I got to agree with Freddo, most of the stories are crap.

Havik: your story has some lore problems despite you trying to leave it vague. It's also just...boring.

Scow2 is to be commended for doing the one thing that needed to be done before we could even consider writing a story: He outlined what a TES story needed. Kudos to you!

Many of the stories that have been presented are actually variations of "Farmer gets village pillaged and stuff happens." BATW!

@Umbrage: Your plot in post 78 has serious lore problems, dictates aspects of character background, violates SI plot, and other things.

who has submitted stories so far?

I don't think I see the lore problems you do in Havik's story, Darth... My complaint against it is that it tries to be too similar to Daggerfall's plot... While Daggerfall possibly had the most awesome handling of a Main Quest in the TES series, it's not a good idea to just recycle the plot.

The most any Sandbox game should have is an easily-skipped (Either through option or mods) Justified Tutorial to introduce new players into the game before giving them access to the entire world to play around in. I don't need the game to make me play out the time my Khajiit Acrobat broke into the local Palace and stole the virtue of the King's most beautiful daughter...

And any story that forces your character to be from the province involved in the game (Even worse a specific town in said province!) automatically fails at everything that can be failed at in videogame storytelling design for The Elder Scrolls.

Got to agree with you there. IT is very similar, but the vagueness just makes it boring.

The whole idea of using a god to advance the plot is also silly. In Daggerfall you slowly uncovered the real crap that was about to hit the fan, but havik throws in a god to advance the plot.

It's not deus ex machina. My suggestion is no worse than Oblivion's use of a "god" to move the plot forward. This all occurs in act I and is an introduction of the final important character to the plot - the "god". It's actually Mephala pretending to be an Aedra, summoning the main character to be her version of Mankar Camoran through deception. The relic was a test, to find a mortal that could be used. It is a MacGuffin in the sense that it moves the plot forward until you reach the second act, much like the "papers" in Casablanca. The pawns in Mephala's game are the warlord with his ruthless hunt for unity, the sage with his adamant sense of stasis and the player character with his or her action. In the end, the player learns that to stop the troubles that are occuring on Tamriel they simply have to stop themselves. I was considering the thief/scolar another aspect of Mephala.

I don't really want to write a novel here, this is a bare bones summary with motivations left out because I know jack about lore.

Edit: I think the big difference between deus ex machina and a god as a character are summed up in the involvement of the character in the plot and their motivations. While I haven't provided you the motivations (because I don't know the lore), I have at least involved the character in the plot (although I left that intentionally vague as it was a plot twist, although I tried to imply that with subtext).

Although I've never been able to play Daggerfall's main quest (despite playing Daggerfall), it's good to know that I've just reiterated the plot.

MY MAIN QUEST: Very Long, but PLEASE read it.


If V is set in Skyrim, I would love the chance to be able to visit the ruins of Saarthal. For a main quest, you could have the other cities of Skyrim getting pissed at Winterhold for refusing to allow people within the ruins. As the player, you could play the leaders of the cities against each other, or work more courier/adventurer style jobs for them until you can finally get into Sartaal. This would be the end of the first third of the main quest. With Saarthal open to the player, unique Fighters/Mages/Thieves Guild and miscellanous quests could open up that involve the ruins of Saarthal. On a little jaunt into Saarthal (have this be optional. The main quest could end for the player on the opening of Saarthal) the player could discover a note, a book, maybe a special shield in Ysgramor's throne room that matches the heraldric device of one of the leaders of a city. You could bring this item to said ruler and this would start the second third of the MQ.

With the second third, the quests involved in it could relate to getting more information on the family backround for the leader of the city. This would involve trips to Saarthal, and the inclusion of a new, shadowy Nordic cult devoted to Ysgramor. These guys would try to either win you to their side to provide all artifacts from Saarthal to them, or choose to kill you if you continue to work for the leader of the city. Once you stumble upon a new artifact, removing it could cause a new section of Saarthal to open up (like removing a book in a bookcase to reveal a secret passage way). This new part would eventually lead to an altar to Shor. Since the leader of the city is connected to the artifact that opens up this new area, he/she would like to see the altar to Shor very much. Escort the leader to it. The crazy Ysgramor cult attacks, driving you off and taking the leader hostage; planning on using him as a sacrafice to Shor, in a insane attempt to bring back the glory of Saarthal. Second third ends here.

Last third of the MQ would involve working with the Priestess of Lorkhan, the ruler of Whiterun (WHO EXISTS IN LORE HUZZAH MY BROTHER AND SISTERS!!!!). She would help you go through numerous trials that prove you to Shor (actually her, because Lorkhan is sorta incapacitated). These quests would involve things like testing your courage, strength, wisdom; all in very suitable, medieval romance errant quests. These quests would eventually lead to you delving into that most awesome of dungeons, the Labyrinthian, and retrieving what Shalidor called Glamoril, the Secret of Life (WHICH ALSO EXISTS IN LORE, HOORAY!!!!). When you take this back to the Priestess of Shor, she would reveal herself to be the shadow leader of the Ysgramor cult. With the leader of the city as a sacrafice, and the Glamoril, she plans on resureccting the city of Saarthal. In a scripted sequence, she blows you away and dissapears from Whiterun. Naturally, you would make your way to Winterhold (which sits on top of the ruins of Saarthal if you haven't got that yet). There, you would find certain parts of the city in chaos, with the cult and the guards doing battle in the streets. Unique Fighters/Mages/Thieves Guild and miscellanous quests could open from the leaders of these factions and citizens/guardsmen of Winterhold. Doing these optional quests would net you major rewards, maybe including a companion or two :winkwink:.

The main quest, however, would continue in Winterhold's palace, where you would have to inform the leader of Winterhold about the cults intent. Acting swiftly, he orders you to go down into Saarthal again and clean up the cult. You do this, arrving in time to mess up the ritual. You kill the Priestess of Lorkhan, free the leader of the city. Unforunately, you failed to stop the Priestess from using the Glamoril. The Glamoril raises a section of the ruins of Saarthal just outside Winterhold. These ruins are filled with the undead forms of ancient Atmorans. With the leader of the city in tow, you go back to the leader of Winterhold and he orders you to investigate the risen ruins. You do so, but are driven back when you come face-to-face against the undead form of Ysgramor. You defeat him, but are ejected from Saarthal anyway because the Glamoril now acting on it's own, acts as a soul to the undead Ysgramor (so you are kicked out of the ruins by a sorta ghost of the Glamoril). A shield forms around Saarthal, preventing further access. When you are outside the risen ruins, you meet with the ghost of the Priestess of Lorkhan, who advises you to travel to High Hrothgar and procure from the Greybeards a tool that was entrusted to them by the last of Ysgramor's line.

New optional Mages Guild and miscellanous quests would open for High Hrothgar. For the Mages, it would involve trying to deduce how the Greybeard are so powerful, getting an artifact from them for study. Anyway; Going to High Hrothgar, you meet with a represenative from the Greybeards, who listens to what you have to say. He agrees, and you do maybe two or three quests for him to secure the Ysgramor artifact, which turns out to be nothing more than a hammer and four nails. You are visted again by the ghost of the Priestess, who tells you to use the hammer to pound the nails into the shield around Saarthal. You do so, and a gap opens in the shield. You would then need to return to the leader of Winterhold, for he gives you something that would shield you from the Glamoril, the Dwemer shield Spell-Breaker. Armed with this shield, you go to face the Glamoril spirit again. Instead of trying to kill you outright, it gives you the chance to become one with it. If you accept the chance to join it, you would be tasked with going and murdering the leader of the city and the leader of Winterhold. Doing so would allow the rest of Saarthal to be raised up. The city would still be filled with undead though.

If you choose to fight, you do so. If you prevail, you go back to the leader of Winterhold and are given the title of Thane, and the rulership of a tract of land that you can make a small town out of (this would be a sorta epilouge quest). The risen ruins of Saarthal, where you fought the Glamoril, would be the newest location for those optional unquie quests for the guilds. And thus the main quest ends. People all over Skyrim will be like "you rock". You get a chance to build up your own town and become a lord (with these scripts, great mods could be made that expand the town, and the cities if someone wanted to take the time, greatly).

Great idea Verlox... almost makes me want to revisit my own MQ idea to flesh out. I love how you have the world and guilds expand as the MQ unfolds, as well. However, it does seem to suffer at least a mild version of Oblivion and Morrowind's main quests that require you to "Do these things in this order, be played as a fool, and triumph with the game's hand firmly bolted to your muzzle nose."

What stops an acrobat-thief from "acquiring entry" to the Ruins without anyone's endorsment of your own. Unless that is an option taken into consideration with similar ramifications. It would also be nice if there were ways to refuse what could be seen as traps by sufficiently intuitive/cognizant characters/players. No Tribunal-style idiot plots please.

Yeah it's pretty good. I had to read up on the Shor religion in Skyrim when I wrote my story a couple pages back, but yeah for the most part it reminded me a lot of Shadows of Undrentide for Neverwinter Nights which brought back a lot of memories lol.

Cause then it wouldn't be a real plot. It would be a list of events you can ignore entirely in favour of skipping ahead. It's alright to ignore the MQ, but to be able to skip through loads of it doesn't sit well with me. Of course, there SHOULD be numerous paths that branch off at a certain point that takes into account what kind of character you are playing. Playing a hard-bitten mercenary with no scruples? Threaten and coerce your way into the ruins or into getting the cult to stand down. Roleplaying this enterprising acrobat you speak of? As soon as you find out that the ruins are actually there, and...eliminate obstacles in your path to get there.

But there are just some things you have to do. It would be stupid otherwise.

@verlox, great plot, but I'm a little confused as to why the ghost of the priestess would be helping the player if the player murdered her

I'm still trying to puzzle out why I put that their to begin with. It's an old post from a different thread, and I do believe I am missing a piece. Which could explain it. Oh well, it doesn't really have to be the priestess. You could change it to a member in the Mages Guild, or maybe some dude in the wilds of Skyrim.

True, at best, in here we might find a few plot summaries that could provide good bases for story ideas. If you want inspiration for the writing in a story that could actually work as the main quest for an Elder Scrolls game, you need something a bit more than a forum post. If Bethesda wants to look for inspiration, they would be better off looking to works of fiction that are considered great (But not Lord of the Rings, while I won't deny that it was a good story, there's already far too many fantasy writers copying everything Tolkien did, despite the fact that most of it wasn't original to begin with, he just inspired the popular perception of many fantasy concepts we see in fiction now.) Taking inspiration from other people's work is fine (though blatently ripping off their ideas is not so good.) but if you're going to look for inspiration, you should find the best source you can.



I have to agree with this. The truth is that, as nice as options are in a game that boasts freedom as a selling point, as long as the game still tries to tell a fictional story, and for the sake of narrative, it's sometimes necessary to force the player to do things that you could conceivably think of ways around, because it's boring if the hero just says "Screw destiny!" and walks up to the villian and stabs him until he dies, skipping over everything that would have happened to reach that final encounter, not to mention it makes for a rather short story. Some games manage to provide logical reasons for forcing choices on you (Like Bioshock, for example, .) but sometimes, that's not really an option. Sometimes, you just have to accept that the game is going to force a few choices on you, even if had you been given the chance to choose, you might have ignored them.



If you try to avert the "save the world" story, you'll probably run into one of the other also very often used story archetypes, not to mention sometimes the options you can use with story archetypes become somewhat limited by the genre a story takes place in, save the world stories are so common in high fantasy because they work in the genre. You won't see a high fantasy game, movie, book, or TV show built around something mundane, like say... a boy looking for his missing dog, because that's COMPLETELY MISSING THE POINT of the genre, unless of course that mundane task just provides your character motivation to get into something much more complex.

Saving the world is merely a basic story structure authors like to use, there are a lot of ways you can approach it. Who saves the world? From what threat? How? Why? Depending on the answers to those questions, and possibly a few more, you can get a wide variety of different stories. Maybe it turns out that whatever threat you're supposed to save the world from is actually a kindly old man who just wants to make the world a peaceful place where everyone can live happily ever after and just has a really extreme way of realizing his goals, or maybe the antagonist is your typical evil overlord who wants to rule the world, maybe the real threat is a guy named http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MikeNelsonDestroyerOfWorlds, a story would be nothing without its antagonist. As far as deciding who the hero is or his own personal motives, in the Elder Scrolls series, that's left up to the player to choose, but you still have to decide how the hero saves the world, Of course, to get the point of this story type, it doesn't necessarily have to be saving the world, it can also be saving a country for something slightly less epic, or a province. Ultimately, if you're looking for mundane stories, you're looking in completely the wrong genre. That's not what high fantasy is about, it's about fantastic tales that we can never hope to experience on our own, the impossible made plausible. This doesn't mean that it doesn't have an element of reality in it, of course, having something in the story that is similar to the world and life we know helps us to better connect to characters in a fantastical setting. Even characters in fantasy still need to deal with things like eating, sleeping, money, and such (though oddly enough, the occassional need to relieve oneself never seems to be adressed.) While fantasy characters do have to deal with problems the audience is likely to face, this is just there to help to make them characters you can relate to instead of just plot devices which happen to be given names and a humanoid appearance. The central story is still killing the tyrant, restoring the rightful king to throne, fighting off a demonic menace, or whatever other potential plot the story could have.

Of course, there are other basic goals a fantasy story can use aside from saving the world, it's just one of the options, and a popular one. In any case, don't expect your fantasy to revolve around normal people living normal, peaceful lives.



This is true, while having the character living a normal life might sound like a good idea on paper, as it allows a work to establish that before the character got into whatever events the story involved, he lived a life you or I might live if we lived in the same world, audiences are also more likely to care about the character's hometown being destroyed or his parents being killed if you actually got to know what those characters were like before their death. But if a story takes too long to actually get to the real point, audiences may start to get bored, which is why if a story begins like this, the event that sets off the actual story likely happens before the end of the frist chapter, if this part isn't just put in a prologue. Take Fallout 3 for example, it starts out relatively mundane aside from the bit about how the world was devastated by nuclear war and you've lived all your life in a high-tech futuristic underground vault. It shows how you were born and your mother (Who you probably don't care at all since hearing her voice in this sequence was all you ever got to know of her before she died.) then the story fast forwards through your character growing up in the vault, stoping on a few important occasions that serve both to introduce you to life in the vault and some of the people you share it with as well as provide tutorial and character creation functions, then on your 19th year your father leaves without telling you where he went or why and things start to get troublesome, forcing you to leave the vault into the radioactive wasteland full of mutants, raiders and other dangers.

I would say Morrowind had a pretty good way of beginning the main quest, once you get off the boat, you're given orders that will lead you to the main quest, but it's very easy to ignore them if you so choose, and even if you choose to report to Caius immediately, he will suggest you should go get some training, establish a cover identity, and such before you start doing quests for him. In this way, the game gives you a clear direction at the start, but doesn't force the main quest on you too much. And should also be noted that Caius doesn't immediately tell you what your actual goal is, he just sends you on errands to collect information on the Nerevarine Prophecies and House Dagoth so things have a bit of time to build up before getting into the epic fantasy whelm (Though genre savvy players will likely not be at all surprised when they learn that the player character is supposed to fulfill the Nerevarine prophecies. The general rule of fantasy is that if a prophecy is ever mentioned, it's going to become relavent to the plot, and odds are that it either foretells the coming of a hero who will turn out to be the protagonist, or it foretells some sort of horrible event you have to stop. Either way, if there's a prophecy, you have an important role to play in it. But that's beside the point.) essentially, it was clear what you should do if you wanted to pursue the main quest, but the game didn't try to pretend that there was any sense of urgency at the start. Oblivion fell into the trap of constantly telling you that you need to waste no time and do this or that immediately. However, whereas the game tries to imply a sense of urgency, it isn't reflected in the gameplay. You can take as long as you want to go to take the Amulet of Kings to Jauffre, and in every other quest. The gates of Oblivion won't open unless you actually pursue the main quest. Implying a sense of urgency has its value in the narrtive department as it can help to build tension (Though as with Morrowind's prophecy plot, where this will lead is probaly somewhat predictable to experienced audiences, it may become predictable, as fans know that the heroes will either be just in time if it's near the end of the story and the time has come to wrap up the central conflict, or, if it's still too early in the story to have the villian be defeated, effect the heroes to fail to get there in time, but survive, possibly with the sacrifice of some other character, and they have to spend the rest of the story cleaning up whatever mess their failure caused.



I entirely agree, aside from my previous bit about the genre naturally lending itself to more epic plots, the main quest of the Elder Scrolls series has always been about that as well, it's even in the title. If your story is going to be in an Elder Scroll, it must be something pretty major. If this sort of thing bothers you, then don't do the main quest, if even having a main quest in a game at all that involves this sort of thing bothers you, then you're playing the wrong game.



No one said good vs evil stories can't be good, sure, it's a very simple way to approach questions of morality, and it's used a lot, but sometimes, simple has its own virtues, and while I like originality in stories, even I must admit that sometimes ideas are used a lot because they work. And sometimes, great stories can be made by taking what at first seems to be a fairly simple, and possibly quite overused idea, and take a complicated, unique approach to it.

More importantly, though, "short summaries without any sort of depth" has nothing to do with not being good vs evil, it's more a problem of the posted stories mostly not going in-depth enough to make full length stories.



I seem to be saying it a lot in this post, but once again, I agree. Being able to create any character you like is a major appeal of the Elder Scrolls series, without having and background forced on you. Your character is whoever you want. Defining where your character comes from would go against that part. The story should not force any background on you.

So, you call Oblivion's story generic, then come up with about the most generic story ever?

You realize 'your' idea was stolen from every other fantasy novel in existence?

i still think it is better than oblivion's story, which is what the thread is about. its not about whether you like it or not.

and i dont see your story anywhere

and my story is an idea, needs much fleshing out, probably would take some time to work out the bugs, as im sure all tes games did.

besides, no body's perfect

so, good day, sir

Wait, where you trying to come up with the most generic story possible or trying to come up with a better one?

NOTE: This is not a actual story suggestion but about the story MECHANICS so I hope this still counts for this thread (if not I'll move it to general).


Writing a STORY is easy, writing a story for a game is not, writing one for a open world sandbox game is damn hard.

You have to consider, a normal story is something that moves on a set pace like when reading a book, your reading speed has nothing to do with how fast the story itself progresses. For a game it's much more difficult because you can influence the pace and you can't have too long drawn out points in between. And it can't be all story since that barely allows interaction.

For a sandbox game it's even harder, especially one where all NPCs and plot tokens are there already and can't just disappear between missions. It can happen that you kill NPCs, a plot token becomes missing or you do things you weren't meant to do till a certain point in time.

Morrowind showed some problems here and there, it was easily possible to kill important NPCs far before you knew they where important or take plot tokens away getting them lost forever (or at least so lost you couldn't find them anymore).
Oblivion didn't handle it TOO much better sadly, plot important NPCs where immortal and even had a special symbol, this kinda gave away plot points and you couldn't drop quest items. Though it did that a bit too blunt, instead of plain out saying “you can't drop quest items” it could have said “I have a feeling this might be important, I should hold onto it”, still a bit cheesy but less immersion breaking.

Anyway, onto the story. I actually don't have a suggestion for a story itself but I have one how the story could be done a way it fits better into a open world setting without restricting you too much.

First off it would not be one solid line of quests but several smaller lines that branch off now and then and have different “entry points”. This means a decision leads to a different line of quests since the outcome of the previous one was different. They can still run into a bottleneck here and there, however this should only bring them back together and not force all lines into exactly the same branch again.
With this method you can have the storyline actually differ depending on your decisions without having to write a completely new storyline every time.

The other thing is “entry points” for the story parts. The usual problem is “quest giving NPC is dead” which means that quest can't be started and the story can't continue. Well what it needs there is a different entry point, you can still look through that NPCs stuff and maybe find notes on something, those could give you a different starting point for that quest. So you don't instantly get the mission “Go there and do this” but “There's something written about this place, maybe I should go check it out”.
Sure you can't always have a convenient note lying around but you can still find other NPCs who might have informations and, if nothing else, you can find a entry point purely by accident as well.
So basically instead of saying “If NPC X is dead you can't continue” or “NPC X simply can't be killed at all” try to find an alternative way to start and complete that mission, try to find at least ONE.
And again the branching storyline, if there is a point where a NPC was absolutely essential to continue and he's dead then have the storyline branch at that point. After all there are a lot of story points where a NPC is needed but, in the end, it could have gone just as well without him.
For example, in Morrowind if Caius Cosades died early in the game you could still use his notes to continue or receive letters from a superior that tell you what to do. That or the story could have simply branched out and sent you directly to the temple.
Hell this could have even worked for Oblivion if Martin died early. If he died in Kvatch you could still go back to Jauffre who might have a “plan B” at hand. And hell even if HE was dead early there could have been ways, ask around the temple, maybe break into the elder scrolls chambers (again ) and ask the scrolls directly.
They did have the right idea with the “backup path” in Morrowind, though it was very hidden and unclear but it was the right idea.
Also this allows “non combat” paths for a storyline, hell imagine you could finish Oblivion purely by playing a character using speechcraft skills? It wouldn't be the same path but go along the same storyline.

And on lost quest items, here's a point where the quest compass can come in useful. You CAN drop and also sell quest items, however once you had one of them in your possession you can always find it again. While you can still say “It's immersion breaking to always know where something is you once held in your hands” it's far less than it saying “QUEST ITEM!!! DON'T DROP!!!” and less annoying than loosing it forever due to a mistake.
Plus the marker for it would NOT always be there, it would only appear as soon as that quest is started and you DID once have it already, think of it more as an emergency “find it again” backup.


PS: Here's a example how http://img229.imageshack.us/img229/3010/branchingstorylinesmorr.gif
The core elements in each path are Dagoth Ur and the Heart, while there ARE a few problems here and there this example is more of how it COULD have worked. Also not all single quests of a path are described but more it's central points.

Unlike you, I don't pretend to be able to do in 5 minutes what Beth took years to do.

Your story shows little understanding of the divines, directly violates the plot of Shivering Isles, assumes far too much about the COC and the PC, and why did you post if you didn't want to get a critique? Oblivion's plot on the other hand has its basis in the events of previous games, and in fact, the events of Oblivion would not be possible had it not been for the Nerevarine. While Oblivion definitely had problems with delivery, it is still a good, solid plot.

@Daniel, those are good points. Having multiple entry points would be a lot better, but there is a question of how much more development time and resources would be needed to do such a thing justice.

Careful, Darth. You might upset the fanbois.

I have to agree, though. If OB's story was given to us better, and changed around in a few spots, it would have been quite good.

I think it's worth the effort at least to a degree, otherwise you either have immortal NPCs all over again or can screw up your game by pinching someone.
If you don't have a severaly branching storyline at LEAST have a way to play certain quests a different way.

Also, while i don't like bringing up that point it IS important here, Replay value. You can play through the game a completely different way, most of all one that's actually FITTING for your character. Try playing Morrowind or Oblivion as a Trader or Diplomat using no lethal force. Impossible because the story actually demands you to kill.

again Daniel, you bring up some good points, my concern is that, if you go for the level of complexity involved in the branching pathways link you provided, there would be a very large and cumbersome amount of development time devoted alternate means of completing the MQ. Its a great idea, but I wouldn't want Beth to devote too much of their resources to things that aren't part of the narrative their trying to tell. Possible system:


<.>
<.>
<.>
<.>

Each dot would be a MQ quest and each < or > a way of re-entering the MQ.

The board just below this one can prove how awesome Oblivion's story could be when authors get artistic license.

OH hell yes. Oblivion's plot with the structure of a fan fic or rp and the creativity of the people there, and its gold.

That's one thing Bioware games have over Bethseda is multiple ways to roleplay and build your character which also leads into replayibility. I think Bethseda should address this issue sometime in the future because Biowares new IP Dragon Age could very well begin to compete with the Elder Scrolls once Bioware begins expanding upon its world(the lore and world was already pretty rich in the game already ). They seem to be moving away from the chapter system they used to present the game in their earlier game and using nodes to make the world more immersive.

End of an Era, anybody?

This part i'm going to have to agree with Darth on, if you go on a killing spree and kill a character vital to the quest, it should be the fault of the player, not Bethsedas to fix.