location of windhelm/winterhold

scipionumatia · September 2018

Playing through skyrim recently and noticed that in eso winterhold and the surrounding land looks like its been deleted off the map. Whats up with this? Skyrim takes place long after eso so unless a piece of land collided with the mainland of tamriel i dont see how this happened. I also feel live ive read something about this but i cant recall.

prof-dracko · September 2018

The map doesn't extend as far as that yet. Only the Windhelm and Riften areas are explorable.

RebornV3x · September 2018

The Skyrim map in ESO is mess up completely Windhelm is in the wrong spot in ESO and unless they extend the map a bit north and to the right Wintherhold will be in the wrong spot too I don't know how they messed up the map so bad when the last game in the series took place there its sad its like nobody on the design team even looked at a map of Skyrim.

scipionumatia · September 2018

^ this is what im talking about for if anyone needs a visual. I assume windhelm is in the correct place because of where the river intersects. This map also has a red dash outline of the boarders. on the eso map there is no land mass north of windhelm which led me to believe maybe there was an event where a land mass crashed into tamriel sometime between 2E and 4E (notice the mountain range north of windhelm, usually occurs when land masses merge).

So there is no lore reason? just bad map design?

RaddlemanNumber7 · September 2018

I noticed that too. The whole coastline in ESO around Windhelm, Solstheim and Winterhold seems really out of proportion. Solstheim seems far too close to the mainland and there is just not enough space for Winterhold to be there at all.

I think the problem is the difference in scale. In ESO Windhelm covers far more of the map proportionally than it does in TES V.

It looks like fitting Winterhold and the college onto the ESO map of Tamriel is going to require a significant change in the landscape.

Crumorn · September 2018

RaddlemanNumber7 wrote: »

I noticed that too. The whole coastline in ESO around Windhelm, Solstheim and Winterhold seems really out of proportion. Solstheim seems far too close to the mainland and there is just not enough space for Winterhold to be there at all.

I think the problem is the difference in scale. In ESO Windhelm covers far more of the map proportionally than it does in TES V.

It looks like fitting Winterhold and the college onto the ESO map of Tamriel is going to require a significant change in the landscape.

Might just be what they have to do to make up for the old map. After all Summerset Shifted pretty dramatically in shape from the original map and so did Morrowind. Another good example of wonky maps is Craglorn. If your in Belkarth and look at the world map it will say your in the middle of the zone but in reality your at the bottom middle of it.

Crumorn · September 2018

Also Solsthein is an Island and shouldn't by no means should anyone be able to walk to it lol

Bruccius · September 2018

Everyone complaining over Winterhold, yet nobody cares that Eastmarch enters Morrowind?

RaddlemanNumber7 · September 2018

Bruccius wrote: »

Everyone complaining over Winterhold, yet nobody cares that Eastmarch enters Morrowind?

Yes, that too. But Winterhold and its college is a place we might actually get to go to in ESO. And it's a great point of interest. The college could be a good place to introduce spell crafting. The fact that most of it was washed away by the time of TES V gives ESO devs a completely free hand to make it something really special.

So far, the only point of interest in Blacklight is the meat balls. And we've done Redoran culture already.

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO · September 2018

a wizard did it.

scipionumatia · September 2018

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom
Are you able to provide any insight on this? Was it done intentionally?

ArchMikem · September 2018

RaddlemanNumber7 wrote: »

I noticed that too. The whole coastline in ESO around Windhelm, Solstheim and Winterhold seems really out of proportion. Solstheim seems far too close to the mainland and there is just not enough space for Winterhold to be there at all.

You see that pointy bit up the coast a ways? I think that is supposed to be ESO's version of Winterhold, it just seems ZOS morphed the geography of the coastline a bit. I can see where Solitude is and just east if that Dawnstar, so logically that little peninsula just before the coast turns southward would be the College and its city.

RaddlemanNumber7 · September 2018

ArchMikem wrote: »

RaddlemanNumber7 wrote: »

I noticed that too. The whole coastline in ESO around Windhelm, Solstheim and Winterhold seems really out of proportion. Solstheim seems far too close to the mainland and there is just not enough space for Winterhold to be there at all.

You see that pointy bit up the coast a ways? I think that is supposed to be ESO's version of Winterhold, it just seems ZOS morphed the geography of the coastline a bit. I can see where Solitude is and just east if that Dawnstar, so logically that little peninsula just before the coast turns southward would be the College and its city.

This the TES V map

Winterhold is North North West of Windhelm. On the ESO map that puts Winterhold in the sea somewhere between Solstheim and the mainland.

Shadow_Akula · September 2018

Bruccius wrote: »

Everyone complaining over Winterhold, yet nobody cares that Eastmarch enters Morrowind?

Borders change over time. Geographical locations of cities rarely do. Besides at the end of the day it is still Ebonheart Pact Territory

scipionumatia · September 2018

Apparently there were draugr in winterhold and a popular opinion is that winterhold was built on an ancient Nordic burial site. I cant seem to find anything on the founding of winterhold, but books in winterhold detail events that happened during the three banners war, and another that detail events of the dragon break. This doesn't really mean much though, the books could of been written elsewhere and brought to the college at a later date.

Im mostly confused as to why the land mass doesn't exist at all. If the land was there and the city hadn't been founded yet that's one thing, this is another.

Shadow_Akula · September 2018

scipionumatia wrote: »

Apparently there were draugr in winterhold and a popular opinion is that winterhold was built on an ancient Nordic burial site. I cant seem to find anything on the founding of winterhold, but books in winterhold detail events that happened during the three banners war, and another that detail events of the dragon break. This doesn't really mean much though, the books could of been written elsewhere and brought to the college at a later date.

Im mostly confused as to why the land mass doesn't exist at all. If the land was there and the city hadn't been founded yet that's one thing, this is another.

Landmass should be there, and regardless of the city, the college should be there, while there’s no actual founding date found in game anywhere, some documents about the college date to around 2nd era 373. Some say it is from the first era and it was created by Shalidor. Either way it should exist by the time of ESO....

Enodoc · October 2018

The map's just wrong. It should look more like this:

Phrastus of Elinhir says, “Our latter-day Nords are not well known for the scholarly attainments, and cartography is not one of their strongpoints. On their maps, sites of great importance—to Nords, that is—are often distorted and exaggerated. So it is with the eerie aerie of Skuldafn, which holds great significance for our superstitious northern brethren. They have never been comfortable with the fact that the Dark Elves hold the west coast of the Inner Sea all the way up to Blacklight; in some cases their maps elide that fact entirely. But it is there nonetheless.”

Bruccius · October 2018

Enodoc wrote: »

The map's just wrong. It should look more like this:

Phrastus of Elinhir says, “Our latter-day Nords are not well known for the scholarly attainments, and cartography is not one of their strongpoints. On their maps, sites of great importance—to Nords, that is—are often distorted and exaggerated. So it is with the eerie aerie of Skuldafn, which holds great significance for our superstitious northern brethren. They have never been comfortable with the fact that the Dark Elves hold the west coast of the Inner Sea all the way up to Blacklight; in some cases their maps elide that fact entirely. But it is there nonetheless.”

Great find, as a TESwiki editor, I'd greatly appreciate it if you happen to recall the source for Phrastus' quote.

Enodoc · October 2018

Bruccius wrote: »

Enodoc wrote: »

The map's just wrong. It should look more like this:

Phrastus of Elinhir says, “Our latter-day Nords are not well known for the scholarly attainments, and cartography is not one of their strongpoints. On their maps, sites of great importance—to Nords, that is—are often distorted and exaggerated. So it is with the eerie aerie of Skuldafn, which holds great significance for our superstitious northern brethren. They have never been comfortable with the fact that the Dark Elves hold the west coast of the Inner Sea all the way up to Blacklight; in some cases their maps elide that fact entirely. But it is there nonetheless.”

Great find, as a TESwiki editor, I'd greatly appreciate it if you happen to recall the source for Phrastus' quote.

Sure, it's from the old ESO Live AUA thread: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/1921591/#Comment_1921591
Can't remember if it was answered at the time on ESO Live too, but the thread is probably easier to reference anyway.

Bruccius · October 2018

Enodoc wrote: »

Bruccius wrote: »

Enodoc wrote: »

The map's just wrong. It should look more like this:

Phrastus of Elinhir says, “Our latter-day Nords are not well known for the scholarly attainments, and cartography is not one of their strongpoints. On their maps, sites of great importance—to Nords, that is—are often distorted and exaggerated. So it is with the eerie aerie of Skuldafn, which holds great significance for our superstitious northern brethren. They have never been comfortable with the fact that the Dark Elves hold the west coast of the Inner Sea all the way up to Blacklight; in some cases their maps elide that fact entirely. But it is there nonetheless.”

Great find, as a TESwiki editor, I'd greatly appreciate it if you happen to recall the source for Phrastus' quote.

Sure, it's from the old ESO Live AUA thread: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/1921591/#Comment_1921591
Can't remember if it was answered at the time on ESO Live too, but the thread is probably easier to reference anyway.

Greatly appreciated, thanks!