Best Of
Re: Making the materials in the game more user friendly.
Honestly I find really, really difficult not to be sarcastic when I read one of these posts, and they pop up really often.
Game developpers have spent years thinking and testing to craft working game systems, and functioning balance, and every now and then, a random player who is convinced he (let's be honest, 99% of the time it's a he) has just reinvented the wheel and propose major changes that, most of the time, would have unpredictable consequences on a system that currently works fine.
I really understand your problem, I have hundred of trait stones too, to the point that after the daily writs I don't even keep them, I sell everything, including lower level materials since I don't need to pile up materials except level 150/160 ones, and the problem is the same (or worse) with runes, since even master writs, by definition, require ONE specific rune each (plus one for the level and one for the raise/decrease effect), and the rest of the time you just pile up dozens of fire, ice, alchemy or power runes that won't be used.
So, really, I know this problem of materials that pile up by tons for nothing, but I kindly disagree about, well, everything you propose.
The existence of style stones is justified both by the lore (each race/style has its own way of doing things) and the gameplay - you must go to specific locations to find specific cultural styles and associated materials. For example, you won't find outside of the Systres archipelago certain styles related to insular Bretons and druids. If ZoS releases a new Chapter and out there you can find the exact same materials that already exist in the base game... what's the point ? It's interesting to find out what these new people and cultures use to craft, and it's enjoyable to complete dailies in these regions just to get new style pages and materials. If the same materials are to be used everywhere on Tamriel, what's the point of having new regions at all ? They won't offer new contents anyway.
For the rest of the materials, in my opinion, it's both a matter of skill - you feel a real progression when you get to use more advance materials because you've leveled up your craft - and gameplay - it really wouldn't feel logical to have such a diversity of possible effects, potions, poisons and all if there were, like, a couple materials in each craft. It doesn't make sense at all.
What could be interesting and would, at least, delay the piling up of materials, would be a system in which materials were unlocked as your craft gains skills. I explain : if you're level 1 enchanter or alchemist, you only have access to a reduced number of runes and plants, and you can't even pick up the higher level ones (exactly the same as raw materials for gear crafting), and as you level up, you have access to a larger diversity of materials OR the higher level materials just replace the first levels ones.
But overall, even if the stocking problem you explain does exist, in my opinion it creates two possibilities in terms of gaming style. I think that, as the developpers see it, either you have an adaptative handling of your materials, you sell most of what you get, and when you randomly need specific materials (for master writs, for example), you buy what you need, preventing you from piling up huge amounts of useless (most of the time) materials, OR.... you subscribe to ESO+ and piling up materials isn't a problem at all.
That's what I think, I may be wrong but in that situation, I genuinely feel that there's balance and a working system around materials supply in the game.
Game developpers have spent years thinking and testing to craft working game systems, and functioning balance, and every now and then, a random player who is convinced he (let's be honest, 99% of the time it's a he) has just reinvented the wheel and propose major changes that, most of the time, would have unpredictable consequences on a system that currently works fine.
I really understand your problem, I have hundred of trait stones too, to the point that after the daily writs I don't even keep them, I sell everything, including lower level materials since I don't need to pile up materials except level 150/160 ones, and the problem is the same (or worse) with runes, since even master writs, by definition, require ONE specific rune each (plus one for the level and one for the raise/decrease effect), and the rest of the time you just pile up dozens of fire, ice, alchemy or power runes that won't be used.
So, really, I know this problem of materials that pile up by tons for nothing, but I kindly disagree about, well, everything you propose.
The existence of style stones is justified both by the lore (each race/style has its own way of doing things) and the gameplay - you must go to specific locations to find specific cultural styles and associated materials. For example, you won't find outside of the Systres archipelago certain styles related to insular Bretons and druids. If ZoS releases a new Chapter and out there you can find the exact same materials that already exist in the base game... what's the point ? It's interesting to find out what these new people and cultures use to craft, and it's enjoyable to complete dailies in these regions just to get new style pages and materials. If the same materials are to be used everywhere on Tamriel, what's the point of having new regions at all ? They won't offer new contents anyway.
For the rest of the materials, in my opinion, it's both a matter of skill - you feel a real progression when you get to use more advance materials because you've leveled up your craft - and gameplay - it really wouldn't feel logical to have such a diversity of possible effects, potions, poisons and all if there were, like, a couple materials in each craft. It doesn't make sense at all.
What could be interesting and would, at least, delay the piling up of materials, would be a system in which materials were unlocked as your craft gains skills. I explain : if you're level 1 enchanter or alchemist, you only have access to a reduced number of runes and plants, and you can't even pick up the higher level ones (exactly the same as raw materials for gear crafting), and as you level up, you have access to a larger diversity of materials OR the higher level materials just replace the first levels ones.
But overall, even if the stocking problem you explain does exist, in my opinion it creates two possibilities in terms of gaming style. I think that, as the developpers see it, either you have an adaptative handling of your materials, you sell most of what you get, and when you randomly need specific materials (for master writs, for example), you buy what you need, preventing you from piling up huge amounts of useless (most of the time) materials, OR.... you subscribe to ESO+ and piling up materials isn't a problem at all.
That's what I think, I may be wrong but in that situation, I genuinely feel that there's balance and a working system around materials supply in the game.
Re: Future of Battlegrounds
You're the first player I'm targeting.Forget about the third team for a moment and imagine I'm number 6.
Re: A little late but: Thanks for the Mammoth mount
I came oh so close to purchasing it. But at the end I decided to resist being an early adopter and hold out for a possible future version. I'm hoping against all hope that ZOS decides to make a multi-rider version. And not just multi-rider like the other multi's already out there, but upgraded. I mean c'mon... lookit how big it is! If ever a multi-rider should have 3 extra seats, that would be it! Perfect for seating a full group of 4 players. =D
Re: Ilsabet's Headcanon (Quest Spoilers; Outline in First Post)
Just once, I'd love an excuse to get the old gang back together that didn't involve an imminent threat to everything we hold dear. Maybe to just see someone on the street and be like "hey, Prince Azah, how's it going?" and not have him be like "well since you asked, the Fighters Guild is in the process of being annihilated and Guildmaster Merric is missing and don't look now but there's a Worm Cultist right behind you, but hey at least you'll get to see Skordo and Gabrielle again!"
Okay so Azah didn't say all that. And if I'm being honest I didn't even recognize him until he called out to me. It's been a while, okay? And I'm pretty sure he has a new hairstyle now. I wasn't even aware he'd joined the Fighters Guild, but it's probably a good thing he did considering what we're dealing with now. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Azah and Merric had been looking into a recent spate of ambushes on Fighters Guild halls, trying to figure out who was behind them and how they were getting in and out so easily. When Merric went missing, Azah needed someone to follow up on scouting reports he'd received about the guildmaster's possible whereabouts.
The scout who had spotted maybe-Merric near Sentinel turned out to be none other than Skordo the Knife. He's been making himself useful with the guild, and appreciating all the resulting opportunities to punch people. We should have plenty more of those after finding out the Worm Cult has decided to make themselves everybody's problem again, starting with taking revenge on the Fighters and Mages Guilds for ruining their Planemeld party all those years ago.
Wiping out four Fighters Guild halls was a pretty effective start. And when we found out that they were targeting a Mages Guild meeting in Shornhelm next, and had a shapeshifter involved, that got us on the trail of both our missing guildmaster and the baddies he was chasing.
As we approached the Mages Guild in Shornhelm, we spotted Azah talking to someone in mage robes - a Breton woman with long blonde hair, who sounded like she was thanking the prince for the Fighters Guild's aid. I caught Bastian in my peripheral vision, and in the split-second it took for the relevant mental connections to snap into place, I grabbed his arm and dragged him around the corner of the adjacent building.
Just ahead, Skordo stopped short and looked at us like I'd suddenly gone off the deep end. "Hey, what's gotten into you? You got cold feet all of a sudden? You know that's just Ga-"
"Skordo, could you go check in?" I interrupted. "We'll be right behind you."
"Yeah, sure. You're not gonna leave me to do all the work while you're off canoodling though, are you?"
Sigh. It's not like... "We'll be right there."
With another skeptical look, Skordo shrugged and took off jogging toward our contacts. "Hey you two, I got bad news. The Worm Cult is..."
Bastian looked slightly weirded out as I turned my attention back to him. "Is something wrong?"
It occurred to me that I might have overreacted just a little. Now... how to approach this...
"How calm do you feel?" I asked.
He looked confused. "I'm... calm?"
"Okay. How restrained do you feel?"
The confusion deepened. These were probably strange questions coming from someone who had just shoved him against a wall. "What are you getting at?"
I glanced over his shoulder toward the blonde mage. "If I told you that you're about to meet Gabrielle Benele..." Bastian's eyes widened in gradual realization. "How calm would you be able to stay?"
"Gab - Gabrielle Benele? The Gabrielle Benele?"
"Yes, that Gabrielle Benele. Do you see why I'm asking now?"
He at least had enough self-awareness to register his rising excitement, and tried to cover it with a pout. "Don't tell me you're worried I might embarrass you?"
"She's pretty much your hero, isn't she? Are you at all concerned about embarrassing yourself?"
The self-awareness deepened. "Oh. Well. You may have a point."
"I just wanted to give you fair warning before you strolled on up. So you know what you're getting into."
"Right. I... appreciate that, actually. The last thing I'd want to do is start babbling without thinking..."
He trailed off into a nervous chuckle, and I tried not to look too vindicated as I nodded along. As enjoyable as it might be to see him in full fanboy mode, this wasn't really the time.
Something else occurred to me. "Oh, and - I think it would be best not to mention Darien. Not unless she does."
"Really? You don't want to check on her progress?"
"It's kind of a sensitive subject. Considering how long it's been... I wouldn't want her to feel like I'm pushing."
"Right. I see. I think."
"Just let me handle the topic if it comes up. And don't bring it up if it doesn't."
"Understood. It is your conversation to have. And if you need me to step away, of course, I will."
I nodded again. "Thanks. We good to go?"
"Yeah. Of course." I released him from his impromptu time-out, and as we headed toward our colleagues, I heard quiet mumbling. "Now where did I leave my copy of Schools of Magic..."
Skordo had started giving our report to Azah and Gabrielle, but some of the news had already beaten us there - in the form of a sudden attack on the mages' meeting, and Merric arriving shortly afterward and racing in to try to stop it while Gabrielle stayed topside to flag down anyone else who might be able to help.
We didn't waste any time heading in ourselves, and found the place in complete disarray. At the end of a trail of cultists and their summoned Daedra and undead (some of whom I'm pretty sure had until very recently been not-dead mages), we finally caught up to our guildmaster confronting a Daedric harvester and her lieutenants.
Merric was outnumbered, and a wide chasm in the floor prevented us from rushing to his aid. I could still shoot, though. But as I took aim, trying to account for Merric's movements as he lashed out at the Daedra's lackeys, he suddenly bolted for a large and ghastly-looking device farther across the room.
"Stop, mortal! The soul reaper is not yet stable!" the harvester cried, and I paused as I recalled the name of the superweapon the Worm Cult had supposedly been developing. If it was already unstable, and an errant arrow hit it...
But Merric paid no heed to his enemy's admonition, and threw his whole weight into a shield bash against the heart of the contraption. It overloaded and exploded, throwing him to the ground.
By the time we found an alternate path around the chasm, the harvester was gone... and Merric was beyond our help. Gabrielle arrived via portal and could only take stock of the aftermath as I did my best to salvage clues and comfort Azah as he grappled with his mentor's loss.
Skordo took the news hard too, but while it didn't take long for his grief to be channeled into a drive for action, Azah found himself overwhelmed by guilt and uncertainty. What was he supposed to do, what was the guild supposed to do, now that someone he considered a father figure as well as a friend and leader was gone?
He wasn't completely on his own, I reminded him. He still had his mentor's teachings to guide him. And we were all still in this together, with a trail to follow and a war to win.
That was enough to clear the stormclouds from his heart, and get us on track to consider our next move. And then Gabrielle arrived with the news that Vanus Galerion was waiting to speak with us. It seemed we would be getting some even more powerful backup.
As Azah and Skordo followed Gabrielle out of the room, Bastian looked like he'd been hit with a blizzard spell.
I raised an inquisitive eyebrow, and he did his best to thaw himself out. "Good. I'm good. Everything's good."
I might have believed him if his voice weren't about two notches higher than usual, but we'd just have to hope for the best.
Vanus was as enamored of his own superiority as ever, although I only had to be a little pert when he disparaged Merric's recklessness in not leaving him an intact soul reaper to study. He'd had his own reasons to suspect that the Worm Cult was up to something, and he was not pleased to learn just what that something was.
The ill-fated magisters, too, had seen ominous portents tinged with the stench of Coldharbour. They had asked Gabrielle to advise them, based on her experience with the Planemeld, and if she hadn't been late to the meeting and run into Merric on the way in, she might have been among the shattered soul reaper's many victims.
There was plenty to be somber about. But there was also work to be done, and forces to muster. Prince Azah took the interim reins of the Fighters Guild, now feeling more confident in his leadership abilities and training, and we prepared to storm the Worm Cult nest we'd discovered on the coast.
The crags of northern Rivenspire brought back memories, especially with Skordo along. Back then he and Darien were pretty much their own comedy duo, even as they were the first to rush into any fight. But I couldn't let nostalgia distract me. We had a new job to do, and new people to do it with.
Inside the cult hideout, Skordo took his fellow fighters one way while Vanus accompanied me and Bastian. (Of course I'm sure he would have said we were accompanying him.) It was pretty funny watching Bastian trying not to be obvious about obviously trying to impress the Great Mage with his spellcasting, while he might have been invisible as far as Vanus and his flashy spells were concerned.
Vanus was a dab hand at dispelling illusions, which led us to a wealth of information about the soul reapers and the cult's plot. The machines are designed not just to autonomously harvest souls, but to funnel them to some kind of remote collection facility. And whatever this faction of the cult hopes to accomplish, the real goal is to curry favor with Molag Bal for something even bigger. Peachy.
We also found instructions for deactivating the soul reapers without having them blow the hell up. It did require a certain amount of trust in the cult's engineering and documentation, but thankfully the process worked. Because there were a lot of reapers to deactivate before the day was done.
When we found the remains of the ambushed Fighters Guild contingent, but no sign of Skordo aside from his dropped sword, Vanus declared that it was time to split up so we might more quickly find and rescue our comrade.
"Be careful," he warned, after doling out his instructions. "Illusions abound in this place."
"I think I've got someone who can handle them," I replied, figuring it was about time I vouched for my partner's magical prowess.
Vanus glanced at Bastian, and his unimpressed frown gave way to a perfunctory nod before he headed in his assigned direction.
We'd barely traversed two hallways before Skordo called to us from across a shattered walkway, looking pretty rough after being ambushed. We caught up to him just as he collapsed in a pained heap, and I instinctively started to move toward him.
"Wait," Bastian said quietly but sharply. "There's something not quite -"
"Skordo! You're injured!" From the adjacent hallway, Vanus rushed in and knelt down to aid our friend.
"No, Vanus! I'm over here! That's not me!" shouted... our friend?
Skordo - the real Skordo - appeared next to us, as his not-so-injured doppelganger chortled and levitated to its feet. The Orc's form dispersed to reveal the harvester mastermind, who activated the magic sigil on the ground that Vanus had somehow failed to notice. The mage found himself trapped in a barrier and being sucked into a portal, and not even Gabrielle's sudden intervention could free him. With one last desperate lunge, Vanus threw his staff toward us, ordering us to protect it before disappearing completely.
"First the Mages' head, next the Fighters' heart," cackled the harvester, resuming Skordo's form before portaling away.
Well. It's a good thing Bastian's knack for pep talks seems to be rubbing off on me. I couldn't blame Gabrielle or Skordo for getting down on themselves for failing to protect our friends, but seeing Skordo so despondent was just unsettling. He wasn't quite feeling like himself, after the shapechanger's spell had knocked him out, but with a little bit of encouragement he was back to fighting form.
Our next stop, after returning to Shornhelm and updating Prince Azah, was the "Fighters' heart" - the Earth Forge, where Merric once forged the weapon that destroyed the Mortuum Vivicus. Skordo needed more pep talking after seeing all of the fighters cut down by the villain wearing his face, but soon we confronted the harvester and made her pay for all of those stolen lives. Along the way, after we got a closer look at the soul reapers in action, Bastian and Skordo drew the attention of the cultists guarding the devices so I could sneak by and deactivate them without feeding them yet more souls.
The worm's - snake's? - head was cut off, but there were plenty more crawling out of the ground. In the time it took Gabrielle and Azah to arrange another meeting of alliance representatives to address the growing threat, reports of soul reapers and Worm Cult attack squads began cropping up all over Tamriel. It seemed that we really were facing a crisis to rival the Planemeld.
Being back on Stirk for another alliance meeting sure was a blast from the past, right down to the prissy diplomats with very little interest in taking the negotiations seriously. I'm not sure if Lady Arabelle still has the alliance leaders locked in a broom closet somewhere, but the best we could get on short notice were some low-ranking ambassadors who looked like they'd only shown up to get a free island vacation.
They certainly didn't put much stock in fanciful stories of reanimated cults and stolen souls, which clearly were some sort of trick to distract them and divert resources from their precious war in Cyrodiil. Merric and Vanus having fallen victim did get their attention, but it was a projected message from Vanus himself that finally got all the way through to them.
Vanus was still imprisoned, someplace that felt like Coldharbour but probably wasn't, and he'd overheard some salient details about the cult's plot. As we had feared, the deployment of the soul reapers across Tamriel was only the first stage of a much bigger operation. There's a massive force coming together, on some out-of-the-way island called Solstice, and once they're ready to go it's going to be bad news for pretty much everyone.
Suddenly our good friends from the alliances were very enthusiastic about banding together to save the world again. Just like they totally did last time, which was news to me. I had to bite my tongue through all the back-patting, particularly when the Pact ambassador said something about Jorunn "setting aside hostilities to defeat the Worm Cult." Either the alliance PR departments put out some very effective post-Planemeld propaganda, or we've all just tacitly decided to take a very rosy view of history.
Either way, this isn't the first time a bunch of plucky do-gooders have stopped a catastrophic Worm Cult plot, with or without the alliances' full support. As Gabrielle said, we did it before, and we'll do it again. I won't turn down the help if the alliances want to make good on more than a token morale boost, though.
And hey, we even have a suitably plucky name for our merry band, courtesy of Skordo and his knack for monikery. "Stirk Fellowship" is kind of tame compared to Doomsmasher or a reference to cutlery, but it'll probably look better on recruitment posters.
We'll have to wait for the recruitment efforts and brain trust strategizing to do their jobs before we can move forward, especially since nobody knows where this Solstice is supposed to be. I hope Skordo is right about it being an island paradise. It's been a while since our relaxing tour of High Isle.
As the meeting wound down, and I made my final rounds with our various delegates, I caught Bastian passing a book and quill pen to Gabrielle in the midst of what seemed to be a remarkably restrained expression of admiration. With the way he was beaming afterward clutching that book to his chest, it looks like he'll have a new treasured possession to cherish for the rest of his life.
My own wrap-up conversation with Gabrielle was pretty much all business, as she fretted about Vanus and looked ahead to all the research in store. I spent the entire time wondering if she would bring up Darien, now that things had settled down, and then just as I was wondering if she was waiting for me to bring up Darien, and wondering if I should, and what I should say if I did, Prince Azah called her over to answer some question for one of the ambassadors, and that was the end of that.
Is there a reason she didn't say anything? Did it even occur to her to want to talk to me about Darien? Did she think I wouldn't want to hear about her efforts to find him, or was there just nothing new to report? Or... has she managed to find a way to move on, just as I should probably...
"Are you sure you don't want to ask her? While we're here?" Bastian said quietly beside me. I'm not sure if he'd been close enough to hear our conversation, or if he could just see the lack of resolution on my face, but I probably shouldn't be surprised that he knew.
Gabrielle and Azah were already deep into their discussion, and Skordo was heading their way too. If any time was not the time...
"She has a lot on her mind right now. I doubt she needs another distraction with so much work to do." I put on a smile that, in retrospect, was way too pleasant to be convincing. "If there was something to report she would have said so, right? No point pushing for something that's not happening."
"If you're sure."
I nodded, very pleasantly. "Yeah. We can go."
I did take some time, before we left Stirk, to just wander around and take in the scenery. The alliance camps were right where we'd left them, and there were plenty of new faces hanging around the guild encampments. My mind wanted to drift back to the old faces, the ones who did the actual work, the one who would never be there again...
But... no. I'm not going to give in to moping. The world doesn't stop just because someone we respected and cared about is no longer with us. We just have to keep moving forward and get crap done, with or without them, just as they'd want us to do.
Hey, saying that didn't even make my gut tighten up. I might be getting the hang of this moving on thing. Well then, onward we go to fight the good fight. Again.
Okay so Azah didn't say all that. And if I'm being honest I didn't even recognize him until he called out to me. It's been a while, okay? And I'm pretty sure he has a new hairstyle now. I wasn't even aware he'd joined the Fighters Guild, but it's probably a good thing he did considering what we're dealing with now. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Azah and Merric had been looking into a recent spate of ambushes on Fighters Guild halls, trying to figure out who was behind them and how they were getting in and out so easily. When Merric went missing, Azah needed someone to follow up on scouting reports he'd received about the guildmaster's possible whereabouts.
The scout who had spotted maybe-Merric near Sentinel turned out to be none other than Skordo the Knife. He's been making himself useful with the guild, and appreciating all the resulting opportunities to punch people. We should have plenty more of those after finding out the Worm Cult has decided to make themselves everybody's problem again, starting with taking revenge on the Fighters and Mages Guilds for ruining their Planemeld party all those years ago.
Wiping out four Fighters Guild halls was a pretty effective start. And when we found out that they were targeting a Mages Guild meeting in Shornhelm next, and had a shapeshifter involved, that got us on the trail of both our missing guildmaster and the baddies he was chasing.
As we approached the Mages Guild in Shornhelm, we spotted Azah talking to someone in mage robes - a Breton woman with long blonde hair, who sounded like she was thanking the prince for the Fighters Guild's aid. I caught Bastian in my peripheral vision, and in the split-second it took for the relevant mental connections to snap into place, I grabbed his arm and dragged him around the corner of the adjacent building.
Just ahead, Skordo stopped short and looked at us like I'd suddenly gone off the deep end. "Hey, what's gotten into you? You got cold feet all of a sudden? You know that's just Ga-"
"Skordo, could you go check in?" I interrupted. "We'll be right behind you."
"Yeah, sure. You're not gonna leave me to do all the work while you're off canoodling though, are you?"
Sigh. It's not like... "We'll be right there."
With another skeptical look, Skordo shrugged and took off jogging toward our contacts. "Hey you two, I got bad news. The Worm Cult is..."
Bastian looked slightly weirded out as I turned my attention back to him. "Is something wrong?"
It occurred to me that I might have overreacted just a little. Now... how to approach this...
"How calm do you feel?" I asked.
He looked confused. "I'm... calm?"
"Okay. How restrained do you feel?"
The confusion deepened. These were probably strange questions coming from someone who had just shoved him against a wall. "What are you getting at?"
I glanced over his shoulder toward the blonde mage. "If I told you that you're about to meet Gabrielle Benele..." Bastian's eyes widened in gradual realization. "How calm would you be able to stay?"
"Gab - Gabrielle Benele? The Gabrielle Benele?"
"Yes, that Gabrielle Benele. Do you see why I'm asking now?"
He at least had enough self-awareness to register his rising excitement, and tried to cover it with a pout. "Don't tell me you're worried I might embarrass you?"
"She's pretty much your hero, isn't she? Are you at all concerned about embarrassing yourself?"
The self-awareness deepened. "Oh. Well. You may have a point."
"I just wanted to give you fair warning before you strolled on up. So you know what you're getting into."
"Right. I... appreciate that, actually. The last thing I'd want to do is start babbling without thinking..."
He trailed off into a nervous chuckle, and I tried not to look too vindicated as I nodded along. As enjoyable as it might be to see him in full fanboy mode, this wasn't really the time.
Something else occurred to me. "Oh, and - I think it would be best not to mention Darien. Not unless she does."
"Really? You don't want to check on her progress?"
"It's kind of a sensitive subject. Considering how long it's been... I wouldn't want her to feel like I'm pushing."
"Right. I see. I think."
"Just let me handle the topic if it comes up. And don't bring it up if it doesn't."
"Understood. It is your conversation to have. And if you need me to step away, of course, I will."
I nodded again. "Thanks. We good to go?"
"Yeah. Of course." I released him from his impromptu time-out, and as we headed toward our colleagues, I heard quiet mumbling. "Now where did I leave my copy of Schools of Magic..."
Skordo had started giving our report to Azah and Gabrielle, but some of the news had already beaten us there - in the form of a sudden attack on the mages' meeting, and Merric arriving shortly afterward and racing in to try to stop it while Gabrielle stayed topside to flag down anyone else who might be able to help.
We didn't waste any time heading in ourselves, and found the place in complete disarray. At the end of a trail of cultists and their summoned Daedra and undead (some of whom I'm pretty sure had until very recently been not-dead mages), we finally caught up to our guildmaster confronting a Daedric harvester and her lieutenants.
Merric was outnumbered, and a wide chasm in the floor prevented us from rushing to his aid. I could still shoot, though. But as I took aim, trying to account for Merric's movements as he lashed out at the Daedra's lackeys, he suddenly bolted for a large and ghastly-looking device farther across the room.
"Stop, mortal! The soul reaper is not yet stable!" the harvester cried, and I paused as I recalled the name of the superweapon the Worm Cult had supposedly been developing. If it was already unstable, and an errant arrow hit it...
But Merric paid no heed to his enemy's admonition, and threw his whole weight into a shield bash against the heart of the contraption. It overloaded and exploded, throwing him to the ground.
By the time we found an alternate path around the chasm, the harvester was gone... and Merric was beyond our help. Gabrielle arrived via portal and could only take stock of the aftermath as I did my best to salvage clues and comfort Azah as he grappled with his mentor's loss.
Skordo took the news hard too, but while it didn't take long for his grief to be channeled into a drive for action, Azah found himself overwhelmed by guilt and uncertainty. What was he supposed to do, what was the guild supposed to do, now that someone he considered a father figure as well as a friend and leader was gone?
He wasn't completely on his own, I reminded him. He still had his mentor's teachings to guide him. And we were all still in this together, with a trail to follow and a war to win.
That was enough to clear the stormclouds from his heart, and get us on track to consider our next move. And then Gabrielle arrived with the news that Vanus Galerion was waiting to speak with us. It seemed we would be getting some even more powerful backup.
As Azah and Skordo followed Gabrielle out of the room, Bastian looked like he'd been hit with a blizzard spell.
I raised an inquisitive eyebrow, and he did his best to thaw himself out. "Good. I'm good. Everything's good."
I might have believed him if his voice weren't about two notches higher than usual, but we'd just have to hope for the best.
Vanus was as enamored of his own superiority as ever, although I only had to be a little pert when he disparaged Merric's recklessness in not leaving him an intact soul reaper to study. He'd had his own reasons to suspect that the Worm Cult was up to something, and he was not pleased to learn just what that something was.
The ill-fated magisters, too, had seen ominous portents tinged with the stench of Coldharbour. They had asked Gabrielle to advise them, based on her experience with the Planemeld, and if she hadn't been late to the meeting and run into Merric on the way in, she might have been among the shattered soul reaper's many victims.
There was plenty to be somber about. But there was also work to be done, and forces to muster. Prince Azah took the interim reins of the Fighters Guild, now feeling more confident in his leadership abilities and training, and we prepared to storm the Worm Cult nest we'd discovered on the coast.
The crags of northern Rivenspire brought back memories, especially with Skordo along. Back then he and Darien were pretty much their own comedy duo, even as they were the first to rush into any fight. But I couldn't let nostalgia distract me. We had a new job to do, and new people to do it with.
Inside the cult hideout, Skordo took his fellow fighters one way while Vanus accompanied me and Bastian. (Of course I'm sure he would have said we were accompanying him.) It was pretty funny watching Bastian trying not to be obvious about obviously trying to impress the Great Mage with his spellcasting, while he might have been invisible as far as Vanus and his flashy spells were concerned.
Vanus was a dab hand at dispelling illusions, which led us to a wealth of information about the soul reapers and the cult's plot. The machines are designed not just to autonomously harvest souls, but to funnel them to some kind of remote collection facility. And whatever this faction of the cult hopes to accomplish, the real goal is to curry favor with Molag Bal for something even bigger. Peachy.
We also found instructions for deactivating the soul reapers without having them blow the hell up. It did require a certain amount of trust in the cult's engineering and documentation, but thankfully the process worked. Because there were a lot of reapers to deactivate before the day was done.
When we found the remains of the ambushed Fighters Guild contingent, but no sign of Skordo aside from his dropped sword, Vanus declared that it was time to split up so we might more quickly find and rescue our comrade.
"Be careful," he warned, after doling out his instructions. "Illusions abound in this place."
"I think I've got someone who can handle them," I replied, figuring it was about time I vouched for my partner's magical prowess.
Vanus glanced at Bastian, and his unimpressed frown gave way to a perfunctory nod before he headed in his assigned direction.
We'd barely traversed two hallways before Skordo called to us from across a shattered walkway, looking pretty rough after being ambushed. We caught up to him just as he collapsed in a pained heap, and I instinctively started to move toward him.
"Wait," Bastian said quietly but sharply. "There's something not quite -"
"Skordo! You're injured!" From the adjacent hallway, Vanus rushed in and knelt down to aid our friend.
"No, Vanus! I'm over here! That's not me!" shouted... our friend?
Skordo - the real Skordo - appeared next to us, as his not-so-injured doppelganger chortled and levitated to its feet. The Orc's form dispersed to reveal the harvester mastermind, who activated the magic sigil on the ground that Vanus had somehow failed to notice. The mage found himself trapped in a barrier and being sucked into a portal, and not even Gabrielle's sudden intervention could free him. With one last desperate lunge, Vanus threw his staff toward us, ordering us to protect it before disappearing completely.
"First the Mages' head, next the Fighters' heart," cackled the harvester, resuming Skordo's form before portaling away.
Well. It's a good thing Bastian's knack for pep talks seems to be rubbing off on me. I couldn't blame Gabrielle or Skordo for getting down on themselves for failing to protect our friends, but seeing Skordo so despondent was just unsettling. He wasn't quite feeling like himself, after the shapechanger's spell had knocked him out, but with a little bit of encouragement he was back to fighting form.
Our next stop, after returning to Shornhelm and updating Prince Azah, was the "Fighters' heart" - the Earth Forge, where Merric once forged the weapon that destroyed the Mortuum Vivicus. Skordo needed more pep talking after seeing all of the fighters cut down by the villain wearing his face, but soon we confronted the harvester and made her pay for all of those stolen lives. Along the way, after we got a closer look at the soul reapers in action, Bastian and Skordo drew the attention of the cultists guarding the devices so I could sneak by and deactivate them without feeding them yet more souls.
The worm's - snake's? - head was cut off, but there were plenty more crawling out of the ground. In the time it took Gabrielle and Azah to arrange another meeting of alliance representatives to address the growing threat, reports of soul reapers and Worm Cult attack squads began cropping up all over Tamriel. It seemed that we really were facing a crisis to rival the Planemeld.
Being back on Stirk for another alliance meeting sure was a blast from the past, right down to the prissy diplomats with very little interest in taking the negotiations seriously. I'm not sure if Lady Arabelle still has the alliance leaders locked in a broom closet somewhere, but the best we could get on short notice were some low-ranking ambassadors who looked like they'd only shown up to get a free island vacation.
They certainly didn't put much stock in fanciful stories of reanimated cults and stolen souls, which clearly were some sort of trick to distract them and divert resources from their precious war in Cyrodiil. Merric and Vanus having fallen victim did get their attention, but it was a projected message from Vanus himself that finally got all the way through to them.
Vanus was still imprisoned, someplace that felt like Coldharbour but probably wasn't, and he'd overheard some salient details about the cult's plot. As we had feared, the deployment of the soul reapers across Tamriel was only the first stage of a much bigger operation. There's a massive force coming together, on some out-of-the-way island called Solstice, and once they're ready to go it's going to be bad news for pretty much everyone.
Suddenly our good friends from the alliances were very enthusiastic about banding together to save the world again. Just like they totally did last time, which was news to me. I had to bite my tongue through all the back-patting, particularly when the Pact ambassador said something about Jorunn "setting aside hostilities to defeat the Worm Cult." Either the alliance PR departments put out some very effective post-Planemeld propaganda, or we've all just tacitly decided to take a very rosy view of history.
Either way, this isn't the first time a bunch of plucky do-gooders have stopped a catastrophic Worm Cult plot, with or without the alliances' full support. As Gabrielle said, we did it before, and we'll do it again. I won't turn down the help if the alliances want to make good on more than a token morale boost, though.
And hey, we even have a suitably plucky name for our merry band, courtesy of Skordo and his knack for monikery. "Stirk Fellowship" is kind of tame compared to Doomsmasher or a reference to cutlery, but it'll probably look better on recruitment posters.
We'll have to wait for the recruitment efforts and brain trust strategizing to do their jobs before we can move forward, especially since nobody knows where this Solstice is supposed to be. I hope Skordo is right about it being an island paradise. It's been a while since our relaxing tour of High Isle.
As the meeting wound down, and I made my final rounds with our various delegates, I caught Bastian passing a book and quill pen to Gabrielle in the midst of what seemed to be a remarkably restrained expression of admiration. With the way he was beaming afterward clutching that book to his chest, it looks like he'll have a new treasured possession to cherish for the rest of his life.
My own wrap-up conversation with Gabrielle was pretty much all business, as she fretted about Vanus and looked ahead to all the research in store. I spent the entire time wondering if she would bring up Darien, now that things had settled down, and then just as I was wondering if she was waiting for me to bring up Darien, and wondering if I should, and what I should say if I did, Prince Azah called her over to answer some question for one of the ambassadors, and that was the end of that.
Is there a reason she didn't say anything? Did it even occur to her to want to talk to me about Darien? Did she think I wouldn't want to hear about her efforts to find him, or was there just nothing new to report? Or... has she managed to find a way to move on, just as I should probably...
"Are you sure you don't want to ask her? While we're here?" Bastian said quietly beside me. I'm not sure if he'd been close enough to hear our conversation, or if he could just see the lack of resolution on my face, but I probably shouldn't be surprised that he knew.
Gabrielle and Azah were already deep into their discussion, and Skordo was heading their way too. If any time was not the time...
"She has a lot on her mind right now. I doubt she needs another distraction with so much work to do." I put on a smile that, in retrospect, was way too pleasant to be convincing. "If there was something to report she would have said so, right? No point pushing for something that's not happening."
"If you're sure."
I nodded, very pleasantly. "Yeah. We can go."
I did take some time, before we left Stirk, to just wander around and take in the scenery. The alliance camps were right where we'd left them, and there were plenty of new faces hanging around the guild encampments. My mind wanted to drift back to the old faces, the ones who did the actual work, the one who would never be there again...
But... no. I'm not going to give in to moping. The world doesn't stop just because someone we respected and cared about is no longer with us. We just have to keep moving forward and get crap done, with or without them, just as they'd want us to do.
Hey, saying that didn't even make my gut tighten up. I might be getting the hang of this moving on thing. Well then, onward we go to fight the good fight. Again.
Ilsabet
2
Re: Crafting Motifs
If you are on PC-EU I have loads of basic motifs stashed that I just give away, just let me know 
Re: Now that we are getting swimming pets, do you think we will get functional boats?
they could make some kinda Boat mount.
Re: Played Arcanist for the first time…
Imagine you are ZOS.
- You have in one hand the veteran players who play really well because they know the game.
- And on the other hand, there are less experienced players who are less patient and want to match the old ones effortlessly.
What to do?
Our friends ZOS have therefore decided to introduce gameplay elements that allow players to easily and significantly increase their damage output without any effort.
This way, less experienced players can match their older counterparts without affecting their older players' damage output.
Everyone's happy and the game continues.
Or not.
- You have in one hand the veteran players who play really well because they know the game.
- And on the other hand, there are less experienced players who are less patient and want to match the old ones effortlessly.
What to do?
Our friends ZOS have therefore decided to introduce gameplay elements that allow players to easily and significantly increase their damage output without any effort.
This way, less experienced players can match their older counterparts without affecting their older players' damage output.
Everyone's happy and the game continues.
Or not.
Xarc
4
Re: leads
folkrift= Falkreath ? ok lots of ppl had same probs with drop
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/594971/belharzas-band-crimson-diamond-lead-does-this-thing-exist
eso plus isn't related with drops of any kind in game,just do some runs and eventually you will get it .good luck
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/594971/belharzas-band-crimson-diamond-lead-does-this-thing-exist
eso plus isn't related with drops of any kind in game,just do some runs and eventually you will get it .good luck
