TheVampireDante Posted October 25, 2014 Share Posted October 25, 2014 I caught Elenwen outside afterwards, and I fus-roh-dah'd her off the cliff. Essential. Figures. There's mods for that - and yes, it is very amusing to watch her pretend to be a Dragon. Screeching on as she goes flying through the air... Pretty sure that one could use her arrogance to nag the smug out of Alduin, given a chance. Plot hole that- Esbern and Delphine being there magically. Delphine has spent many years in hiding, but also putting a network of contacts together - so it wouldn't surprise me to learn she heard of the meeting from one of them in each camp. Both direct parties (Tullius, Ulfric) would have told people where they were going in advance, so that each group could prepare themselves if anything happens. Tullius either invited Elenwen - or she found out when he was preparing to leave (while talking with Jarl Elisef maybe?) and insisted she be included to "preserve the conditions of the WGC (white-gold concordat). Her BS excuse aside, I'm sure that she knew being there would enrage Ulfric and put him on edge (given their history), which makes his decisions based on his anger and hatred of her, nothing else. She's hoping he makes rash decisions. Which, he does - the degree of which depending on whether you throw her out or not. Elenwen is no doubt surprised to see Delphine and Esbern, especially so close. Must have really irritated her knowing she couldn't act against them. Likely annoyed that even if she stays they really don't pay her much attention. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LeddBate Posted November 1, 2014 Share Posted November 1, 2014 I was actually glad when Elenwen showed up. Not my character, he was P.O.ed. But I loved it! I got to talk briefly with everyone before Arngeir called the meeting to order. Loved Elenwen's faintly threatening "...And this time I know what you are..." response. Not surprising, really, since I annihilated her entire security force on duty between the party and her private house. Oh, and offed her chief torturer... er, I mean "assistant". Throwing her out was great fun. +1 to Bethesda for setting that situation up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riprock Posted November 2, 2014 Share Posted November 2, 2014 I caught Elenwen outside afterwards, and I fus-roh-dah'd her off the cliff. Essential. Figures. There's mods for that - and yes, it is very amusing to watch her pretend to be a Dragon. Screeching on as she goes flying through the air... Pretty sure that one could use her arrogance to nag the smug out of Alduin, given a chance. Plot hole that- Esbern and Delphine being there magically. Delphine has spent many years in hiding, but also putting a network of contacts together - so it wouldn't surprise me to learn she heard of the meeting from one of them in each camp. Both direct parties (Tullius, Ulfric) would have told people where they were going in advance, so that each group could prepare themselves if anything happens. Tullius either invited Elenwen - or she found out when he was preparing to leave (while talking with Jarl Elisef maybe?) and insisted she be included to "preserve the conditions of the WGC (white-gold concordat). Her BS excuse aside, I'm sure that she knew being there would enrage Ulfric and put him on edge (given their history), which makes his decisions based on his anger and hatred of her, nothing else. She's hoping he makes rash decisions. Which, he does - the degree of which depending on whether you throw her out or not. Elenwen is no doubt surprised to see Delphine and Esbern, especially so close. Must have really irritated her knowing she couldn't act against them. Likely annoyed that even if she stays they really don't pay her much attention. Well, yes, I agree; we can rationalize all sorts of situations in which Esbern, Delphine, and Elenwen end up going to the meet, but the timeframe available for them to do it in makes most if not all of them impossible. The meet is not in a few days or next week, or at some other set time where the parties involved could do any of those things like talk, or have spies report etc.- it's right now, as soon as the Dragonborn arrives, which is usually immediately. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lachdonin Posted November 2, 2014 Share Posted November 2, 2014 Well, yes, I agree; we can rationalize all sorts of situations in which Esbern, Delphine, and Elenwen end up going to the meet, but the timeframe available for them to do it in makes most if not all of them impossible. The meet is not in a few days or next week, or at some other set time where the parties involved could do any of those things like talk, or have spies report etc.- it's right now, as soon as the Dragonborn arrives, which is usually immediately. Time in TES is sketchy at the best of times. Everything is highly condensed for gameplay reasons, regardless of realistic logistics. We haven't had to worry about such things since Daggerfall. If the events of Skyrim are converted to a realistic timeframe, given the scale of the world and travel between points, the main quest takes place over the better part of a year, meaning there were likely several weeks between arranging the peace summit, and it actually happening. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riprock Posted November 2, 2014 Share Posted November 2, 2014 (edited) Well again I can agree, but that is another rationalization to sort the issue out. We are left to suppose and guess and come up with the scenario that allows it. That type of contortion is hardly needed; the storyline could have avoided this issue entirely in a few ways. A good way to have addressed this would have been to have the meet at High Hrothgar in 3 days time or something like that. Arngeir could have said "Well Dragonborn, nothing of its like has been seen at High Hrothgar. In three days' time we will be ready to host your council". Edited November 2, 2014 by Riprock Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Browncoat22517 Posted November 3, 2014 Share Posted November 3, 2014 Delphine also indicates that she served in the Great War, in which Ulfric also fought. Best answer IMHO. As much as people don't like Delphine and the Blades in general, she is very well connected. It's not unreasonable to assume that if she could influence Farengar to have someone fetch the Dragonstone (and have the knowledge to interpret that it's actually a map), then surely she is capable of keeping tabs on the major players in the Civil War. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lachdonin Posted November 3, 2014 Share Posted November 3, 2014 Well again I can agree, but that is another rationalization to sort the issue out. We are left to suppose and guess and come up with the scenario that allows it. That type of contortion is hardly needed; the storyline could have avoided this issue entirely in a few ways. A good way to have addressed this would have been to have the meet at High Hrothgar in 3 days time or something like that. Arngeir could have said "Well Dragonborn, nothing of its like has been seen at High Hrothgar. In three days' time we will be ready to host your council". A great deal of story issues could have been avoided rather simply in Skyrim through better pacing. The rushed pacing of Skyrim's quests, on all fronts, turns otherwise great plots (or at least plots that are superior to Oblivions in every way) into bad stories. This is just another symptom of rushing rearing it's ugly head that the lore-community has to then sort through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ManleySteele Posted November 3, 2014 Share Posted November 3, 2014 IKR. Seems like the first thing you have to learn in a modern RPG is to pay no attention to the pacing provided by the game developers. I don't understand why they insist on spamming the PC with quests right at the start. Are they just lazy or are they poor designers? Both? I have to play the start of most games about 3 or 4 times to figure out who to ignore and what I should actually do. I would probably do it anyway, but forcing the issue is a poor choice IMNVHO. (In my not very humble opinion) Edit: I got on a rant that doesn't belong here. lol Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoneWolfEburg Posted November 8, 2014 Author Share Posted November 8, 2014 (edited) Yeah, I agree that Skyrim pacing is off-whack. It's not so much being bombarded with miscellaneous quests (I don't want to wander the land, desperately hoping to stumble on a quest) as the urgency of the storylines - Lachdonin put it well, I think. The main quest in particular jumps into the "OMG OMG QUICKLY QUICKLY DO THIS OR WE'RE ALL DOOMED" mode quite early, which conflicts with the freeform-exploration nature of the game. The only non-urgent task is getting the Dragonstone for Farengar, and the game sneakily attempts to get you past this with Valeriuses' The Golden Claw. In the next TES game, developers should either hold off with the urgency until relatively late, or adopt the Oblivion solution - it had Martin tell you multiple times that he needs 3 days of struggling with mysterious writings to figure out what to do next. That I liked. Edited November 8, 2014 by LoneWolfEburg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MidbossVyers Posted November 13, 2014 Share Posted November 13, 2014 I think it's because Morrowind had absolutely no sense of urgency, and the players lost direction. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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