Has vanilla Oblivion never really "bothered" anyone else?

[Jathom95]

I read somewhere (probably on the UESP Wiki, but it could very well have been somewhere else) that the weight system is metric. If that is the case then divide by 2.2 to get weight in pounds. An 18 pound warhammer sounds reasonable to me ... you do want to do some damage with it, right?

@Striker879 That does make quite a bit more sense. I still find vanilla encumbrance values to be unnecessarily restrictive. Don't get me wrong, I'm not lugging around 12 cuirasses and 16 warhammers at once. But to me max encumbrance should be the equivalent to where in reality you'd be so overburdened you literally can't move, and I feel that vanilla values hit that ceiling too quickly. I can deal with a lot of other "annoyances" but having to drop what I'm doing to find a container to drop 3 daedra hearts so I can move again is something I can do without. You'd actually be surprised to know that real life weaponry was actually made to be much lighter than we're led to believe. Fantasy weaponry like in Oblivion would have been considered impractical, because more weight would be a tactical disadvantage.

 

So have you tweaked your RF and BPA INIs Jathom?

 

Oh, if it's able to be tweaked, I'm doing so. And most of the time I tend to be on the "hardcore" end of things. I have RF and BPA, both tweaked. Basic Primary Needs, anything to add a little more challenge plus I like that there's actually consequences to having a character who drinks heavily other than draining attributes like the vanilla game. But "worst" of all, according to most people, is that I have fast travel disabled. Most that I've come across would never dream of playing like that, too inconvenient they say. But that's precisely why I love it. It encourages exploration, not to mention the immersive quality of stopping at an inn in town for the night and getting a good night's rest before heading off for adventure. I just love it.

 

My earlier mention about the interface has also led me to go looking for alternatives, and I've just discovered MajorJim's UI was updated a year or so ago by a different author. I haven't used it in years, but with this new update it does feel surprisingly vanilla. I'm going to play around with it some more, but I could very well have something close enough to vanilla for me to be satisfied with it.

 

 

Yes it 'bothered' at lot of people, specifically the appalling level scaling and to a lesser extent the Radiant AI which was disappointing in execution and a PR fail, IIRC. And then there was the horse armor DLC which became a meme due to its infamy.

 

Mod author Oscuro was so bothered by the level scaling that he created OOO (Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul which is still available on the Nexus) and it was wildly popular as it created a deleveled Imperial Province and was well executed. It helped to land him a job at Obsidian.

 

There was a major project to unify the 4 major game overhauls (of which OOO was one) into a compatible framework, called FCOM Convergence, although it was rather involved to install and troubleshoot, IIRC.

 

I binge-played Oblivion when it first came out but now I can't stand the game. It's an uninspired RPG that's set in a game world that's a forgettable facsimile of medieval Europe.

 

Yes, I'm aware. That's why I titled the topic as such. I'm aware that many people hate the game to its core and believe it accomplished nothing worthwhile. What I have a hard time understanding is why people treat Oblivion as if it's the first to delve into "generic fantasy" territory. Do we just forget about Arena and Daggerfall, which were arguably worse in that department? In Arena, the Emperor talks in butchered Ye Olde English? Or the entire setting of Daggerfall at that. But most give them a pass because of their age and that most people today don't consider them part of the current identity of the Elder Scrolls series. But even Skyrim, the game that made the series mainstream, draws its influence from other places. Dragons? Norse folklore? Everyone shits on Oblivion for ripping off LOTR, but let's not pretend Bethesda wasn't ripping what was popular at the time of Skyrim's release, i.e. Game of Thrones.

 

I don't have an issue with people not liking the game. It's when people become so militant about it and seem to think others have no reason to have different preferences in what they want out of their respective games. I have been called "stupid" for playing this game for so long. Stupid, over a damn game. Like seriously? What kind of childish nonsense is that? People who read extensively don't chastise others for liking different genres. I just largely ignore it and go my merry way, Makes everyone happy.

Edited February 27, 2021 by Jathom95

[Striker879]

I haven't disabled fast travel myself, but that is as much a consequence of the fact that I just never do it during gameplay as anything (i.e. just because something is possible has no bearing on whether or not I will utilize it ... fast travel has on rare ocassions been handy when I didn't have a testing save close by to somewhere I was modding). Now autosaves are a whole 'nother story ... scripted are the only ones not disabled for me (and I don't use any of those fancy "better saving" mods).

 

My original motivation/goal for using RF + BPA was to overcome a limitation with Universal Skeleton NIF based skeletons (the one I use is BBB Ragdoll Breast Physics - Growlfs Skeleton but any skeleton.nif derived from the later versions of Growlf's skeleton.nif suffer from the same problem). It was exploring the INIs for settings to solve that problem that brought me to where RF and BPA are integrated into my gameplay style now beyond fixing that Growlf problem.

 

BPN also ties into the mix nicely, and adds it's own sprinkling of texture to the rising dough. Often while working through a long dungeon crawl I'll find myself thinking strategically ... planning where to get some rest and have some food/drink to regain strength and stave off the "pillow guy". The worst was trying to save Farwil and company from the Cheydinhal Oblivion gate (that gives you no recourse to going back to Tamriel) as I entered without nearly enough coffee in my inventory. I wound up getting through it by carefully selecting my locations before the collapse from lack of sleep hit.

 

Harder/more complicated always wins my heart and mind.

[Jathom95]

 

Harder/more complicated always wins my heart and mind.

Understand that completely haha. At least now I know someone like-minded for mod recommendations and general gameplay grievances. Sometimes you feel as if you're the only one who plays this way. :laugh:

[HadToRegister]

^ Yeah, I know what you mean.

 

 

...and the vanilla encumbrance system (come on really ... one single flax seed weighing in at 0.1 is all it took for me being able to move at full speed to being rooted to one point ... Realistic Fatigue/Basic Physical Activities forever for me).

 

@Striker879 I'm right on board with the encumbrance system being horrible in vanilla. Besides the issues that RF remedies (use it and BPA myself), everything is honestly too damned heavy. In the inventory that is.

 

I've started using Counting Beans - A Weight Mod by CoffeeIsDead to remedy that one. That's been an issue for Bethesda since Morrowind at least. If encumbrance is supposed to be measured in pounds, then the vanilla system makes everything far heavier than it should be. 40 lb warhammers? 36lb swords? That mod tackles this particular issue nicely. Doesn't hugely unbalance the game, just makes sure that one dungeon sweep won't take up 85% of your inventory space. I don't know that I can play without it now.

 

 

I always fire up Automation tools for TES5Edit, by MatorTheEternal and make ingredients weightless.

12 Bergomot seeds shouldn't stop me from walking.

 

The scripts work on Oblivion on up to Fallout 4.

Just use the REPLACE option, put in your path of DATA - Weight, or DATA/DATA - Weight have it search for *, and put 0.000000 in the replace box.

[gnarly1]

Yes, I'm aware. That's why I titled the topic as such. I'm aware that many people hate the game to its core and believe it accomplished nothing worthwhile. What I have a hard time understanding is why people treat Oblivion as if it's the first to delve into "generic fantasy" territory. Do we just forget about Arena and Daggerfall, which were arguably worse in that department? In Arena, the Emperor talks in butchered Ye Olde English? Or the entire setting of Daggerfall at that. But most give them a pass because of their age and that most people today don't consider them part of the current identity of the Elder Scrolls series. But even Skyrim, the game that made the series mainstream, draws its influence from other places. Dragons? Norse folklore? Everyone shits on Oblivion for ripping off LOTR, but let's not pretend Bethesda wasn't ripping what was popular at the time of Skyrim's release, i.e. Game of Thrones.

 

 

I don't have an issue with people not liking the game. It's when people become so militant about it and seem to think others have no reason to have different preferences in what they want out of their respective games. I have been called "stupid" for playing this game for so long. Stupid, over a damn game. Like seriously? What kind of childish nonsense is that? People who read extensively don't chastise others for liking different genres. I just largely ignore it and go my merry way, Makes everyone happy.

I'm one of the minority who gave Skyrim a 'thumbs down' in my Steam review and it's as scathing or even moreso than anything I've written about Oblivion, which I barely talk/write about at all. I actually finished Oblivion's main quest. I barely started it in Skyrim.

 

Your points about Oblivion being unfairly maligned are well made but you've missed the massively consequential fact that Oblivion followed Morrowind and it contextualised what we expected from Oblivion. Oblivion's Imperial Province is bland compared to Morrowind's Vvardenfell. I remember the first time I saw the Cantons of Vivec emerge from the fog and being mesmerised by the alien architecture. I can think of no equivalent experience in Oblivion.

 

I can still distinctly remember the feelings I had when playing Morrowind - of being a barely-tolerated outsider who had to earn their place in the world. Oblivion engendered no such feelings nor any others that I can recall. Sure, ES lore/world-building can be fairly derivative at times but Kirkbride's contribution to the lore also helped to create Morrowind's unique atmosphere and I felt than Oblivion under-leveraged the unique aspects of ES lore.

 

That's another aspect that disappointed people about Oblivion - that the Imperial Province, particularly the biome(s) was nothing like how it is described in the lore.

 

So, to me, Morrowind felt unique and otherworldly and Oblivion didn't.

 

But none of what I've written is intended to invalidate your enjoyment of Oblivion. Morrowind has some fairly obvious flaws but I still love experiencing it.

 

Dragons? You mean Wyverns....? :tongue:

 

EDIT: just realised I misread the thread title, hence my first reply. Too much gaming today - need to give the eyeballs a rest.

Edited February 27, 2021 by gnarly1

[Striker879]

Fortunately for me Jathom I don't mind being "an army of one" ... it may be a bit over the line to say I revel in it, but that does indicate the direction I'm facing. That won't stop me from sharing my spin on what tweaks to the game make it more enjoyable for me, nor dampen my interest in finding out what your ideas for the same are. The one thing I can't do for myself is have an idea that doesn't have it's start in my own gray matter. Ideas I don't necessarily agree with have just as much (if not more) value to me as ideas that align well with my own. The ones that align well just take closer scrutiny to see where they differ and thus may outline new pathways forward.

 

I don't have a problem with the idea of encumbrance HadTo, in fact for me the notion of no encumbrance has less allure than that used by the vanilla game. What irks me is that if my character's max encumbrance was for example 500, in the vanilla system at 499.9 I can move without any penalty but at 500.0 I'm frozen in place. With RF + BPN as I start to carry more my speed and fatigue are affected and if I'm foolish enough to exceed my maximum I'll find my guy laying on the ground incapacitated. Makes walking around with your pockets filled to the brim a bit of an "adventure" at times, especially when near an enemy with burden poisons/enchantments at hand.

 

Though I haven't played either Morrowind or Skyrim I'm always interested in other's views on the differences between the games. If I were to summarize what I've read so far I think I'd go for dumbing down in the interest of more mass appeal as you go from Morrowind to Skyrim. A larger fan base does not necessarily equate to better gameplay, or even a more fullfilling gaming experience for the player. It does achieve the business model goal of more money in the "right" hands though, which is the primary reason the games exist.

 

In some distant future perhaps I'll take Morroblivion for a spin (I'm not sure I could come to grips with the chance based combat aspect of vanilla Morrowind). That would need to come after my next character gets off the ground in Oblivion however, as I have a good sized handful of new additions to my Oblivion mod loadout I'd like to try, one of which (Maskars Oblivion Overhaul) will certainly take me well beyond the "vanilla" game. My current guy (who is only 6 years gameplay old) is beginning to show his age. One of these days he'll find himself relegated to the role of mod test dummy for my next guy.

[Jathom95]

 

...But none of what I've written is intended to invalidate your enjoyment of Oblivion. Morrowind has some fairly obvious flaws but I still love experiencing it.

 

Dragons? You mean Wyverns....? :tongue:

 

EDIT: just realised I misread the thread title, hence my first reply. Too much gaming today - need to give the eyeballs a rest.

 

No, your points were actually among the most respectful compared to what I've been used to. I was actually worried I was coming off too brash in response, hopefully not. And I've always understood how someone could prefer a game like Morrowind. Narratively, it's the best game Bethesda has ever produced and next to Daggerfall the one with the most actual RPG elements.

 

When someone presents their points such as you have, that's perfectly fine. What appeals to one may not necessarily to another, and I can see where Oblivion could be a case of "been there, done that" with a lot of people. Truth be told, the game honestly holds some personal significance to me as well. I don't talk about it often, but it got me through a very difficult time in my life. While most found the temperate forests and valleys to be boring, I found comfort in those places. I love Morrowind as well, but for very different reasons. Morrowind, I love the sense of adventure and stronger narrative emphasis. And just like Oblivion, I don't really ever tire of it. But what they both have for me personally at least is the feeling of a living breathing world. Morrowind, because of the ever present culture and political dynamics, and Oblivion for the sense of communities and each town having their own little stories to play out.

 

And yes about dragons, that has irked me ever since Skyrim's release. They're wyverns as you said. But wyvern probably wouldn't have been as "cool" of a sales pitch as slaying dragons. And that's all I'll say about Skyrim.

 

Fortunately for me Jathom I don't mind being "an army of one" ... it may be a bit over the line to say I revel in it, but that does indicate the direction I'm facing. That won't stop me from sharing my spin on what tweaks to the game make it more enjoyable for me, nor dampen my interest in finding out what your ideas for the same are. The one thing I can't do for myself is have an idea that doesn't have it's start in my own gray matter. Ideas I don't necessarily agree with have just as much (if not more) value to me as ideas that align well with my own. The ones that align well just take closer scrutiny to see where they differ and thus may outline new pathways forward.

 

Though I haven't played either Morrowind or Skyrim I'm always interested in other's views on the differences between the games. If I were to summarize what I've read so far I think I'd go for dumbing down in the interest of more mass appeal as you go from Morrowind to Skyrim. A larger fan base does not necessarily equate to better gameplay, or even a more fullfilling gaming experience for the player. It does achieve the business model goal of more money in the "right" hands though, which is the primary reason the games exist.

Sure, like I said, me liking what I like and someone else potentially not has never bothered me. What would be the point of preference otherwise, y'know? But frankly, I think the mass appeal of the series hasn't attributed to the "dumbing down" so much as game audiences shifting a lot since the early 2000s and back. From Morrowind to Oblivion, the gameplay might've been "simpler" on a technical level, but you still had enough interesting concepts to make it a worthy successor even if it wasn't what most were expecting. And just like many other works of fiction, you have many different opinions. Some love it, some hate it, some are indifferent. This is in contrast to Morrowind and Skyrim which are almost universally liked. I don't use a stronger term like adored because not everyone may feel that strongly about it. Whereas Morrowind is sort of seen as one of the last great "true" RPGs before saturation hit the market and devs began streamlining, Skyrim is loved by mainstream gamers for its relative simplicity. The game doesn't really require you to think at all. Puzzles are laughably easy, dungeons have obvious return to start paths at the end to avoid backtracking, and you get to be the Chosen One who can shout at other people.

 

Which is frankly another reason I'm drawn to Oblivion's take. I find the Chosen One concept in games to be tiresome. A self-made hero who has crawled up from nothing is much more endearing to me personally. Morrowind does well with making you earn the title of Nerevarine, and having you question the implications of what it means, but something about having absolutely no claim to fame at all at the start of Oblivion and becoming Champion by your own volition just scratches that itch for me something fierce.

 

I'm really enjoying this conversation by the way everyone. :happy:

Edited February 28, 2021 by Jathom95

[Oblivionaddicted]

I find the vanilla Oblivion pretty enjoyable, I remember I spent some weeks playing with the base version before using mods whereas I immediately knew I would have to use mods to enjoy Morrowind given the countless glitches and flaws its vanilla version makes you suffer.

 

In nearly 14 years I've always liked the UI and never used any mod to change it but there are mods I would hardly play without like natural faces, the portable container or HGEC F-cup (for medical reasons of course ^_^ ).

[Striker879]

So one of my typical Striker questions Jathom ... did the market expectations actually change from Morrowind through Oblivion to Skyrim, or does it appear to shift as each game was targeted to an ever expanding market?

 

I completely understand Bethesda's part in the progression, as the main focus of all companies is to produce larger profits. In the gaming industry there really is only one way to do that ... sell more games. If a portion of their old customer base isn't happy with what Bethesda needed to do to gain that larger audience, well isn't that what marketing departments are all about ... convincing the masses that less is actually more?

 

Akin to Flat Earthers to some eyes, I'm one of the few who thinks that bigger isn't always better (notice I didn't assert never). Weighing what is lost vs the gains is a personal accounting. Once again we have no right answer, just different ones.

 

When you play Morrowind do you mod it to become more Oblivion-like (I'm specifically thinking of game combat mechanics, but don't let that limit the scope of your answer)?

 

It wasn't until I'd played Oblivion for some before I came to realise that it wasn't my first RPG game (I came from primarily a Doom/Quake/Half Life 1/racing and flying sim background). The very first game I played was the Privateer series, and especially with the first one I remember how I couldn't wait to get home from work so I could disappear into the game universe. It wasn't just the main story that pulled me in, but the ability to go anywhere, do anything whenever I wanted that sucked me in and wouldn't let go. Perhaps that's why I never actually played any of those FPS titles through to game end (or perhaps very rarely would be more accurate) ... they only offered the choice of wander around in an empty level after you'd killed the enemies or go to the next level and another grind.

 

When I first played Oblivion I regained that freedom of choice. Frenetic activity or peaceful repose, all within my grasp whenever I wanted it. I study things I like, so the vagarities of the leveling system was just another element to be mastered, not something to fight or rail against. The more I understood the more I appreciated how Bethesda had given me the tools to go my own way, even if all of those tools weren't handed me via a tutorial dialogue on a silver platter. I have notes to myself for tweaks to my custom class for my next character, and no doubt that playing that character will open up new insights and possibilities for the next guy after him.

 

A couple of years back I ran across a page here at Nexus for Privateer (actually a remake using the Gemini engine) and decided to give it a go. I won't say I didn't enjoy the revisit, but it's true value was in helping me see how rich the game experience in Oblivion was in comparison. In the end Privateer had lost it's grasp on me, not because of what it had to offer but due to what it couldn't offer because of limitations from it's era (Intel 286/386/486). Playing Privateer allowed me insights into my Oblivion experience I lacked before it gave me the frame of reference the FPS/sim transition could never give. This gives me an appreciation for how the Morrowind/Oblivion/Skyrim experience must play for some folks, as that progression devolves in the face of ever increasing computer power, as opposed to evolving to take advantage of what tomorrow offers.

 

Gnarly posted a video link in the Mod Authors forum yesterday that I enjoyed. I'll post the link here with a thank you to Gnarly ...

 

[Striker879]

I find the vanilla Oblivion pretty enjoyable, I remember I spent some weeks playing with the base version before using mods whereas I immediately knew I would have to use mods to enjoy Morrowind given the countless glitches and flaws its vanilla version makes you suffer.

 

In nearly 14 years I've always liked the UI and never used any mod to change it but there are mods I would hardly play without like natural faces, the portable container or HGEC F-cup (for medical reasons of course ^_^ ).

 

LOL ... OA be very very careful when getting close to the Blockhead rabbit hole. If you slip over it's edge there is no way out!