Relativelybest

Oh yeah. I'm gettng this one myself. :thumbsup: Feels good to have actually been able to contribute to something around here.

It's pretty hard to make a comparison between Dwemer technology and our own, because of magical stuff like soul gems. They were clearly industrialized, though, and knew about robotics an (apparently) remote transmission. In some ways, their technology suggests achievements we haven't reached yet. First of all, Dwemer Metal is clearly an alloy. otherwise it would be possible to find it naturally. The fact that nobody knows how to make it just means that Dwemer metalurgy was way more advanced that anything the other races have. Please note that "alloy" doesn't have to mean one metal mixed with another - carbon isn't a metal but mixing it with iron creates steel. Depending on the exact percentage of carbon, you get steels with different hardness and strenght properties. Adding stuff like chromium and silicon and tungsten to the steel gives you even more varied properties. If the other races can't figure out a way to replicate this metal, it's probably because it contains elements they simply don't have the technology to isolate, maybe even elements they haven't actually identified yet.

Whenever I'm not trying to move the plot along with my main PC, I'm mostly enoying myself by making alternative characters with different goals and personalities. I have one mage girl who went straight to the Winterhold university before doing anything else, and my latest character is obsessed with investigating the Falmer. (I wanted to see how quickly I could get a new character into Blackreach.)

So, does that mean your Dragonborn doesn't kill the dragons at the dragon lairs? Seeing as that would be doing the same thing as the dragons, I mean: invading their territory and attacking them unprovoked.

Well, close enough for what I'm going for, I suppose. Visually, anyway. Would love to do all this, but I don't even have the creation kit, and last time I tried to do some advanced changes to a mod (in Fallout 3) I messed it up so badly I had to uninstall the game and start over. So I'm not really confident in my own modding skills.

Delphine: We know about Paarthurnax. Me: Yeah, turns out he's a dragon. He's cool, though. Delphine: Never the less, we don't need him anymore. So we'd like you to kill him. Me: *snort* Delphine: ? Me: No, sorry. Do go on. Delphine: Like I said, he used to be Alduin's right hand and he did a lot of bad things, so you need to go up there and kill him for us. Me: Pffffwahahahahahaaa! Delphine: What's so funny? Me: No, it's just... That like Luke Skywalker being asked to assassinate Yoda. Or Frodo Baggins being told he has to stab Gandalf. Delphine: I don't know who those people are. Me: Nevermind. Meta joke. Delphine: So you'll do it? Me: Hell no. What are you crazy? He's the only dragon in the world who'll talk to me without trying to set me on fire. Delphine: He already betrayed Alduin. We can't afford to let him betray us as well! Me: Sure we can. If he turns evil, then I take him down. Cause and effect, woman, it's simple physics. Delphine: Well, until you kill him, we won't provide you with any more help. Me: Oh no. I can't possibly manage without you and the old man helping me out. Whatever will I do? This ultimatum has really put me in a tight spot! Delphine: Are you.... Are you being sarcastic? Me: Sarcastic? What's that? I don't know what the word means!

I tried to kill him the first time I met him, actually, because I wanted to loot his clothes. Unfortunately, the guy was essential, and had an essential guard helping him. As far as I know he's still standing outside that farm waiting for the farmer to fix his wagon, because apparently the farmer lied when he said he'd help him even after I talked him into it. (I don't really play asssassin characters.)

Yeah, I'm pretty much the same way. I mean, dont get me wrong: if Bethesda wants to create a fantasy universe that doesn't aknowledge homesxuality at all, that wouldn't really bother me because gay people isn't high on my list of action RPG requirements. But if they then throw in gay marriage as an actual option, it breaks my immersion. I don't expect Bethesda to be the gods of quality writing. Goodness, no. But I do kinda expect, you know, consistency. I expect them to understand that you can't have your cake and eat it at the same time. That you can either make a setting that does not aknowledge that homosexuals exist, or you can let your players have gay marriages with no consequences, but that you can't do both. You have to make an actual commitment, is what I'm basically saying. Ah, but what reason would he possibly have to be closeted with a beard wife in a society where there is apparently no stigma to gay marriage whatsoever? You pretty much nailed it. It's an immersion issue for me, not a political thing. Right, so one possible couple of gay guys, maybe. Oh, I absolutely agree. If you ask me the entire thing needs an overhaul. Just, I thought that was a rant for a different thread. I'm not talking about sex, I'm talking about marriage. Love. People being romantically involved with each other. There's plenty of that in this game. It's very badly executed, yes, but at least it's there. ....How in God's name can the option of gay marriage not count as making homosexuality apparent? o_O Besides, you're telling me that in this day an age, you can't put a couple of token gay people in an M-rated fantasy game that lets you engage in murder, cannibalism and blood sacrifice to demon gods? Have you payed attention to the fantasy genre the last couple decades? Watched Game of Thrones, maybe? It's not the 1800s anymore, it goddamned 2012. I don't buy it. I think Bethesda could have totally gotten away with it if they wanted to. They just didn't want to have to bother making the effort.

I have to say, though, it's kinda weird to go to the spoiler forum and not emidiately find two fifty+ page threads of people treating the partisan politics of an imaginary viking kingdom like incredibly serious business.

So I finally made a character for whom turning into a werewolf actually feels appropriate. Thing is, she's a catgirl, and it kinda sorta feels a bit thematically weird for her to go from feline to canine. Yes, I know going from hominid to canine makes just as little sense. It still bugs me, though. So I was thinking: Sabercat head + sabrecat tail + werewolf body, plus some new textures and sound replacements = weresabercat! ...Come on, I can't be the only one who thinks this would be totally awesome. :thumbsup:

On the contrary, that's why marrying her would be appropriate. In any other decent fantasy story, the wandering diamond-in-the-rough hero marrying the young widowed queen after helping her win her throne would have been part of the plot. But in Skyrim, Divines forbid you marry anyone who actually matters. :rolleyes: That's what I don't like about the marriege feature - it mostly feels like something they stapled on as an afterthought, as opposed to a legitimate part of the story.

Would love to see some really ambitious quests for Skyrim - something equivalent to Dungeons of Ivellon or Gates to Aesgard for Oblivion. I've actually started to make notes for a puzzle-centric adventure mod that I hope wouldn't be "too" difficult to make, but since I'm not really a modder myself it may still be just another pipe-dream. (I have a lot of those, some being pretty absurd in terms of the effort they'd require.) Huh, really? That's pretty disconcerting. :confused: So, why are quests harder to make for Skyrim? Is the process more complicated than for Oblivion, or is it just a generaly buggy system?

^This. Also, Magica Sabers Expanded by Aberation is a general improvement: http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/10517 (Though, unless you are really patient and willing to grind smithing and do a lot of material hunting, you're going to want to have some console commands handy. The material requirements are kinda absurd.)

I don't really go out of my way to be evil in these games. Mostly because you actually have to go out of your way to be evil in these games. Usually I just do whatever comes natural, requires less effort, and/or is more benificial to my character, which usually results in my character generally having more good tendencies. To use D&D terms, I'm usually either Chaotic Good or Chaotic Neutral.

What's strange about wanting to marry Elisif?

I would like a mod that makes the following changes: 1: Movement is less impeded while blocking. (Though still more so than with the Block Runner perk.) 2: Replace sheild/weapon bashing with an instant normal melee attack from the main weapon. 3: If possible, make it so that interupting an enemy power attack while blocking causes bonus damage and better criticals. How that? Can it be done?

This is something that's been bugging me for a while. So, you can marry people in Skyrim, including people of the same gender as your character. That basically means that homosexual relationships aren't just tolerated in the world of Elder Scrolls, but actually socially and legally approved of. Which is of course a nice thing, only... ...Well, I haven't actually met any gay NPC. Like, an actual same-sex couple. In fact, aside from marriable NPC (who's sexual orientation is of course variable by default) I haven't met a character who even hints at being gay. They don't seem to exist. For that matter, is there any mention if homosexuality anywhere? I mean, I don't really study the lore in detail, so maybe I missed it, but nothing I've seen or read have ever even hinted at this subject. On the other hand, I did find a book detailing the tragic love story between a dunmer and a khajiit, so at least I know there are some references to interspecies relationships. (Which should realistically be a rarer thing than same-sex relationships.) So, if you marry a character of the same gender as yourself, everyone is totally cool with it and you are allowed to love each other with the blessings of the Divines and all that... yet you are apparently the only openly gay couple in the known world? I dunno, does anyone else find this kinda jarring? o_O

Dream mod, huh? Well, I'm not sure its even possible, but I'd like a mod that completely remakes the melee fighting into a system that relies on skill and timing rather than having a great armor, the best sword and a ton of healing. You know, something that makes it feel like I'm actually playing a skilled fighter. Other than that... I suppose I'd like a mod that lets me create custom followers. Like, literally access the race menu in game and make a character, then boom, a follower. (Not sure that's possible either.) On a somewhat similar note, I would like to meet potential spouses as part of some kind of quest where marrying them is a conclusion that actually makes sense. What I mean is, I don't want to marry some girl as a result of doing her some random favor, like bringing a message to her dad in the next village or whatever. I want to fight my way through a monster-infested fortress and free her from her captivity in the highest tower. Or, say I play a thief, maybe I'll run into my potential spouse when we both try to break into the same building. Or maybe I'm hired to find/kill/kidnap a person and we end up falling in love along an unlikely series of hijinks and misunderstandings? You know? A bit of effort is all I ask for. Something that makes me feel motivated about this marriage thing.

Eh, I just get a better feel for females, making it easier to get into character. Somehow, male characters never feel quite "real" to me. They end up being just some guy running around doing stuff. I've been some guy all my life, so I don't realy see the appeal in pretending to be one in a video game. If I want to be some guy running about swinging swords around, I can do that in real life. Anyway, I don't really feel a need to identify closely with my characters - in fact, I tend to prefer ones that are radically different from me. Plus, I don't really like the look of the dudes and with the limitations of the race menu, I don't think it's even possible for me to create a male character I consider genuinely cool.

I don't think dragon immortality is all about Alduin - it seems to be something intrinsic to their nature. Paarthurnax said that the reason Dragonrend hurts dragons is because it forces them to understand the concept of mortality, which is something they usually can't even grasp. Apparently it all has something to do with Akatosh being the god of time, making dragon souls linked to time itself or something like that.

So, is there any point to being a cannibal in Skyrim? I mean, it made sense in Fallout because it's a nuclear post-apocalypse and food is supposed to be scarce and irradiated. But Skyrim is littered with food and edible animal and has a system that lets you cook actual meals. It really kinda surprised me when I ran into the cannibal lady and she was like: "You are one of us!" and I was like: "No, I'm pretty sure I'm not. Why are 'you' even a thing, anyway? Go buy some beef or something." Except, in the later case you're not actually directly responsible for his death. And even if we say it's your fault he dies, as an indirect result of your actions, we're still looking at a scenario where you literally kill him personally vs one where leaving him alone might cause him to die, maybe, if he's unlucky. So, killing him is the greater evil no matter how you look at it.

So far I've actually been very careful when dealing with the Daedra. I think maybe Meridia and Mephala have some claim to my soul, but if so they didn't really mention it. I also did Sheogorath's quest but he didn't seem interested (besides, there's worse places to go than the Shivering Isles), I've avoided becoming a werewolf specifically because I don't want Hircine to get his paws on me, and most of the other princes I've basically given the finger. Anyway, even if there are multiple claims to my soul, I plan to solve this problem by never dying. It's spelled "Kvatch." ...Also, does anyone else think "Hero of Kvatch" is a terrible name for the Oblivion protagonist? At the very least, just going by the main quest, your Oblivion character found the last emperor, performed constant raids into Oblivion, saved Bruma from utter annihilation, destroyed an evil cult, slew it's ancient wizard leader, stole their unholy artifact book, recovered the Amulet of Kings, and generally messed up Mehrunes Dagon's plan to take over Nirn. But the only thing people seem to remember is the time you cleared out some minor Daedra from an already destroyed city. I mean, you don't really save Kvatch. You just close the gate and get rid of the remaining invaders, and that second part is optional. Either way, the city is still the same smoking bunch of rubble it was when you found it. It's not exactly your biggest triumph in the game. o_O

While on the subject of weather and lighting filters: There's apparently some sort of decreased saturation effect going on when you're outside in cloudy weather, making everything look bleaker and kinda washed out. (When using the lightsaber mod, I noticed it had a radically different glow outdoors than it had indoors.) Is there any way to get rid of that?

Assuming it works like a regular quest, you should be able to start the quest and then directly hand the crown over to whichever faction leader you prefer. That happens to me all the time when I find quest items for quests I haven't accepted: "I need you to go find the lost lute of..." "You mean this lute?" "Wow! You work fast!"

I aim to please. The later. I'm not really a modder, I just design swords as a hobby. I tried to get into Blender once but it didn't work out. Best I could do is maybe whip a model up in Google Sketchup. After that someone else would have to take over.