This has always bothered me but it never really truly annoyed me until recently. I really dislike the fact that to get the power of standing stone A, I HAVE to go to point B, and if I want shout C, I HAVE to go to points D, E or F. This defeats the game's 'total freedom' paradigm. I understand why they replaced the birth signs with the stones (to stop new players from making permanent choices they might later regret, which is also why the skill perk trees are so linear, so it's almost impossible to make a 'bad' build), but the way we learn shouts, which are the game's defining feature, could have and should have been designed in a more intelligent manner.

The walls have many rune words on them, which tells me that at one point in the game's development, this was done differently (ie. you could learn a single rune word of your choice from a wall). Perhaps they didn't want to overwhelm the player with too many choices? If so, this seems to be the recent trend with games: to assume that gamers are morons intellectually challenged and need to be dictated everything instead of being forced to make decisions. I really don't like this trend. I blame CoD.

edit: adding this later post because some people don't understand my point.

So, because Beth wants you to explore their world and discover the word walls and standing stones, that's them "undermining" your freedom? Also, your entire second paragraph is based on assumption. you have no proof that at one point you could choose any word at any wall other than "Well, there's not just one word on the wall!". there walls are burial markers, so there's not just going to be one word, which is also why one specific word of power lights up, because it's the one that can be used as a Thu'um.

Reward for exploration = limiting freedom? Seems you learn something new everyday.

Whether the intent was to hand hold or not, it doesn't hamper my freedom personally.. I'm still going to wander. I don't know if they dumbed it down or not. The Word Walls have all those runes because they're memorials and dedications... basically grave sites and the like. I thought the "word" feature that starts glowing is just supposed to be something that simply sticks out to your character.. something he/she zones out on.

As for standing stones, I'm liking them on my mage. It's basically a cloth wearing spellsword (more of a mage actually, but I do melee a bit). I wasn't really getting much use out of the stones on my warriors before. I feel more free than ever with this character.. really diverse. My warrior types are the ones who aren't free... warriors are cool, but they're kind of "complete" in their own right. I don't mix it up much with them, especially when it comes to standing stones.

So you need to explore in order to find stuff in an sandbox rpg ? shocking....

Come on, use your heads a bit. A feature that can radically change gameplay should not be a reward for exploration, because on subsequent playthroughs you will just make a beeline for whatever shout it is your build depends upon or you just enjoy using, which, as I said, undermines the player's freedom. Loot chests and unmarked locations with interesting features are sufficient rewards for exploration.

Another one that entirely missed the point. You know, maybe Bethesda was indeed right in introducing more hand-holding.

You're right! We should just have every shout unlocked from the beginning! I mean hey, now we don't have to undermine our freedom or waste precious time making a beeline for them!

I've never thought of a build that really depended on shouts. My characters don't even do the main quest until well into the game (therefore, no shouts at all). I like doing other things first. Roleplaying wise, when I enter places with Word Walls, I imagine my characters don't even know what the hell is going on when they read a Wall. Maybe they think that glowing happens to everyone. lol.. Little do they know they're the dragonborn. Later in the game, I activate them as I get souls, but my builds don't depend on them. I don't go to these areas just to get Shouts.

And petty insults too? Oh, this thread is going swimmingly.

And here I thought that everyone in these forums liked Morrowind's system which invloved handplaced loot in specific areas...

If you believe you can enjoy the game only after you get your favorite shout/standing stone buff , then you misse dthe point of the game. Skyrim is not the game for powergamers ( you know, the peeps that need to get this and that and whatever else to make their char top of the line before they can actualy play the freaking game ) , it was not made for you guys so don't [censored] .

PS: Don't feed the troll more, let it starve and it will go play Diablo3 soon.

It is not the case that this was done differently. The runes on the wordwalls are actual texts; if you look up shouts on the UESP pages, you see the complete translation of all the runes. Since most wordwalls are graves, too, the texts on them are oftentimes comparable to those you'd find on tombstones. Out of those texts, one word is highlighted, and that is the one you learn. It was never the intention to be able to learn multiple/different words at one wall (with one exception, I believe you find all three words of Aura Whisper at Krosis' wall).

As for all the wordwalls and standing stones being spread all over the province, they only add more incentive to go out there and explore. Bethesda did that for a reason.

Do you feel the same about quests? They all have a start and finish point. That's an rpg kind of thing.

Are you for real? Reread the OP. The idea is that you can choose ONE (1, UNO) word of your choosing from any word wall. Ie. you're in Bleak Falls Barrow, and you arrive at the word wall. The rune words light up before your eyes, and you can choose any one of them. Then you'd still need to unlock it with a dragon soul. How is this in any way unlocking all shouts from the beginning?

You do realize that that would actually be worse, right? Now, instead of having to work for the more difficult shouts(getting to their location, fighting the enemies, etc) you can just go to the three easiest wall locations and unlock them.

Funny. It is precisely because I'm a roleplayer that this has become annoying to me. Say I'm playing a non-Bosmer ranger and I want the ability to tame beasts. I now have to haul ass to gods know where the closest animal allegiance word wall is. This is metagaming and I don't like it.

Exactly why would you pick different shouts at Bleak Falls, for example. There's nothing in the Wall's message that would be a shout, except Fus.

Here lies the guardian
Keeper of dragonstone
And a http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Unrelenting_Force of unending
Rage and darkness

The Walls have actual text written on them, in dragon language, each translated in elderscrollswikia or UESP, i don't remember.

I admit I didn't bother to inspect a world wall and research the wiki to check if the non-highlighted runes represent the other available words. I take it from your post that they do not, so that dispels my theory.


More difficult shouts? The most powerful (unrelenting force) can be unlocked very quickly, so I don't think the difficulty in obtaining shouts was ever a concern on Beth's part.

Go to UESP and search for the word walls. The site has their translated text and if you take your time to read them you will see that it makes sense that these texts were written. Now, explain how would the dragonborn just choose which word to learn? Can't he just learn all of them if they are all in the text? Why would he need to go to other dungeons? So I do not believe that this makes sense lore-wise.

Having specific words in the word walls does encourage exploration, because if you just got all the words that your character needs in the first few word walls you wouldn't really need to hunt for other word walls. Many RPGs have certain rewards in certain places. You can't just open a chest and then choose between the "Ultimate Blade of Destruction", "Unbreakable Shield" etc. You can only find the "Ultimate Blade of Destruction" in a certain place just like Daedric artifacts that require Daedric quests. Or should we just make it so you can get whichever artifact you want from whichever Daedric quest you want too?

About the world walls, this is a surprising complaint, never bothered me that I have to explore to get non-linear progression. The only thing that I do complain about (but it's only tangential to your topic) is that they removed the birthsigns and replaced them with standing stones, instead of including birthsigns and stones. I am a fan of initial choices that matter and can't be changed, along with other choices that can be changed. This is handholding indeed, especially when I read Todd Howard explaining that people would feel frustration when they chose the initial character stats, then go out in the world and they don't like what they chose... so they have to start over. SO [censored]IN WHAT? It's an RPG for Christ sake, trial and error, live with the consequences, you know... choices and consequences. Adjusting to overcome immanent disadvantages is part of roleplaying. Same with the race differentiation, they have reduced the racial choice to pretty much cosmetics, which is sad for a serious RPG

Mmmm....I got shot in the butt once in a war a long time ago...that kind of limited where I could go for a while.

Life svcks, and so does some aspect of video games...get over it.

By this logic there should be only one Daedric quest with a reward of your choice which you can repeat 16 times.


Instead of travelling to three Word Walls containing the shout you need, you'd travel to three nearest Word Walls and pick up the shout immediately. It's exactly the same thing, but it takes less time, isn't realistic and destroys immersion (IMO).

What you don't seem to understand is that the text on Word Walls isn't a list of all shouts, or some random letters put together. They're actual words in the dragon language and teach you a specific shout. Every Wall conveys a unique message - dragon souls give you power to learn any shout, but to discover the words you need to find places where the ancient knowledge is hidden.

I didn't know that. That dispels my theory, but it doesn't change my opinion that it should have been done differently. My suggestion was that word walls should have all the words written on them, but there are other ways to do it.

Do you guys understand my point though?


Nope. I HATE it, for exactly the same reason, and it's why I grew bored of FO3 really quickly. On my 2nd play-through I felt compelled to follow a route to pick up the guns / armor I wanted instead of just heading off in a random direction and exploring. Willpower issue? Perhaps.


I pick up quests in areas that I decide to visit, and complete them if my travels ever take me to the objective's location. Otherwise, they sit in my journal, untouched .