Dawnguard: Harkons Plan

[Lachdonin]

Sajuukkhar is right on this one, in my mind. The 'sun' of Mundus is something very different from the rolling ball of plasma we know and love. You can't assume the normal environmental rules apply. Just because something is green doesn't mean it's that way because it's photosynthetic. Even then, the Stars of Mundus give off the exact same energy as the Sun, so while the magical 'light' which may feed these plants would diminish, it's highly unlikely they would die.

 

And as Sajuukkhar said, blotting out the sun doesn't stop it from working. It's not like Harkon's plan would have sealed the hole left by Magnus. It's more like putting a filter over it to ward off the worst effects. For the most part life would go on as normal, with the unfortunate difference that powerful vampires could now wander around at will.

 

As for who would win the inevitable conflict? Well, Harkon isn't the only Clan-Lord in Tamriel. It's reasonable to assume there are hundreds, if not thousands of powerful Vampires throughout the provinces, all of whom would capitalize on the event. The in-game representation of Vampires and Vampire Lords also cannot be taken at face value, as we know of Vampires (mainly from Daggerfall) commanding armies of undead. It wouldn't be about hunting down individual, though powerful vampires, it would be all out war, where every soldier you lose gets up to fight for the enemy.

 

Finally... the Alduin thing... IF Harkon succeeded before the Dragonborn defeated Alduin, and the Dragonborn was slain before vanquishing Alduin, there would be no rulership for anyone. Alduin's victory means the end of the world and the birth of the next. Almost everything goes with it, save for maybe the few shards Dagon had hidden away before he pissed off Alduin.

Edited August 2, 2013 by Lachdonin

[fifteenspades]

You shouldn't assume harkon would carry his plan out in the time era that your character lives in.

Vampires are immortal so he could do it anytime he wanted once he had the bow, maybe he would wait till after the aludin thing

or maybe even wait till the dawnguard again dismembers.

 

I agree society's would rise up to fight the vampires for centurys after with a specific intent on killing all vampires but would that even be able too?

Lets assume nighttime is actually realistic and not like vanilla skyrim. only the khajiit can see in the dark and werewolves, everyone else would have to rely on man made light/magick

vampires would have a huge advantage... because when it's dark... it's freakin dark. Also i am not sure how the Moon works in TES, is it a moon? or is it something else?

and with the sun blotted out, does the moon still come out?

 

Now ask yourself if you are a person living in the era of vampires, where just going out of w/e safehold you call home is a risk to your life. because most likely when people start to fear the vampires and acknowledge how powerful they are, A ton of people will opt to become a vampire. so not only do you have the physical problems, you have the mental problems. Do you think you could be a solider who has to fight in the dark against who knows what and keep your wits about you? you may even have to fight people you once knew who were either turned willingly or not. and when you fight a vampire you have to make sure never to get hit because even a scratch can turn you.

 

Now finally let's assume TES follows the laws of evolution and adaptation. If you assume that, then you can say Eventually after a long period of time people will start to adapt to the dark, their body will become more used to it and develop in ways to cope with the dark.meaning they become more accustomed too it and most likely will be able to see a lot better. Only at that time do i ever see a rebellion against vampires effective in any way. Unless of course the vampires just kill themselves in an internal power struggle. but again this wouldn't happen for hundreds upon hundreds of years.

[justwannaddl]

I'm not sure the blotting of the sun can ever be more than a temporary localized event. The player could blot out the sun with the bow using Serena's blood but the effect always wore off. Prolonged use would lead to damage to the environment but it would bounce back eventually.

 

The arrows may give vampires advantages in controlling villages or towns but that alone would not allow them to control Skyrim much less Tamriel. A vampire army can only be supported by a large population of uninfected. It is hard to judge how this would have ended though. In Morthal, only one person besides the Dragonborn had the courage to really face Movarth and his thralls even though they formed an angry mob and he was crazy with grief. If most people were to act as scared sheep like they did, then the vampires would have little to fear even without the bow.

[Lachdonin]

A vampire army can only be supported by a large population of uninfected.

 

 

The problem with this is, Vampires in the TES universe don't need to feed to survive. In fact, the longer they don't try to maintain their 'humanity' by feeding, the more powerful they become. So a 'supporting population' is totally irrelevant to them.

[justwannaddl]

Physically, that may be true but mentally, it has been shown they revert to rabbid monsters without a constant supply of blood. Without intelligence, they would be slain like wild animals.

[luzburg]

Physically, that may be true but mentally, it has been shown they revert to rabbid monsters without a constant supply of blood. Without intelligence, they would be slain like wild animals.

 

Lesser vampires.

Harkon straight out says he keeps thralls in case you need to feed like lesser vampires. Obviously vampire lords don't actually need blood. Do you ever see Harkon, Serana or Valeria drinking blood?

[justwannaddl]

The vast majority of any vampire army will be lesser vampires and thralls though. Pure blood vampires, vampire lords and daughters of Coldharbour aren't exactly the norm afterall. Even then, vampire lords require blood to fend off the four stages. One of the biggest strengths of vampires is their ability to hide in plain sight and not feeding isn't exactly an option vampires take lightly.

[TheObstinateNoviceSmith]

I'm not sure the blotting of the sun can ever be more than a temporary localized event. The player could blot out the sun with the bow using Serena's blood but the effect always wore off.

 

This is something I was wondering about as well. I mean you spend the whole time trying to avoid Serana's blood only to be able to do it anyway and the effect ends up being temporary.

 

It kind of made the quest make little to no sense to me since Serana didn't have to die at all it seems and the sun thing was a temporary thing not to mention the whole prophecy thing was made up anyway.

 

Regardless, we don't know what the outcome would have been which is ultimately the point. Assuming that whatever can be done an be undone, my guess is that humankind (as well as the other living races) would have united and wiped out all vampire kind and got the Sun back up long before it had any serious impact on Tamriel's climate.

[TheVampireDante]

I think Harkon's version of the plan was going to involve tainting the bow itself, not just topping a few arrowheads with blood.

 

If he'd done that them perhaps the effect would be different? Either longer lasting, or indeed - permanent. His other option would be to keep Serana and/or Valerica (if he got to her) alive, but subdued somehow - use them as a supply source for the blood he required to repurpose the arrows.

[justwannaddl]

Tainting the bow actually does make more sense but I could have swore the prophesy was about firing tainted arrows instead of tainting the bow. I'm guessing Harkon didn't know the effects would be temporary as it has never been done before. Then again, he did have a large inventory of elven arrows so he may have planned to capture Serana and/or Valerica all along.