like malaria, where you puke all over the place then fall to the ground, or ebola where you bleed out of your eyes, nose and mouth? you probably meant some less serious diseases but what ever.

Well, let's see. We have humans in Nords, Imperials, Bretons, and Redguards. They can acquire diseases such as bonebreak fever, which displays symptoms of a variety of bacterial infections. Therefore it's safe to say that bacteria exist in Tamriel. Therefore, with the exact same life forms in the game as there are on earth... you have no point. The OP was wondering about diseases and how they might relate to Skyrim. Then others began discussing bacterial diseases so I wrote out some information about them. It wasn't supposed to be argumentative, just informational and speculative.

Yes they might have bacteria, but it could follow a completely different structure to the stuff we have on Earth..

Probably because due to their little revamp of magic in skyrim, to cure a disease using spells, you now require a perk in restoration or something. That or a potion of cure disease.

Skyrim should probably have a shaman in every village, hah.

Or you can just get a blessing at one of the various temples/shrines dotting the landscape..

then player would want to be a shaman.

i think its a silly topic, not to bash anyone. but years ago i moved from arizona to alaska and noticed that alot of the "sicknesses" i had while i lived in the lower 48 were not as common while i lived in the frozen tundra. within a week i could breath easily through my nose as well as my asthma went from cronic to almost nil

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that the rule of thumb was to assume things worked like they did in real life, unless stated otherwise.

Now, I might have missed it, but I don't recall reading anything in the lore about the nature of diseases and how they work. That would suggest we should assume that they do, in fact, work like they do on earth.

Unless, of course, you're just trying to make excuses for them.

Well no I had no idea that was the rule of thumb.. I really doubt they were thinking that in-depth when they said that.. I don't think anyone thinks as in-depth as bacteria except us.

I hate to break it to you, but we're not that special.

Well the number of people, including us, pondering wether bacteria works the same way on Nirn as it does on Earth is still probably quite low.

You have contracted HIV, this is incurable. This save is unusable in 245 in-game days.

This.

Hi there Zsoul! Good to see you.


Are you sure you got your facts right? Not only can cryo bacteria thrive in cold weather, areas likeThe Rift are not that cold in the first place. I think you mean well and obviously hold Beth in high regard, but there is no need to come up with this apparently contrived logic to defend the innocuously small number of diseases in Skyrim. OT, what I would wish is for diseases to have effects other than a health or stamina decrease. What about going blind and haveing to make your way to a cure? What about going deaf? Waht about blurry vision? What about notoriously lagged movement?

It's a pity they've removed the active effects icons, that way you knew in Morrowind and Oblivion you had a disease because you saw a strange new icon on your screen. At least I think it was in Oblivion too, it's definitively in Morrowind.

Hello Surfinsax! Jolly nice to see you!

Hmm, I beg to differ. The stats frame of reference gave birth to the icons you mention. I reckon we have to let go of that and adopt a more consequential aproach. Let diseases, all dseases, have visible ffects: blindness, night blindness, day blindness, defness, blurry vision, daltonism, laggy movement, decreased speed of wielding, sudden paralisys, increased cold/heat susceptibility, etc. Now, if only hardcoe mode was in place, I could come up with a lot more effects.

I think the reason for a lack of diseases is a symptom of 11.11.11
When a game is rushed to make a date such as 11.11.11, many things are left out such as diseases. Other symptoms include bugs and many systems being left out.

Another explanation could be time. There is a lot to do and a deadline looming. Do you put in more diseases or other features that you may feel would better benefit the majority of players?

I mean are diseases that important? I understand that they add to the game, but with the removal of attributes it reduces the number of diseases/effects available from the start. Unless there is a specific disease for each skill, which would be wierd I think.

Even in MW I thought diseases were more of an annoyance than a "feature" that I thought was important to my play experience.

EDIT: And I only tried Skooma a couple times in MW but stopped when I realized the effects. Never touched it since. And do we need addictions in a game, even though rated for Mature in the U.S., that is played by gamers, lets say, "more impressionable" than old farts like me.

im happy with the number of diseases in the game.

I don't agree with the cold affecting it, but to be honest MW just had way too many.

I think Skyrim is fine the way it is.

Does anyone know whether or not the disease gets worse if you don't treat it? I generally carry a few hawk feathers to chew on if I get anything so I don't know if things get worse or not. They should, but curing yourself is so easy in this game it's kind of pathetic.

@LeBurns - The diseases do not get worse.

I probably won't buy the next TES because of this...

It may have something to do with Bethesda dumbing down features to appeal to a wider audience, at least that's my guess.

fridge logic? i wish. bethesda just took the time to do somethign counter-productive (imo, at least, graphics before mechanics is counter-productive) and decided the game should look purdyful (yes, purdyful, it is a word down here ) before it should live up to mechanics from daggerfall/morrowind/oblivion, sadly it went the way of skooma and became a horrid aspect that should not have been inclded in the first place if you live by bethesda's motif of "if its broke, trash it"

p.s. i do love skyrim on its own, but it find it a worhtless piece of trash that is not worth the disk it is on looking back over the entire seris...might wanna make that my siggy if i am going to keep telling the truth, dont want to be called a troll now do i?