I can't debate about your assumptions and opinions.

Metal Gear Solid also had all this. In 1998.

My largest complaint is that it seems like there is no difference between races in how npcs act towards you. I went to Windhelm on my dunmer, and when the nords were done talking to the dunmer chick she asks me "how do you feel about the dark elves?". Gee, I don't know lady.

Some quests the quest giver will go on discussing with npcs after you have fixed the problem. Again like they have simple forgot to disable them once a point is reached.
The comments guards make are so easily obtained and certain phase seem to have higher priority over others meaning even with a possible 20 or so lines they may comment on you'll frequently hear the same few. Practicually with sneak thief (pickpocket sneaking and stealing are 3 seperate things, ignoring the oxymoron that is this saying, although not as bad as OB's) having about 90% chance of being said. Feels like I walk round with a dark cloud enshrouding me and a swag bag on my back.
Dialogue triggers are easy to set off and don't seem to turn off, being in a house with a housecarl you can end up hearing "my thane" over and over due to being so close all the time, frequently with my back to someone they'll say a greeting including when I'm moving further away, no guard no one stole my sweet roll, im 10ft away from you looking at the blacksmiths shop about to go in, I never owned a sweetroll let alone started complaining to you about it.
Npc's have highly limited amount of phases most of the time, maybe why they where afraid to turn off some of them so you end up being treated like a stranger not the saviour of the city they named you 2 mins earlier. Your also rearly given even sensible dialogue varieties to pick from, not an infinite amount of things you can reply with, but if you can give 3 yes's why not one no, oh I can roleplay and just press b and walk away, genius, that goes right up there with rping a good person so you ignore all the murders, haunted houses and other things.
Not just dialogue and the scripting associated that is lacking, action scripts severly lack where npcs won't adapt their daily routines to your actions, even for quests, it's one thing to have every npc being able to recognise someone close to them has been killed if you chose freely to do so, but another to not have it after a quest you've been given.
There are some points where they seem to apsire to greater things, hint at things that lack depth, but then you're never given to option to delve deeper, yes your brother is a tricky one, I someone completely lose the ability to ask how he came across this claw, or why a barman has another. Similar to the the intro, your given a choice but it matters so little that choosing for the opposite side you intend to play for doesn't have an effect. Or one of the hot topics at the moment, dropping items in cities, if your lucky enough to have someone react to it, theyll usually just shove it back in your inventory, thats much more sensible then the as advertised version, and on the rare occassion they do ask if they can have it, theyll happily exclaim how theyll use it right away, but never do. Same as shopkeepers being replaced if one dies, lucan constantly tells me how he AND his sister can help me, she'll even stand at the counter at times, but never has she given me the option to buy from her.
The shooting an npc and hiding one, didn't oblivion fallout 3 and new vegas all have the comment "they must have run away" if they had been attacked.

Yeah there are some nice little touches here and there, but they as so frequently and completely detracted by the constant base level flaws in it they may as well not exist, frankly I would have prefered to have the basic stuff sorted, proper recognition of your character, especially if they are a certain npc's boss, npcs not commenting on things Ive since fixed unless it's to mention that, over the little touches that vanish in the sea of other issues. Water physics are great with corpses, having it break over them is cool, shame it doesn't treat you alive the same or the world didn't act as one big slip n slid for the greased up corpsed on land.

Certain lines Bethesda added were not needed, just plain stupid and should not have been added for instance

the sweet roll line
the fur in your ear line
the carry the meade line

It's those lines that bug the hell out of me. They weren't necessary, aren't funny, and drive me batty because I just want to flay every guard who says it. I ignore all the rest but yes, Bethesda could have been much tighter on dialogue and weren't. Bethesda should have coded lines for all npcs for after you complete quest lines and prior lines should be triggered not to repeat.

I hate how, if you complete the legion quest line, when you run into legion soldiers escorting a stormcloak prisoner, they treat you like crap. They say things like "this is official imperial business, out of the way citizen." Meanwhile I am a high ranking imperial officer in full legion armor with officers helm. What gives?

I agree with the OP. Another thing that really takes me out of the game is when people say "their line" every single time I walk past them. I'm so tired of hearing the same lines over and over and over again! Just shut up already. Yes, I know you work for Belethor at the general goods store.

Yeah, it's the lack of attention to details that is this game's problem. Details that were paid attention to in Oblivion

It pains me to say this, but Bioware does a much better job with dialogue

Meh, dialogue has never been a strong point for Bethesda, so the comparison is a foregone conclusion. Their strong points are elsewhere.

Yes, simple "hello", "greetings" or "good day" would be enough. They should talk about their life only if you start a conversation with them.

IMO, it's Obsidian. Hell, Obsidian's dialogue in Fallout:New Vegas was superior to Fallout 3's, but at least Fallout 3's is vastly superior to Oblivion and Skyrim's. I thought FOR SURE, that after playing Fallout 3 and Oblivion, they would have learned a thing or two from dialogue. I guess not.

This one gets me as well.

I meant the reaction to the PC; like race, class, achievements etc

The worst for me was when Ulfric asked me something along the lines of "why would a foreigner want to join the StormCloaks"?

Ummm, because I'm not a foreigner; I'm a Nord. The whole reason I chose Nord was to have an attachment to the conflict but I get the exact same dialogue that my Dunmer got? Lame.

Rules-based reactions to the CP have never been a strong suit of the ES series. They've never figured out that when people advance to the head of a guild, they want some sense of accomplishment in dialog. I'm not sure how the deficit can be supplied in a game that relies so heavily on spoken dialog, though. Written can be supplemented, but it'll break the immersion if new dialog is only offered in written form.

Still, I have faith in the ingenuity of modders. Just put up this idea once the CK comes out, and see if anyone bites down on it.

Man I don't know. I joined the dark bortherhood, I havn't actually went to the sanctuary yet but I have done the steps that lead up to it. Assassins still attack me, I get notes signed by Astrid to kill me. Like yo wtf, [censored]... didn't you just tell me to come "home" not too long ago? Now I'm some fool that needs to die, and you send some gimped ass assassin to do it? Which always seems to be Argonian. Really?

They could have done a slightly more careful job, though. Having gone through the whole Companions questline, I get guards commenting on the fact that I finished it (good!).... but I also still get guards saying "Oh, you're that new Companion - do they make you fetch the mead?" (not so good).

Yes, it's a bit picky, but a little bit more attention to detail wouldn't be a bad thing.

there are some good and some bad things about the AI....I specially like some sentences as example: " Oh look there, a cave, let's go look inside" or "wow, I've never seen such thing!" or "you should better stop doing this"<---when conjuring a flame atronarch over and over again. then there were some sentences in the city when using magic: " please don't burn anything, ok?" "oh your magic looks so wonderful " "please keep your magic outside the city walls...-.-" also in fights: " Come over! I wanna shot you!" "Don't come closer" well there are alot of different things I feel, gave the game a more realistic look than previous elder scroll games....but it lacks in some cases...as example: why the hell are those people talking to me about stuff when I'm just running around? or accusing me of talking to much or saying they don't wanna talk if I haven't even stopped for them?lolz...why has nearly every guard a cousin who fights against dragons except him? ....o.o


btw. about the Thalmor, I haven't met alot of them ingame...some were aggressive, because (i guess) I met them in a dungeon...then I've also met some other thalmors on the street...talked to them....and doesn't matter what I answered (there was even an answer to not say anything) they accused me of beeing a Talos follower and attacked me....I thought: hey cool! they gave me a reason to hate them even more XD so I slaughtered the rest of them too but only after I talked to them about their religious views again it wasn't my fault, they attacked me XD I swear!


and about random encounters.....I don't know who or what don't like me....but 2 times I got attacked by an assassin, which a letter in his pocket, that someone ordered the dark brotherhood to eliminate me....someone paid money for it. geeez, poor guy seems feared of me
or another guy stumbled upon me saying:" please hold this and don't tell anyone about it!" I: "What?!" then he run off, shortly after him came another guy and asked me if I've seen a guy running past, while I was saying: "uhm...don't know?" the other guy started screaming and the one I just talked to draw his bow and chased the other guy who was pleading alot! O.o

I was standing there: "Wtf?!" and watching them running away. The hunter:" I'll get you, little bastard" the other guy:" no please, I don't wanna die"


O.o but I love those moments^^

This is another gripe I had that forgot to mention.


Random citizens of a town? They have one or two lines unique to them that they SPAAAAAAAAM. Spam to HELL.
Random nameless guards? They respond to events and rumors. They occasionally mention Dragonborn or mention major happenings in their dialog.

Now, why the HELL did they make this choice? Wouldn't if feel much more natural if "I work for Belethor at the General Goods Store" was also capable of saying "Is that fur coming out of your ears?" The way they have it set up, the named NPCs get old SOOOOOOOOO fast....

I also don't get why they cut Oblivion's system where NPCs would engage in random conversation in exchange for practically zero NPC discussion, save for a few scripted ones the first time you catch two NPCs near each other. No Oblivion's system wasn't perfect:

"Greetings!"
"Hello."
"What's going on with you?"
"Farewell!"
"Bye"

But for all it's mistakes, it STILL felt more alive. No reason they couldn't improve on Oblivion's little random chit-chat system, but instead it was just cut. If you sit in the market district and wait, the NPCs just do the same.

All I want is that the Thalmor recognize my Altmer as one of them.

Other things I can live with, I don't understand why people brag about every little detail about this game.

Why am I not surprised you're playing an Altmer?

You can already play the game for hundreds of hours, be quiet.

Probably because they had years of forum threads mocking the typical mudcrab discussion, so they over-reacted and went the other way.
(Or they got the wrong message - "people don't like the randomly generated conversations!" - from all the forum pvssyr.)

I agree.

It has been mention in this thread already how your character is the leader of the companions the guards still say your character fetches the mead. Same [censored] with my character. Another thing that pretty much put me off the game for a while was during the In My Time Of Need quest.


I didn't have the motivation to continue my RP. That killed it for me.