51 replies to this topic

[AnkhAscendant]

In this case I don't think the game forces you to do anything. I hate the railroading in Skyrim but in this case you really can just ignore the quest, it doesn't even get forced into your journal unless you ask about it.

In some situations (the Vigilant of Stendarr in Markarth is one exception, sure there are more) you are literally FORCED to make a decision against character. But in most cases you're only forced to choose between RP and having an empty quest journal.

Much as I hate having uncompleted quests in my journal (and I really, really do especially the f'in Thieves Guild), I choose RP at that point.

I actually kind of want to defend the Molag Bal quest. I think you can do it even as a holy good saintly character, and I think you can do it while still RPing, because you're not really forced to choose against character. I think this because you as the player aren't being forced to murder, the character is. It's not lazy game work in this quest's case, it's how it shoulder be.

Noble person goes into a house to cleanse it of evil. Evil god takes over the house, locks the door, and gets inside noble person's head, and gives them the option of killing or dying. Noble person does what he has to do to live and then lives with that on their conscience.

Molag Bal is evil. Why would he really give you a choice? ^^ I would think it was more unrealistic if the PC actually could resist him or defy him. The only way I'd improve the quest myself would be to make it so that you actually do tart to lose health/magicka/stamina after a little while of refusing to murder the vigilant...

Of course, if you don't want your saintly character to have to make such a hard choice and suffer, you should probably avoid it.

[Moraevik]

That's all and good, AnkhAscendant, but a "saintly" character will choose to die before committing such an atrocity. For players who are role-playing good characters to the hilt this is a no-win situation, and for a novice placer with no knowledge of what is going to happen when he enters the abandoned house it's a forced no-win scenario. You go in, thinking you're going to do your good deed for the day, and you're suckered into having no option but to restart the game from a previous save and then avoid the Vigilant from then on.

What you're suggesting is for a role-player to step out of character and do something his character wouldn't do, even to save his own life. Some of us aren't going to do that.

Solution: Click on the Vigilant in the console before talking to him. Type "disable". Hit the enter key. Type "markfordelete". No more Molag Bal quest. End of problem.

[Promiser]

I talked about this elsewhere, but I think almost all the Deadric quests could do with some more options. Peryite for example. Why was I not allowed to ask for his 'blessing'? You'd get that nasty vomit ability, the afflicted would see you as their brother, go in murder that elf, and then you can have the option to be cured and get the shield or keep your 'blessing'.

Merida, why can't I ask for Dawnbringer (Dawnbreaker?) to be reforged into a bow? Why am I not given the option to allow the sword to be corrupted and side with the guy and those corrupted shades?

Shoegrath. Maybe I don't want the staff? Perhaps I could instead ask for 'Sheograths Smile'? A power used once a day that causes people in the area to be calmed, rallied, frenzied or feared randomly.

These sorts of things would be absolutely amazing and give you a reason to do Deadric quests as any class. Spellbreaker is useless if I don't plan on using shields ever. Simple things like this would give Skyrim even more replay-ability I think.

[AnkhAscendant]

That's all and good, AnkhAscendant, but a "saintly" character will choose to die before committing such an atrocity. For players who are role-playing good characters to the hilt this is a no-win situation, and for a novice placer with no knowledge of what is going to happen when he enters the abandoned house it's a forced no-win scenario. You go in, thinking you're going to do your good deed for the day, and you're suckered into having no option but to restart the game from a previous save and then avoid the Vigilant from then on.

What you're suggesting is for a role-player to step out of character and do something his character wouldn't do, even to save his own life. Some of us aren't going to do that.

Solution: Click on the Vigilant in the console before talking to him. Type "disable". Hit the enter key. Type "markfordelete". No more Molag Bal quest. End of problem.

You pretty much have it down, actually. If your character would't do it even to save his own life, then die. (Really I mean pretend that Molag Bal kills you, since the quest won't actually do that.) That Dovahkiin dies a saint. And then reload and don't do the quest, since you kind of can't continue the game with a dead Dovahkiin. Personally I think that having the quest still there and avoiding it makes the character more saintly, since it's easy to be good when there's no choice to be otherwise, but if disabling him so that the quest won't get into your journal for you to have to ignore is better for you I don't begrudge it. I just don't think that there should be a moral way to complete the quest, because again, Molag Bal is straight up evil, and evil doesn't play fair.

[Promiser]

That's all and good, AnkhAscendant, but a "saintly" character will choose to die before committing such an atrocity. For players who are role-playing good characters to the hilt this is a no-win situation, and for a novice placer with no knowledge of what is going to happen when he enters the abandoned house it's a forced no-win scenario. You go in, thinking you're going to do your good deed for the day, and you're suckered into having no option but to restart the game from a previous save and then avoid the Vigilant from then on.

What you're suggesting is for a role-player to step out of character and do something his character wouldn't do, even to save his own life. Some of us aren't going to do that.

Solution: Click on the Vigilant in the console before talking to him. Type "disable". Hit the enter key. Type "markfordelete". No more Molag Bal quest. End of problem.

You pretty much have it down, actually. If your character would't do it even to save his own life, then die. (Really I mean pretend that Molag Bal kills you, since the quest won't actually do that.) That Dovahkiin dies a saint. And then reload and don't do the quest, since you kind of can't continue the game with a dead Dovahkiin. Personally I think that having the quest still there and avoiding it makes the character more saintly, since it's easy to be good when there's no choice to be otherwise, but if disabling him so that the quest won't get into your journal for you to have to ignore is better for you I don't begrudge it. I just don't think that there should be a moral way to complete the quest, because again, Molag Bal is straight up evil, and evil doesn't play fair.

An option to break him out and then be forever hunted or haunted by Molag Bal could have been interesting though. Maybe some of his cultists start popping up as random events and the first few times Molag Bal comes to you again saying he will hunt you down and kill you. Even if that never actually means you're killed by him, it stops you from being stiffed armed into a quest

[AnkhAscendant]

I talked about this elsewhere, but I think almost all the Deadric quests could do with some more options. Peryite for example. Why was I not allowed to ask for his 'blessing'? You'd get that nasty vomit ability, the afflicted would see you as their brother, go in murder that elf, and then you can have the option to be cured and get the shield or keep your 'blessing'.

Merida, why can't I ask for Dawnbringer (Dawnbreaker?) to be reforged into a bow? Why am I not given the option to allow the sword to be corrupted and side with the guy and those corrupted shades?

Shoegrath. Maybe I don't want the staff? Perhaps I could instead ask for 'Sheograths Smile'? A power used once a day that causes people in the area to be calmed, rallied, frenzied or feared randomly.

These sorts of things would be absolutely amazing and give you a reason to do Deadric quests as any class. Spellbreaker is useless if I don't plan on using shields ever. Simple things like this would give Skyrim even more replay-ability I think.

From a game perspective you have a good point about things like asking for weapons to be reforged or a different reward, but from an in-game perspective, trying to argue with what the Daedra offer you is rarely a good idea. ^^; Meridia, while arguably good, is haughty as all get-out and has no tolerance for foolishness. Ask for her holy sword to become a bow and she'd take it away and possibly smite you for hubris. Peryite would probably give you his blessing (which I do think should be an option), but he sure as heck wouldn't cure it. If you wanted a power from Sheogorath he might give you that, but he'd also drive you mad, so your Speech skill would be stuck at 0 for the rest of the game and you wouldn't be in full control of your Sneak / walk / run mode and you'd equip / unequip / unsheath / resheath your spells and weapons, and armor, randomly. (I actually like that idea. ) Daedra don't really care if you don't like their artifacts... lore says they have enough adventurers seeking them out that they can choose to be picky (even if what we see in the game disagrees).

I have actually wanted to revamp and expand the Deadra quests to be more like Daedra factions, and I was planning to start a topic about the same. I would be interested in hearing any more ideas you have if I ever start it. (This thread is already being dragged away from its intended purpose...)

Edited by AnkhAscendant, 06 September 2012 - 01:59 PM.

[Promiser]

"Use this sword to spread my light!"

"You know, I could do that a LOT better if it was a bow, just saying..."

Granted, some things aren't as black and white as the example I stated. But I think Merida wouldn't complain if your character explained you could serve her better if the weapon was reforged.

You won a bet with Sheograth, and despite him being a bit of a smug jerk, he's pretty honorable with bets, despite being underhanded and sneaky about it. I don't think permanent disabilities would be a good option, but for Sheograth's Smile, maybe random skills boosts and debuffs along with this power (within 10 or 15 points) would be interesting. The nature of the power though would amuse him, and even the player. You walk into a bandit camp, half of them are screaming and running around smashing their friends heads in. The other half are standing there like everything is normal or suddenly acting all bravado. It causes chaos, which is sure to bring him a smirk.

Also, if you've got the talent and know how... I'd love to work on this with you! I don't have the technical expirience for it yet, but I'm willing to learn or even just throw ideas at you. Just toss me a PM if you're serious about it and we can figure things out from there. But you're right we're derailing the topic...

[Promiser]

As a side note, the Azura quest alone makes me feel like you could even have the option of using what's his face at the Skyforge and maybe some knowledge from a few mages/cultists to reforge them yourself.

[gsmanners]

You pretty much have it down, actually. If your character would't do it even to save his own life, then die. (Really I mean pretend that Molag Bal kills you, since the quest won't actually do that.) That Dovahkiin dies a saint. And then reload and don't do the quest, since you kind of can't continue the game with a dead Dovahkiin. Personally I think that having the quest still there and avoiding it makes the character more saintly, since it's easy to be good when there's no choice to be otherwise, but if disabling him so that the quest won't get into your journal for you to have to ignore is better for you I don't begrudge it. I just don't think that there should be a moral way to complete the quest, because again, Molag Bal is straight up evil, and evil doesn't play fair.

So, your options are:

1) Murder the crazy Boethiah priest because he's an ungrateful dumbass who insults you when you rescue him (which fails the quest).
2) Murder the crazy Boethiah priest because Molag Bal tells you to (which makes you Molag's champion).
3) Leave the quest in your log, mocking you (or you could view it as your character mocking Molag).
4) Avoid the Vigilent in the first place (which implies that your character is a Stendarr-hating insensitive brute).

I'd really like a fifth option, myself.

[Lachdonin]

I'd really like a fifth option, myself.

As much as i enjoy Skyrim, i think this is hte real crux of the problem. Theres plenty to do, yes. The game has more quests to it than either Oblivion or Morrowind (maybe even more than both combined) but it lacks ways to DO those quests. In many cases, even a simple Journal feature which moved quests you didn't want to bother with to an 'inactive' tab would have been a start.

Of course, this has really always been the way of things in TES games. When given a choice, it's pretty much A or B, nothing else. Even then, such choices are few and far between. We could do with an injection of the Fallout quest-designer philosophy, but only if its done well.