The Chat Thread (Read OP)

[Iskar]

I thought the reformed temple had returned to daedra and ancestor worship after the fall of the tribunal and recognised Azura, Boethia and Mephala as the "true tribunal"?

[Akar]

No you're thinking of Reformed Judaism, which does follow those tenants.

[Morticia Iunia Bruti]

Yeah they did. But after the Red Year the power of the Temple was broken, large parts of the population fled to Solstheim and Skyrim. The House Telvanni was nearly complete extinguished by the Argonians.

I don't know, if the now homeless Dunmer would not loss their former arrogance against other races.

At least my roleplay interpretation.

[Cookiegod]

One day the seventh house of Cookie shalt triumph. Just you wait, outlander.

[Akar]

My gods smile down on me, can you say the same?

[Flinn]

Yeah they did. But after the Red Year the power of the Temple was broken, large parts of the population fled to Solstheim and Skyrim. The House Telvanni was nearly complete extinguished by the Argonians.

I don't know, if the now homeless Dunmer would not loss their former arrogance against other races.

At least my roleplay interpretation.

IIRC they are also ghettoized in Whindhelm, aren't they?

However, on the question "Skyrim is not for RPG", I always had an opposite stance on that; I mean, of course considering the almost infinite combinations of possible character you can have considering the race, the skills, the sex and your own possible fictional background, it would be impossible for the game engine to be able to react properly to every single possible kind of character and adapt to it; they probably went too far with this? yes they probably did, considering that most of the people does not even recognize you as the Dragonborn.. but these are engine limitations, or are justified by not making it excessively burdensome.

Where I found Skyrim very great for RPG is in that it does not force you to do anything, in terms of how you act, morally speaking, so it's entirely up to you to follow up with the behavior you decided for your character. I mean, just because you can pillage Gerdur''s house at the beginning it does not mean that you have to.. I found a good balance in deciding in advance what kind of character I wanted to play, and trying every time to go for a different path (apart for the main quest of course); i.e. I had a "neutral Breton mage" who I involved in the Winterhold Academy questline, a "evil Bosmer assassin" who I involved in the Dark brotherhood etc. in total I had 6 different games, each of a minimum of 100 hours, usually much more.
Most of the other RPGs only offers you the possibility to stick with a preset character and despite them claiming things like "your choices will affect your fate", there's very little you can change, story wise; others RPGs offers you a variety of character but there's always the same main plot to follow, etc

[Iskar]

However, on the question "Skyrim is not for RPG", I always had an opposite stance on that; I mean, of course considering the almost infinite combinations of possible character you can have considering the race, the skills, the sex and your own possible fictional background, it would be impossible for the game engine to be able to react properly to every single possible kind of character and adapt to it; they probably went too far with this? yes they probably did, considering that most of the people does not even recognize you as the Dragonborn.. but these are engine limitations, or are justified by not making it excessively burdensome.

Dragon Age Inquisition manages just that, so it's not like it's impossible. Bethesda just didn't aim for it and instead dictated that you have to dislike the Thalmor, worhsip Talos and find Nords very cool.

Where I found Skyrim very great for RPG is in that it does not force you to do anything, in terms of how you act, morally speaking, so it's entirely up to you to follow up with the behavior you decided for your character. I mean, just because you can pillage Gerdur''s house at the beginning it does not mean that you have to.. I found a good balance in deciding in advance what kind of character I wanted to play, and trying every time to go for a different path (apart for the main quest of course); i.e. I had a "neutral Breton mage" who I involved in the Winterhold Academy questline, a "evil Bosmer assassin" who I involved in the Dark brotherhood etc. in total I had 6 different games, each of a minimum of 100 hours, usually much more.
Most of the other RPGs only offers you the possibility to stick with a preset character and despite them claiming things like "your choices will affect your fate", there's very little you can change, story wise; others RPGs offers you a variety of character but there's always the same main plot to follow, etc

That is true for those small things, but there is no overarching roleplay possibility. The world doesn't react to most of what you do, main and side quests aren't interlinked at all, most dialogue has no meaningful choices at all and the best they can manage are the super-weird comments of random people on your skills which they cannot possibly know about.

Yeah they did. But after the Red Year the power of the Temple was broken, large parts of the population fled to Solstheim and Skyrim. The House Telvanni was nearly complete extinguished by the Argonians.

I don't know, if the now homeless Dunmer would not loss their former arrogance against other races.

Superiority only looks like arrogance from below #telvanni

[Flinn]

Dragon Age Inquisition manages just that, so it's not like it's impossible. Bethesda just didn't aim for it and instead dictated that you have to dislike the Thalmor, worhsip Talos and find Nords very cool.

Haven't played it, only Origins and honestly the possible characters are much much less than those of Skyrim.

That is true for those small things, but there is no overarching roleplay possibility. The world doesn't react to most of what you do, main and side quests aren't interlinked at all, most dialogue has no meaningful choices at all and the best they can manage are the super-weird comments of random people on your skills which they cannot possibly know about.

Not to mention those who are entitled to bother you with their life as an adventure before they got an arrow to their knee

[Sir Adrian]

I disagree. Skyrim reacts to your choice right at the start. It wouldn't be difficult to ask you if you believe in the tribunal or just have a different line of dialogue for dunmer on Solstheim.


The problem with Skyrim is not the engine limitations, Enderal is made on literally the same engine. The problem with Skyrim and Oblivion and the Fallouts is Morrowind, or more specifically the state of Bethesda during the creation of Morrowind. Back then Bethesda was nearly bankrupt, and in an almost permanent state of crunch time, and that left a mark on Todd Howard. They managed to save themselves with Morrowind and Todd swore he would never make anybody go through that experience ever again. As a result post-Morrowind Bethesda always tries to make game with maximum public appeal with a fixed deadline without resorting to crunch time. This means that even though they plan on adding stuff in the game a lot of it has to be sacrificed due to a lack of time - example the civil war in Skyrim, or npcs reacting to the player in a meaningful manner. They add what they have to add to make the game sell and the thicker rpg stuff gets added in only if there is time left.

Take for example Fallout 4. House building mods were extremely popular in Skyrim, so they added that in F4, however they wasted so much time with that that they did not have time to actually program the quests anymore so a lot of material had to be re-written in a hurry, which is why the writing of the base game is so bad it would get 0 votes in the Scriptorium Writing Competition while the DLC is actually quite decent.

[Morticia Iunia Bruti]

@Flinn: Yeah, they are the disliked scum od Windhelm, forced to live in a Ghetto.

Bethesda just didn't aim for it and instead dictated that you have to dislike the Thalmor, worhsip Talos and find Nords very cool.

You don't need to worship Talos. You can choose the Empire instead of the Stormcloaks. If you don't care about the main quest, you even won't be hunted by the Thalmor at one point. Actually i play a character, which doesn't follow even the main quest, as i use a random start mod. But even in Vanilla you don't need to go to Riverwood.

I never ever played one Nord so far or support Ulfric's racist Nord rebellion.

But like the Thalmor? They are arrogant, openly racistic ("High Elves über allem"), religious intolerant (Thalmor-Inquisition) and intrigant ("Ulfric").

It's like complaining that you can't sympathize with Mehrune Dagon in Oblivion.

[Derc]

My Dragondude just wanted to take a nice chill trip from Whiterun to Markarth, but ended up killing a dozen bandits, venturing off in a thousand year old ruin along the way, uncovering a legendary relict, selling his soul to another Daedric Prince. But eventually he made it. First thing that greeted him in Markarth was an old man who slayed a young girl right in front of Dragondude's eyes, which then again plunged him into a plot about a cannibalistic cult. At least the Met in the inn next door was good. As were the twenty cheese wheels and that thousand year old cabbage uncovered in said ruin.

[Morticia Iunia Bruti]

The cannibalistic cult quest is fun.

[Iskar]

I disagree. Skyrim reacts to your choice right at the start. It wouldn't be difficult to ask you if you believe in the tribunal or just have a different line of dialogue for dunmer on Solstheim.


The problem with Skyrim is not the engine limitations, Enderal is made on literally the same engine. The problem with Skyrim and Oblivion and the Fallouts is Morrowind, or more specifically the state of Bethesda during the creation of Morrowind. Back then Bethesda was nearly bankrupt, and in an almost permanent state of crunch time, and that left a mark on Todd Howard. They managed to save themselves with Morrowind and Todd swore he would never make anybody go through that experience ever again. As a result post-Morrowind Bethesda always tries to make game with maximum public appeal with a fixed deadline without resorting to crunch time. This means that even though they plan on adding stuff in the game a lot of it has to be sacrificed due to a lack of time - example the civil war in Skyrim, or npcs reacting to the player in a meaningful manner. They add what they have to add to make the game sell and the thicker rpg stuff gets added in only if there is time left.

Take for example Fallout 4. House building mods were extremely popular in Skyrim, so they added that in F4, however they wasted so much time with that that they did not have time to actually program the quests anymore so a lot of material had to be re-written in a hurry, which is why the writing of the base game is so bad it would get 0 votes in the Scriptorium Writing Competition while the DLC is actually quite decent.

Sure, the engine allows for it, they just didn't do anything with it. Enderal is simply the kind of game Skyrim should have been. I have come to think of Skyrim as a mediocre Enderal overhaul mod.

[Abdülmecid I]

I think Bethesda is just aiming at increasing its customers as much as possible, no matter Howard's fragile sensitivities. Stream-lining the game is the safest way to appeal to a wider audience, as well as to reduce your expenses.

In Skyrim, I always play as a Thalmor commissar with easily adjustable moral principles. The greatest challenge was to complete all these quests without killing a single Thalmor agent. I did it with the exception of Ancano, who I revived as my thrall anyway. Fun, arrogant times. Sneaking in the embassy was easier than expected, but what I found hardest was to escape from the sewers without killing a single High Elf and, most importantly, without letting Dolphin kill any of them. We finally did it, although an over-excited member of the Thieves Guild got impaled in the process.

[Akar]

We finally did it, although an over-excited member of the Thieves Guild got impaled in the process.

Just a normal job hazard.

[Flinn]

We finally did it, although an over-excited member of the Thieves Guild got impaled in the process.

screen pls

[Abdülmecid I]

At your service:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Iskar]

He certainly did not expect the Thalmor Inquisition.

[Flinn]

What kind of naughty impaler would keep a screen of that?

Our beloved Turkish impaler, who else?

[Cookiegod]

I haven't played Enderal, but I came to severely dislike Skyrim when I finally realised what they were doing. Those A->B->A fetchquests do not add any value whatsoever to ones life, but they're really good at giving those small dopamine hits that are just about great enough to keep you playing, wasting the maximum amount of your time at the minimum cost to them. Luckily they forgot to implement the monetisation of all that screentime (which Todd Howard lamented), and trying to change that after the fact failed as well. Lucky for me I had a fixed goal in that game, and that was to get the most useless skill of the game (pickpocketing) to 100 and unlocking all the skills there, after which I robbed everyone in the city completely naked. Then I took some screenshots, saved and closed the game, and told my friends, whom I'd played it in parallel with, that I had finished the game.

"What do you mean you finished the game?!"

*shows screens*