I don′t care if they turn away from the lore just as long they don′t ignore it completely witch I don′t feel that they have (with a exaption of The elder scrolls online which isn′t them really). If they explain why in the game the information two-hundred years ago didn′t fit I don′t see any reason to be mad about it.

I cant wait for that new mount, I named my Character in Skyrim "Deathrider of Goldenglow" for a reason.. to be an insane see all kill all character... go vampires and beautiful purple flamed horse... i shall name her Precious... yeesss sweet Precious... i wonder what else this dlc will contain... epicness... most defiantly.

True. That would be the kind of vampire stuff I'd like to see. Oblivion did hint at that with a few NPCs, but you couldn't really be a part of that world. I think the primary thing they wanted to do was get away from the type of vampires where anyone can spot a vampire at a glance and want nothing to do with you. Since it wasn't a vampire game, there wouldn't be enough vampire content to justify locking you out of most of the rest of the game. But the story they had written only explained Cyrodiil, so when we got to Skyrim there was either the choice to go back to the old model or add more changes.

WOOOOOW my feelings!

Nah I don't care. I have my opinion and I believe I'm expressing it constructively. I ignore petty insults because I'm here for productive debate, and name-calling isn't productive. I ignore statements of "if you don't like it, get out" because NO, I wanna challenge the design decisions. If we label every design decision as "a matter of personal taste: either you like it or get out" then we'll never improve.

For example I was just eating dinner and watching the "Making Of Skyrim" vid on youtube. At about 12 minutes in, Todd is talking about world building. In reference to putting SOOOOOOOO much time and effort into world-building and minor details on bushes and rocks, he says "well you could say, 'what effect does that have on gameplay?' Let's not overthink it: that's just me."
NO TODD, LET'S DO OVERTHINK IT! This is basically a summary of my views here on the forum. I totally disagree with putting so much time and effort into building the world that the NPC detail and storyline seem to suffer, and I DO think their should be a discussion of it's value. Likewise, I think there should be a discussion about the DLC concept.

Let me just put this in perspective....In Skyrim we've gotten....

-The return of the Falmer. This is one of the lost civilizations, much like the Dwemer, though of course not quite as famous. They're finally back: Skyrim lets us discover a civilization that's been lost for centuries, how EXCITING!! And what do we find out happened to them? "Dey asked da dwemer 2 help dem cuz da nords killeded thier town but da dwemer were lyk "we wana b nais but we also scurred dey might hurt us" so dey compromised n decided 2 enslave da falmer n forcefeed dem poisonous mushroomz so nao da falmer r jus goblins. Becuz dats how u b nais 2 sum1: u enslave dem and feed dem poisonous mushroomz. I also bet poisoned blind slaevs r super productiv."

-Werebears!.....Where are they?!
K nevermind, no werebears. It's not like we were told they were a part of Skyrim's environment or anything.

-Dragons need a motive? Naaaaah of course not! People are fine with them needlessly flying around killing people!

-Hey I got a great idea, let's
-Should people react to anything the player does? Naaaaah useless feature.



I would hope most people agree that Skyrim has provided us to be severely worried about the writing department, and when Dawnguard presents incredibly cliché ideas while simultaneously throwing out/playing down existing lore that was x1000 times more original, then yes, we're gonna be concerned about the quality of the writing, and the future of Elder Scrolls lore in general.

Who are you to say whether or not the DLC story is good or bad?

Isn't it childish to make a judgement call before having enough information to make a judgement call?

I mean, maybe their target audience is 8 year-olds instead? That's a full 50% margin of error you'd be projecting then.

There doesn't really seem to be any strong opposition to the weakness of the writing in Skyrim. And yes, people need to challenge stuff, thats how you keep things fresh. Who knows, maybe it'll land you a job. A particularly vocal member of the Civ community wound up with a job with Firaxis...

I agree in part with your post but surely the "discussion of value" that you like to talk about is purely subjective. Perhaps some people would prefer a wonderful, detailed and engaging environment over NPCs reacting to them, it's all down to opinion and unfortunately because of that nobody can be right, only have the majority of support. I do disagree with your point on the Falmer though, merely using that ridiculous 'dumb language' does not make your point correct, though, I don't see your issue with the Dwemer taking the Falmer's fragile position and using it to stealthily enslave them. I can't say much for the idea to remove Werebears, I feel they should have been there instead of Werewolves if anything and the Dragons, well, they were supposed to be fodder. The Dragons being complex, motivated beings was most likely removed so you could slaughter them like a common Wolf, otherwise gaining Dragon Souls would have been very tedious indeed.

As for your spoiler, yes, that was ridiculous.

The Falmer. Let's put this in perspective....

If someone comes knocking at your door, claiming to be homeless and hungry, but you yourself are suspicious of them and worry about your safety, would you let them in? Would you compromise with yourself and say "I know, I'll let him stay with me but I'll regularly poison him to keep him weak." No wtf, that's PSYCHOTIC. That makes [censored]-all sense and it's the type of thing that would land you your own page in the DSM IV, along with a mental disorder specifically named after you. And this is what the technologically advanced, intelligent Dwemer came up with? What the hell???

As for the world? I would expect some form of compromise, and at the same time, some of the mistakes with the writing and immersion are SOOOOOOOO easily fixed it's ridiculous. Why doesn't "I work for Belethor at the General Goods store" just say "Good day" when he walks by me, and "I work for Belethor at the General Goods store" only if I attempt to talk to him? Why doesn't he greet me far less often, instead of as long as I get within a quarter mile of him? Why is the head-tracking on NPCs so off so that while someone's giving a war speech, a line of 20 soldiers is staring DIRECTLY AT ME instead of at the guy giving the speech? The only reason I can imagine these things weren't caught is because they were sooooooooo caught up in putting those rose petals on flower #4472 that they forgot to beta test the NPC interaction.

Why doesn't the Thieves' Guild quest line make ANY DAMNED SENSE? Some of these are so awful and yet so easily fixed that it's passed the point of "priorities" and entered the realm of straight-up "neglect."
And even if we, for example, could prove for a fact that 80% of TES fans prefer world exploration and having REALLY DETAILED BUSHES to NPCs that aren't all different forms of insane, what am I to do as a minority if I want more story? Right, I voice my opinion so Bethesda knows that fans like me exist. That's exactly what I'm doing.

And yeah, this upcoming looks grim for the writer's guild here on the forums. It's cliché ideas, so our hopes aren't real high...

I just hope the Soul Cairn will have Wraiths, Daedra and all the old spooky monsters that they had in Arena.......... If it's just boring ghost people i will be dissapointed........

I want to see M'aiq allude to this


I've often wondered this. Occasionally, I undress my character so they REALLY have something to look at.

I'd say that a lot of the writing issues, particularly with factions, are a result of Radiant Story. I don't know how much you followed Pre-release Skyrim stuff, but originally, Radiant Story was used (Overused) for every quest in the game. The result was a "Generic, flavorless experience", so they went back and redid everything. If this happened fairly late in development, they probably didn't have time to put their stuff through a proper writing circle. (Peer Reviews and stuff)

I mean, we know Bethesda as a developer can write well enough, Fallout 3, while far from perfect, is in a completely different intellectual class as Skyrim is... So the potential is there.

"M'aiq has heard of people who have trouble finding a good tale. They have obviously never seen the wondorous, majestic tail of M'aiq."

Wait. You're complaining about lore inconsistencies in a universe where retcons are a running gag?

Exactly: bad priorities. I just think it never should've come to the point where, not far before release they're JUST figuring out that the story svcks balls.

And yeah they've done good at times, and others they've done horrible. Shivering Isles, the Fallout 3 dialog in general and the Oblivion Thieves' Guild suggest they can deliver, whereas things like Little Lamplight, Skyrim dialog and Skyrim's Thieves' Guild suggest....well I dunno what they were thinking with those. So even though they've got potential, I worry about if they're using it or not.

Same here. I wonder why all the wraiths weren't in skyrim to begin with.

I would assume the point of that was that even though the Dwemer were highly advanced and intelligent they were still as twisted and evil as anyone else can be and in their arrogance and power most likely saw the Falmer as severely inferior, their actions were horrific but it was essentially most human slave trades just instead of violence there were chemicals used.

I do enjoy that observation, it conjures up the image of Bethesda planting some Watercress whilst half the game crashes behind them.

Edward or Jacob, brah?

All of this. Skyrim looks great and sometimes provides awesome atmosphere. Npc's and the two faction quest that Ive played (thieves and college) on the other hand are horrible. I just dont understand it. I dont get how nobody recognised how the continuity is so damn broken.

Actually the continuity isnt really broken cause its consistent with the crap that is quest lines and npc interactions.

Dwemer being terrible to people that come knocking at their door is pretty actually pretty consistent with their portrayal in Vivec's http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:36_Lessons_of_Vivec,_Sermon_3. Based on that, they might've done what they did to the Falmer out of some kind of twisted mad science experiment.

Except that's not the motive assigned. It wasn't "they wanted to experiment on them," but rather "they were paranoid and distrustful" that was said.
I agree with you it is possible to assign emotions or motives that make the situation make more sense, but my point is that Bethesda somehow failed to pick the right emotions and motives, and THAT scares me.

Gambles just don't always pay off. I don't think it was that their "Original" Story svcked, it was that they just didn't have one, so they had to pen it in rush-time.

Even Skyrim has a few gems of writing in it. While I'm not overly fond of the Main quest from a thematic standpoint, I really like the events the Main Quest brings you to. The Dark Brotherhood itself is almost pure gold, (No surprise there, Emil Pagliarulo did it), and there's a few shockingly good Misc quests. (Find Derkeethus for a minor misc quest is delivered well, for example), and Falkreath as a city and a character in its own right is a high point in the game from all perspectives.

This. Everyone acts like Immortal Blood is cemented fact, word of god truth. These Immortal Blood fans conveniently ignore that books in the Elder Scrolls series are made to be written by less than credible sources. Anti Ulric books are written by Imperial men, for instance.

Exactly how I feel, and this is coming from someone who often shoots down people trying to worm through lore in the lore forum.

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