/tgesg/ - Weekend Elder Scrolls Lore General

It's pretty good. I haven't played any system other than D20 and UESRPG, so I can't really comment on that.

"It is easy to demonize those who are different. Though none will deny raids and invasions perpetrated by the Reachmen, the prejudice against them comes mostly from the differences in worship and culture between them and other Tamrielic peoples. They have been pushed from their traditional lands, relocated to poorer ground, only to be evicted from there as well once valuable minerals or metals were discovered. Their children are kidnapped from them and shipped off to Imperial schools where they are forced, in the name of “civilization,” to forget their culture, their language, and even their birthnames. Neither do their troubles end once they dress and talk like the Nords or Bretons, for, in the eyes of the Empire, their blood makes them forever a lesser, more barbarous race."

-Lady Nerevar

cmon americans, get posting already

I've been sad all day because of the low activity (I'm euro trash)

I'm working on a mod for Skyrim that introduces proper tiers to the civil war soldiers, instead of going "lol scaling good enuf". I'm trying to figure out the names for the different tiers, though.

Imperials are easy enough. Something like:
1. Imperial Auxiliary
2. Imperial Legionary
3. Imperial Veteran
4. Imperial Principes
5. Imperial Triarii
6. Imperial Draconarian

No idea what to do for the Stormcloaks, though.

I haven't tried the stormcloak side, do they have no titles at all?

Maybe animal-based titles? Fox for lowest ranks, then wolf, bear would be higher up, mammoth would be highest.

Go by the vanilla ones like Unblooded, Ice-veins and so on?

uesp.net/wiki/Morrowind:Imperial_Legion#Imperial_Legion_Ranks
Have fun

UESRPG is way to convoluted in my opinion.

>Unblooded
>Ice-Veins
>Bone-Breaker
>Snow-Hammer
>Stormblade
Those are the ranks from Skyrim for the Stormcloaks.

I think they are more titles than actual ranks

First off, the "tier" system shouldn't end up like Dremora armies in Oblivion where once you get to a certain level every single Dremora is a Valkynaz(the daedra equivalent of General).

Auxiliaries would be specialists from around the empire: some would be pushovers(healers and engineers), others not so much(archers and light cavalry).

Legionaries are the rank and file troops. In a pitched battle or siege there will always be legionaries making up the bulk of an Imperial force, they should be the most common. Veterans and would be the higher tier of legionaries for higher encounter levels/harder quests.

In Roman history, Princeps were HEAVY infantry and Triarii were pikemen(as opposed to sword & board + javelin of the rank and file). So these would be rarer alternate types of legionary.

Cyrodiil also has Knightly Orders(one per city, plus several more) which are THE elite heavy cavalry of Tamriel, there are similar orders in High Rock. Battlemages are another traditional Imperial unit drawn from the Nibenese nobility: these guys will have heavy armor too and will back it up with alteration spells.

By Draconarian do you mean Knight of the Imperial Dragon? There are several knightly titles that are granted to Imperial officers. Knight of the Imperial Dragon is a title only given to officers of Tullius' rank, or as a token of honor to the best of the best(i.e. the Hero of Kvatch).

I think that's way more interesting than le antlery nordbretons we got in Skyrim desu

I figured the one's the player gets are for officers, so I wanted to do something parallel. It'd be weird if the engine got a high roll and you run into a patrol of 3 Tribunes and a Praefect out in the middle of the woods.

I'll keep that all in mind.

What ingame books do you guys think are pretty fun reads.

I've read through A Dance in Fire and the Argonian Account multiple times, those are probably my favorites. I also enjoyed The Real Barenziah and the Lusty Argonian Maid

Tbqh, they were supposed to be more Orcish than anything.

Breathing Water

A Dance in Fire and the other books about the same guy. Also the Lessons, if only for that fucking feeling you get when you read them for the first time.

I have that one on a special self

Chimarvamidium

Yah, she always struck me as another one of those people obsessed with 'muh oppressed races.'
The Forsworn want to ethnically cleanse the Reach, but they're good guys because 'muh underdog culture.' Let's just forget that Nords have lived in the Reach since before the Reachmen were even a thing.
The majority of that quote is just blatant lies.

Stormcloaks would have a very fluid Teutonic-style command structure, as they are a Nordic army, and one from the Old Holds at that.

The ancient Norsemen that the Nords are based on gathered around both charismatic leaders and around hereditary nobility. So you would essentially have a lot of variance in how different groups of Stormcloaks are organized.

Generally the hold guards would be fyrdmen(militia), part-time soldiers.

The full-time soldiers would be the housecarls, sworn swords who would act either as bodyguards, field commanders and drill commanders(as shown in the vanilla game) or band together to form elite units of hardened killers(led by a Thane or a charismatic warlord).

You would also see Thanes commanding hold guard directly, if they have large feudal holdings or if they were assigned command of a fort or something similar.

There would be different levels of veterancy in all three "ranks" of Stormcloak, to the point where there might be an elite group who aren't housecarls. or a warlord who isn't a Thane.

There would also be many sworn brotherhoods among the Nords, shield-siblings like the Companions: these blood groups would operate as a unit, usually with improvised tactics, and would have greater loyalty to one another or to a particular lower ranking leader, than to Ulfric himself.

Nord unit types would include regular soldiers in mixed armor, both sword +board AND two handed, as well as berserkers, light cavalry, and bowmen. Magic would be less prevalent than in the Imperial Legion, and Restoration would be the most common school.

Can you give me a summary of what the fuck the Lessons are.

Unblooded is an organic rank, it means someone who hasn't fought in a battle before(so actually not an appropriate name for the player if you have already killed bandits or dragons by the time you get the quest).

The other names are oath-names, thane-names, song-names, etc., essentially the nicknames that Nords give each other that can eventually grow into titles, actual names, and in some cases family names that last thousands of years.

Unblooded and Thane are the only "ranks" you receive in that questline's dialogue.

>Vivec was a god all along
>Vivec had a portentous birth
>Vivec was Nerevar's friend and advisor
>Vivec wanted to learn about CHIM
>he turned into a chick and seduced Molag Bal
>he and Molag Bal compared their spears and there was much biting
>Vivec learned about the Wheel and the Tower
>the demon offspring of him and Molag Bal's union threatened Morrowind
>he showed up with his spear and pierced the second aperture
>he defeated them all and told Nerevar about CHIM
>[secret codes within and forbidden verses claim that he actually betrayed Nerevar and wasn't a god originally]

Mankar Camorans Commentaries, Vivec's 36 lessons, any personal letters that tell someone's life story

RottenDeadite has done some work explaining them, for what it's worth.
>inb4 reddit

newwhirlingschool.com/index.html

All of them.

It's Vivec's fantasy world designed to legitimize the Tribunal's godhood and destroy the past he left behind. It is also a guide book for the Nerevarine.

>It is also a guide book for the Nerevarine.
I feel sorry for her

thx

This bothers me because it is word for word what happened to the Native Americans. Might as well just call the Reach the Black Hills at this point. It's also annoying because they're not daedra worshippers, and the Empire has been fairly tolerant of other faiths and religions in their empire overall. Why would anyone care about differences in worship and culture, when their religion is honestly fairly similar to that of Nedic animal spirits and totems?

It's forcing an Indian parallel where there doesn't need to be one, and it takes away from the actual struggles of real Native Americans, and just makes the whole idea feel hackneyed and like an ugly copypaste job. Why not mix in some other tribal cultures in there? They don't have to be NAs - they could have some elements of Lithuanians before their conversion, or the Celtic vibe that keeps getting smashed into Bretons as a whole these days, or the Miao in China.

Hallgerd's Tale, Vernaccus and Bourlor, and The Gold Ribbon of Merit

Isn't Hallgerd's tale the one where he ends up fucking his slut-wife while wearing heavy armor?

>drugged up celtic bretonord berserkers charging down hills covered in a mountain flower salve that dulls pain and invigorates them
I'd fight it.

>tfw you can't exterminate the Reachmen

Good thing it's not canon.

She actually made a post explaining that what she writes as personal interpretations are only that.

Are blue mountain flowers supposed to be Woad?
On one hand, that makes sense since BMFs and wheat make a potion of Restore and Fortify Health, which fits in with the protection woad was supposed to bring, and it fits since Nords had Woad as a racial and Reachmen wear woad all the time.

On the other hand, I thought woad wasn't a flower but resembles something more like a weed that isn't actually blue in color.

Yeah, I know. That's why I'm pointing out that there's no real reason to be upset at some suburban white americlap confusing Gauls/Celts with Native Americlaps.

Woad is indeed a flower, pic related, but the dye is made from the dried leaves rather than the flower themselves.

And you get the dye to stick to the fabric by using a base and fermented piss!

I love chemistry!

>fermented piss
>nords literally wear piss and shit

I wish I could organize and store stuff like this, but I still have yet to get a house from the Redoran in my game.

Yes.

Always use protection.

You can pretty much live anywhere you want in Morrowind. I always claim Velas' Manor in Godsreach after kiling him.

"This is real lore, debate me"

Really? I never thought about killing anyone for a home, especially since most homes already come well-stocked and decorated.

You kill him in a quest

I used to RP buying any house. I'd bribe the NPC owner a ton of times to represent paying them, and then use the console to disable the NPC (that way they could be brought back immediately if need be),

There was also command like "set owner" that removed ownership of everything in the cell.

>There was also command like "set owner" that removed ownership of everything in the cell.
I can't believe I've never heard of this before now, it would have made shit so much easier.

is zenimax even trying?

Man, I should have put points into Speechcraft, but I had too many other really important skills to add. Turns out a personality bonus from my sign doesn't help much in getting people to see my way.

I honestly like Oblivion's system best. There was still a bribe, but the minigame was more capped by your speech skill than hampered by it.

Oblivion had a couple neat additions, I really liked (c) casting system especially.

Magic were always memes and words. Why do you think it's called a spell?

I'm actually really ambivalent about Oblivion's speechcraft.

On the plus side it's quick, easy and intuitive. It's decently balanced relative to your character's skill and Personality stats (unlike lockpicking).

On the minus side, it's nonsensical from a narrative point of view. Persuading someone does not consist of alternately joking, boasting, complimenting and intimidating in quick succession. It makes no sense at all and I get sick of hearing the speech clips for it. Honestly I think they should have kept this system more abstract.

Yeah, magic was much improved. Hugely in fact, in both convenience and game power. In MW it was the warrior types who were the easiest characters to play. In OB it's the magic-users, who I think are even better than stealth archers.

Not all magick is mythopoeia.

>youtube.com/watch?v=Z4-rpANruo4

It all ends up there in the end though. What you can do with magic is limited by what ideas were included.

All ideas are memes and therefor all magic known to anyone or anything are memes.

Don't necessarily have to kill anybody.

If you're hanging with the Redoran for instance, you may have done this quest in Ald'ruhn already that involves a dude owing lots of merchants money, when you complete it he devotes his life to the temple and hands over his house and stuff to the temple. He leaves, but no temple people or anything show up, so it's ripe for player use.

I like anything that touches on cosmology and history.

I dislike all the rambling stories where the author has disregarded correct TES naming conventions. This isn't DnD. Standards should be maintained.

>the lusty argonian meme

entry level

my characters always carry a copy with them on their adventures

The question was about what I considered fun and The Lusty Argonian maid is still pretty fun. Everything from the author to the actual story, and the implications of it being preformer as a play makes it a rather amusing piece of ingame literature. It's a shame that we never got to see any other of Curio's plays.

I'd also like to see the contents of the rest of the play, the part you can read in-game is supposed to just be one scene.

The only problem I have with Morrowind's system (and let's not even get into Skyrim's) is that it seems rather random. Sure, it's based on skill, but you have to work and even savescum to get bribes and compliments and taunts to work at all, instead of getting ignored.

Half the reason I even bother with the main quest is reputation points for free disposition

Skyrim 2 confirmed, remastered for consoles.

watching E3 too
still no Todd yet

>Skyrim remastered is coming October to Xbox One, PC, and PlayStation 4
wake me up
can't wake up inside

Ashland character and their virtual native lands come together in such a way to justify the destruction of a Native cultural identity by pushing Indianness to the boundaries of virtual space, perhaps out of the Morrowind’s constructed logos, out of Euro-American acknowledgement. On a whole, it is difficult for the Euro-American consciousness to create an Indianness that is both consumable or exotic, and easily ignored, but once completed, a Euro-American logos can easily appropriate and dissolve Native cultural identities for various purposes.

The Ashlands and their inhabitants exist as a convenient signifier of Indianness in order to achieve these purposes. Peculiarly, out of the four Ashlands tribes, only two exist in regions characteristically Ashlands.Cut in half, the other two tribes reside in Morrowind’s “Grazelands,” a region of Morrowind with larger stretches of grassland and few trees. Although tribes in the Grazelands boarder Ashland territory closely, as a fictitious indigenous group, Bethesda designers could have easily called the tribes the “Grazelanders” since the creation of Ashlanders did not exist in previous Elder Scrolls games. Therefore, their association with “ash” signifies a post-apocalyptic Indianness, justifying the Indian identity as it exists within the ashes of its own culture or way of life.

Skyrim, now with more Fogg Howard that makes it look better apparently

Didn't they already remaster it a while ago? Even then, fans have been taking care of that for a while.

Oh shit no not this again

No TES: VI yet, then.

Disappointment.

Well that was a complete waste of time.

They get their name from the fact that they are nomads that migrate frequently through the ashlands.
And Ashlanders don't strictly live in Vvardenfell.

We did get something though.

Remember the paper that was released listing thing that couldn't be said? One of the things was Fallout Nuka World.

Another thing on that list was Project Greenheart.

Valenwood confirmed.

fair point, though I personally think Valenwood by itself is too small compared to the previous games. Some kind of conbination of Valenwood with Elsweyr or Summerset, or ideally all three, is what I'm hoping for.

...

Small is good, it lets them focus more on the story and game play than building the actual world.

Also, Skyrim remastered is free for anyone who already has all the DLC on PC. Hopefully they've fixed bugs and shit by this point.

>Oblivion where once you get to a certain level
This.

When I'm level 50 or whatever, I want to be leagues stronger than a bandit, not fighting bandits decked out in glass or ebony armor.

>I personally think Valenwood by itself is too small compared to the previous games
You do realize they can scale these worlds as large as they please, right?

That might be for the best. And there's not an ebin release date, so the fact that they haven't announced it is good, since that just means more time for development.
This might effect mods, though. I just hope my PC can handle it and not burst into flames like with Fallout 4.

If there's one thing Fallout 4 did right, it's how the world doesn't scale to you. Intelligence is still the most important stat, since it means you can get into the deeper parts faster without having to worry about optimization.

>Skyrim remastered is free for anyone who already has all the DLC on PC
Time to buy Hearthfire

Just download a couple of mods and forget it was ever announced.

Bethesda's developer culture isn't really like that. I doubt that they'll have addressed the causes of the original version's biggest memory leaks. My most realistic hope is that they'll improve cell loading and have better LOD stuff. Maybe they're sitting on super high-quality art assets? I doubt they'll match up with the best texture modders out there, though.

My dream, though, would be for them to acquire the Unofficial Patches. The gulf between them and the last official patch is unbelievable.

>spoiler
My nigga