Vvardenfell

[Nexim]

Hi all, Since the release of Skyrim, I've been interested in visiting the isle again. The call is becoming too much for me, and I've been told that the landmass of all of tamriel is actually included in Skyrim's launch data.

 

So, I've been doing a lot of thinking, a lot of reading in-game, and a fair bit of poking through the UESP pages on Morrowind. I think it's time that we start talking about the possibility of getting a community together to start taking on the task of piecing together Morrowind a bit at a time.

 

I'd like to outline my thoughts on the subject, first and foremost.

 

What's so interesting about Vvardenfell?

 

Skyrim lore spends a great deal of time talking about what happened at the beginning of the fourth era, and after the collapse of the empire. Morrowind was always a barely-conquered province, full of intrigue. Now, much moreso.

 

The most intriguing thing about Morrowind, has always been their native religion, the worship of the Tribunal, the Almsivi, and the Dunmer focus on tradition, and their grand heritage. The empire could never quite stomp out the worship of the Almsivi, just as they could never quite undermine the worship of daedra across all of Tamriel. With the recent questions as to the divinity of Talos, ancestor worship in Morrowind can only be regaining lost ground, and although the fall of the Almsivi temple was accelerated by the mad plot of Almalexia ending in her own death as well as that of Sotha Sil, and the destruction of Vivec's grandest show of power, the captured moon above the city of Vivec, the Almsivi would still, in all likelihood be worshiped as patron saints of the old Daedric princes Azura, Mephala, and Boethia.

 

The falling of Baar Dau (The ministry of truth) on the city of Vivec was likely interpreted by some as the sign of house Dagoth's final victory over the Almsivi, that in the throes of defeat, the very power of the Tribunal was turned against them, causing Red Mountain's destruction of all who would betray Dagoth Ur. Surely, some would still follow in the footsteps of House Dagoth, perhaps some would even willfully contract corprus. Some might even have discovered the means by which Dagoth Ur created his lieutenants, the dreaded Ash Vampires. Though house Dagoth would be a shadow of its former glory, it undoubtedly was not wholly stomped out by the actions of the Nerevarine, and perhaps, to this day carries on in the ancient chambers of Dwemer ruins beneath Red Mountain.

 

In addition to the internal politics of Morrowind, there exist external influences, surely stronger than any internal faction, especially after the devastation visited upon Vvardenfell by natural disaster, the oblivion crisis, and by the invasion of the Argonians. Much of Vvardenfell would remain a barren wasteland, hardly recovered from the foyada mamea which carved bloody swaths through all of Vvardenfell, the violent shaking of the earth would have uprooted entire cities, and all that grew would have been choked by ash spewed forth from Red mountain. Efforts to eradicate the blight would have been stymied by the oblivion crisis, only to have it further hampered by events beyond the borders of Morrowind. With time, some remnant of Dagoth Ur's influence would grow substantial, through the uncontrolled spread of the blight, and of corprus, especially now that Red Mountain's eruption would surely have decimated the Ghostfence, whose power would have failed with the destruction of the tribunal.

 

Morrowind is now nothing more than a band of refugees-to-be, clinging to land that was once their ancestral heritage, hoping that one day, the Dunmer will hear their heritage calling them home again.

 

 

Major Players

 

Morrowind has been contested for two hundred years, since the Oblivion Crisis eventually severed all Imperial control.

 

Internal Forces

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• House Indoril, weakened by the loss of the Almsivi, would have retreated to its holdings in the south of Morrowind, along the mainland, which arguably saw the worst of the Argonian occupation. What is left of Indoril, after centuries of decline, would be nothing more than a name and a heritage, though, without true power to call their own. If anything of Indoril survives in Morrowind, it would be too busy attempting to liberate the south of Morrowind from the Argonian stragglers who have decided against return to Black Marsh.
  
• House Hlaalu under imperial reign, was the most powerful and priveledged of the great houses. Its holdings swelled, until abruptly, the empire was forced to recall aid and soldiers from Morrowind during the oblivion crisis, and the following great war. Hlaalu would have declined more than a fair bit, and invested the most in stymieing the Argonian invasion. Hlaalu's mainland holdings would have been mostly-intact after the cataclysm at Red Mountain, but their strength would have been sapped severely alongside the empire's.
  
• House Redoran's primary holdings were on Vvardenfell, and being weak in comparison to Telvanni or Hlaalu, would suffer much from the eruption of Red Mountain, though, due to their weak ties to the empire, and lack of land claimed by argonian invaders, they would stand a strong chance today to gain much influence.
  
• House Telvanni, opposite Hlaalu in territory, would have held off the Argonian invasion as it reached their lands, and with significant holdings in mainland Morrowind, Telvannis has been untouched by any of the events of recent years. Of all the great houses, Telvanni stands ready to claim superiority.
  
• House Dres, dres shares Indoril proximity to the argonian invasion, and held no land on Vvardenfell. The war with the argonians would nearly have destroyed Dres, and its long legacy would have declined to a house of refugees and settlers seeking only to survive.
  
• Ashlanders, the Ashlanders would have suffered much over the centuries, but many more civilized Dunmer would have returned to the old ways after the cataclysm and wars. The Ashlanders would probably have been hurt the least of any inhabitants of Vvardenfell, and would likely have taken the opportunity to reclaim much of their ancestral land from the Redoran and Telvanni.
   
  

 

External Forces

 

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• The Empire some small faction of the empire would likely be assisting in matters on Vvardenfell, and in mainland Morrowind, though funding and resources would be very limited. Since Morrowind's near-destruction would have led to nearly all profits from the province rebounding to expenditures, little interest is maintained in anything more than a show of cooperation in the hopes of regaining lost loyalty for the future. The war in Skyrim surely would have pushed refugees to the east, into mainland Morrowind, and into the already-crowded Solstheim. Imperial presence would most likely be much weaker than that of the Thalmor.
  
• The Thalmor seeing the Dunmeri distrust of the Empire, the Thalmor would spare no expense to gain the trust and loyalty of the dark elves. Embassies would be constructed along the mainland, all except in Telvanni land, and at the remnants of ports in the Vvardenfell district. The Thalmor would like nothing better than to undermine Imperial power, and by preventing their regaining the vast deposits of ebony in the earth on Vvardenfell, would prevent yet another avenue for restoration of imperial superiority.
  
• An-Xileel after hearing the call of the Hist, the An-Xileel fought off the invading Daedra with such ferocity that Mehrunes Dagon was forced to end his assault on Black Marsh. The An-Xileel used their political influence next to call an end to Imperial allegiance, which eventually led to a wave of Argonian expansion. The obvious target, was that of the Dunmer, who had been hunting their people as slaves for centuries. The ferocity of the incursion into Morrowind actually undermined the power of the An-Xileel. Argonian strategists could not reign in control over their forces, and eventually, the ferocity of the Argonian forces met the strength of the Hlaalu and Telvanni on either side of Morrowind. The argonians pushed north to Red Mountain, but were unable to carry forward further momentum, as their supply lines had been taxed too much by their aggressive expansion. Eventually, the Hist recalled the assault, but quite a number of Argonians stayed north of the old border to colonize the swampy regions that the Dark Elves once defended.
  

 

 

Assets

 

Of course, this project would require quite a fair bit of art assets unique from TES: V. We would need to do quite a lot of retexturing to the existing terrain assets, to create entirely new flora and fauna, based on the existing Morrowind assets, as well as re-imagine the architecture put forward by Morrowind. The game is quite dated, so a lot of work can be put in to the originals, and while staying true to the original design, we can surely put in quite a fair bit of work toward making it fit within the existing model/texture quality requirements.

 

Importing old assets from TES:III would be strongly frowned upon, of course, so as to stay within the restrictions Bethesda puts forward in their own licensing agreements.

 

Much of Vvardenfell would be uninhabited wasteland, dead or dying shrubs, dusty magma channels, and barren ash-deserts. Almost every settlement on Vvardenfell would have been almost completely destroyed by the cataclysm at Red Mountain, and the entire south would be the remnants of a brutal war between the Dark Elves and the Argonians.

 

Vvardenfell would be peppered with mines, ruins of old settlements, daedra ruins half-buried by magma, ancient fortresses weathered by time, and dwemer cities either further buried, or further uncovered by the eruption. Much of the required manpower would be in designing dungeons and locales, but a significant portion of the manpower would also be in creating new textures for the terrain in Morrowind, as well as creating new cities and settlements on Vvardenfell. Since it is mostly destroyed, Lore only needs be loosely followed in the construction of the new Vvardenfell district.

 

New structures

 

I see Redoran settlements remaining partially in their style of crab-shelled structures, but with some stone mixed in, as things have modernized.

Hlaalu would have course maintain their style of adobe-like structures with intermittent Velothi themes.

Telvanni would be using a mixture of traditional Velothi building styles alongside the Telvanni use of magically-grown fungi for their holdings.

Dres and Indoril cities would be entirely ruined, and Argonian settlements would probably be constructed atop them.

Imperial fortresses would mostly be destroyed, with an exception of a few in the north. Existing assets with minor retextures could be used for much of this.

 

Moreover, I see a return to the Velothi ways of building among settlers, the swamps still using a mostly-wooden shack feel, while we may have to introduce a small variety of destroyed structures to use for ruins of old cities destroyed in the cataclysm.

 

Factions

 

Great Houses:

(Only one of these factions should be joinable per game)

 

• Telvanni
  
• Hlaalu
  
• Redoran
  
• Dagoth
  

 

Morrowind-Specific:

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• Camonna Tong
  
• Morag Tong
  
• Almsivi Temple
  

 

Imperial:

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• The Legion
  
• Imperial Trading company?
  
• Explorer's league?
  

 

Additional/Unplanned:

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• Thieves' Guild tie-in?
  
• Remnants of the Fighters' Guild gone-local?
  
• A local mages' college?
  
• Local trading company?
  

 

 

New quests/plot

 

I would probably see Vvardenfell as being more focused on the struggles for dominance and political power between the major players, be it the Telvanni, who are striving for Dunmer independence, the Hlaalu, who are capitulating with the Thalmor. In addition, I can see the conflict between the new Argonian inhabitants and the natives growing quite a bit. There is always the age-old Telvanni slavery thing, which could build some interesting plots, as well as some cues for a partial return of the Blight and Corprus, with some elements of House Dagoth returning to prominence again. Of course, Dagoth-Ur would be dead, so no resurrecting old bad guys, just keeping his cult alive.

 

I would also like to see some sort of adventure involving the rediscovery of Akulakhan's remains, and exploration of newly-excavated Dwemer ruins. Perhaps our old friend Divayth Fyr can make an appearance.

 

I think the importance of Morrowind as a videogame, was the complexity of the quests, and the numerous possible outcomes offered the player. In keeping faith with the vision of TES III, Morrowind, I would like to see some strong quest lines with branching outcomes, and the evolution of political drama actually having more than a cosmetic effect on the character's playing experience.

 

 

Future ideas/implementation

 

I would like to see this project collaborating with others, especially those teams who, undoubtedly are going to take on the project to resurrect Cyrodiil, and perhaps if a team were willing to take on Black Marsh. I would like to see the same team tackle mainland Morrowind, but unfortunately, the pace at which Tamriel-Rebuilt has been working this past decade, does not harbor a reasonable time-frame for us to possibly enjoy it as we would have three years after the launch of Morrowind. Most of the story interaction between the Vvardenfell mod, and that of Skyrim's world, should be limited to mainland Morrowind, and probably through the ports at Dawnstar and Winterhold.

 

 

Time frame

 

I'm aware that this would be a massive undertaking, and would require on the order of hundreds of people to execute properly. This is why I am hoping to garner some interest across the modding communities of TES series, and trying to pull people out of existing projects for TES: III, reddit, etc. The project would have to be an open and collaborative environment with a large staff of unpaid laborers volunteers who are more interested in a quick turnaround of a quality landmass than with the idea or illusion of perfection, unlike other landmass mods.

 

The way I see it, the best way to get this done quickly, is to start small, and work your way up. Solstheim would be an excellent bridge to Vvardenfell, as most of the assets for Solstheim would already exist from Skyrim content already launched. Solstheim would be an excellent way to show off what the modding team can do using stock content, buy the modelers time to create the content necessary for Vvardenfell and mainland Morrowind, and would also create a community interested in continuing where Solstheim left off. Solstheim would be released as a small mod, giving players a taste of what they can expect from our work on Vvardenfell, and also, hopefully draw in hopeful modelers, texturers, modders, lore-geeks, writers, and voice actors.

 

At the end of the Solstheim mod (I would target 3 months to 6 months), we would release our work to the public via steamworks as a platform to recruit new talent.

 

After Solstheim, a second team would be recruited to add further detail and quests to the Solstheim mod regularly (monthly updates) until the landmass is considered finished, while some of the Solstheim updates are held back to permit linking into quest lines that involve both Skyrim and Morrowind.

 

While Solstheim is being polished, the Vvardenfell team will be working on populating Morrowind with content for players to explore, and writing storyline into the game. The Modeling team should have finalized the majority of assets during Solstheim production, and thus, can move on to working on specific requests not covered by the general requests, as well as polishing existing assets. In the off-time, the Vvardenfell modeling team should be working with a third implementation team, which will cover mainland Morrowind. Mainland Morrowind will be divided into three rather large sections, Hlaalu-controlled land, Indoril/Dres/Argonian contested land, and Telvanni controlled land. Each segment will be prioritized and release accordingly. After all three claims are complete (2 years, or so, I imagine, they can be linked with quest chains between Vvardenfell, mainland segments, Skryim, and hopefully Cyrodiil/Black Marsh mods that should be in the works by then.

 

At all times, efforts should be made to keep the landmass teams on the same page, and working from the same pool of people if possible. New landmass mods should be sought out, encouraged to merge with others who have the same goals, and all members of the community should be encouraged to work on asset requests, etc. from each community as their interests permit.

 

 

Speak up!

 

I'm here, mostly asking for community interest in working collaboratively with others in this endeavor. I don't want to be the central leader in the project, I'd like it to be a mildly-democratic process, in which others have a voice, but a representative panel of leaders and experts would take the charge in making sure submissions and ideas were of quality, and implemented properly. At the same time, I don't want to see the project get bogged down by requirements of perfection, and eventually die off like many others. So, if you have particular skills, we're looking for them, and will keep them in mind when we set up a virtual space to start discussing moving forward with this mod. If you have any criticisms, also, please speak up.

[huntsman2310]

some epic ideas man. You know the folks over at Beyond Skyrim can help you.

[nzk0]

I would love to see this happen

[JimboUK]

Sadly there is very little outside of Skyrim that is usable, in fact there seems to be less added land than there was in Oblivion. Vvardenfell for example isn't to scale, is only half there and you can't walk on it.

[BlackCompany]

Got some big plans there. No reason you can't pull them off, however.

 

Might be I can offer some help. Though no modeler, I can use extant resources to construct dungeons. I also handle effect scripts and even some quest scripting fairly well. I have done multiple path quests a time or two. I have done numerous effect and magic scripts. Activators and trigger zones are another favorite of mine.

 

If you need NPC's, AI routines, effect or trigger scripts let me know. Ditto for the smaller quest scripts. I have not yet written a large, MQ style quest script. I could give it a try but would likely need much testing. As for designing dungeons, laying our NPC's, spawns, this sort of thing...I would just love to see this project happen.

 

I know big mods get talked about a lot and finished seldom. I for one hope this one takes off. You've got a plan, you know the lore, you have a time line and that speaks volumes. Let me know if I can help out.

[Iceflame542]

I would like to help on this project when the creation kit comes out, I can create whatever areas are needed, interior and exterior, and I can retexture models to give them a unique morrowind like appearance. I have not had 3d modeling experience, but there are always many modder's resources unused by many and I could look into it. Phitt is planning on importing his models and textures from the Sheogard oblivion mod to skyrim and releasing it as a modder's resource. That would include dwemer and daedric ruins along with some buildings for villages, flora etc. I had an idea as well to add more at the morrowind-skyrim border gate, possibly an imperial border fort with guards and an inn and traders. The trade shop would include a mix of items found in Morrowind and Skyrim as the merchants cross the border. Seeing as the player character apparently was caught crossing the border into skyrim illegally, it seems there needs to be border guards for that to make sense. For npcs, the ones in vvardenfell should sound more like the the morrowind dark elves due to the frequent ash storms if people are adding custom voices. Edited January 11, 2012 by Iceflame542

[Korodic]

it took me 4 months to create a whole new guild with a storyline and I only came out with a decent mod. Big goals need big teams to get anything decent going. That was my lesson. Be sure to have excellent planning!

[Bismarck]

Give me a mouth and a mushroom tower staffed with sphere/steam centurions and I will fall down to the knees and praise you.

I really miss that magical, unique atmosphere, the diverse and interesting architecture and the cultural diversity of Morrowind. Such a mod would make many people happy, but creating it is going to be very difficult. Tamriel Rebuilt has worked on Morrowind for years and they have just finished the Telvanni regions (without quests, as far as I know).

You will need many people to add Morrowind to Skyrim and it will probably take years to deliver a high-quality mod. That's not going to be easy. Alone the first step, the landscaping, will take an eternity. Maybe it is really best to start with Solstheim as it shares the same culture and architecture with Skyrim. Luckily, the island is not very densly populated and Raven Rock, Fort Frostmoth, the Skaal village and the mead hall could be added quite easily.

[Iceflame542]

I also realized that when people start making exterior regions, we should list the altered cells to avoid overlapping and to make a smooth transition from the cell borders.

And if we need to move it into it's own world space for whatever reason, there should be an invisible automatic door at the border gate. While it would be nicer to have it on the same world space, im not sure if the map can be altered enough to not try and center itself into skyrim when you are in other provinces. Also, where the world cuts off half way through the collision-missing vvardenfell hightmap, can we still add new land passed that? That needs to be tested before we add anything, and also if it is just the height map that is missing collision or if there just isn't proper collision that far away from the default game-world.

[Iyzik]

I would love to be of help with this idea. It sounds totally awesome to me. I am semi-new at TES modding but I learn quickly. I have been modding and hacking other games for a while. I can help with player objects/items and probably world items also. (I have Maya and know how to use it but Im not super good at designing good models, I am good at textures and scripting nonetheless). I have some scripting experience and I also am decent at building terrains. (Although I use game engines like Unreal and Unity and I'm not sure how possible terrain and cell editing in CK will be??) yeah so if I could be of any help, send me a message or something. This sounds totally awesome to me. Edited January 12, 2012 by Iyzik