They deserve the chance to fight back, but they don't deserve to force me to do their dirty work for them. If they want to kill Paarthurnax, they're welcome to try. Paarthurnax and the Greybeards have a right to protect themselves though. Also, the dragons (and especially not Paarthrunax) are not the ones who nearly annihilated the Blades. That was the Thalmor.

And as for whether or not Paarthurnax deserves to live forever, are you saying that Akatosh made a mistake in the creation of the immortal dov?

The lore is a bit unclear when it comes to Akatosh and the creation of Dragons. Alduin was brought to life to "clense the world" when the time comes. I would imagine the other Dragons served as his army (?). So when he decided to Conquer the World all followed, all became corrupted. Something like Lucifer in Christianity... though not exactly ofc.




Also I didn't make myself clear. By giving the Blades chance to fight back I meant helping them rebuilt and help them later on.

The blades aren't any use to me, I already gave them three followers. took the potion and grabbed the gear. And I am perfectly capable of slashing a dragon to pieces.
At least that old Lizard gives me some extra power in shouts. And those shouting hippie's shows me the words of power.

So if I would be extremely selfish character I would leave paarthunax alone. But knowing he outlives me. I should kill him as he might return to his old nature knowing There is no dragonborn to stop him.
But nah... I am lazy..... and an extremely selfish character

Frozen heart inn.

The innkeeper hints the old geezer is a veteran who retired in a secluded place to wash away bad memories with mead. He seems even older than Esbern.

I'd love to help the Blades get back on their feet, but if they demand I betray a valuable ally then they can forget about me siding with them.

I feel that Bethesda threw in some faction conflict to give players a "choice", and ended up doing a bad job of it. On one hand, you have the Greybeards, a pacifist faction for whom dragons can do no wrong. On the other, you have the Blades, a faction with members who are more pro-active yet are developing a serious case of incompetency. I don't mind the demand to kill Paarthanaax - it makes sense in that you're the only one who can get past the Greybeards. I also don't trust Paarthanaax - the Dragon Wars happened in Skyrim, so what put the Akaviir on his trail? Siding with the Greybeards is just a bad fit for me, period. My character might as well lie down and die, at that point. However, I do wish the Delphine and Esbern my character meets were the same ones described in the Thalmor dossiers - clever, devious, and don't mind getting their hands dirty.

Even if the answer to this question is no, it is hubris to have the opinion that it's you who must execute him in cold blood.

If such an ancient and God-like creature's time is up, then I would think the Gods or future heroes can deal out justice at whatever time he becomes hostile and no longer helpful. The PC dynamic in single player games tends to condition us to think it's all about us - but getting into the lore of TES reveals that mindset to be false.

One of the real questions about the Paarthurnax dilemma is whether or not you have developed an in-game philosophy, and whether that philosophy allows for murder in cold blood of someone who poses no immediate threat. Some may say that his execution is justified, and some may be pro-evil and wish to kill him because it is evil. But it all comes back to a personal philosophy and the reasons behind what you will and won't do. I have to say I love that aspect to The Blades in Skyrim.

I find it quite a stretch to regard killing Paarthanaax as murder. Cold and calculated, yes, but murder, no.

/agree.... and VERY well-put!

I checked with Uncle Google The Master of All Internet Secrets and he says "murder" is just a synonym for "kill"

mur·der/?m?rd?r/Noun: The unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another.


Verb: Kill (someone) unlawfully and with premeditation.


Synonyms: noun. homicide - assassination - killing - manslaughter
verb. kill - slay - assassinate - slaughter - butcher

Murder is a loaded word meant in a certain context. One does not normally regard killing animals as murder, for example, unless one is an animal rights activist intent on provoking a reaction. I stand by my position.

In this game world, Paarthurnax can be seen as human in all but form. Especially since the dovakiin is - obviously - both human in form yet of dragonkind. Therefore it's not a stretch at all to consider killing Paarthurnax to be murder.

If you want to play up the dragonblood connection, sure. However, I consider my characters vastly more human / elven / whatever, than dragon, so I don't consider it murder, I consider it getting rid of a threat. Also, having human-like traits doesn't make Paarthanaax human.

Whether I like the dragonblood connection or not, it IS there, and it's unlikely to "fade" - unless Beth actually just made this entire game as a "forgettable" mega-DLC. But of course, each to her own.

My character saw killing Paarthanax simply as 2 Dovah seeing which was more powerful. He didn't just attack him out of nowhere. He told him before hand that he was going to do it.

Just wanna remind that Paarthurnax is a mass murderer himself and not even his immortality will change that. The Blades see his death as punishment for those crimes.

That was long long ago and in another age and another reality.

I wasn't using the word 'murder' in any particularly inflammatory context. I also used 'execution' in order to represent more view points.


I am wondering how you can even relate to an immortal, let alone pass judgement on one.
Can you even name a relative of yours that lived a thousand RL years ago? And any relative of yours that lived a thousand years ago is long dead from something - would you feel the need to take it on yourself to kill whatever was responsible for that relative's death?

It really is "another age and another reality".
If I bumped into some immortal alien being on top of a mountain who confessed to having killed some relative of mine a thousand years ago, but also confessed to having regretted it and put the effort in to make more moral choices, it wouldn't even occur to me to pass judgement on it/him. I just wouldn't feel like I could relate to the immortal thing enough to be qualified to pass any judgement. Plus, it was a thousand years ago. Even if it was someone I was related to, it's long past, and we cannot judge if the world would be better or worse if it hadn't happened.
Maybe that's what immortality is for? To make mistakes and then learn and be tortured by the mistakes you know you made - for all eternity. Kinda harsh, really.

You call it mass murder, I call it role fulfillment. If Alduin is supposed to be the bringer of the end times, it follows that his fellow dragons are his fellow harbingers of Nirn's day of reckoning. Paarthurnax was merely fulfilling the duties laid out to him by Father Akatosh. Little did he know that Alduin had abandoned his station as World Eater and sought to rule the world instead. After that, he rebelled, and with the blessings of Kyne he taught the first Tongues the Thu'um.

Besides, does it really qualify as mass murder? I mean, he killed man and mer, but he's an immortal dovah. He's on a completely separate level of creation. It's no more mass murder for him to burn down a village than it is for me to clear out a fox den.

Also, there are no real specifics on what exactly Paarthurnax's past crimes entail. We only have vague ideas of wrongs from the mouths of two fugitives who do not really provide any outstanding evidence to support their claim, nor do they consider the circumstances by which these supposed atrocities occurred. On the other hand, we are given very specific accounts of how Alduin was first defeated, and how Paarthurnax was instrumental both in the first war against Alduin and in the current war.

Oh, I think you just hit on something, and I've realized why so much of the 'kill Paarthurnax' thing rubs me the wrong way.
We are supposed to kill the son of Akatosh just on someone's word, with no way to investigate or prove the justification of it for ourselves. I just realized this really engages my stubborn gene.
Given the character of Delphine I really don't want to blindly follow her orders just because she's read an old book, and she says so.

Actually, since I have REAMS of gemological info (well, it's megabytes now, but you get the idea) - yes, I can name ancestors over a thousand years back. And they aren't "air-dreamt" fakes either - these are real people in the domesday books and wills of their eras. I do agree with you. I didn't state that as a point of argument, just as a point of information.


That's very profound in all honesty. Of course, there are some quite definite "kill the son of the deity" scenarios in our own world (and not just the christian one - this is a myth which is found across most cultures, as well as the one where the god-king is killed to enable the progression of whatever the culture in question considered of overweening importance.... Um. Was this the thread with the post about Joseph Campbell? If not, well.... I recommend Mr. Campbell as a very good reference on comparative mythology.... and MUCH easier to read and relate to than Edith Hamilton!)

Wow. You must be related to royalty to have reliable genealogy going back that far. And I don't doubt it, because there are more genes in the gene pool from nobility and royalty the further back you go, because it's the descendants of wealth and comfort who survived a thousand years ago, not the descendants of poverty or hardship.


I've read and enjoyed the Hero book by Joseph Campbell (The Hero's Journey?), but it was a long time ago.
I wonder how we'd feel if Paarthurnax volunteered to be executed, like a god-king from some pagan culture? I couldn't give the Old Orc a 'good' death, so I doubt I'd step up to kill Paarthurnax even under these circumstances. While I consider my Dohvakiin a leader, and not a follower, I would still be acutely aware of not being an ultimate authority who can pass judgement.

BTW, you have another cool sig. With so few words, your grand daughter seems to have a more developed emotional IQ, and be more insightful than many advlts I've met.

If Paar had volunteered to die to mitigate past wrongs, that might have been a perfectly acceptable thing to some of the factions. I would have tried to talk him out of it....

My g'daughters (the sig is from the younger one) are very complex young people. I hope the older one lives to grow into sense someday, and the younger one decides to embrace real life eventually. Kids are... different.... these days.... [ETA: forgot to say, at that time in younger g'daugher's life, she'd never met us to remember. They lived in Germany, and we did spend a month there when she was born - because daughter had some issues, and SIL was in the AF and working double shifts mostly, so there was also the 5 year old to take care of.... but we'd never met the younger girl at that point. So it was.... actually pretty amazing....)

As far as the genealogy - no, there's no royalty in there, though most of the ancient ancestors were fairly well-to-do merchants (in Hamburg Germany, Brussels Belgium - though he was actually a Scot with political and financial ties to Mary Queen of Scots - and in Edinburgh and London....) Most of my ancestors on this continent arrived with the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and several other less well-known sailings.... including some descendents of the Scot who was doing his best to put Mary on the throne. Didn't happen.... Too bad too, because likely Mary's get would have NOT been the sort of idiot Queen Vic was, with her puritanical stupidities.... My ancestors might have arrived here with the rest of the puritans et al, but they (from various journals etc.) did NOT agree with all that. I must say I've done my best to keep that spirit alive.

And I must say, you are one of my favorite people on this forum.

Having more in-depth dialogue options with a being like Paarthurnax would be worth having to put up with 'The Blades'. I still run up to the Throat of the World every now and then just to speak to him. Too bad we are limited by the technical and creative boundaries of the game, because being able to ask him random stuff would have made the game more cosmic. I think it's the limitations of the game which inhibit some players from realizing just what they are standing in front of when it comes to Paarthurnax. I'd like an option to run Delphine up to Paarthurnax not just because she should do her own dirty work, but also because if she spoke to him she might reconsider her position.

You are also one of my favorite and most memorable forumites, and I'd like to read more of your creative writing...

That's it! I WANT to be able to listen in on a Delphine/Paarthurnax dialog.... can you imagine the possibilities! Well, yes, YOU can, and I can.... That would be wonderful - the meeting of two opposed minds, and hearing them come to an actual MEETING.... I wish it were possible given the state of game programming.... Melissa Scott wrote a book about a VR game which actually became reality in some ways - and while I sometimes wish that was a possible thing, then again I think.... hmmm.... do I really want someone I don't know, and who may not have ANYONE'S best interests at heart, given the ability to manipulate politics, money, people? I don't know.... maybe in a sandbox.... heh.