Man, I feel sorry for Falmer.

[Korodic]

As far as the Dwemer thing goes, their behaviour in regards to the Falmer is... Well, out of character. I suspect that it's just bad writing, but if i were to explain the situation in Lore-Friendly terms, it would be something like this.

 

The Dwemer take in the Falmer survivors.

The Falmer (After a few years/decades) pressure the Dwemer to take revenge against the Nords

The Dwemer refuse, and the Falmer attempt a coup (We're led to beleive they were rather militaristic, given the Snow Prince and how easily they drove humans out the first time)

The coup is put down, and the Falmer enslaved as punishment

 

And you know the rest. It fits more with the overall character of the Dwemer as portrayed in other sources.

ha! i didn't even realize who i was replying to at first. But yes, this makes the most sense. As dwemer were portrayed as a brilliant civilization of logic, but perhaps had too much intrigue in logic for their own good.

[thesapien]

As far as the Dwemer thing goes, their behaviour in regards to the Falmer is... Well, out of character. I suspect that it's just bad writing, but if i were to explain the situation in Lore-Friendly terms, it would be something like this.

 

The Dwemer take in the Falmer survivors.

The Falmer (After a few years/decades) pressure the Dwemer to take revenge against the Nords

The Dwemer refuse, and the Falmer attempt a coup (We're led to beleive they were rather militaristic, given the Snow Prince and how easily they drove humans out the first time)

The coup is put down, and the Falmer enslaved as punishment

 

And you know the rest. It fits more with the overall character of the Dwemer as portrayed in other sources.

ha! i didn't even realize who i was replying to at first. But yes, this makes the most sense. As dwemer were portrayed as a brilliant civilization of logic, but perhaps had too much intrigue in logic for their own good.

 

That doesn't explain the torture.

 

I still kind of thing the writers just couldn't resist throwing it in there to satisfy their fetish, or maybe just out of habit. Else, we're led to believe the Dwemer civ was likely in decline at the time and about to fail.

[ModelV]

Come on, one ruin had that floor fan blade with spikes on both sides of the room and at the end of the moving fan blade a spiky door flings open onto your face. Now throw hundreds of Falmer women and children in there, and hear their cries.

 

 

From my experience what your talking about is standard Dwemer security I see everywhere in their ruins. Currently activated due to some sort of lock down Im sure.

 

 

Also from what Ive found(what little ive found) it looks more like the Dwemer were using the Falmer for experiments into biology and weapons. Goes along better I think.

[alienraven]

As far as the Dwemer thing goes, their behaviour in regards to the Falmer is... Well, out of character. I suspect that it's just bad writing, but if i were to explain the situation in Lore-Friendly terms, it would be something like this.

 

The Dwemer take in the Falmer survivors.

The Falmer (After a few years/decades) pressure the Dwemer to take revenge against the Nords

The Dwemer refuse, and the Falmer attempt a coup (We're led to beleive they were rather militaristic, given the Snow Prince and how easily they drove humans out the first time)

The coup is put down, and the Falmer enslaved as punishment

 

And you know the rest. It fits more with the overall character of the Dwemer as portrayed in other sources.

 

Sorry but that does'nt make much sense to me so some of the Falmer want to keep fighting the Nords, understandable but foolish. And the Dwemers responce is to torture them mutilate them and enslave them.? what i think is the Dwemer were like the Altmer, elietist and racist they took in the Falmer out of pity and a vague sence of Elfish soldidarity but wanted to make sure to keep the Falmer in "there place" So when the Falmer started to have ambitions above there status ie trying to ataine posistions of power and authority, they had to be put down.

[Lachdonin]

Sorry but that does'nt make much sense to me so some of the Falmer want to keep fighting the Nords, understandable but foolish. And the Dwemers responce is to torture them mutilate them and enslave them.? what i think is the Dwemer were like the Altmer, elietist and racist they took in the Falmer out of pity and a vague sence of Elfish soldidarity but wanted to make sure to keep the Falmer in "there place" So when the Falmer started to have ambitions above there status ie trying to ataine posistions of power and authority, they had to be put down.

 

Which is definately the image given by ONE book in the game. However, it doesn't match with any of the other material on the Dwemer. They were isolationists, non agressive (though would fight back if attacked) largely trustworthy, and kept promises. There is nothing, anywhere else, which depicts the Dwemer as elitist, and in fact it is alluded to by Divayth Fyr that they left Summerset largely because of the intolerance of their Altmer brothers, back in the deep mists of time.

 

The image of the Dwemer, as portrayed in Falmer; a study, is directly counter to all the other information about the Dwemer. Are we to assume that the book, written by a scholar centuries AFTER the Dwemer dissapeared (and thus well after the poisoning of the Falmer) supercedes the other information we have on the Dwemer, some of which comes from a Dwemer himself?

[alienraven]

Are we to assume that the book, written by a scholar centuries AFTER the Dwemer dissapeared (and thus well after the poisoning of the Falmer) supercedes the other information we have on the Dwemer, some of which comes from a Dwemer himself?

 

yes beacause theres no reason that a Dwemer writing a book might lie about the history of his own people.

To put this in a real world context,acording to the Ancent Roman historians any peoples who were'nt part of the empire were lawless cultureless Barbarians. And for centures we belived that. But modern archeology has proven that not to be true.

 

Similerly in Tamrel for centures the Dwelmer have been held up as the pinicle of Mer civilisation, but new evidence is coming to light which tarnishes that reputation.

[Lachdonin]

Are we to assume that the book, written by a scholar centuries AFTER the Dwemer dissapeared (and thus well after the poisoning of the Falmer) supercedes the other information we have on the Dwemer, some of which comes from a Dwemer himself?

 

yes beacause theres no reason that a Dwemer writing a book might lie about the history of his own people.

To put this in a real world context,acording to the Ancent Roman historians any peoples who were'nt part of the empire were lawless cultureless Barbarians. And for centures we belived that. But modern archeology has proven that not to be true.

 

*cough cough* You picked probably the worst person here to use that example on, you know, being an anthropologist and all... But i digress. The Romans never argued that the 'barbarians' were cultureless, only that their culture was inferior to that of Rome.

 

To the point, however, none of the readable books we have on the Dwemer were written by Dwemer. They were written by scholars who were extensivly studying the Dwemer, and by stories written by ancients who had actualy interacted withthe Dwemer. The dwemer i mentioned talking to was Yagrum Bagarn, who was very much alive at the time, and his protector Divayth Fyr was (and may still be) widely regarded as the most knowlegable scholar on everything Dwemer in all of Tamriel.

 

I admit that, yes, we have to take into accound cultural bias, but at the same time you have to apply that lens to Falmer; a study. It is very clearly biased, to the point where the author defencivly argues against the presence of bias, and it also shows a complete lack of understanding of Dwemer culture. It's written more by an adventurer than a scholar.

[alienraven]

*cough cough* You picked probably the worst person here to use that example on, you know, being an anthropologist and all... But i digress. The Romans never argued that the 'barbarians' were cultureless, only that their culture was inferior to that of Rome.

 

To the point, however, none of the readable books we have on the Dwemer were written by Dwemer. They were written by scholars who were extensivly studying the Dwemer, and by stories written by ancients who had actualy interacted withthe Dwemer. The dwemer i mentioned talking to was Yagrum Bagarn, who was very much alive at the time, and his protector Divayth Fyr was (and may still be) widely regarded as the most knowlegable scholar on everything Dwemer in all of Tamriel.

 

I admit that, yes, we have to take into accound cultural bias, but at the same time you have to apply that lens to Falmer; a study. It is very clearly biased, to the point where the author defencivly argues against the presence of bias, and it also shows a complete lack of understanding of Dwemer culture. It's written more by an adventurer than a scholar.

 

ok hands up here im going to have to cede some of this to you im no expert on Elder Scrolls lore in fact Skyrim is the first of the games ive played all the way through. But i still think that you should take a more balanced view of the Dwemer. To take Rome as an example again. They were cirtanly a great civilisation making great advances in technology and art etc. But they also thought the gladaretorial games were great entertainment, and enslaved the native Britons to mine British gold for them.

[Lachdonin]

Oh, i'm not saying that the Dwemer are saints, but the book Falmer; a study implies that their abuse of the Falmer was unprevoked, or even intentional from the start. The Dwemer definately (as far as we know) were behind their 'changes', which speaks of a somewhat vindictive streak which is somewhat reinforced through other sources (The Chim-something-or-other for instance). However, we know nothing of the motivation for the act, and outright sadism, as the book implies, is out of character for the Dwemer.

 

Something happened between the Dwemer and the Falmer to cause the abuse. But, since the Dwemer are gone, and the Falmer aren't exactly talkative, we don't know what it is. I suspect that, given the Falmer's militaristic streak, they wanted revenge on the Nords and tried to take the means by which to do it. Admitedly, the only supporting evidence i have to that is based on character aalysis of both races of Mer.

[alienraven]

Hang on i may have got something mixed up here the timeline as i understand it is this

 

Dwemer enslave Falmer.

 

Falmer Rebel escape and retreat deeper down underground.

 

After a while they come back up to fight the Dwemer head on only to find theyve disapeared.