A New Daedric Prince

[krimzin]

yeah, i don't think it really specified, but since he's a mage, i think he would most likely be a Breton than any other race.

[grmblf]

hi there, I came to see how's that progressing so far and I've realised I've get lost somewhere in this story, and this starts to be a big thread to read all over (once again) so I thought it'd be nice if either you zprospero or krimzin could write a summary of both the past history and quest storyline. I'll understand you don't need such a summary so if you aren't willing to write it and you don't care I'll write it myself with all the imprecisions and innaccuracies from such a TES lore ignorant like me :P

 

Right now I have a few questions/considerations about the course the story is taking, perhaps some has been explained before, if so then I ask you please excuse me because I don't get them:

 

1 - Tharn's Illusion: How is that finaly the player 'sees beyond' Jagar Tharn illusion? Sincerely, I don't think a simple scroll from Ealdor has to break the enchantment (neither should allow the player to see). By wich mean can Ealdor bypass Tharn's magic? Is it Ealdor more powerful than Jagar Tharn? I don't think so, neither I think that this was simply an illusion spell, it's suposed to have deceived arch-mage Traven and all the mages in the IC, perhaps even Uriel Septim trusted that vision otherwise he could told you that, don't you think?, so perhaps is the player powerful enought to counter that enchantment/don't be affected by it? I'd make that Ealdor gives you some kind of quest to obtain something (a stone, glass, metal, etc, or go to perform some ritual) to obtain the ability to see the true nature of the place. Perhaps this could be focused otherwise, making Jagar Tharn spirit and all that demons only exist in a "spiritual" plane overlaping to the real one, so he's not present in body but his spirit reigns the palace. This way he woudn't need to take over a body, but you'd still need a battlemage hearth.

 

2 - Ocatto's hearth/Tharn's body: I know EG team would like to see Ocatto untouched but really I see it quite difficult to extirpate him his hearth and afterwards make like if nothing happened. I've got an idea but perhaps it's too crazy and it's too much of the same, but since you need his hearth, and no human being can live witouth his hearth (not even vampires! It'd be funny make Ocatto become a vampire just because we needed his hearth), but you could kill him, extirpate his hearth, then place a black soul gem or some other un/holy item in it's place and cast some macabre ritual to revive him. And then make him looks very old and his skin turned to a greener note depending on how long he had been dead. But for the rest he could act normally, and it'd be even quite logical he remembers nothing from while he was dead neither the moment before of his death. It's not that I don't like the possession stuff, simply that the hearth thing wasn't covered, but that's a suggestion only.

 

3 - Main storyline: It seems that evey idea here aims higher than the last one, and there's nothing wrong about that, but simply that threats are growing in power and this no longer seems a quest a level 5 character could start. Moreover the apparition of Tharn seems to be the center of the action now and compared to this the adventures of Ealdor in his ascension seems quite irrelevant for the Champion of Cyrodiil that once again will save the world from a terrible threat. Again, nothing absolutely wrong about it, but IMO this diverts the player from the original story presented in this mod. I'm not talking about doping Tharn from the story, simply I'm telling I think you should take special care planning his apparition.

 

4 - Tempo: perhaps it's soon yet to talk about the story's tempo but as I've said above it seems to me that things are growing bigger and bigger, and also the duel with Tharn sounds like an epic thing, but I really wouldn't like it being 'more epic' than the ascension of Ealdor itself or a fight agains a deadra if this finally occurs. You can't simply saturate the story with epic moments as this would make no difference between them (I'm not saying you're already doing so!) and there's to be high-intensity and low-intensity moments, just to make the difference. So my personal suggest here is that if the fight against Jagar Tharn has to be somehow the climax of the story then make it has a longer prelude, some big crescendo before the final moment and not just to come, see and win. I know the palace doesn't allow for much room for this kind of 'adventuring', but considering you're talking about killing him with a magical dagger perhaps the big quest is to find that dagger and the palace is just the boss room, but then once again, it should be in a way that doesn't allow the player to retreat to a safe place. To make it interesting, perhaps Ealdor doesn't know that Ocatto is possessed by Jagar Tharn, so you discover this when you attempt to kill him in bed, in fact you kill him but then you release Tharn's spirit and thus the whole 'illusory reality' with demons and so. This way you can make each quest Ealdor gives to you looks harder than the latest one but in the end they become harder than intended/announced, so this allow for some degree of suspense (you were sent to kill a sleeping man and ended up fighting Jagar Tharn so now that Ealdor sends you to a dangerous quest you're fearing the worst when maybe that is one of the easy quests).

 

@ Krimzin: hey man you're doing a good work on this, keep it up! but please don't make Tharn tells you the whole reasoning and explanation for his deeds, I always find quite pathetic when the bad guy tells all this things before the final battle, it's like they're saying they're going to die XD

 

Well, these are just my thoughts, you know you can do with them what you want. Maybe there are more questions than suggestions but don't take it like I'm questioning the story, I just want to give you something to think about - or something to write about if you've already thought about it! :)

[krimzin]

lol so are you suggesting he tell his story after he's dead? He's a villain, they like to monologue. Their own voice is prolly their favorite thing to hear. Plus, they aren't implying their death, their implying YOUR death. And I do see a little of what you're saying about Tharns magic. True, the Emperor is powerful, but let's keep in mnd, he's had this kinda thing happen before, and that was when he was fairly young. He's a lot older and world-weary now (well actually he's dead, but) so he's still pretty suceptible to a mage's illusions. Also, Traven just doesn't seem to be a super-mage. He's no Gandalf by any means, he couldn't even see that billions of Necromancers were attacking the guild and helping Mannimarco to power. So I doubt he could see through any illusions a powerful battlemage aided by a daedric prince could cast. and I agree that it shouldn't be known quite yet that Ocato is possesed by Tharn. Perhaps there should be a quest, either in favor of another daedric prince or a different entity entirely, to get this "Veil-Breaking Sight" and the magical dagger. Maybe even Mehrunes Dagon himself could be lying dormant beyond the reaches of Oblivion and ask for vengeance against Ocato/Tharn. But that is blowing it pretty far out there.

About the Epic-ness, This is meant to be an EXTREMELY epic quest. We're talking about bringing a Daedric Prince to power, it doesn't happen every day. in fact, it really hasn't ever happened. And mind you, this IS taking place after the main quest, so there is no Level 5 character about it, you will have some power at your disposal, rest assured. Tharn is probably one of the least of your worries once you meet up and try to fight against Azura. Azura is a GOD, not a mere sorcerer. There is no Avatar of Akatosh to save you in that fight, it will be intense.

About Ocato. Ocato really won't change during the course of this. Ocato is Ocato, but Tharn is working his strings. Behind the illusion, Tharn is very much a physical entity, Mehrunes made that possible. However, he is limited to his illusion. He stays in the palace because even a daedric prince can't bring a battlemage of Tharn's caliber back to full power, but they can give him life and daedric magic. the heart you will be getting is Tharn's, not Ocato's. Ocato is just an anchor to fit tharn into the story. Otherwise there wouldn't be anything believeable to tie Tharn into the story with. By this point in the story your character should be used to saving Tamriel from sure destruction. I mean during the course of this quest, I'm sure Tamriel will be on the verge of disappearing off the face of nirn more than once. The purpose is to keep the player constantly intrigued, the quest really can't settle down or you'll get bored with it and poor Ealdor will have to wait for a really long time to be a god. (lol impatient time god)

But I see your need for the "Low-points" and they are easily implemented with quests for smaller items that help to get to bigger tasks, like the dagger and scroll leading to Tharn. There's plenty of opportunity for low points like these so you can rest easy. The trick is just making them flow easily with the story.

[zprospero]

Let us remember, we want to keep the storyline of Ealdor and Ouroboros

separate for now. Azura will not step in so overtly until AFTER he's ascended.

 

Okay, here's a synopsis of the storyline, as I think it will be.

I think we'll drop the illusion breaking spell in favor of the magic dagger,

I explain somewhere below this.

 

Ealdor sends a herald to invite you to his tower. You arrive, and

he explains he needs your help. There will be a few simple quests

at the beginning, go here and bring me this, talk to this person for

me. Lots of this has to do with the simpler parts of constructing the

Counterfeit Heart, paying smugglers to get Dwemer parts delivered,

maybe visiting a retired Blackwood Company agent to get Hist Sap,

which, (I came up with this part) is what is used to create the green

gem that Mantella appears as.

 

Then comes the hard part. The special information you seek (the magic

dagger's location, and the location of the latest incarnation of Lorkhan

(remember we need his soul to make the Mantella)) is hidden in the endless

library of Hermaeus Mora, Apocrypha.

 

Unfortunately, you helped Akatosh, god of TIME, to close the Oblivion Gates.

Akatosh decided to close the gates forward and backward. No one can get in,

without direct intervention from a god. However, if Hermaeus opened the door

himself some of the other gods might get suspicious. Hermaeus has little to do

with the living and Azura knows of Ealdor.

 

So, you need a secret way into the Oblivion planes. In the book "The Doors of Oblivion"

it is mentioned that a Master Conjurer traveled into Oblivion via a method he learned from

Divayth Fyr, our first special guest. So, Ealdor and you meet with Fyr. He explains the method

of using the portals and mentions that he has found a more direct route that the one the

conjurer took. Note, as a Telvanni he's going to want something. I haven't thought up what

yet, but it will probably be hidden in Apocrypha.

 

Via the means described Fyr and Ealdor open a portal to take you to Apocrypha, a very small

section where Hermaeus has closed off certain areas so you don't end up endlessly trapped. Here

you will meet one of the many ghosts who are imprisoned here. He will make a deal with you. Bring

him the knowledge he's been seeking endlessly and he'll lead you to the information you want. He

warns you emphatically, as Ealdor has too, to not look in ANY other book or you'll be ensnared by

the trap. This will involve some sort of puzzle to get to the necessary book. You are given the

information necessary and leave Apocrypha. This will be a nice low tension research quest, with

only the occasional possibility of death/eternal imprisonment.

 

Once you have this information then you must go and get the means to kill Tharn and collect

the soul of the latest Lorkhan incarnation. Ealdor will send you after the last living descendant

of King Wulfharth (the guy whose soul ended up in the original mantella), who is probably a really

nice guy. Since we want balance it should be a really nice guy and a really bad guy who you have

to kill. You soul-trap him and capture his soul in a special soul-gem. Then you go after Tharn. Ealdor

does not tell you Ocato is Tharn. He gives you a dagger that he says will, using a chronomantic

enchantment, cast Silence permanently on the battlemage. Of course, this is not true and it's actually

an enchantment to exorcise Tharn from Ocato's body.

 

Tharn, realizing he's been found out, breaks his own illusion and invites you in to gloat. He doesn't

elaborate too much on his plans, since he may not have ones yet beyond being the de facto emperor,

just basically says "Thanks and go die." We might want to work in a little bit of "join me." Remember

that this is the guy who seduced Queen Barenziah. Of course, he'll try and kill you regardless.

 

You kill him, extract his heart (which the magical dagger keeps his soul attached to), from his new

body (not Ocato's, he migrates to one he's been saving for a fight) and then go back to Ealdor,

reasonably ticked off. Ealdor just ignores your complaints and introduces you to Sotha Sil.

 

Sotha Sil is here striking a bargain with Ealdor.

 

From the UESPWiki:

 

"In the smoky catacombs beneath the city where Sotha Sil forged the future with his arcane clockwork apparatus, something unforeseen happened. An oily bubble seeped from a long trusted gear and popped. Immediately, the wizard's attention was drawn to it and to the chain that tiny action triggered. A pipe shifted half an inch to the left. A tread skipped. A coil rewound itself and began spinning in a counter direction. A piston that had been thrusting left-right, left-right, for millennia suddenly began shifting right-left. Nothing broke, but everything changed.

 

'It cannot be fixed now,' said the sorcerer quietly." — 2920, Evening Star

 

Ealdor is the only person in all this universe who can go back and fix Sotha's beloved Clockwork City. He will aid Ealdor so that his City can be repaired and his people protected (by the various strange means his city was designed for). The machine was his way of atoning for his crimes against Nerevar, since he knew the power they stole would eventually fail.

 

Sotha is here to perfect the last few pieces of the Counterfeit Heart, but they are lacking. Who in Cyrodiil knows about Dwemer machinery and would suitably have access to ANY dwemer items they wanted? The woman who runs the Orrery, of course. [Note that you don't have to have the Orrery mod installed, you just have to go talk to her in the Archmage's Lobby] Remember that only the Nerevarine knows that Sotha Sil is dead (and Vivec, unless he's dead). Sotha will give you a letter to take to her, requesting some dwemer items that have been evading him and praising her ingenuity. The flattery wins her over and she decides to bend the rules and help by shipping the items to the requisite destination, where will Ealdor's herald will retrieve them.

 

Sotha and Ealdor complete the Counterfeit Heart and the ascension ceremony begins. Sotha and Divayth will be there assisting Ealdor with the machine. The approving daedra are here, represented by their statues (They are ambiently keeping the non-approving ones from stepping in directly). Ealdor destroys the soul of Jagar Tharn permanently, the requisite act of destruction, and then gives life back to Wulfharth's descendant, the necessary act of creation. Note that he needed the soul of the descendant because that was the one thing he couldn't create on his own since he isn't a god yet.

 

The last thing to be done is to destroy Ealdor's corporeal form entirely. This is accomplished by that jewel that I mentioned when we talked about the Staff of Chaos. You are the one to destroy him (You won't have to fight, just blow him up.) The last act is to destroy the Counterfeit Heart, since it's power is spent anyway. You place the jewel into the heart (like the Order Pillar things in Shivering Isles) and the Heart self destructs removing the power of the Staff of Chaos from the flow of time (the staff is indestructible). You are returned safely to the real world, where Ealdor's Tower remains. The herald gives you a note and key and leaves, whining about having to get a new job. Ealdor bequeaths the tower and it's unique contents to you, just in case. If it worked, he says, you will see him again.

 

Note that the ascension ceremony won't go as easily as you hope. There will be some people you have to stop from interrupting, and none of the immensely powerful wizards are going to help.

 

End of Ealdor portion of storyline.

 

@grmblf

 

This is mainly just reiteration, but it's an awful lot to read up there. So, these are specific responses.

 

1.

Jagar Tharn's illusion will be broken by Jagar himself. Yes, Ealdor is not as powerful as Tharn, that's one of the reasons he hired you. There will be some quests to expose the weakness. Like when Traven killed himself to prevent your being Enthralled by Mannimarco. Something will happen to make you strong enough to fight Tharn as well, and the dagger will be enchanted specially to combat Tharn's powers.

 

2.

Don't worry. Ocato is merely possessed. The dagger hurts Ocato, but exorcises Tharn from him.

Ocato recalls nothing of any of this and continues as he would normally. Tharn migrates to a new

body in order to fight you.

 

3.

Yes, I agree the mod is starting to take a shape I had not planned, but I think a better one. As krimzin stated, this takes place after the Main Quest, so you should be pretty powerful, this quest is not meant for lower levels. In a way, Ealdor is already acting as a daedra, similar to how the others say "[name here] demands a more powerful champion for this quest." We might even want to work in a level threshold, but that will become more apparent during testing. Also remember that Ealdor is Telvanni, he probably doesn't care about Tharn ruling the Empire, he only wants him so he can ascend. Telvanni are self-absorbed, while it may don on the player the scope of your actions, it means little to Ealdor. Tharn isn't really a threat, just a problem. He's merely trying to do what he did before, rule in the Emperor's place. He may have no devious plans beyond this yet. He's weakened and recovering his power. Then you step up and kill him before he gets the chance.

 

4.

I agree very much with the idea of keeping a proper tempo. Some of the quests will be very hard. Some will be very easy. Others will be designed to look easy and then turn out really hard and vice versa. We'll be sure to keep the quests from going one big battle after another.

 

Thank you for your concerns and suggestions, they are really helping to keep me thinking.

 

@krimzin

 

Your description of the battle sounds very awesome. Thank you for your help and ideas.

[kieranfoy]

yeah, i don't think it really specified, but since he's a mage, i think he would most likely be a Breton than any other race.

If you're talking about Jagar Tharn, I believe he's a mix of various elven races. Or so I recall.

[krimzin]

ok, so let me alter my idea a bit. So you are told you need a Battlemage's heart from square one and you know you'll need a magic dagger. You aren't told who's heart until the last minute basically. Somehow you get the dagger infused with epic magekilling power. Then Ealdor mentions, "Ok now that you are going to get the dagger, you killed Ocato..." you say, "What?! Kill the only person who can possibly pull the Empire back together?!" Ealdor, "Did I stutter? You killed Ocato. Didn't I mention that? Maybe not, but go now. Toddle off. Besides, there was something strange about him anyways." You then go to the Imperial Palace and upon entering, and approaching the council chamber, you suddenly feel like you are pulled away to somewhere else, but when you open your eyes, you're standing right where you just were... but something doesn't quite seem the same. Again the skeleton legion troops and you enter the council chamber and see Ocato (This will just be a copy of Ocato, so that nothing happens to the original) As you plunge your knife into him, he falls to the ground... then his body disappears. As you look around puzzled, a shadowy figure steps forward. It's Tharn, he does his speech and teleports up then you fight all the undead watch soldiers and run up to fight him. he gets stabbed and dies and turns into a burnt corpse and you take the heart and get teleported back to the council chamber and there's Ocato standing there like a moron as if nothing happened. you ignore him and take the heart to Ealdor and it continues from there.

[sinisterassasin]

Can i get in on making weapons/shields and what not for this quest i've been doing alot of practice

[grmblf]

Can i get in on making weapons/shields and what not for this quest i've been doing alot of practice

Hey man good that you're practicing moddeling, I hope we could see soon a mod of yours, but I think that zprospero original idea was to add only the minimum necessary custom-made meshes to make it light, and that's already covered I think, but who knows maybe if you have a good idea that fits the story or if you want to model some of the artifacts needed for the quest that'd be great, but not weapons and armors by now. Wait, there was a dagger involved, lets wait zprospero says if he wants a new model/texture for it.

[zprospero]

Since the dagger is meant to be a unique artifact I see no reason why we couldn't have a unique texture or model for it, if you would

like to do it. There may be one or two other things that we discover we'll need as I write the quests, but I can't think of any others right

now. Thank you for the offer.

[krimzin]

yes i agree you should make a new dagger. i was just gonna use mehrunes razor and give it a different name lol. something with a gem on it somewhere for a soul to be inside. maybe you can even have the dagger powered by Uriel or Martin septims soul. But I'm thinking a soul of someone pure, that should be what overpowers Tharn