Just how powerful is the DragonBorn?

[Deleted19391624User]

:smile:

is knowledge gained by another's tutelage still not knowledge?

That's not the point; the Dragonborn wouldn't be able to defeat Miraak without it.

[Mortrix927]

Okay.... Riprock, what's the thing about pickles?

[Riprock]

Um, they're green?

[Riprock]

 

:smile:

is knowledge gained by another's tutelage still not knowledge?

That's not the point; the Dragonborn wouldn't be able to defeat Miraak without it.

 

 

So the Dragonborn can only be powerful if he came by knowledge in an original fashion? If so, the idea of Word Walls should also be an example of the Dragonborn not actually being powerful: that's not him, he's just copying, in essence.

 

Your standpoint is that the Dragonborn needs to stand on his own two feet 100%, he cannot stand on the shoulders of those that came before. That describes an Ultimate Deity, not a Hero, wouldn't you agree? And in Skyrim, we are not playing the role of an Ultimate Deity. It's also a classic element of character development when a protagonist discovers lost knowledge, and in part, that plays directly to the concept of 'The Hero's Journey'.

[fraquar]

All I know is if I was this great powerful hero, Skyrim sure did a masterful job of just making me feel like another average joe when I was going about doing what I was doing.

[Lachdonin]

I feel It should be pointed out that Bend Will's power is suspect. When Miraak uses it to control Solsthie, he's clearly channeling his Thu'um through specially corrupted cairns, and even then there seem to be limits. His control is neither permanent, nor is it all encompassing (Neloth seeks unaffected, and it definately has deminishing returns on the Dragonborn). It's likely limited range, temporary nature and diminishing returns make it of extremely limited use... And unlikely to affect the strong willed, powerful individuals a major political player would interact with.

[FegelTemplar]

Depends who's story you're willing to accept as true. There's always various ideas about who is who in TES.

 

For some, Talos is a Nord. For some, he's a Breton.

 

For some, the Dragonborn is a Nord, for others he's another race.

 

For some, the Daedra and Aedra are physical beings who actually fought each other a long time ago on Tamriel, forming the islands and mountains. For others, the Et'Ada are just the planets, or spirits, or whatever else.

 

 

In my opinion, all of these feats like the Dragonborn being able to shatter the sky with his voice or kill people with a whisper are all typical exagerations from medieval people, and all these stories that Daedra are omnipotent spirits and are one with Oblivion is yet more bullshit from medieval scholars who didn't know what they were talking about and therefore made up what they believed to be the truth. It makes for a better story.

 

What we do know, what we actually see in game, is that Daedra and Aedra are just mages on steroids. Dagon and Akatosh appeared on Oblivion, Molag Bal appeared in ESO, Akatosh appeared in one of the older games... and they always had a physical shape and could be fought back to some extent. We also know from one of the Dwemer stories found in Skyrim that the Daedra aren't omniscient either: the Dwemer managed to trick Azura with some magic box. What we do know about the Dragonborn is that s/he can slay dragons, but s/he can also be killed by things as small as mudcrabs or skeevers. This is what we have seen in game, this is the most direct evidence we have of what power each being truly holds. Any backstory is unreliable in comparison to this.

 

I would say that given enough time, the Dragonborn still wouldn't be on the same level as the Aedra and Daedra. Miraak had plenty of time and he still got himself killed by Hermaeus Mora. If Miraak had fought Mora while he was still at full power, would he have won? We don't know, because Mora only shows up to finish off people.

 

It's complicated, but I think all of these beings are FAR less powerful that lore would have us believe. Lore is mostly legend, and legend is always an exageration of reality.

[Lachdonin]

I think your selling the Aedra and Daedra short in terms of power. Can they manifest in physical forms, like that encountered in the Imperial City, or what was fought in the Battlespire? Yes. But they cannot be killed, you can only destroy their avatar and banish their power. To kill a Daedra, you must ERASE their sphere from existence. To end Azura, prophecy and the notion of transitions must cease to be, and for Akatosh to fall you must entirely destroy Was, Is and Will Be.

 

The Aedra and Daedra are far more than just really powerful mages, but they are limited in their ability to express their power and sphere because of the rules of the Mundus.

[FegelTemplar]

I think your selling the Aedra and Daedra short in terms of power. Can they manifest in physical forms, like that encountered in the Imperial City, or what was fought in the Battlespire? Yes. But they cannot be killed, you can only destroy their avatar and banish their power. To kill a Daedra, you must ERASE their sphere from existence. To end Azura, prophecy and the notion of transitions must cease to be, and for Akatosh to fall you must entirely destroy Was, Is and Will Be.

 

The Aedra and Daedra are far more than just really powerful mages, but they are limited in their ability to express their power and sphere because of the rules of the Mundus.

How can you assert that they cannot be killed?

 

What if it's just that there's lack of someone strong enough to kill them? They certainly aren't omnipotent, nobody in TES Universe is.

 

Some people claim Akatosh is time istelf, but he did appear as a dragon/bird hybrid to fight Dagon. If he truly was time, he could have just removed him from existence. From what we see in game, it's far more likely that Akatosh is only someone who is capable of bending time to some extent, not time itself. Much like the Dragonborn is capable of using the Slow TIme shout, Akatosh would be able to do that to a greater extent, being far more powerful. Perhaps on the same level as the Dragon Elder Scroll.

 

Lorkhan died, and Trinimac was completely transformed into a Daedra, so it's really a long shot to say they can't be killed or harmed. It's probably just that they're evenely matched, they're all existing in a stalemate and there's nobody who is strong enough or willing to kill them. Perhaps if you gave Sithis a good enough reason to kill Molag Bal, he'd get it done.

 

In this discussion I see many people using the argument "this book in game says this, therefore it's true", but there's really a lot of contradictions within the books, a lot of contradictions between what they say and what we see in game, and especially a LOT of exageration.

[Lachdonin]

You are drastically oversimplifying things. Lorkhan 'died', but at the same time did not. He continued through Shor, through his Shezzarines, through Sheogorath, and through Mundus. He cannot he killed in the sense that he ceases to be, only divided into smaller components.

 

Sithis, also, isn't a god or an active force. He is the omnipresent soul of misanthropy and limitation. In many ways, he IS death, the absolute limit of existence, but unlike the Et'ad a he bas no conciousness, no self upon which to reflect to express his own identity. Her really isn't even a he, but an it.

 

When Dealing with the actual interaction in the Temple of the One, you have to remember a few things. First, because if Mundus, Akatosh is bound to the time-line of Nirn. That is a price the Aka-tusk paid for its part in creating the mortal world. It was fragmented, splintered, into aspects of time, past-Auriel, present-Akatosh, future-Tosh'Raka and End-Allduin. These different aspects are sorely diminished, and bound by their own fragmented nature. Akatosh can erase nothing, because he IS the present, and has no power over the past. Even then, as Daedra, Mehrunes Dagon exists outside of the Mundus Time, and is not affected by it at all. However, time it's self serves as a part of the barrier which protects Mundus and seperates it from the timelessness of Oblivion and Aetherius, and that allows Akatosh to basically throw Dagon out... Provided he makes it to Nirn. Being so diminished, the Aedra have great difficulty leaving their own planes.

 

We also know that Aka is more than a simple chrono-mancer, because any attempt to change, interfere or remove him breaks time. His very being is so intrinsically woven into the fabric of Mundus that pulling at threads causes you to give birth to your own grandfather. His depiction as a Dragon is something related to the internal imagery of TES, and shouldn't be confused with external concepts. Even the Dovah are just fragments of time, the weakest shards of the Aka-tusk, representing static moments.

 

And I assert that they cannot be killed, because intimately stronger entities have tried. Not even Talos or Vivec have managed to remove a Daedra. Rough up, beat down, and dick-slap, sure, but the Et'ada are intrinsic reflections of IDEAS within the dream, and while new ideas can be born, it is extremely difficult to destroy an idea.

 

Aedra, Daedra and the Magne'ge aren't even really people. They are self-actualized concepts and ideas whose influence is based on their expression within the Aubris. In order to get rid of any of then, you have to totally eradicate their idea. Look at Jyggalag, not even the collective might of all the other Daedra could erase him.

Edited January 19, 2015 by Lachdonin