Hello. I just restarted Morrowind and trying to get into it. I have a weird problem, though...

I got attacked by the Dark Brotherhood assassin because I have Tribunal installed (normal). From what a friend has told me, this is the second best light armor in the game next to glass, and I'm barely level 3. Also, it annoys the hell out of me from an aesthetics perspective...

a) There isn't some hidden downside to this armor, is there? Did Bethesda just really screw up balance here?

b) How bad of an idea would it be to ditch this armor for something else?

Sell it for a good early financial boost

No, no downside.

Beth just thought that everyone who is playing Tribunal, must have played morrowind already and have a well developped character so the armor is not as valuable as in low levels.

If you are on PC, you can download a mod to delay the attacks.

No, there's no downside to the armour.

Bethesda didn't screw-up the balance at all. You have to realize that when the expansion was released, the people buying it obviously already had Morrowind and therefore likely had high-level characters. A good set of armour was a great bonus to have, instead of weak stuff that would be useless.
Also, Tribunal is meant for high-level characters, so although the first assassin might be a bit unbalanced for a level 1 character, the armour otherwise fits into the game perfectly.

Is it a bad idea to keep? Well, play the game however you want to.

There are also many mods that will delay the assassin's attack. You can delay the attack until you're level 5, 10, 15 etc. Or delay it until you're the Nerevarine. (among other options)

EDIT: totally ninjad

er, they didn't screw up balance, they just went on the assumption that no one would ever play a low level character with Tribunal installed? Sounds like a screwup to me.



Anyway, thanks for the replies. I think I'll sell it for early money and download that mod.

But if the armour was weak, then playing Tribunal would be really boring/easy. Since it is meant for characters level 15+
Makes sense to balance it that way, since they are assuming people would want an expansion to be a new challenge.

No, it doesn't make sense to balance it that way unless, again, you assume no low level characters will ever play the game with tribunal installed.

What would make sense would be the dark brotherhood waiting until you've leveled up a fair bit to attack you.

http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=14891

:)

I agree

Anyone starting a new game with Tribunal installed is quite likely to be attacked by an assassin in Seyda Neen. The weird thing is that, with careful planning, it isn't that hard to kill the assassin, thus taking possession of an over-powered set of light armour at a very early stage. By the time you've landed in Balmora, you can be wearing a full set of DB Armour, plus have about half a dozen other sets in one's inventory to sell. How does that make sense?

The number of mods delaying assassins until certain varied conditions are met (which I personally use) show how easy it would have been for the developers, with a little thought, to have sorted this out before Tribunal was released.

Apparently, everyone is completely misunderstanding me.

The DB armour is perfectly balanced for the expansion.
It is correctly balanced for high-level characters, and the DB armour fills the mid-level gap between Netch and Glass.... Therefore, correctly balanced.

I understand that level 1 players might find it "a cheat", but no one is making you use it. Just leave it on the corpse and walk away. You are choosing to unblance your own game by using the armour at level 1.
You don't even need a mod for that, just roleplay.


And before any says, "But they give it to you at level 1."
A level 1 character can also get a Glass weapon, a deadric weapon, Denstagmer's Ring, some Indoril Armor, powerful enchanted clothing, etc, with hardly any effort.

hello, I heard that on xbox this encounter doesnt happen until the main character is at lease lvl6, so definitely sounds like a bug to me.

all of that is

a. isnt given
b. impossible to find with a lvl1 char w/o foreknowledge. Aka w/o cheating.
c. If characters would run in glass armor they wouldnt need DB set anyway

That is true about the Xbox... But it's not a bug. Look at the relative Script and Leveled List in the CS. It's easy to see how they did this on purpose.

Foreknowledge is cheating??
That's funny. Did you only play the game once, and then quit because you were cheating with your memory?

I just think it's easy to ignore the armour, and therefore you don't unbalance you new character. Sounds easy to me :shrug:

What they perhaps meant to do is to start the attack once the player starts the AddOn, even as level 1. But that obviously backfired.

This was obviously a misake and corrected by the mods. You cannot release an expansion for only those who have already played the game. There are always people who buy the game AFTER the release of the expansion. I felt the same way like you. I bought the GOTY version and was attacked by assasins at the start of the game. To those who say "just ignore the armor" : That's immersion breaking. You kill the guy, see the great armor and walk away... how can you "role-play" in this way? :shakehead:

There's nothing wrong with the armor itself, Bethesda just shouldn't have made it available so easily at level 1 by having the DB attack you straight away, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense anyway if the only thing you've done so far in the province is giving some wood elf his ring back.

I agree. It would have made more sense to time the first assassin attack after a certain rank in any faction, or even more so after certain number of reputation points. I don't complain getting a good armor at start though.

I hate to say it (and I'll probably I'll get crucified for this) but this might be a case where scaling could have been applied to good effect. Dark Brotherhood armor would start with Fur stats if an attack happened at level 1. Every few levels the armor would get progressively better, ending with the equivalent of Glass armor stats at about level 20. I think that way it might not feel so unbalanced to so many people.

I agree with you on this, and use a mod to delay the attacks, but I have to say that armor or no, the whole Dark Brotherhood assassination attempt intro to Tribunal breaks immersion pretty badly. The DB are supposed to an elite and terrifying group of assassins- level 25 guards will tell you to write a will and stay the hell away from them when you report the first attack. They are clearly unparalleled trackers and will find and approach you without fail no matter where you sleep, be it the depths of some lost cave, a bunk in a Legion fort, or the Cavern of the Incarnate. And yet, though they are able to send literally hundreds of men after you, these men will always come one at a time, be appropriately scaled so as not to provide too much of a challenge even when you are pathetically insignificant, and manage to knock something over so that you wake up right before they strike. And then, when you've finally slain they're leader and discovered who it was that wanted you dead, you will happily take on a series of quests for him, because, hey, why not?

Mods to delay the DB attacks or scale the armor are all well and good, but I personally would like to see a mod that completely changes the beginning of Tribunal altogether.

I think the only reason the DB attack breaks the immersion is because it happens so early. It would be a pleasant surprise (gameplay wise...) for a character who is only getting easy fights already. For that kind of character, the armor may or may not be of use, and it's not an overpowered one at any case. Those are also the only characters Dark Brotherhood should even be interested in, which makes me once again lean towards the first attack happening after reaching certain amount of reputation points.

The DB armor scaling sounds pretty good, too, but that doesn't save the fact that the DB shouldn't be dealing with you at all on lower levels, and that the particular guy they sent after you really haven't met their high standards. I think that's the way to "roleplay" the attack though. 'Gee, luckily that guy was a sorry excuse for a DB assassin. Otherwise I could have been badly hurt or even died. Oh well *grabs the armor for use or cash*.'

Removed who's behind DB even though it's mentioned already.

Well, the attacks are scaled to some degree because the first time I was attacked it was because I had just installed the expansion on an ongoing game with a level 20 character. The attack was two assassins with paralyzing daggers; quite a shock, I'll tell you...

Its a good set! I would keep it and sell any more that you get. You get a ton of money that way.

Or, if you think its unrealistic and could make the game easier then I would not have the add on active until you level up your character a lot. Thats what I would do.

Indeed, it is not very difficult to make a leveled list of the armor, with gradually better stats at regular increments. I do this to all the armor mods I download, so I can wear them throughout the game without them being unbalanced.

Yeah, I was kinda un-happy, as I didn't immediately go over to mournhold, and by the time I was level 15, an assassin attacked me and dropped me a freaking Daedric Wakazashi, pretty much the strongest one-handed short sword in the game. I had to go over and handle the problem then or I was going to become vastly over-powered.

Honestly, at level 15 you should have some top equipment; this is not a problem. The game was designed to max at around level 20 pre-expansion. Most repeat players have every unique item by level 15.