in Oblivion, you could meet the Eternal Champion, who is kicking it on a farm or something.

ArlEammon

2015-06-02, 02:29 PM

Sithis has a claim on every member of the Dark Brotherhood's soul, if I remember the in-game dialogue correctly.

Also, yeah. All my characters are werewolves. No drawbacks, plus immunity to disease. Why wouldn't you keep it?

I seriously dislike vampirism. Annoying drawbacks, annoying facial reskin, annoying alternate form. Really, even master vampires are so wussy. Whereas playing as a werewolf in wolf form feels so visceral. That sprinting power attack takedown is really satisfying.

Really, if you have the Agent of Mara perk, and all three Magic resistance perks in the Alteration school, AND are a Breton on top of all that, it's more than worth it to be Vampire Lord.

But even if you're another species like Orc, Nord, etcetera, it's still with it with the magic resistance perks and Agent of Mara perk. You can enchant armor with anti-fire enchantments anyway, and at the level you need to be to fight Harkon, you can have enough points in enchantment for it to work. Not to mention some potions that protect you from fire anyway.

Other than that, the Vampire Lords draining spell works like a grenade/fire ball that really harms the enemy badly, and adds to your hit points. They gain Frost resistance, and thus, if your a Nord, you are almost immune to frost based spells automatically.

veti

2015-06-02, 03:34 PM

If I bother to even get infected with lycanthropy, I tend to keep it. In Skyrim lycanthropy is a disease with literally one drawback, why would you bother to cure it unless you were seriously missing that 15% well rested bonus? How often do you actually rest in a bed in the game?

Speak for yourself obviously, but I sleep in a bed most every night. (It's the simplest way to pass the time while I'm waiting for the shops to open.) And if I don't have a bed in that town, I'll go to the inn and rent a room. And it's not so much the 10% well rested bonus I miss, it's the message "your beast blood keeps you from restful sleep" that I find utterly disheartening. "Not being able to sleep properly" strikes me as a truly horrible fate.

That, and the comments you keep getting from guards about hairy ears and wet dogs. Just puts me right off.

And it's kind of fun to have an RP reason for mass murdering Silver Hands who otherwise seem to act like common bandits if you get to close to them anyway.

I'm pretty sure the SH don't show up at all until after you've joined the Companions, so arguably you're always aligned with their enemy, and you can't really blame them for getting a bit antsy when you come close to their hideout.

Bringing me to Aela. Man for all that I want to like her, it's just not happening. If my character goes looking for a mate, her obsession just makes her so...so...you know I don't even know the word I'm looking for here. Just unappealing. Ironically my DB was a little heartbroken that Narri (yes, that Narri) wasn't an option—I know there are mods for that, but her personality is just lost because the mods all use the generic spouse dialogues.

Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. Aela has a lot going for her, but she's just a bit too into the whole furry thing. And it's a crying shame that none of the tavern wenches or bards are marriable. I'm a big fan of Lynly Star-Sung, she even has a bit of backstory going for her and a chance to do her a favour, but... nothing doing.

ArlEammon

2015-06-02, 03:58 PM

NineThePuma

2015-06-02, 04:43 PM

I'm pretty sure the SH don't show up at all until after you've joined the Companions, so arguably you're always aligned with their enemy, and you can't really blame them for getting a bit antsy when you come close to their hideout. there are two generic Silver Hand Camps that you visit in the storyline, and they're silver hand camps outside the storyline too.
Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. Aela has a lot going for her, but she's just a bit too into the whole furry thing. And it's a crying shame that none of the tavern wenches or bards are marriable. I'm a big fan of Lynly Star-Sung, she even has a bit of backstory going for her and a chance to do her a favour, but... nothing doing.What's wrong with furries? :<

Winter_Wolf

2015-06-02, 08:30 PM

Speak for yourself obviously, but I sleep in a bed most every night. (It's the simplest way to pass the time while I'm waiting for the shops to open.) And if I don't have a bed in that town, I'll go to the inn and rent a room. And it's not so much the 10% well rested bonus I miss, it's the message "your beast blood keeps you from restful sleep" that I find utterly disheartening. "Not being able to sleep properly" strikes me as a truly horrible fate.

That, and the comments you keep getting from guards about hairy ears and wet dogs. Just puts me right off.

I'm pretty sure the SH don't show up at all until after you've joined the Companions, so arguably you're always aligned with their enemy, and you can't really blame them for getting a bit antsy when you come close to their hideout.

Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. Aela has a lot going for her, but she's just a bit too into the whole furry thing. And it's a crying shame that none of the tavern wenches or bards are marriable. I'm a big fan of Lynly Star-Sung, she even has a bit of backstory going for her and a chance to do her a favour, but... nothing doing.

As it happens, in real life I nine times out of ten cannot get a restful sleep, and tend to smell like a wet dog after I've been out in the rain. True, I have dogs and their smell gets on my clothes, but I like it so I'm not terribly bothered by "eau de wet dog". And actually most times in game I'm caught outdoors when night falls and whether it's true or not, I can't help but think sleeping in random bedrolls is a good way to get someone trying to stick the pointy end into my gullet.

Good call with Lynly, I usually don't stop in that neck of the woods for a drink. Been doing more though, since installing the Blackthorn mod and patrolling "my" holdings around there. And Hroki. Guess her daddy's a little overprotective or something. I think the world I was missing to describe Aela was "vindictive." I tell you what, that's one woman I wouldn't want to scorn.

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-03, 07:00 AM

The "fur coming out of your ears" comment gets kind of weird when your character is a Khajiit. :smallconfused:

I don't like Vampirism because of the constant "your blood boils in sunlight" message every time you go outside.

DigoDragon

2015-06-03, 11:33 AM

The "fur coming out of your ears" comment gets kind of weird when your character is a Khajiit. :smallconfused:

Also strange when your ears are covered (http://www.prequeladventure.com/this/story816.gif) by a hood or helmet. :smalltongue:
Guards have some real keen sight.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-03, 01:30 PM

Also strange when your ears are covered (http://www.prequeladventure.com/this/story816.gif) by a hood or helmet. :smalltongue:
Guards have some real keen sight.

Who do you think shot them in the knee, huh?

ArlEammon

2015-06-03, 02:19 PM

veti

2015-06-03, 03:21 PM

And actually most times in game I'm caught outdoors when night falls

Fortunately, innkeepers never sleep. And no-one looks twice at a stranger rolling up to the inn at 4 a.m.

Without a reservation...

ArlEammon

2015-06-03, 03:23 PM

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-03, 05:07 PM

DigoDragon

2015-06-03, 05:33 PM

Just wait until someone sends thugs after you after that someone is dead.

Happened to me... actually pretty much every time Anise gets skewered by the bandits that spawn near her cabin and I decide to grab some alchemy stuff out of her basement.

DomaDoma

2015-06-03, 05:56 PM

Urag Gro Shub, the librarian hired some thugs to "teach me a lesson", and then they proceeded attempted murder.

"You only need to teach him a lesson, but you need not kill him. Although I have no qualms about it if you do".

Hey, at least it wasn't storm atronachs. Which is what he threatens you with as the in-case-you-cross-me, IIRC.

...I really don't know why I'm so fond of Urag. But I very much am.

veti

2015-06-03, 08:19 PM

Urag Gro Shub, the librarian hired some thugs to "teach me a lesson", and then they proceeded attempted murder.

"You only need to teach him a lesson, but you need not kill him. Although I have no qualms about it if you do".

I hate that encounter. Like, you accidentally pick up a sweetroll or something (standard retail price: 5 gold), and then you're fighting for your life against three heavily armed maniacs all of whom fight to the death (theirs or yours), who must've cost a couple of grand to hire. What part of that makes any kind of sense?

Why don't they just get Farkas to come and beat me up with his fists? It'd be proportionate, and a lot cheaper in both money and lives.

Anxe

2015-06-03, 10:13 PM

ArlEammon

2015-06-03, 10:54 PM

I hate that encounter. Like, you accidentally pick up a sweetroll or something (standard retail price: 5 gold), and then you're fighting for your life against three heavily armed maniacs all of whom fight to the death (theirs or yours), who must've cost a couple of grand to hire. What part of that makes any kind of sense?

Why don't they just get Farkas to come and beat me up with his fists? It'd be proportionate, and a lot cheaper in both money and lives.

It's one of the few things that sets the Companions as being morally superior to other guilds. The College is the best, of course, partially because they have to be paranoid. Nords hate them for being dangerous, which is only partially correct. Remember that in the College, they kick you out. lol.

The Companions are literally wolves at their highest positions, man-wolves, yeah, but still wolves. They recognize that beating someone is better than murder. It's funny, or maybe creepy that you find letters demanding your injury or death from children. You wouldn't even expect it from Braith, her bullying, while not acceptable, is just shenanigans that happens during that age for some children. But you can get it from Lars, or even kids that you can adopt, before you adopt them, if I remember right.

NineThePuma

2015-06-04, 12:07 AM

The Companions are literally wolves at their highest positions, man-wolves, yeah, but still wolves. They recognize that beating someone is better than murder. It's funny, or maybe creepy that you find letters demanding your injury or death from children. You wouldn't even expect it from Braith, her bullying, while not acceptable, is just shenanigans that happens during that age for some children. But you can get it from Lars, or even kids that you can adopt, before you adopt them, if I remember right.

Wolves are actually, outside of the whole "Werewolves" thing, typically seen positively in a lot of mythologies and symbolism. Animal shapeshifters are also frequently seen positively. Kind of makes me wonder why werewolves are pretty bad.

The_Jackal

2015-06-04, 12:23 AM

Really, if you have the Agent of Mara perk, and all three Magic resistance perks in the Alteration school, AND are a Breton on top of all that, it's more than worth it to be Vampire Lord.

But even if you're another species like Orc, Nord, etcetera, it's still with it with the magic resistance perks and Agent of Mara perk. You can enchant armor with anti-fire enchantments anyway, and at the level you need to be to fight Harkon, you can have enough points in enchantment for it to work. Not to mention some potions that protect you from fire anyway.

Other than that, the Vampire Lords draining spell works like a grenade/fire ball that really harms the enemy badly, and adds to your hit points. They gain Frost resistance, and thus, if your a Nord, you are almost immune to frost based spells automatically.

Best species for Vampire is Dunmer, IMO. Directly counteracts the fire vulnerability.

DigoDragon

2015-06-04, 06:38 AM

I've always been tempted to see what happens if you just run from the hired thugs. Do they despawn if you get away from them?

The one time I tried that they kept following me until a bear mauled them.

Anxe

2015-06-04, 09:26 AM

The one time I tried that they kept following me until a bear mauled them.

I had the opportunity once where they spawned across the river at the Windhelm docks. I could've just walked back into the city and left them alone because they refused to swim across. I swam out and murdered them instead. If I hadn't... They might've found me once I exited the city's main gates, they might've stayed outside the docks forever, or they might've despawned. Or gotten eaten by bears!

AND NOW WE'LL NEVER KNOW!

DigoDragon

2015-06-04, 09:40 AM

I had the opportunity once where they spawned across the river at the Windhelm docks.

Oh that's a sweet spot right there. It's not too far from giants, mammoths and dragons to the southwest. :smallbiggrin:

Or if you're feeling particularly evil, swim across to kill one, raise it as a zombie, then swim back and them the rest fight off their undead friend.
...geez, I'm an evil Dragonborn.

veti

2015-06-04, 03:30 PM

Wolves are actually, outside of the whole "Werewolves" thing, typically seen positively in a lot of mythologies and symbolism. Animal shapeshifters are also frequently seen positively. Kind of makes me wonder why werewolves are pretty bad.

It's the Big Bad Wolf syndrome, I think. Wolves live in the wilds. They're the antithesis of civilisation, home, comfort, safety - all those things you would take very seriously, if life were as precarious as it would be for a medieval peasant. Wolves are what you use to scare children into not wandering off in the forest. (Bears they might think they could run from. But not wolves.)

Or if you're feeling particularly evil, swim across to kill one, raise it as a zombie, then swim back and them the rest fight off their undead friend.
...geez, I'm an evil Dragonborn.

Nah, cast Frenzy on them. That's evil. Especially with the collateral damage that would follow (I think hardly anyone on those docks is 'essential'...).

ArlEammon

2015-06-04, 03:34 PM

It's the Big Bad Wolf syndrome, I think. Wolves live in the wilds. They're the antithesis of civilisation, home, comfort, safety - all those things you would take very seriously, if life were as precarious as it would be for a medieval peasant. Wolves are what you use to scare children into not wandering off in the forest. (Bears they might think they could run from. But not wolves.)
.

Also, remember that in Paris, a few centuries ago, maybe just two hundred years ago, four packs of wolves invaded the streets of Paris, massacring many innocent people.

snowblizz

2015-06-05, 06:17 AM

Also, remember that in Paris, a few centuries ago, maybe just two hundred years ago, four packs of wolves invaded the streets of Paris, massacring many innocent people.

I'm sceptical to all such claims, because wolves have since millennia learnt to stay away from humans. Also, a year or so back, I saw a discussion about animal killings statistics in my country. And this is one that still today is mostly covered in vast pine forests, just to be clear. In recorded statistics from sometime late 1800s there has not been a single wolf killing, (despite what some people in the countryside would have you believe), and even house-cats outperformed bears when it came to killing humans (2-1). And no I do not know how exactly, and yes I am desperate to know how/why too.
If wolves know to stay away from humans in a country where they'd literally would have to look for them to find any I'd say it sounds a bit off that they'd run into the streets of Paris...

Finally got around to playing some Skyrim again. Started on the whole Civil War thing. Been avoiding taking sides for 51 levels now. I guess it's time. I only hope there's a third side. The Dragonborn's.:smallamused:

Anxe

2015-06-05, 12:37 PM

Link Drop!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf_of_Soissons
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolves_of_Paris

ArlEammon

2015-06-05, 03:33 PM

I'm sceptical to all such claims, because wolves have since millennia learnt to stay away from humans. Also, a year or so back, I saw a discussion about animal killings statistics in my country. And this is one that still today is mostly covered in vast pine forests, just to be clear. In recorded statistics from sometime late 1800s there has not been a single wolf killing, (despite what some people in the countryside would have you believe), and even house-cats outperformed bears when it came to killing humans (2-1). And no I do not know how exactly, and yes I am desperate to know how/why too.
If wolves know to stay away from humans in a country where they'd literally would have to look for them to find any I'd say it sounds a bit off that they'd run into the streets of Paris...

Finally got around to playing some Skyrim again. Started on the whole Civil War thing. Been avoiding taking sides for 51 levels now. I guess it's time. I only hope there's a third side. The Dragonborn's.:smallamused:

Link Drop!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolf_of_Soissons
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolves_of_Paris

@Snowblizz, Anxe, put down two links to what I was talking about, although I was really only talking about number two. Thank you Anxe.

Sajiri

2015-06-05, 04:54 PM

So my PC vs PS4 for ESO dilemma has been solved, now that I accidentally got my husband onto SWTOR the other day and he's content to play that together instead of ESO. Going to preorder it today and try to stave off buyer's remorse at spending $100 when Im not working.

Even though I have no idea which race to play, I'm so used to playing custom races in ES games, although I suppose that preordering the game at leaves gives the chance to play any race in any alliance.

Forbiddenwar

2015-06-05, 11:27 PM

Finally got around to playing some Skyrim again. Started on the whole Civil War thing. Been avoiding taking sides for 51 levels now. I guess it's time. I only hope there's a third side. The Dragonborn's.:smallamused:

Is this possible? In game or through mods? To just wipe out both armies? I tried to kill the (in character) faker dragonborn, ulfric, once. But the game wouldn't let me

mythmonster2

2015-06-06, 12:04 AM

Is this possible? In game or through mods? To just wipe out both armies? I tried to kill the (in character) faker dragonborn, ulfric, once. But the game wouldn't let me

The first thing to come to mind is the Become High King of Skyrim (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/41087/?) mod.

Triaxx

2015-06-06, 12:53 AM

Don't forget the status of wolves as livestock killers, at a time where loosing one or two sheep/cows/pigs was the difference between life and death.

snowblizz

2015-06-06, 07:24 AM

Is this possible? In game or through mods? To just wipe out both armies? I tried to kill the (in character) faker dragonborn, ulfric, once. But the game wouldn't let me

Doubt it. That's why I am hoping. It would be some awesome. Admittedly, that is kinda of a trope though ("chosen one becomes king"), but I thoroughly enjoyed when Shogun2 Fall of the Samurai gave me the option to side with the Emperor, side with the Shogun or side with myself because obviously I knew better than either how to run the country.

@Snowblizz, Anxe, put down two links to what I was talking about, although I was really only talking about number two. Thank you Anxe.
Having read the links I still actually don't *believe* in the stories. There's probably some reasonable core there, but overall, just the kind of stuff that seems OTT. They are "seriously" talking about the wolf having armour...:smallconfused:

NEO|Phyte

2015-06-06, 07:56 AM

faker dragonborn, ulfric

Wut? To my knowledge, Ulfric has never claimed to be dragonborn. He's just studied with the greybeards to learn how to Thu'um.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-06, 08:08 AM

Anxe

2015-06-06, 12:58 PM

Doubt it. That's why I am hoping. It would be some awesome. Admittedly, that is kinda of a trope though ("chosen one becomes king"), but I thoroughly enjoyed when Shogun2 Fall of the Samurai gave me the option to side with the Emperor, side with the Shogun or side with myself because obviously I knew better than either how to run the country.

Having read the links I still actually don't *believe* in the stories. There's probably some reasonable core there, but overall, just the kind of stuff that seems OTT. They are "seriously" talking about the wolf having armour...:smallconfused:

Where do they mention armor of any kind in those stories? Ah. Found it in one of the associated pages where its listed as if it were a crackpot theory. Did you check out this associated page? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wolf_attacks
Tons of documented wolf attacks going back to the 1700s. These aren't occasional things. The two we were talking about were just some of the worse ones. While the stories have mythical elements applied to them at this point, they still come from real original sources.

Regardless of the true elements in the stories, the point was that people are scared of wolves. They're seen as a menace and the reintroduction in the USA is contested today, http://www.jyi.org/issue/restoration-or-destruction-the-controversy-over-wolf-reintroduction/
Wolves are also seen as noble. Call of the Wild and the wolf being the symbol of Rome are two the more well known examples I can think of. Wolves are seen as positives in a lot of myths as was pointed out earlier, but in reality... they're terrifying.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-06, 02:31 PM

So, what are some of your favorite Oblivion spells to make?

I've become fond of my "cheap" spell... Fortify 100pt Mercantile on Self, Fortify 100pt Personality on Self, and Charm 100pt on Touch, all for 2 seconds. Lets you barter with ease.

I've also got two others... Solo Stop is a 1 second paralyze effect on Touch, while Group stop does 1 second paralyze in 10'. It interrupts whoever you hit with it, and while you don't get a second, on bit foes (like ogres), you can practically parry by stopping them mid-blow... then hitting them repeatedly with an axe.

DomaDoma

2015-06-06, 10:30 PM

I had three spells that I made my bread-and-butter whenever there was an escort mission: an extra-strong version of Heal Other, a spell called Aid to the Fray that was a ranged, not-very-focused healing spell because I swear your allies just cannot keep still if there's an enemy even remotely nearby and you'd better just buy time to get between them, and a powerful luck-boosting spell I called Martin's Chance in a fit of pique over the whole Mysterium Xarxes plan. It was a sore blow to me that custom spells were written out of Skyrim, I'll tell you.

EDIT: Oh, also a maximum-level lockpicking spell, Volanaro's Key, but that was in the postgame, so it didn't see much use.

Temotei

2015-06-07, 05:43 AM

I've mentioned some of mine before, but...

I loved Feather 100 + Fortify Speed 100 + Fortify Athletics 100 for 3 seconds. Called it Sprint or something usually. Substitute/Add in Fortify Acrobatics if you want to jump rooftops and such.

Restore Health in a small amount + Shield + any other buffs you want for 15 seconds for a short-term catch-all combat buff. I usually went with Fortify Strength and anything else I could fit in after that. Name was...Battle something. I don't remember.

The cheap spell mentioned above is basically one I made on every character except the non-city-going ones.

Same with the unlocking spell.

Drain Health was a fun one with high values for a short duration for a sort of "death touch" effect.

There were others but those are some of my staples. Note that I had a mod that raised the spellmaking caps to 300 from 100, so I ended up often having Feather 300 + Fortify Speed 300 + Fortify Athletics 300 for 3 seconds rather than only 100. Three times the fun!

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-07, 07:20 AM

The only ones I can remember offhand are three Destruction spells, one for each element (fire, frost, lightning) that increased the weakness to that element and did damage of same.

I called them Dragonfire, Dragonfrost, and Dragonthunder respectively, partially because my evil mage was setting himself up to be Martin's advisor (so of course he wanted to echo the dragon theme), and partially because starting all the spells with the letter D put them near the top of the alphabetized list, which made them easy to find. :smalltongue:

Triaxx

2015-06-07, 08:24 AM

I had a 100ft for one second Detect Life, I called Ping (as in sonar ping), that I used for locating enemies around me. Stupidly cheap, and incredibly effective at finding that one enemy you can't find to make the bloody music shut up.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-07, 11:24 AM

Oh, I forgot "Rangefinder", which was a 100' Telekinesis spell for 1 second. Good for getting Welkynd stones down, and seeing what things were at a distance.

snowblizz

2015-06-07, 12:28 PM

I forget what I called them, but the three (IIRC) Feather weight spells or some such, "Packmule" I think was one. There was some kind of limit to the number of spells of the same effect or something, I forget the details really, but I think it had something to do with the 25,50,75,100 skill point "levels".

Sajiri

2015-06-09, 04:36 AM

I picked up ESO today, I like how it makes no mention on the collectors edition box (which was the only one displayed in store) that playstation plus was needed, and I hadnt seen it mentioned anywhere. I knew I should have looked it up, but I asked about it when I went to preorder it at the store and was just told 'nope entirely free'. It wasnt until I opened up the metal box, then held the inside game case up close to my face and could read the tiiiiiiny print saying playstation plus was required =_=

At least it turns out I never used my free 2 week trial for that, so that will last me until FFXIV expansion is out, then when I get bored of that I can resub to it. It also made me finally get off my butt and unsubscribe to some other MMOs I never play anymore that were just eating up money, so I guess in the long run Im still saving money kind of.

I was excited to realise that I'd be able to get on immediately, before the US and EU folks did, but then the husband was complaining about the 15gb update lagging him so I've had to have it on pause the last few hours...guess I wont be getting on before the rest of the world does now, I know it was possible to copy PC characters over but I was hoping I'd get a good name out of it and use some of my skyrim characters' names.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-09, 09:56 AM

I think I need to get back to Skyrim... I had a dream last night of fighting a dragon.

Fates

2015-06-10, 12:54 PM

I've been playing TES II: Daggerfall on and off for the last few months and I'm coming very close to finishing the main quest. I have to say, for all it's faults, I really enjoy that game. It's got a very good atmosphere to it and it's fun and light-hearted. Well, except for the dungeons, which usually are creepy as all hell (but that's good too!). You don't really realize until you've played for a while exactly how much content the game actual has- much of which is very well hidden. I thought the witch covens were a great little easter egg, and the enchanting system is extremely fun to use (even moreso than Morrowind's was). I also just like going to the different provinces of the world and looking at the differences in background and architecture. As for the main quest itself, it's relatively enjoyable, although if you don't have a guide handy you're never going to know who to talk to. But a lot of the court intrigue is really interesting to get involved in- I especially liked working with Barenziah and co in Wayrest. Overall I would recommend the game to anyone who doesn't mind playing games that are 19 years old. As "retro" games go it's one of my favorites. Just don't expect to be leaving that dungeon any time soon.:smalltongue:

LibraryOgre

2015-06-10, 03:20 PM

I suspect I could still navigate Daggerfall's opening dungeon blindfolded... but I always ran into a problem with the letter to the King of Worms quest, where no matter what I did, the quest borked.

Fates

2015-06-11, 12:46 AM

I suspect I could still navigate Daggerfall's opening dungeon blindfolded... but I always ran into a problem with the letter to the King of Worms quest, where no matter what I did, the quest borked.

The King o' Worms doesn't send letters, he sends notes carved in unliving flesh. You might have just skipped over the message that pops up after you kill the messenger zombie?

Triaxx

2015-06-11, 04:44 AM

I struggled for weeks to get out of the opening dungeon. Ended up with a Benny Hill solution. Lure Skeleton away, then run for elevator.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-11, 08:58 AM

The King o' Worms doesn't send letters, he sends notes carved in unliving flesh. You might have just skipped over the message that pops up after you kill the messenger zombie?

It's a letter he receives. You're supposed to get it from Wayrest to his hold, and come back in less than a month. Even with Mark/Recall, I never got that quest to work.

TheEmerged

2015-06-11, 10:39 AM

As it happens, I just started Skyrim back up and I'm running with a third character. I have a decent excuse - a new desktop computer that is dramatically more powerful. Big difference this time is that I'm going to try out some heavier addons and, after I surpass 50th level & the main quest, the DLC's (never got around to putting them in the budget).

I've done a much better job of training this time than my first (the second was cheat heavy so it doesn't count). I think I've only missed training once since about 5th level. I got both 1 handed & archery to 50 using early trainers this way. I'm putting off Alchemy almost completely this time - I'll admit to "cheating" the perks for learning all formulas just by eating purely out of convenience. One other thing I'm doing differently is leaving the magic skills almost fallow - in particular, I haven't touched Conjuration this time (first time through, it was my first skill to cap and I made a lot of use of Bound weapons early on) and I'm not worrying about Alteration or the Illusion\Quiet Casting perk until later. I'm going to do the quest to unlock the master restoration trainer soon, though.

Thing is, I made the mistake of outleveling my combat skills again despite trying to watch for it this time. I just did it at a different point (I was okay until the mid-20's levelwise). I think my mistake this time was more due to splitting time between 1-handed, archery, and block than overdoing my crafting (although my smithing has hit 70 and enchanting 55, enchanting is mostly from learning recipes). I'd thought leaving Alchemy fallow would be enough to avoid that but no such luck. Maybe I should have put off Block as well until I had both 1 handed & archery to 80 or something.

One bother is that I can't find at least one of my hand-written pages of notes - the one with the location of That Cave(tm) in the northern areas with three Frost Trolls near the entrance that is perfect for Legendary\overtraining armor skill, which also had my 'favorite potions' list. A couple were just complete lifts from the UESP (like the five-effect potions that are so good for training) but I had to experiment to find my "Roadkill" potion recipes again (I could remember the Charred Skeever Hide and a few of the third ingredients but not the Mudcrab Chitin).

GloatingSwine

2015-06-11, 11:07 AM

I suspect I could still navigate Daggerfall's opening dungeon blindfolded... but I always ran into a problem with the letter to the King of Worms quest, where no matter what I did, the quest borked.

Daggerfall was notoriously broken. There are several unofficial patches on UESP which fix all manner of things in it.

IIRC at release the main quest couldn't be completed at all.

Also, some quests expire because the person you need to talk to just leaves after a certain date, including main story quests, which can stop you completing it.

Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll

2015-06-11, 11:26 AM

Daggerfall was notoriously broken. There are several unofficial patches on UESP which fix all manner of things in it.

IIRC at release the main quest couldn't be completed at all.

Also, some quests expire because the person you need to talk to just leaves after a certain date, including main story quests, which can stop you completing it.

And people complain about modern games being uncomplete at release because of the draw of day-one DLC.

GloatingSwine

2015-06-11, 07:34 PM

That's without even going into the skill list, many of which are completely useless. The way the game would occasionally pitch you into the void outside the level without warning, (bad enough that a patch had to have a button to teleport you out of the void if this happened), dungeon designs that could be impossible to navigate because they just didn't connect properly, and enemies that grew more dangerous the faster your PC was.

And a pointlessly huge map full of basically nothing but random dungeons and crap towns to never visit. Skyrim is 14 square miles, Daggerfall is 88,745.

veti

2015-06-11, 09:31 PM

Triaxx

2015-06-12, 06:24 AM

Winter_Wolf

2015-06-12, 08:33 AM

I always find it cute how after all this time, some people manage to only be on their third character. I'm something in the 30's or so. Then again, I bounce from game to game, and come back when a new character idea pops into my head.

If ya get a character that really speaks to you, then you tend to stick with it. Some of them, though, tend to rot in limbo after a while because they're just not as interesting for whatever reason. I had a dunmer early on, but there was something terribly wrong with either the game as a whole, or the particular combination of things I tried to do with that character, and that guy lasted all of five levels before those saves were completely unplayable. My Nord ranger lasted until about level 153 until I screwed up that save with a mod. That particular mod is on my permanent crap list for it, too. Then there was the argonian assassin who lasted all of ten levels at the most, and I just didn't feel it so he got the boot. Then again I think I have a pretty heavy bias toward Nords and khajiit, based on how long they last before I try a new character.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-12, 08:51 AM

I think I've mentioned this, but I think one of the things that keeps me from playing a Khajiit or Argonian is that they don't feel any different than playing a Nord or a Redguard or whatever... I don't really get the sense that I'm a cat-person or a lizard-person.

Anxe

2015-06-12, 11:31 AM

Level 153? I'm at around 120 now and I feel like I've finished all the content and played excessively. Did you get some of the larger modded content like Falskir?

Sajiri

2015-06-12, 04:49 PM

I always find it cute how after all this time, some people manage to only be on their third character. I'm something in the 30's or so. Then again, I bounce from game to game, and come back when a new character idea pops into my head.

I don't think I've ever gotten higher than around lvl 25 only because I tend to get bored of the build I'm playing, or everything becomes too easy. (I think my arcane archer might have got higher than that, but I stopped playing that one because my game was messed up and glitchy)

My current character just got to...17...last night. Only just got around to seeing the greybeards. I am sticking with the arcane archer this time, but the difference is it has perkus maximus now.

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-12, 06:16 PM

I always find it cute how after all this time, some people manage to only be on their third character. I'm something in the 30's or so. Then again, I bounce from game to game, and come back when a new character idea pops into my head.

I tend to play characters into the dirt. I've only had two so far in Skyrim (600+ hours total), and I'm on my third in Oblivion. The 'stop playing a character when I run out of things that are in-character and roll up a new one for the rest of the content' method is actually a fairly new concept for me.

Winter_Wolf

2015-06-12, 11:43 PM

Level 153? I'm at around 120 now and I feel like I've finished all the content and played excessively. Did you get some of the larger modded content like Falskir?

No, I just played him like a wandering ranger. I discovered a LOT of nooks and crannies that I had no reason to expect and just stumbled around a lot. Mostly wandering and offering to help out literally every NPC that asked, poking around in caves and ruins, just generally tramping the countryside. I've heard that Skyrim isn't so big, but they pack a LOT of stuff in there if you're willing to roam. My ranger started out as a ranger (stealth, 2H, archery, no real spell use), then after saving the world from Alduin he went to the Mage's College and distinguished himself by saving the world from Ancano, but later sort of fell in with a bad crowd in Riften and became a Nightingale and was *this close* to actually becoming the official guildmaster before the game died on me. Riften coincided with his realization that Nari wasn't ever going to be wooed away from that damned inn. Probably my most role-played character. Second most was a khajiit thief, and I translated in my head from standard dialogue to Elsweyr khajiit dialect. I think he managed to save the world, too. Then Dawnguard struck and I was at a point where Serana was mandatory, but couldn't ever keep up with my method of imitating a cliff racer/mountain goat. I'm a huge fan of traversing the overland by scaling up mountains as high as I can go and then just running/jumping as far as possible. The vistas are great.

One thing that I really enjoy about the game is that I'm STILL finding a lot of places that I didn't know about. Granted they're getting few and far between, but every character that lasts past the first few levels seems to uncover a new place. Once I got the expansions properly installed, there was a massive spike in new locations, but now I'm back where I was. I didn't do much with Solstheim yet, probably because I started fiddling around with upgrading mods and some of them I think were known to break savegames when upgraded. Also I think I broke the Dragonborn main quest by freeing the slaves at all the stones before I even tried approaching the temple. Don't do that.

NineThePuma

2015-06-13, 01:59 AM

Khajiit Speak is the best mod.

Also, it has a line when you go to the college and ask for entry, when you give the smart ass response where you go "This one must become arch mage in two weeks or this one will lose a bet." and that's just pure gold.

Triaxx

2015-06-13, 05:32 AM

I've had more than thirty, and only one character who got to level 50, because there was an achievement there, and it was back before the change to smithing to make it by value. I don't tend to fade out before level forty. Unless something breaks naturally. I've had two heavy armor users, one Orc with a mace and a shield who completely eschewed ranged weapons. The other was a Female Nord Paladin who did no wrong, and ended up wearing the Divine Aegis mod armor, because it's an awesome Ebony retexture, with an equally cool sword and shield.

Several magic users, my first being a Khajit who went from Helgen to Winterhold and only came back to help with dragons while wearing archmages robes. Mulitple High Elves with their own agendas, most of them not even bothering with the college.

Archers, thieves, rangers, hunters, even a character or two on the lamb from the law. There's almost no character type you can think, I haven't played. Except for conjuration specialists. Never have gotten the hang of them.

DigoDragon

2015-06-13, 07:43 AM

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-13, 11:25 AM

Then Dawnguard struck and I was at a point where Serana was mandatory, but couldn't ever keep up with my method of imitating a cliff racer/mountain goat.

My followers have that problem with me too. :smallbiggrin:

Khajiit Speak is the best mod.

Also, it has a line when you go to the college and ask for entry, when you give the smart ass response where you go "This one must become arch mage in two weeks or this one will lose a bet." and that's just pure gold.

XD

The_Jackal

2015-06-15, 07:44 PM

I'm at level 73 or so on my Dunmer Vampire Ninja Bacon Wizard (https://xkcd.com/856/), so I guess I fall into the 'way too high a level' camp. But I view Skyrim more as an exercise in polishing than a narrative to be completed. I'm basically ready to finish the main quest, I've just been putting it off while I do stuff like find every Standing Stone, collect Barenziah's hat, learn every Thu'um, claim every Daedric artifact, etc. I've been putting off going to Solstheim, should I do that before or after I dispose of Alduin?

Landis963

2015-06-15, 11:38 PM

Temotei

2015-06-15, 11:43 PM

Makes more sense, IMO, if you do it after. Miraak sends the assassins after you after you complete the main quest, so you have a motivation to go there.

He sends them after you very early on in the main quest, but only after you're level 25, pretty sure. I think it's when you go for the horn of Jurgen Windcaller.

Dhavaer

2015-06-15, 11:54 PM

He sends them after you very early on in the main quest, but only after you're level 25, pretty sure. I think it's when you go for the horn of Jurgen Windcaller.

They're sent after you as soon as you visit the Greybeards the first time. There's no minimum level I've ever run into.

NineThePuma

2015-06-16, 12:34 AM

25 it's guaranteed. there's a small chance of them showing up before then.

veti

2015-06-16, 06:58 AM

They're sent after you as soon as you visit the Greybeards the first time. There's no minimum level I've ever run into.

Yep, I invariably encounter them in Ivarstead when I come back down from my first trip up the mountain. May be as early as level 7 or thereabouts.

DigoDragon

2015-06-16, 07:56 AM

Yep, I invariably encounter them in Ivarstead when I come back down from my first trip up the mountain.

Their first attempt to kill me was at my front door to Proudspire Manor when I got up in the morning to do a quest. I was around level 16.

It was kind of funny to step out and there they are, like they're Miraak's Witnesses. :smalltongue:
"Have you accepted the word of Miraak today?"

Just my luck that no one passed by that alcove and saw our fight (and my character's weakness being melee). Guards didn't even show up despite that I FUS-ROH-DAH'd one of the cultists into my neighbor's door. I hid the bodies afterwards, and occasionally you can hear the kids shout "Ah, dead body!" when they're playing tag. Funny thing is when I checked on the kids the first time, they were rummaging through the cultist pockets. :smallbiggrin:

Triaxx

2015-06-16, 06:48 PM

I find it pretty hilarious that Miraak's cultists are categorically less of a threat than the hired thugs that come after me. Partially is the mod I have that boosts the armor cap to 90%, which wouldn't seem to make much difference, but it really does. Not that crossbows, or magic care in the slightest.

Anxe

2015-06-16, 09:02 PM

That's probably the mod then. The cultists were much more of a problem for me than the hired thugs.

Mando Knight

2015-06-17, 10:42 PM

So, I picked up Skyrim from the Steam Sale today, and downloaded mostly bugfix mods so far. Are there any Project Nevada-level must-have mods for Skyrim?

mythmonster2

2015-06-18, 01:34 AM

So, I picked up Skyrim from the Steam Sale today, and downloaded mostly bugfix mods so far. Are there any Project Nevada-level must-have mods for Skyrim?

Definitely grab SkyUI if you haven't already. The regular UI is... workable, but SkyUI is just so much better.

Kesnit

2015-06-18, 05:31 AM

So, I picked up Skyrim from the Steam Sale today, and downloaded mostly bugfix mods so far. Are there any Project Nevada-level must-have mods for Skyrim?

Along with the previously mentioned SkyUI, have you gotten the unofficial patches (1 for the main game and 1 for each DLC)?

At some point, you will likely want Live Another Life (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/9557/?) so you don't have to play the very long tutorial every time you start a new game.

Immersive Armors (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/19733/?) and Immersive Weapons (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/27644/?) add so many options to the game. If you get them, also snag Complete Crafting Overhaul (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/49791/?), which makes crafting armor and weapons so much better.

Helgen Reborn (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/35841/?) is supposed to be really good. I haven't played it, but my wife did and enjoyed it, and it has a lot of good reviews.

Legacy of the Dragonborn (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/52248/?) is AMAZING, thought I would recommend waiting until it comes out of beta. The author thinks updates can be made without breaking existing games, but is not 100% sure.

Run for Your Lives (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/23906/?) and When Vampires Attack (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/28235/?) will keep NPCs alive by having them run away from dragons and vampire attacks in cities. (Novel concept - run away from the fire breathing monster! :smallbiggrin:)

Stones of Barenziah Droppable Plus Quest Markers (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/14525/?). Just trust me on this.

Timing is Everything (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/38151/?) isn't as important as other mods, but is extremely useful.

Weapon and Armor Fixes Remade (http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/34093/?)

Feytalist

2015-06-18, 06:43 AM

It is entirely possible - and enjoyable - to play Skyrim with no mods at all.

Kesnit

2015-06-18, 07:36 AM

It is entirely possible - and enjoyable - to play Skyrim with no mods at all.

Well, yes. But when you've played the heck out of it on the 360 (which my wife and I both have), mods add a nice change.

Anxe

2015-06-18, 08:29 AM

I regret never getting the UI fix. I'm less sure about the bug fixes. They fix some stuff but break other stuff is what I've read. I didn't experience any serious bugs in my massive playthroushould so I'm inclined to think they're unecessary.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-18, 08:38 AM

I found Skyrim unplayable without the UI fix. I really wish cross-platform programmers would realize how obnoxious a console UI is when you're on a PC. "Why can't I click here? I can move my cursor RIGHT HERE, but when I click HERE it moves to THERE because it assumes I'm using a console despite being loaded on my PC?"

Anxe

2015-06-18, 09:46 AM

One of the most annoying ones was when you're clicking on the sub categories in the inventory. Clicking on the O in ARMOR works, but if you click on the middle of it? WOOPS! You clicked outside of the inventory so clearly you wanted to exit it!

And the strange limitation of Favorited Quick buttons to 8 numbers instead of the obvious 10 that are available.

That's about all really. I got used to it and by the time I learned about the UI fix I was more tempted to just complete the game as entirely Vanilla. Fairly certain I made the wrong decision.

GungHo

2015-06-18, 10:38 AM

I found Skyrim unplayable without the
UI fix. I really wish cross-platform programmers would realize how obnoxious a console UI is when you're on a PC. "Why can't I click here? I can move my cursor RIGHT HERE, but when I click HERE it moves to THERE because it assumes I'm using a console despite being loaded on my PC?"
Simple UX consult doesn't even cost all that much even for a multimillion-dollar program of work.

DigoDragon

2015-06-18, 10:56 AM

Clicking on the O in ARMOR works, but if you click on the middle of it? WOOPS!

That happens to me in dialogs, often resulting in the game selecting a choice other than what I wanted.
I've accidentally flipped off so many Nords. D:

Winter_Wolf

2015-06-18, 12:33 PM

That happens to me in dialogs, often resulting in the game selecting a choice other than what I wanted.
I've accidentally flipped off so many Nords. D:

Oh yes this. I ended up getting the dialogue and message box fix mods and life was SO much better after that. I was resistant to getting SkyUI myself at first, because I knew once I started to add mods, it would never end. Well it's technically ended for the most part, now I just keep updated (to a point), but mostly I'm done with anything else. Then again, I've hit my computer's limit on what's still playable and enjoyable, so I'm hovering at about 95-100 mods active. Mostly they're small and I probably could merge a few, but I like having the ability to tweak ONE thing at a time, rather than having to deal with creation kit to turn off/on that ONE thing that I'm kind of iffy about.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-18, 02:16 PM

That happens to me in dialogs, often resulting in the game selecting a choice other than what I wanted.
I've accidentally flipped off so many Nords. D:

Oh, by the Nine, the ****ing dialog! I'd forgotten the dialog!

Console controls suck horribly when you're not limited to a console's controls.

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-18, 10:30 PM

Oh, by the Nine, the ****ing dialog! I'd forgotten the dialog!

Console controls suck horribly when you're not limited to a console's controls.

+1 this. I've handed over my gold to theives I wanted to kill because of this issue, and it's even worse during dramatic quest dialog when I pick the wrong response. -_- Sure, I can load my last save and do it over, but the drama dies either way.

DigoDragon

2015-06-19, 07:39 AM

+1 this. I've handed over my gold to theives I wanted to kill because of this issue

You can hit ESC and cancel out of the dialog. Then you can murder to your heart's content! :D

Granted that's not helpful to any other dialog situation...

Feytalist

2015-06-19, 10:15 AM

The Great Wyrm

2015-06-19, 11:09 AM

Anxe

2015-06-19, 01:04 PM

I find this all very odd. I also play on the pc, without any mods (as I mentioned), and have never had any problems with inventory, dialogue or option screens.

I'm destined to be the odd one out on this particular topic, it seems.

Most of the problems come up when I use my mouse to navigate instead of my arrow keys. Which do you use?

Mobius Twist

2015-06-19, 05:24 PM

I just got Skyrim on the Steam Summer Sale.

I started my first playthough. Upon entering Riverwood, I killed a chicken.

I died almost instantly. In confusion, I looked the Riverwood Chicken up online.

Lesson: Chickens are holy creatures in Skyrim.

It's amusing how much video game logic takes over. You wouldn't really think to murder a real-life chicken in full view of its owners while passing through town and expect a bemused glance and an offer of a quest, right?

Apparently in Skyrim everyone's so sick and tired of enforcing laws that even minor theft is looked up on as a capital offense. Just so you know.

Feytalist

2015-06-20, 06:38 AM

Most of the problems come up when I use my mouse to navigate instead of my arrow keys. Which do you use?

Both, I guess. I tend to navigate the inventory and magic screens with keys, and dialogue with mouse, perk trees with mouse. No issues with either.

veti

2015-06-21, 11:21 PM

It's amusing how much video game logic takes over. You wouldn't really think to murder a real-life chicken in full view of its owners while passing through town and expect a bemused glance and an offer of a quest, right?

Apparently in Skyrim everyone's so sick and tired of enforcing laws that even minor theft is looked up on as a capital offense. Just so you know.

And that too is videogame logic. In real life, if everyone in town was whaling on me, I'd try to surrender, or failing that, run like hell. I wouldn't fight back, and if for some reason I did, I wouldn't even consider using lethal force.

It's only 40 bounty. Nobody is attacking you for killing a chicken per se, they're attacking you because you're a heavily armed stranger who's just demonstrated a total lack of respect for law and property, and if they don't stop you now, next time you'll be coming through with ebony gear and what's to say you'll stop at chickens? It's a perfectly sensible thing for them to do, IMO.

TheEmerged

2015-06-22, 12:55 PM

So, most amusing experience of my third playthrough so far?

I'm swimming from the docks in Windhelm when all the sudden the combat music starts. I initially panic and start looking for those blasted fish that attack... when I glance up and see a dragon. Oh, that's right, I just found a dragon word and the game *hates* it when you have a locked one... Anyway, climb the embankment, start killing it...

...just about the time the soul sucking commences, I suddenly get interrupted by dialog. "This is a stickup..." Oh, that's not the exact words but... yes, three bandits that just watched me slaughter a dragon are trying to rob me. It's such a cliche...

...and that's when it starts raining guards. Don't ask me how, but three or four Windhelm guards suddenly start dropping from above and taking falling damage with no explanation. Apparently they got upset at the damage, and started attacking the would be robbers. When they finished off the robbers, they adopted the "stand there and admire the dragon bones" pose & dialog.

So, dragon attacks, robbers that take on legendary superhereos, raining guards... I love Skyrim :smallamused:

LibraryOgre

2015-06-22, 04:52 PM

Nords are many things, but none would be such a coward as to stop a perfectly good robbery just because someone just single-handedly defeated and absorbed the soul of a dragon.

Winter_Wolf

2015-06-23, 12:39 PM

So, most amusing experience of my third playthrough so far? I'm swimming from the docks in Windhelm when all the sudden the combat music starts. I initially panic and start looking for those blasted fish that attack... when I glance up and see a dragon. Oh, that's right, I just found a dragon word and the game *hates* it when you have a locked one... Anyway, climb the embankment, start killing it... ...just about the time the soul sucking commences, I suddenly get interrupted by dialog. "This is a stickup..." Oh, that's not the exact words but... yes, three bandits that just watched me slaughter a dragon are trying to rob me. It's such a cliche... ...and that's when it starts raining guards. Don't ask me how, but three or four Windhelm guards suddenly start dropping from above and taking falling damage with no explanation. Apparently they got upset at the damage, and started attacking the would be robbers. When they finished off the robbers, they adopted the "stand there and admire the dragon bones" pose & dialog. So, dragon attacks, robbers that take on legendary superhereos, raining guards... I love Skyrim :smallamused: Maybe they thought it would be easier to take him since he'd be winded from fighting the dragon? Also, were all the guards male? Was it raining men? :smalltongue: There's a song from the 80s called "Raining men" for everyone who doesn't know why I'm amused.

DigoDragon

2015-06-23, 01:31 PM

Also, were all the guards male? Was it raining men?

Well, since he didn't see that coming, it must of been a... StormCloaked rain. :smallbiggrin:

LibraryOgre

2015-06-24, 07:39 AM

Maybe they thought it would be easier to take him since he'd be winded from fighting the dragon? Also, were all the guards male? Was it raining men? :smalltongue: There's a song from the 80s called "Raining men" for everyone who doesn't know why I'm amused.

Hallelujah. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5aZJBLAu1E)

TheEmerged

2015-06-24, 10:45 AM

I recall there being at least two males and one female, didn't see the fourth paratrooper too closely (I wasn't sure if it was a guard or not). So technically it was, in fact, raining men :smallwink:

Managed to find three of my final missing enchants at the same merchant - including the all important Muffle & Waterbreathing enchants, finally. Let the Enchanting grinding begin! Seriously, you ought to see the collection of petty & lesser souls & leather helms\boots I've got stored and ready for this.

I've only got a few more levels worth of training I can do on Pickpocketing without getting into the Thieves Guild - which I'm trying to hold off on this time, I did it too early on my original character (that was the main reason that character outleveled himself). I've mostly got this character back on track, I still have trouble with ambush scenarios (which arguably I should anyway) but generally combat is back to being manageable.

LibraryOgre

2015-06-24, 12:55 PM

I will say, one of the great things I decided to do for my crafting was to give my companion a Soul Trap weapon and all my empty soul gems.

Mobius Twist

2015-06-24, 01:08 PM

The game is surprisingly playable even when you eschew all manner of crafting. The purchased potions are sufficient, the money to buy them isn't exactly hard to come by (even early on) and vendor-sold armor, weapons, and rings take on a new level of importance and value.

Heck, artifact quests are suddenly awesome.

Of course, if you level only magic skills in a harsh Nord tundra, all bets are off. You're really just dooming yourself.

TheEmerged

2015-06-25, 12:39 PM

See, I'm one of those weirdos that likes the crafting aspect of games :smallcool: Figuring out how to best mix the enchants into equipment sets is as fun as actually playing the game for me, and the mingame of figuring out the best way to cap the results out almost as fun. That's why I've been stockpiling lesser\petty gems and making hoards of leather boots\helms, it's a particularly good way of doing it. The same way that one of the best ways to get early Smithy points is to hoard iron\silver ore until you get the Transmute spell and make jewelry - since your skillups are dependent on the value of the item, at the lower skill ranks you're much better off making jewelry than the "make 10000 iron daggers" approach.

Similarly, if the first & second playthroughs taught me anything it's that many of the skills are WAAAAY easier to level when you make a equipment set appropriate to the challenge. See for reference the Dragon Armor of Thievery, the Dragon Armor of Life & Death (free casting of Resto and Destro), etc etc etc. That's one reason I didn't bother with Conjuration and Illusion early on with this character (during my original run, Conjuration was my first skill to 100 and I spent a lot of early effort getting Illusion leveled for a perk I wanted).

Calemyr

2015-06-25, 12:57 PM

Put me down as another vote for crafting. I love making my own gear and melding it to my own purposes, far far more than premade gear - even if it were superior, though it never is.

To my mind, the Dovahkiin is always the founder of a new age. Everything in the game is built on ancient traditions and legendary treasures. The fact that the Dovahkiin is a god-smith that pulls forgotten arts from the history books and builds new legendary weapons and armor that put the gods to shame... That the last Dovahkiin saves the world just not through brute force and forgotten arts but also through creativity, ingenuity, and original thinking... It just really appeals to me. You sing the songs of the old days. I sing the songs of days yet to come.

Triaxx

2015-06-25, 02:14 PM

Mando Knight

2015-06-25, 03:58 PM

Agreed. Though I suppose if you're going pure wizard in Skyrim, learning when to flee becomes important. Even more than a thief, knowing when to hold your ground, when to fall back, and when to just leg it is the disctinction between life and death.

Or just buy firebolt and get impact and laugh maniacally.

For me, the Thief gameplay is mostly "when to hold your ground, when to hide again, and how to get Lydia to do the brawling for you."

Anxe

2015-06-25, 05:41 PM

On Legendary all the gameplay is about not getting hit. Bandit Leaders can kill me in one hit. Mages are terrifying until I get in close to smack em. I gotta have an immortal follower to soak up damage, but she usually goes down fast in fights. Then I've got my Dremora Lord summon to soak up damage after that. Final way of avoiding getting hit is a Paralyze enchantment on my Sword. Once I close on one enemy that enemy will never move again.

Dragon breath is also so frightening. I usually need to chug two Ultimate Healing potions if I can't get out of the blast. One potion mid blast and another at the end. That's with 600+ health.

Mods might make the game difficult, but cranking the difficulty slider up does the job too.

Mobius Twist

2015-06-25, 08:09 PM

Until I found Spellbreaker (http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Spellbreaker_%28Skyrim%29)dragon breath was a significant worry too.

Between that shield and the occasional ward spell the fly-by breathings were less of a concern. When they're on the ground and breathing you straight in the face for prolonged periods, that's still a problem. Then, some vegetable soup and constant Shield Bash is the only way out.

Anxe

2015-06-25, 10:39 PM

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-28, 04:26 PM

Question: for the Oblivion Arena, is there any questline or plot beyond 'kill things and become Champion' and 'find out about the Gray Prince's father?'

Anxe

2015-06-28, 04:45 PM

Question: for the Oblivion Arena, is there any questline or plot beyond 'kill things and become Champion' and 'find out about the Gray Prince's father?'

Does, "Kill the Adoring Fan in humorous ways," count as a quest?

LibraryOgre

2015-06-28, 06:54 PM

Question: for the Oblivion Arena, is there any questline or plot beyond 'kill things and become Champion' and 'find out about the Gray Prince's father?'

Not really.

Kareeah_Indaga

2015-06-29, 07:33 PM

Okay I guess I'll just use it as an early gold source. Thank you both. :)

TheEmerged

2015-07-01, 09:14 AM

I have to say, "amusing thing happened during\after dragon attack" is approaching trope level during this playthru.

1> I fast travel back to that farm with the lady that wants 20 jazbays when, yep, the "nature abhors a locked dragon word" trigger goes off and here comes a dragon. Thankfully I have a freshly-made, improved, and enchanted daedric sword I need to get first blood with and the dragon lands quickly so it's over almost as fast. After the dragon dies and everyone is walking away, the younger sister on the farm sighs heavily and complains about how every day is the same at this boring farm...

"Right, because a freaking creature out of this world's myths lands behind your windmill and gets killed when a DragonBorn jumps on the back of its head and sword-trusts through the skull repeated almost as often as you go to the well."

2> I'm outside of Windhelm, getting ready to hitch a ride to Solitude to start some quest chains there when, you guessed it, here comes a dragon. No bandits or raining guards this time... just a carriage driver that keeps telling me to hurry up because he doesn't have all day.

"Sorry, I realize saving your life from this ancient monstrosity is delaying your schedule but..."

This time I didn't have the locked dragon word to blame. Ah well, a bit of amusement and some additions to my "Dragon Smithing is only about 10 skillups away" collection.

RE: Spellbreaker. Heh, see, my characters usually take the next best thing - Breton who typically ends up taking those Alteration perks to raise magic resistance and/or absorption. I think the only ES game where I *wasn't* Breton was Daggerfall because of the High Elf cheat.

veti

2015-07-01, 04:00 PM

RE: Spellbreaker. Heh, see, my characters usually take the next best thing - Breton who typically ends up taking those Alteration perks to raise magic resistance and/or absorption. I think the only ES game where I *wasn't* Breton was Daggerfall because of the High Elf cheat.

Yep, a Breton with the Agent of Mara perk (power, trait? whatever) only needs to add a cheap amulet to be permanently warded better than by Spellbreaker, hands-free and without the weight. It's been my favourite race for the past three generations of Elder Scrolls.

Nords and Dunmer also each get 50% resistance to the breath of approximately half the dragons out there. Unfortunately, you can't always tell what's going to hit you before it does. (Heck, sometimes I'm still in doubt until the blast ends, and I can finally see what's happened to the ground around me.)

Anxe

2015-07-02, 11:55 AM

My character is an Imperial and the Voice of the Emperor has proved to be pretty damn useful when I want someone to just sit down and listen (or sit down and let me take their stuff). It's basically replaced a third of the Illusion spells.

DomaDoma

2015-07-02, 08:10 PM

Voice of the Emperor: the ability to evoke a preternatural reassurance in everyone around you, for the thirty seconds before someone looks you up on IMDB.

But yes, seriously useful. Was kind of disappointed that it makes your allies stand stock-still, as I first used it as a "hey, so why DON'T we reason with the Stormcloaks" in the tutorial dungeon, but even so... probably the best of the "get me out of here" species bonuses, with non-combat benefits to boot. I adore it.

Feytalist

2015-07-05, 07:50 AM

Started up Skyrim again after a couple of weeks' taking a break (I was playing Quake 1 and 2 again... shhht).

My current character is level 50 now, and I haven't even visited the whole Western part of the map at all. Everything Rorikstead and beyond is undiscovered. I just reached Falkreath. Haven't set foot on Solstheim yet, and haven't started Dawnguard either.

I've come to realise that trying to do absolutely everything in one playthrough is... counterproductive.

DigoDragon

2015-07-05, 01:24 PM

I've come to realise that trying to do absolutely everything in one playthrough is... counterproductive.

It really is, and I consider that a point in the game's favor. That I cannot just play it through once and have gotten through everything.

LibraryOgre

2015-07-06, 02:17 PM

I'm going through Oblivion, but my wife gave me a surprise: A new (to me) laptop. By the numbers, its only marginally better than my old desktop, but it's got 7 instead of Vista, twice the hard drive, and a processor that clocks in at 3 times better according to passmark... and the desktop was running everything fine.

But now I have to find the balance of mods on Oblivion, because my Oblivion run (a Redguard Woman with all of the magic skills as primary... but who mostly hits people while wearing a mix of armor) is ALMOST finished... just Shivering Isles and the Main Quest to go.

DomaDoma

2015-07-06, 04:48 PM

Never done Shivering Isles, but word on the street is that doing it before the Main Quest cuts a lot of your main-quest interactions into so many ribbons of nonsense. Do that one second.

LibraryOgre

2015-07-06, 06:11 PM

Never done Shivering Isles, but word on the street is that doing it before the Main Quest cuts a lot of your main-quest interactions into so many ribbons of nonsense. Do that one second.

It's Sheogorath's Realm. I expect it to cut things into shimmering ribbons of nonsense. ;-)

DigoDragon

2015-07-06, 09:19 PM

my wife gave me a surprise: A new (to me) laptop.

Sweet!

I never gamed on a laptop cause the screen sizes are pretty small for me. But I guess nowadays you can readily plug them into a monitor or digital TV.

LibraryOgre

2015-07-06, 09:31 PM

Sweet!

I never gamed on a laptop cause the screen sizes are pretty small for me. But I guess nowadays you can readily plug them into a monitor or digital TV.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking.

Triaxx

2015-07-09, 10:02 PM

I tend to play turn based games on my laptop, X-Com, Fallout Tactics, that sort of thing. Lots of games don't do Touchpads well.

DomaDoma

2015-07-11, 06:17 PM

It has never occurred to me until now that the mere fact of possessing a full laptop in this day and age is enough to mark me me a Filthy Elitist. I mean, I am, but it's elitism against smartphones. Consoles, I just have better things to do with my money.

Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll

2015-07-11, 07:54 PM

You mean a full desktop?

Triaxx

2015-07-12, 06:54 AM

Really? Then that means I'm also an Elitist. Awesome.

Though I also have consoles. Meh.

Yuki Akuma

2015-07-12, 07:04 AM

But now I have to find the balance of mods on Oblivion, because my Oblivion run (a Redguard Woman with all of the magic skills as primary... but who mostly hits people while wearing a mix of armor) is ALMOST finished... just Shivering Isles and the Main Quest to go.

It's so weird to me that the most effective way to play Oblivion is to pick primary skills you will never, ever use.

DomaDoma

2015-07-12, 07:47 AM

I haven't got too far in Morrowind, because every time I start it up I have to go to extreme lengths to remember where I am and what I was doing (and my most current save is wandering around Vivec, so good luck with that). But I do very much appreciate that if it's not a primary or secondary skill of yours, you just suck at it. Makes your character build an integral part of the character you are playing. Whereas the most you get in skill-based factions in the later games is one single, solitary skill check. Which, in the case of the Skyrim Thieves' Guild, you can get away with failing.

NEO|Phyte

2015-07-12, 08:32 AM

Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll

2015-07-12, 10:08 AM

I keep a list in a notebook of my current quests and quest hooks for Morrowind, to avoid having to deal with the terrible Journal.

Mando Knight

2015-07-12, 02:50 PM

Makes your character build an integral part of the character you are playing. Whereas the most you get in skill-based factions in the later games is one single, solitary skill check. Which, in the case of the Skyrim Thieves' Guild, you can get away with failing.

The Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood in Skyrim put more emphasis on their relevant skill checks than the others, though. Becoming Harbinger of the Companions just means you do a lot of fighting (which you can do with magic or Stealth Archery just as well as with Heavy Armor and your favored melee weapon skill), and becoming Archmage of Winterhold means you just need to know a handful of low-level spells (that are generally just handed to you if you don't already know them). The Dragonborn could be a straight-up Fighter or Stealth Archer and still get declared Archmage.

The Thieves Guild at least requires some kind of guile to get through the couple of no-kill theft quests before you can get to the normal dungeon-raiding ones that lead to being made Nightingale, and getting the formal promotion to Guild Master takes a little more work that's generally dependent on Stealth, Lockpick, and/or Pickpocket (the Pickpocket jobs being a really easy way to boost the skill, since it's pretty valuable stuff that you need to lift). The Dark Brotherhood similarly requires a good Stealth skill if you don't want to get caught, since you're often killing people in populated areas.