We already know there were armies of shouters, if there hadn't been the ancient Nords wouldn't have been able to prevail against Alduin and his allies in the Dragon Wars. Paarthurnax began teaching the Thu'um to those Nords who wanted to overthrow Alduin and it was only their ability to shout that gave them any hope of victory.

And it's theorized that the draugr are what remains of those ancient Nords who served the Dragons and their Priests instead, and who were taught to shout in the service of their masters.

Isn't the Thu'um much more powerful than spellcasting though ? I thought it was, since the Greybeards seemed to shake the whole of Skyrim (maybe even Tamriel) when they called on the Dovhakiin.



Well Ulfric Stormcloak managed to trick them didn't he ? They taught him and straight after it he went and killed Torygg with the Thu'um. Maybe not straight after it, he also used it to crush the Forsworn uprising in Markarth.

Yes because he would be dedicated to the cause and to his people, even in real life double agents have operated behind enemy lines for decades, there's no reason a skilled and well trained Nord couldn't fool them.



Several generations time is pretty soon if you think about it. There's no way the AD could have completely replenished it's forces in 30 years.

1. It takes time and patience, which many Nords don't like.
2. The only ones the can really teach now are the Greybeards, the dragons, or the dragonborn. The Greybeards don't approve of using the voice for harm, so they wouldn't. The dragons would just snack on you, and the Dragonborn is busy being the dragonborn.

double post.

Well considering the Greybeards are all Nords themselves I think it's safe to say there's a good few Nords out there with the patience and will to master the Thu'um.

Hmm... lessee... Ulfric was chosen to train with the Greybeards. It took him almost 10 years to learn two shouts. So even if the Greybeards only know the same 20 shouts that the PC can learn as the Dragonborn, and it takes an average of 5 years to learn one shout for someone who was specially chosen for that honor, then learning "all there is to know" from the Greybeards is gonna take him at least 100 years unless he's uniquely gifted for a non-Dragonborn. The Greybeards would be the ones to decide that, because they're the only "experts" on the subject available.

Which leads to the question of whether or not they would find this one Nord worthy of teaching. As far as we know they only teach two kinds of people - Dragonborn, and students they choose themselves. This one theoretical Nord could just as easily have the door slammed in his face, and even if he doesn't he's going to be an old man by the time he comes down off the mountain knowing everything there is to know. He's still gotta live long enough to pass all that on to others, and that's not gonna happen overnight either.

Edit: I am getting [censored] pissed off at this board displaying the html tags after saving and edited post. Why the [censored] does it keep happening.
Plenty of powerful things are done with traditional magic and its much more freely taught and easier to learn

Nope he never tricked them, he spent years studying with the Greybeards and learned how to use unrelenting force but he decided becoming a graybeard wasn’t the life for him so he left. You don’t see him open a school or teaching others he keeps the knowledge of power to himself. And as the above points out he was ten years old when he left to train with them

And many of those people who operate behind enemy lines for over a decade go native, and studying among the Greybeards would limit his contact with the outside world. You’d also have to find a Nord despicable enough to do that as the Greybeards are revered as great holy men.

Yeah but most don't (I think)..


My point is the Greybeards clearly didn't know what Ulfric was going to do in the future, so tricking them would be possible if the potential candidate appeared genuine enough. Ulfric possibly could have taught others what he knew but preferred to hoard the power for himself.

Isn't it simply the words you need to learn ? Then it takes years of meditating on them to increase the power of the shout ?

Before you learn the voice you must learn the script young padawan.

Yes, training with the Greybeards was all part of Ulfric's master "40 year plan" to become High King and secede from the Empire. He must've started plotting it when he was still in diapers, otherwise how could a mere child trick the Greybeards into choosing to train him, and trick his family into sending him to High Hrothgar, then trick the Aldmeri Dominion into attacking the Empire ten years later so he would have what looked like a valid excuse to leave HH, then trick the Empire into signing the WGC so he would have what looked a valid reason to be angry about how it all turned out?

Then he had to manipulate the Forsworn into taking back the Reach, and trick the Nords there into letting him get it back for them with the whole "free Talos worship" arrangement, then trick the Thalmor into pressuring the Empire to pressure the local Jarl to call off the deal and turn Ulfric and his men over to a higher authority for punishment so they could use that as excuse to start the secessionist movement and give him a reason to use the Thu'um against Torygg to make a point about who was a more capable defender of their country.

And just think, the whole plan would've fallen apart if he hadn't been able to trick those silly old monks into teaching him how to shout 40 years ago, when he was still just a lad in short pants!

I swear to god I wish I could punch someone for whatever &)*&$)*&*)%@ reason sometimes when I save a post I've edited all the html tags are displayed and it [censored] pisses me off because I basically need to rewrite the entire reply,

I'm not suggesting Ulfric purposefully tricked them, but the Greybeards obviously don't possess the gift of foresight. Ulfric went on to use the Thu'um in combat and for his own purposes, which shows that another candidate could in fact trick the Greybeards into making them think they were truly commited to the Way of the Voice, while all the while planning to return and teach it to others for war.


I'm not saying it should or would happen, but if I was High King of Skyrim it's certainly something I would ponder.

Yes, it was all part of his master "40 Year Plan" to become High King and secede from the Empire.

Ulfric didn't trick anybody, he was chosen to be their student when he was a child. The expectation was that he would become a Greybeard, altho who exactly expected and desired it at the time is never specified. About ten years later, when the Great War broke out and he was old enough to choose his own path in life, he decided not to become a Greybeard and left. There was no trickery involved, unless you want to believe that a mere child was able to trick a wily and powerful bunch of old monks into choosing him as a student and did it because he wanted to learn the Thu'um and then use it in situations that he somehow anticipated decades in advance of them actually happening.

He may not have purposefully tricked them, but he still did, they couldn't tell what Ulfric was going to become, which makes them as human as any other Nord in that respect. This means they could be fooled.

Except Ulfric went to train at ten years old and only later decided not to become a graybeard. So no he in no way tricked them he trained with the greybeards and decided he didn't want to become one of them. Your talking about a full grown advlt trained in deception maintaining the charade for two or more decades, and he must do this with only the Greybeards to talk to.

the voice is notoriously difficult to learn, and it takes one hell of a disciplined person many years to learn even the simplest of shouts. Even then only the Grey Beards know the instruction for teaching; a group who would refuse to teach it to anyone who they believed would misuse it. Their entire philosophy revolves around not using the voice for personal glory. It would however be interesting to see Dovahkiin turn into Talos 2.0 and reforge the Empire.

I doubt the Grey Bears would even be open to the idea of teaching people the shout again anytime soon after how Ulfric chose to use it, Dragonborn being an understandable exception.



Ulfric was training with the Grey Beards from 10 years old to presumable a time between his 12th birthday and 20th. It's highly unlikely that he had any intention of misusing the voice at the time, and thus could not trick the Grey Beards. However, he did forsake their teachings and disrespected his masters in choosing later to use the voice for his own glory.

Just to be clear: "tricking" someone generally means that there was a deliberate intent to deceive them. Ulfric did not "trick" the Greybeards into anything, unless you want to believe that as a child he already intended to use the Thu'um for what they would consider nefarious purposes and deliberately got himself into HH somehow with the intention of learning it under false pretenses. Saying that he didn't trick them "purposefully" is equivalent to saying that there was no trickery involved at all.

The most you could say is that both Ulfric and the Greybeards were "tricked" by someone or something else into believing that he would indeed grow up to become (and remain) a Greybeard, and that would require that the someone or something else already knew that this would not be the case at all. I'm gonna go with a Daedric Prince on that one, it seems like the kind of thing one of them would do.

I guess so. That's unfortunate, would be cool if the Nords learned to commonly (well compared to modern day Nords) shout again like their ancestors.

This. He didn't trick the Greybeards. He just betrayed their trust after the fact.

It takes a lot of mental willpower for one, meaning only certain people can use the Thu'um. Even in the Draugrs, only the really high level ones can use the Thu'um. But more importantly, the Greybeards. They just sit on top of that mountain and only train those who dedicate themselves to the, "Way of Peace."

You don't think Paarthunax could be convinced into teaching some soldiers a shout or two, do you? Or teach the PC (and Ulfric, if he has any interest in it) HOW to teach?

Then their trust was based on the expectation that the child they chose to train would grow up to be who they required him to be, not who he actually turned out to be. If they really believed that was something that they could control, or that Ulfric was obligated to them as an advlt because of decisions that were made for him when he was a child, then they are not as wise as they appear to be. If they were certain that Ulfric would grow up and still want to become one of them, and that's why they chose him, then they made the wrong choice. That was their failure, not Ulfric's, and he is not obligated to them simply because they screwed up (if indeed they even feel that way about it).

As I've said in other threads, unless the Greybeards are willing to keep their students under their immediate control (i.e., physically confined to High Hrothgar) for their entire lives, by force if necessary, they cannot ever be sure that what they teach will not be used in ways of which they don't approve. They have even less expectation of that if they take a child to be trained, because the day will come when the child will be an advlt who is free to walk away from the life that someone else chose for him. If they assume otherwise, then they are trusting in the inevitability of an outcome that they themselves cannot guarantee and which the student cannot guarantee as a child and is not obligated to give them as an advlt. That is foolishness, and the Greybeards are not fools.

I think it's fair to say he disappointed them, but "betrayed" implies an obligation that never really existed IMO. An expectation is not an obligation, and children are not bound by the expectations of others once they become advlts and are free to choose for themselves.

If he didn't want to be a Greybeard, that was his choice. He was free to abandon the Way at any time of his choosing. However, using their teachings for the sake of war, regicide, and destruction is a betrayal of their trust. While the Greybeards don't own the Voice, deciding to use the knowledge they gave him in direct opposition to their beliefs is a betrayal in my eyes.

I support Ulfric and I agree with this. It's just a fact, he betrayed them. But I think he would have led the rebellion regardless if he knew shouts or not. The Greybeards took him in because they knew he was special.

First off, Ulfric was training with them as a boy. By age 20ish, he left High Hrothgar to fight in the Great War, against the will of the Greybeards. He's known how to use Thu'um for a long time, and didn't just go to HH ask him to teach him and kill Torygg right away. If you talk with him, he tells you his life's story, and left HH because he was essentially a young and restless kid who hated how the Greybeards just sat on a giant ivory white tower and were completely removed from the world.