Blades

So this is not another topic about which side is right or not. I wanna talk about what did Bethesda do to one of the coolest factions in Elder Scrolls series, at least for me. How do you feel about it, do you care or not. Maybe you think it's fine and whole thing was overexaggerated?

For me it seems people started to literally hate them to the point that they would even kill them repeatedly if they were given such chance. I once even saw such vid on YT.

That's all well and good, but what faction are you talking about?

The Blades?

The Thieves' Guild?

There's a lot of essential NPCs that people seem to want to murder.

Buahaha sorry . At first there were "Blades" in the topic name but I changed it and forgot to mention about them later .

They took away the Blunts skill. To make up for it, they changed the Blades into Blunts

I like Esbern, but Delphine's not agreeable to me. Arngeir and the rest of the Greybeards endeared themselves quite a bit to me. And immediately upon meeting Delphine, she begins to disrespect me and the Greybeards. It gets even worse as you progress in the story. She even goes up to High Hrothgar and disrespects the Greybeards in their own home. That's not right.

This, also I don't like the entire "all dragons must die" attitude, I think Paarthunax, has done plenty of stuff in order to atone for his past sins.
Also Delphine steals the [censored] horn and still claims to be a friend, she's a damn [censored], that's what she is. Esbern was alright I guess, but also he had some of this kind of attitude. Not as much as Delphine, but still.

I'm not sure I'd consider what we saw in Skyrim to really be "the Blades." Two people do not an entire group/organization make. (Assuming here you don't toss a few followers to the Blades...but even then I think you can only recruit three at max? So that makes five, with three probably taking a lot of direction and instruction from the first two.) I see it more as Delphine and Esbern and their own opinions, habits, and what they think about the Blades and their purpose than I do the traditional Blades that we saw in Morrowind, etc.

I'm still pretty cool with the Blades as a group. Esbern's all right too, if a bit paranoid (but understandably so). Delphine...erg. I can see why she is the way she is, but I can't really stand her. My character left after discovering Sky Haven Temple with them and hasn't bothered to come back--mostly because of the way Delphine was acting during that quest. (Rude to Esbern, rude to my character, and ranting on about how terrible the Greybeards are, apparently oblivious to the fact that my character's quite fond of them and oh no you didn't.)

When given the option in later quests to consult with either Esbern or the Greybeards/Paarthurnax, I've picked the Greybeards every time. I suspect the next time I see Delphine will be during "Season Unending," and that's going to go just as poorly. And ensure that my character most definitely never goes back to Sky Haven Temple.

They're less Blades and more Akaviri Dragonguard instead now.

I hear you all. The thing is I really don't like how Bethesda made them. Their story in Skyrim while interesting in a way ( being hunted down by Thalmor ) shows them in a very bad light.

We weren't even given a chance to make any impact on their faction except recruting 3 random NPC's.

Would've been awesome if instead of being granny dragon-butthurt Delphine is a competent Blade that is eager to rebuild her organization and exact revenge to the immediate danger (hint: the chief dragon isn't trying to kill her)

Would've been awesome if we get inducted as a Blade and sneaks into a Thalmor base and deal all kinds of crazy crap damage

Instead... y'know... we get Blunts

i think the blades are good showing just how badly the thalmor have damaged the empire. The great body guards of the emperors have been reduced to two dragon hunters that, due to their stubborn nature can't even kill dragons as the one guy that can help them is being blanked by them for not killing the dragon that helped to kill alduin!!

"What is better - to be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?" they want to kill someone who can come up with a line like that?

On a personal level I feel disappointed that I couldn't carry on my character's TES tradition of joining The Blades and being part of a nicely secretive, noble, and powerful institution.

Story-wise I guess it was an interesting turn of events to not only completely disempower that institution, but to avoid making them appealing underdogs (most players would probably enjoy helping out the underdog) and instead make them bitter, unlikeable fringe dwellers with so very little to offer, both practically and in terms of any ongoing story.

While Delphine seems to have been intentionally written as an extremely unlikable character, I was with Esbern right up until he started perverting the word "justice."

I always avoided joining the Blades in all of the games because, well... They're like the faction you're supposed to join and the non-conformist part of my brain just yells NOOOOOOO!!!

Wait, so...does that mean you never did the Morrowind MQ? Because I'm pretty sure joining the Blades is a requirement for doing it at all. In Oblivion it was totally optional though.

Blades is only a requirement in Morrowind if you do it the straightforward way. You can do both back door methods without ever talking to Caius.

I liked the Blades but feel they've been hammered and beaten to the point that they have become broken and bitter... I do feel you should be able to rebuild the blade again but maybe their will be another DLC waiting to happen. I kinda get the feeling theirs a massive dark twist to the main story of how the Thalmor knew who the Blade members were and how to hunt them down and almost wipe them out so easily. I admit the last few times I made new chars ive sided with the Greys but if their ever is a DLC to expand on their story I might change my mind... who knows?

I've never had any use for the Blades. Not in any of the games where they were "involved". Just not my thing....

Same here. The way Bethesda keeps pushing you to join them every game (or you start the game as one already, such as in Daggerfall), just makes me not want anything to do with them. Given what twits the last two of them are in Skyrim, I am glad the Thalmor wiped out the rest of them. I just wish they would finish the job and relegate them to a footnote in history, filed under "What were we thinking?"

They aren't the Blades that guarded the Septims. They have lost their purpose. So they decide to revert back to their barbaric ancestor's ways.

Except that they started out as Akaviri Dragonguards, which is basically what Delphine and Esbern have returned to now. They only became the Emperor's personal spies and bodyguards with the rise of the Septim Empire. So...shouldn't it be that they'd lost their original purpose long ago, and have just now reverted back to it with the loss of the Septim dynasty?

Just saying. From a historical perspective, they've regained their purpose more than they've lost it.

The main thing is.... sure, the devs can micro-manipulate players into being Blades once.... but not forever. And... well... I never even went there once. But - to quote one of my fav characters of all time from books.... "I'm well known for being a vindictive b1tch".... I figured out the whole thing early, and never went there after.

Still, the bottom line with TES game series is that it can be all things to all people who play the game. Including those of us who just love to thumb our noses at game devs and their silliness.

Considering that the empire have disbanded them, I say they are doing rather well going back to their roots. I believe it is only the Blades who have enough sense to forgo politics in favour of stoping Alduin threat. But this only becomes apparent if you do the season unending quest.

But they lose the points they get for having common sense that Alduin is more important by demanding I kill one of my most powerful allies, and lose 4 more of them, or else they won't be my friends anymore.

Yeah well, every faction in the game makes you do something you normally wouldn't do. It's not like you are not treated like an errand boy by every single faction in the game.