/tgesg/ - Weekend Elder Scrolls Lore General

Comfy landscapes edition

>Tabletop/P&P RPGs
[UESRPG - P&P RPG] docs.google.com/document/d/1pTgTN2aJUoY95JtquowagfUJLL7tCQYhzJKcCAcbvio/edit?usp=sharing
[Scrollhammer - Tabletop Wargame] 1d4chan.org/wiki/Scrollhammer_2nd_Edition
Discussion in #Scrollhammer (irc.thisisnotatrueending.com (port 6667))

>Lore Resources
[The Imperial Library] imperial-library.info/
[/r/teslore] reddit.com/r/teslore/
[UESP/Lore] uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Main_Page
[Pocket Guide to the Lore] docs.google.com/document/d/1AtsWXZKVqB4Q825_SwINY6z4_9NaGknXgeOknOCDuCU/edit
[Elder Lore Podcast] elderlore.wordpress.com/
[How to Become a Lore Buff] forums.bethsoft.com/topic/1112211-how-to-become-a-lore-buff/

>General Rules
This is NOT /tesg/ minus waifus, so behave properly.
Keep the squabbling to a minimum.
No waifus/husbandos except for Vehk and Vehk

Previous kalpa:

First for Telvanni

Anybody know anything about the Land Dreugh, and where the idea for them came from in the first place?

What is everyone's favorite in-game book?

I enjoyed The Black Arrow and Immortal Blood, as well as that letter by Vivec describing what happened at red mountain

The Lusty Argonian Maid was a 11/10

Obligatory Real Barenziah.
PRICKLY PUSSY PRICK.

Made this post last thread, but nobody's really delivered.
I'd really like to hear about anyone's UESRPG campaigns.

I know you're just memeing but it's great the devs have a sense of humor and don't take their world seriously all the time. Tamriel would be pretty awful if it was just another grimdark Tolkien rip off.

Hence why I like skooma cats lots despite the whole furry thing

Right?

A Hypothetical Treachery

Was pretty cool finding it in a chest with a weak healing potion.

The Third Door is also pretty good.

Dreugh already existed as an enemy in morrowind in some regions of the sea between vvardenfell and the mainland.
Land dreugh are meant to be a point in the dreugh's lifecycle where they grow a hard exoskeleton and come onto land to mate and lay eggs. Not sure who in the team originally came up with the idea though.

What are some other funny things that they put in, I feel like there are more but I forget them.

Thanks user

Okay, convince me /tgesg/ Why should I go back to play some of the previous ES games? I actually did play Oblivion and hated it due to poorly thought out gameplay. What is the appeal of Morrowind and Daggerfall (and a lesser extent Arena).

Currently 3 sessions into a 5e game using TES as a setting.
The group has run into a settlement of khajiit farming some land east of leyawiin.
I know most of the background lore and history of the khajiit, but does anyone have any real information on how day to day khajiiti society is different to niben culture?
I've already told them that the society is agrarian, and the architecture is unique in that they live in small bowers made of bent wood and the woven discarded leaves of moonsugar cane. Any other helpers to really make them feel real?

You can check the UESP easter egg pages but off the top of my head
>eltonbrand
>falling wizards
>fat lute
>creature merchants in Morrowind
>M'Aiq
>a potion of true shot next to a toilet bucket in skyrim

I know the rest, but falling wizards?

Song of Pelinal

He's an inspiration.

Have you told them that it's indecent to show chest fur in public?

...

Joke's on you, we don't actually talk about UESRPG here. It's just an excuse to let us have a vidya thread on Veeky Forums.

consarnit

Did see one cool campaign on here, though. Was set during the great Thrassian Plague outbreak.

Wish I could find it again.

Are Alduin and Auriel shards of Akatosh or equal parts of the oversoul?

equalish parts of the Oversoul

Racial fighting styles?

>implying anyone in /tgesg/ plays UESRPG
>implying anyone on Veeky Forums actually plays tabletop games

...

>Arena
It's a decent dungeon-crawler, but it's fairly different from current TES lore-wise. Personally wouldn't recommend it over Daggerfall.
>Daggerfall
Probably the best gameplay in the series if you're into oldschool RPGs. A bit hard to start, and some skills are useless as hell, but once you minmax the fuck out of your character you're good.
>Morrowind
Amazing world, interesting characters; a game that had actual love and care put into it. Gameplay is dated but don't be a dunce and you'll figure it out.

little too generalized a question tbqh

It hurts man.

PANKRATOSWORD

I'm talking hand-to-hand, blade, axe, spear, anything. Even magical.

If that's what you mean.

...

Well see, racial fighting techniques aren't endemic to a race. It's a cultural question you are asking, and even a little more complex is an nature/nuture argument that would proceed afterward. There are inbound abilities of races, but those aren't determining factors of their own fighting style. You can be black and not steal bikes, you could be a dwarf but not a blacksmith. You could be a Dunmer and not use fire magic or use an ebony katana, etc.

Morrowind is easier to get into than Oblivion.

If it had been west of leyawiin, i would say just running the oblivion quest. that was hilarious.

I see.

In hindsight that should've been obvious. Oblivions counter-intuitive leveling angered me more than anything, almost as much as the conversation pie that relies heavily on the ugly faces of the npc's. I do mean counter-intuitive in that if you didn't level in the best way possible you would be underpowered with each level up and putting points in luck was a trap. If only I knew then what I know now. Quests were neat though.

The hero we needed.

But didn't deserve.

>Skimming the book
This looks really good.

Is this based on Runequest? It looks similar to runequest.

How does it play mechanically?

the only way to level in oblivion was to use magic. Powerleveling an altmer with the atronach sign and tons of welkynd stones is the best way.
grind the mages guild and get access to the spellmaker.
Weakness to fire on self for 3 seconds, summon skeleton 3 seconds, heal self 1 point, etc because you get the exact same level progression as high level spells. once you get to level 45, you can safely install the dlc's (because doing so from the start locks certain types of loot at level one instead of progressing with the character).
then use the frostcraig spire glitch to get into the test area, bring plenty of skooma and do the sigil stone glitch to get 40-50 of each type of transcendent sigil stones plus the mace of doom.
you may now actually start the game.

Gods speed.

or you could just cheese everything with weakness to magica 100% 2s and drain health 100pts 2 secs on a weapon

What's the best race for a knight?

Imperial.
Breton lore-wise.

Bretons have a longstanding culture of knightly orders.

Aren't they geared toward being wizards though

It differs quite a lot.
Now, I don't know how big the settlement is, but I'm just going to list of a few suggestions.

The settlement is mostly small and medium sized farms, with one or two rather big ones that are more important. There's a small village centre where you get some more secondary services as well, and which serves as a focal point for the community. In total there's maybe two or three hundred people living in the settlement and all the associated farms.

All of these related family units will be in the same clan, and most of your inhabitants will probably belong to the same few clans. In a small settlement it might just be one or two. Each clan will have its own loose leadership, with the religious and cultural head being the Clan Mother, who's the keeper of religious secrets and traditions. Could be an authority figure to introduce your players to.
Remember how important belonging to a family and a clan is. There's a word in Ta'agra which means both "landless" and "scum", which should tell you something about how Khajiit that "don't belong to anywhere" are viewed.

Yeah, see? I thought I'd ease myself in like I do with most RPGs and just play a Nord warrior. So damn basic there was no way it could fail. Except it did, I was leveling too fast with all the main skills and not really getting +5 but more like +2-4 with 3 as the average and wondering why aren't these enemies dying like they were 5 lvls ago? And why do the bandits all have elven and orcish armor so early?

If only I'd known magic was the answer, because magic is always the answer.

Most Khajiit farms are inhabited by a big family group, and nearby farms are often owned by members of the extended family. These families are way more communal than a Cyrod family would be, and things like ownership would be much less defined. The farm isn't your or mine, it's our. Likewise raising children is a communal responsibility, and adults are likely to be surrounded by and in charge of children of the same sub-breed.

A large part of the weirdness of Khajiiti life would be the fact that several of them are so incredibly different, so you'll want to think about how they address that. The believe that all their different forms have their own purposes and are of equal value. Therefore your adventurers might come to see the Khajiit as somewhat nonchalant about the whole deal. Sure, cousin Barri might not have hands and can't plant any crops, but he's a cat the size of a horse and can pull a plough much better than any bipedal Khajiit can. It's not a matter of compensation to them that their society has adapted to this, since it's the way it's meant to be, and always has been.
Treat it like it's just another mundane fact of life, because that's what it is to them.

Gameplay-wise, yeah.
If you want to roleplay, Bretons fit the role.

Lorewise Imga
You will never find a people more noble and embodying the knightly virtues as the proud and just imga

Leyawiin is in kind of a border region, but I'm going to assume your Khajiit are culturally Pellitinian.
Bipedal Khajiit wear a budi to cover their torso fur, as anything else would be indecent. The budi is a shirt or tunic that's fastened with braids on the right side, and is otherwise often striped or similarly patterned. They may be embroidered. In addition many will drape themselves in large shawls or many varieties, which will also be brightly coloured and patterned. More Bosmer-like Khajiit will have tattoos, that you could perhaps use to show clan allegiance or social/religious standing. Finally they'll want to wear any jewellery and trinkets they can practically incorporate into their dress. Even if they're poor, they'd like to show off what little they've got.

Food is sweet and desserts are relatively elaborate for common life. Make the Khajiit offer your players food or treats, it's a good way to display wealth, something southern Khajiiti culture emphasises. They'll ideally want to come across as civilised, cultured and well-off, or as close to that as they can manage.
There's some Daggerfall-era lore that says Khajiit don't like to eat in groups, so you could use that. Maybe someone's in charge or making food for the day, and then everyone just kind of eats on their own when they choose to. If your players end up accepting food from some of them, you could make the players the only ones eating.

What's your favourite race/class/playstyle across all Elder Scrolls games?

If anyone's armed, they're most likely carrying something like a scimitar, a sabre, a dagger or a bow. Armour would be something like a light fluted helm worn over cloth, and somewhat loosely fitting leather armour clad in light, lacquered scales. Avoid heavy armour.

Khajiiti religion seems to put a lot of weight on being and doing, so you could emphasise that. They don't seem to worship a lot outside of the big annual festivities, but instead there's religious undertones to daily life. It's not important to pray to the gods as much as it's important to be as the gods. Clan Mothers should act like Azurah and Mafala, hunters should act like Hircine, and mothers should act like Mara. And most of all you should live according to the Riddle'Thar, he who is as much a god as he is a concept of order. Cleverness, trickery and secrecy are cultural values as much as bravery is to Nords, so don't expect to get information like this out of them easily. Keep your players guessing. They don't need to understand, they just need to find it interesting.

So when it comes to day to day life, I'd focus on how things are communal, family/clan belonging, how "there's a cat for everything", include some Pelletinian traits, exchange obvious religion with "practical" religion, and maybe do the thing about not eating alone.

Literally just get one of the various deleveling mods floating about on the Nexus. Boom, done. Which reminds me, I need to grab a deleveling mod for Skyrim as well. I like the experience of being totally outmatched in an area, then coming back later and wiping the floor with the enemies. Actual progression is nice, whereas the "perpetual moderate challenge" thing they have going is just annoying.

Unless you're on console, then you're boned.

They have mods on consoles now

Characterise common folk as being somewhat impulsive, determined to keep up appearances, reluctant to explain or give out information, and generally more concerned with how things are rather than how they could or should be. How rather than why. That's for philosophers or Clan Mothers to come up with.

That last bit about character is based on the Ahzirr Traajijazeri, which I generally have a lot of issues with, but if you want them to feel different then I suppose it's fair game. The points about religion are also based on my personal interpretation of things, but I think it would be a good way to make them feel different to someone like a Nibenayan, who comes from a land of a thousand cults.

Well, that was a lot longer than anyone cared to read.

It's not for lack of want though. It's just that my group is already in a long-running GURPS campaign, and I'm not the DM.
And we generally run our DM's homebrew settings.

RQ was a big inspiration, but I can't comment on mechanics, I haven't gotten a chance to try the new edition.

Nord warrior tank.
Disgustingly casual, but it suits me.

Question, what's your real life ethnic heritage/ancestry?

I know it doesn't matter but humour me here

Telvanni Dunmer Wizard

Though in skyrim, since they got rid of mousewheel spell select, I tend towards a more warrior type playstyle, since pausing for menus is super boring.

Mick, Kraut, and Scot.

So American then.

...

Dunmer Witchhunter. I do one as my first character in every game. tfw no mysticism. tfw class system is dead.
Bretronach Spellsword is a close second though.

Was that a joke, or is this going somewhere?

Argonian warrior/barbarian, Focus on heavy armors, alchemy, and hitting things with a hammer.

I like to think of them like a merc for heir who isn't afraid to make it known they murder people for money.

Gotta get that moon sugar somehow right?

Argonian spear-wielding, summoning stealth archer

31/32 mix of northern European and according to my grandmother, like 1/32 black foot indian. I also have an anglo saxon family name.

Since there's so much more physics engine clutter and AI scripting than Morrowind I don't think non-instanced cities will ever return, but maybe automatic instance changes when you jump in from the outside could work, I seem to remember FO4 having something like that in one zone but I may be hallucinating

They said levitation will never be coming back. Ever. It's way too difficult to plan dungeons around.

or maybe bethesda could get good at occlusion culling and not have everything load at once, just what we're looking at

Whoa, slow down there. You're talking about things that make sense. Bethesda doesn't do that.

But the dungeons are hardly planned at all anyway, they just look good, Who cares if people cheat past encounters.

Or just throw some more ranged enemies and make levitation extremely noisy.

Bethesda should just give up making good dungeons. Skyrim has shown they're shit anyways.

Wow, why would someone bother to make a map that detailed but keep game-sized cities with *visible buildings* on the ground? I should NOT be able to clearly see the Falkreath longhouse on a map that size.

This. I like cave diving, but when 99% of them are all 8 feet tall and 16 feet wide and look exactly the same they get boring.

Why not just make it a endgame reward?
Who cares if you can skip dungeons at level 60?

why not just make it really hard to make it last a long time? 60 second levitate vs. a 1000 second levitate are two different animals.

>float thru a dungeon vs. selectively choosing to float here and there

They actually have dedicated, paid dungeon designers on staff following the release of Oblivion. I'm not kidding.

I didn't make the rules guys, I am just relaying to you what they said regarding the matter. They seemed upset that players could levitate past enemies in dungeons in Morrowind and vowed never to reinstate it again

Imperial master race. I usually go for a sneaky mage build because fuck charging into a horde of enemies like some stupid Nord.

>They actually have dedicated, paid dungeon designers on staff following the release of Oblivion. I'm not kidding.
But, they're super linear in skyrim, very good looking with some interesting nooks and crannies but exceedingly linear and with puzzles that the lore even lampshades as "Only a braindead Draugr could fail to figure out."

dont forget the fuckin loop doors at the end of each dungeon

that pissed me off so much

>Stupid Nord
>Colovians exist

They exist specifically to keep the dumber Draugr from reaching their masters en-masse and flooding them with power to reawaken.

There's books about it. Death of a Wanderer for the "These fucking doors are for babies" and "Among the Draugr" for what the lesser Draugr do to charge their masters.

>implying I'd play as a 'we wuz kangz' Colovian when the superior Nibenese exist

thats dumb tho

makes sense, but from a design standpoint, its dumb.

Were there even puzzles in Oblivion or Morrowind?

So what, the Bretons are like English with some minor Celtic nods?

In Oblivion, yes. I can't think of any off hand for Morrowind other than I think there were a couple in Tribunal; nothing is really coming to mind though.

>lol stupid nord
>c-combat?
>b-balls?

Real-life Bretons are French and Celtic, so TES Bretons are probably French-based as well.

Okay, but Brittany doesn't exist in the Elder Scrolls so why would they be French based?

Case in point, I just did Bleak Falls Barrow. The first campaign dungeon you truly do outside the tutorial. This dungeon should be great right?

No. Lore wise, this dungeon was built to keep a draugr locked up, hence the claw mechanism. That entire thing falls apart when you realize there's a lighted path in the draugr's chamber which leads to an easily opened door. Nearly every single dungeon has these quick exits, which make no sense.

Bethesda really dropped the ball with skyrim's dungeons.

A very inept baker makes a plea to the daedra for the ability to bake the best sweetroll in Tamriel.

A daedra grants him this request, but instead of making sweetrolls, they instead turn into deadly SweetTrolls.

Which daedra helped him? Sheogorath, or Clavicus Vile?