realistically I do think that Serana would still be active at this time. According to Bethesda she wasn't locked away until the second era. Which means it realistically would be like I think sometime within the 2e 600's or early 700s. The thing is she was a very isolated girl, and well very sheltered so she wouldn't be a quest companion at best just a side character to the main player which is actually her mother which I think should be the focus of a small story of a few quests. Like I can see the mother being more active and more involved. I don't think Serana should be a story npc or a quest giver maybe just a character with like two or three lines of dialogue trailing behind her mother at least. The Mother can maybe do some quests that maybe relate to the construction of the sleep thing for her daughter and running interferace so Harkon doesnt' find out about it maybe by hunting vampires or something that have caught onto it. Like Stuff like that I think ESO can do. Because if they follow Bethesda's like saying of when it happened. Then yes Serana and Veronica can still appear. I can imagine Castle Volkihar being closer to dawn star if its an island that has moved so that is likely why a location in dawnstar hold was selected to be Seranas sleep tomb prison.

Because we don't see castle volkihar within the solitude and western skyrim area at all which was where it was located so it makes me think it was closer to dawnstar and given the fact islands can move away or sink or whatever. I can see it being located near the dawnstar region instead. So like I think realistically having the mother show up with a cameo of the daughter would be realistic personally within a storyline within dawnstar. As that is where it all takes place is in that hold. Though I don't think it should be a location we dirrectly enter. As I don't think Harkon should be involved, given all Veronica would need to do is ask the Vestige to kill Harkon and well the Vestige has the means to do it. They killed a far more powerful vampire lord after all then Harkon. Rada al Saran and other powerful vampire lords. So to the vestige Harkon would be small fry. So it makes no sense for any interaction between Harkon and the Vestige.

On Harkon

I think Harkon is being underestimated a bit here.

Yes, the Vestige has defeated incredibly powerful enemies, but Harkon is not just another vampire lord.

House Volkihar has been described as one of the oldest and most powerful vampire bloodlines since Immortal Blood (introduced back in Oblivion), long before Dawnguard expanded their story. By the Fourth Era, Harkon is not only the patriarch of that bloodline, but also one of the very few known pure-blood vampires who received Molag Bal's gift directly and possesses the Vampire Lord form.

The game mechanics in Skyrim don't necessarily reflect that level of power. Lore-wise, Harkon, Valerica, and Serana are all extraordinary individuals. Valerica is capable of manipulating souls, hiding an Elder Scroll, establishing a refuge in the Soul Cairn, and even restoring the fragment of the Dragonborn's soul after the partial soul trap. Serana herself can perform that partial soul trap in the first place, something very few mages would even understand.

Because of that, I don't think "the Vestige would simply kill Harkon" is nearly as straightforward as it sounds. The Vestige has defeated beings of extraordinary power before, but The Elder Scrolls has never treated power as a simple hierarchy where defeating one character automatically guarantees victory over every supposedly weaker opponent.

If ESO ever explored House Volkihar, I would actually prefer Harkon to remain someone the player avoids confronting directly rather than reducing him to another boss fight.

On Serana as a companion

I actually think there is room for Serana to accompany the player without contradicting Dawnguard, provided it happens during the right period of her life.

I'm not suggesting she should become the central hero of the storyline or replace Valerica as its emotional focus. Quite the opposite. Valerica should remain the driving force of the narrative.

But Serana could absolutely travel alongside the Vestige for part of the story.

Imagine meeting her shortly after she becomes a Daughter of Coldharbour. It would be one of the few moments in her life where she is powerful enough to matter, yet still emotionally vulnerable enough to grow as a character.

She would still be young, traumatized, and far less confident than the Serana we meet in Dawnguard. Instead of the composed woman from Dawnguard, we'd see someone still relying on her mother for guidance and still learning many of the abilities she later masters.

That wouldn't diminish her Skyrim story—it would add context to it. It would also explain why Serana is unusually willing to give a complete stranger the benefit of the doubt in Dawnguard. Not because she specifically remembers the Vestige centuries later, but because, at one of the darkest moments of her life, she learned that not every stranger is an enemy.

To me, that's a much more interesting way of connecting ESO and Dawnguard than simply bringing Serana back for nostalgia. It builds on her character instead of relying on fan service.

Angry_Carrot wrote: »

On Harkon

I think Harkon is being underestimated a bit here.

Yes, the Vestige has defeated incredibly powerful enemies, but Harkon is not just another vampire lord.

House Volkihar has been described as one of the oldest and most powerful vampire bloodlines since Immortal Blood (introduced back in Oblivion), long before Dawnguard expanded their story. By the Fourth Era, Harkon is not only the patriarch of that bloodline, but also one of the very few known pure-blood vampires who received Molag Bal's gift directly and possesses the Vampire Lord form.

The game mechanics in Skyrim don't necessarily reflect that level of power. Lore-wise, Harkon, Valerica, and Serana are all extraordinary individuals. Valerica is capable of manipulating souls, hiding an Elder Scroll, establishing a refuge in the Soul Cairn, and even restoring the fragment of the Dragonborn's soul after the partial soul trap. Serana herself can perform that partial soul trap in the first place, something very few mages would even understand.

Because of that, I don't think "the Vestige would simply kill Harkon" is nearly as straightforward as it sounds. The Vestige has defeated beings of extraordinary power before, but The Elder Scrolls has never treated power as a simple hierarchy where defeating one character automatically guarantees victory over every supposedly weaker opponent.

Yes he is very old, at least but we don't know when the family achieved their vampirism. Rada for example could even predate Harkon. But that doesn't matter as much. Rada is special he isn't just a vampire lord, he is a sword singer too and a very powerful one at that. he had enough power to kill all of western skyrim and enough power to kill everyone in the reach with one sword strike but he choose not to do that. As even I think he only wanted to kill only those that were needed to free the grayhost not all of them. He also had better wings too, so he was above other vampire lords that we have seen. So I think in turns of power Rada would be the strongest, and given the vestige beat him, him who was able to actually duel a god to a stalemate. Kind of shows like where Harkon is on the scale. he is very powerful yes. But not the strongest. I believe that is why he didn't even attempt to stop Rada either or the grayhost threat. As even though they are causing problems within SKyrim the volkihars domain. Rada basically outclasses him in every way. Harkon isn't stupid either.
So yes the vestige is one of the few beings that can kill pretty much anything. They are strong enough to take on a daedric prince basically. The only thing I think they struggle with is aedric beings. Like Dragons which only true dragonborn or like the use of dragonhorns and certain dragonguard techniques can take down.

Laura Bailey was the VA for Serana and she also voices Isobel. Something tickles me at the thought of having her voice two companions.

Thevampirenight wrote: »

In Skyrim, Serana has two things of dialogue, that references that she basically might have to be imprisoned after ESO's timeperiod. When I did the math, using the years she basically says in her dialogue then I got a prominent actual year when it happened. In theory.
do you trust Harkon at all? "It's not a question of trust... he's just obsessed with the prophecy. And from what I could tell, a thousand extra years of obsession haven't made him any better. We should have found him a hobby."
Then, What do you know about Elder Scrolls? "I mean... as much as anyone. Not a lot. You'd figure a couple hundred years locked away with one would have given me some insights, but no. Turns out you don't learn much from just sleeping with something."
1000 minus 200, is 800, I did that because well she was for sure imprisoned longer then that, yet she said two hundred years and because she said harkon has been given 1000 extra years to stew over it, when subtracting that it gave that number. eso timeline to skyrim is around 949, 949 minus 800 is 149, 582 + 149 is 731.
So like doing that type of math, like in theory if her dialogue hints towards the year if you math it right, and you do the math that way. then it would be 2e 731 when she was imprisoned. It was a fun little math experiment I did and it like really like narrowed in down in a way that made a lot of sense. bethesda did say it was late second era, and this math actually aligns with that and not only that gives a proximate year.

That's a genuinely interesting observation. I had never thought of combining those two lines that way, and I can see why 2E 731 stands out: it produces a date that fits surprisingly well with the broader idea of a late Second Era imprisonment. I also agree with the general picture behind your calculation. Serana seems to be roughly a thousand years removed from the events surrounding her family, with a substantial part of that time—perhaps around eight centuries—spent sealed away. So I don't think our conclusions are especially far apart. Where I would be more cautious is treating the dialogue as precise enough to identify a specific year. "A thousand extra years" sounds like Serana describing the immense length of Harkon's obsession, rather than giving an exact chronological figure. Likewise, "a couple hundred years" is naturally approximate and may not literally mean exactly two hundred years. There is also some ambiguity over whether the two statements refer to periods that can be directly subtracted from one another. The thousand years seem to describe the overall duration of Harkon's obsession, while the couple hundred years refer specifically to Serana's time imprisoned with the Elder Scroll. So I think 2E 731 is a clever and surprisingly plausible estimate, but probably not a date we can establish from those lines alone.
My own theory relies more on the surrounding dialogue and indirect evidence: Serana is familiar with Skyrim having a High King, she does not speak as though the Dwemer were her contemporaries, she does not appear to remember the Falmer as Snow Elves, and her reaction to Cyrodiil being the seat of an Empire can be interpreted in more than one way. Fort Dawnguard already existing during the Second Era adds another interesting piece to the picture. None of those details provides an exact date either, but taken together, I think they leave enough room for Serana and House Volkihar to be active during ESO without contradicting Dawnguard. So I would put it this way: your calculation offers a possible late Second Era date, while my argument is mainly that the established lore does not require Serana to have been imprisoned before ESO. They are different approaches, but they point in a broadly similar direction.

I was thinking a bit more about the companion idea, and I realized there might be a very natural way to make it work without contradicting Dawnguard. Rather than having Serana become a companion simply because she's a popular character, her role could emerge directly from Valerica's plan. If Valerica has already realized that Harkon is becoming increasingly obsessed with the Tyranny of the Sun prophecy, but hasn't yet completed the preparations for hiding the Elder Scrolls and sealing Serana away, then she faces a serious problem. Keeping Serana close becomes dangerous. If Harkon discovers what Valerica is planning, he gains both his daughter and one of the keys to fulfilling the prophecy. That creates a believable reason for Valerica to entrust Serana to the Vestige for a time. Not because Serana is incapable of defending herself (she is already a powerful vampire) but because moving separately makes them harder to track while Valerica finishes preparing the Soul Cairn refuge and the ritual that will eventually hide both the Elder Scrolls and Serana herself. This would also solve another issue that has been mentioned in this thread. Valerica would remain the central figure driving the story, while Serana would naturally accompany the player for part of the journey instead of taking over the narrative. It could even strengthen Serana's characterization. We'd meet her before centuries of isolation shaped the person we know in Dawnguard: younger, less confident, still relying on her mother, and still processing everything that had happened to her. Then the ending becomes far more tragic. The Vestige believes they are helping protect Serana, only to discover that Valerica's final solution is to seal her own daughter away for centuries. The player understands why she does it, but also understands what it costs both of them. To me, that feels like a much stronger emotional connection to Dawnguard than simply bringing Serana back for nostalgia.