Today's Interesting Romance

bellanca6561n

Well...for me it was. Forgive me that it's a bit long. How ESO handles romance has interested me for some time due to its mixture of humor, drama, and contemporary political correctness.

This game has some peculiar romantic story lines yet none stranger than this one.

It begins in standard fashion. You're riding along, the "Help! Help! Help!" NPC runs up to you, black chevron over his head, pleading for aid due to horrible things happening nearby. In this case it's a guy in a very traditional role. He's been taken in by a family, falls in love and betrothed to the daughter, goes off to make his fortune in what passes for the big city, now returning to marry his beloved only to find the entire family has vanished.

Then it gets....different. I believe the quest is called something like, A Change of Heart. So you're imagining all sorts of scenarios other than what the story really is. They have a servant, an Orc girl, who's in love with the daughter as well, and this sets the story in motion.

ESO tries to be very, very contemporary in its sexual attitudes. A Dunmer woman married to an Argonian, at least two same sex marriages, and several cases of considering your female character as a possible suitor for other female characters.

Not very Jane Austin...not very ANYTHING feigning to be fantasy past, much less fantasy medieval. It has to assume an alternate history of an alternate world where reproduction is not a factor. Makes sense I suppose in a place where you almost never see a child, except as a corpse perhaps, or as a mentioned corpse.

This isn't weird for gaming. It actually seemed weird in Lord of the Rings Online when they introduced Rohan and it was FULL of children. That was charming though and served, like the toilet in Firefly, to bring a greater sense of reality into a genre starkly lacking it.

So too this quest. This story doesn't feel politically correct at all. The mother, objecting VIGOROUSLY to the love the servant girl feels for her daughter, ends up opening, yes, a Daedric portal and you have to rescue everybody. How exactly the Daedric portal in the basement (all old basements feel like they have them) was supposed to solve the problem....well...that's not clear. It simply serves as the convenient and mandatory combat challenge.

The mother feels terrible - also mandatory - to have put everyone through all that, even though mothers, and fathers, have been shoving families into Daedric portals since time began. What's interesting, though, is that quest ends with the romantic outcome unresolved. As you're about to leave, both the fellow and the orc gal stand before the daughter plighting their troth Nice of them all not to notice that my character is dressed up as a Daedric Dark Seducer.

twev

I wonder which new content update will convert the juxtaposition to polyamory.

Brasseurfb16_ESO

There was also another funy relationship between two homosexuals in Bangkorai. One of the guy got bitten by a WW and decides to seek help in a hidden village which happens to know a way to supress the WW transformation. His partner get suspicious about the village and ask you to investigate. You learn about the WW origins of the village and decide to break a ritual that severe the bond of the transformation supression causing the villagers to progressively turn into feral WW. You than are offer the choice to help the homosexual couple to escape the village, causing the doom of the village but saving their relationship or hunt the infected partner to restore the ritual and put people from the village back into their supressed state.

bellanca6561n

twev wrote: »

I wonder which new content update will convert the juxtaposition to polyamory.

I suppose when Nirn goes through its summer of love.

Perhaps then they'll refresh the pub folks songs as well.

Morgha_Kul

I don't mind the progressive relationships, but I wish only a couple of things.

Certain races are known to be rather racist (such as the Dunmer). So, I think it somewhat out of character for any Dunmer to be in a relationship with another race. The pairings should keep the personalities and history of the races and cultures in mind.

Second, and more importantly, I wish there was some possibility for US to romance an NPC... ideally one of our own choosing. One of the things I enjoyed most about Star Wars The Old Republic Online was (and is) the ability to romance someone. There, the choice was somewhat limited. If we could romance ANY NPC character somehow... that would be really nifty.

For example, my Telvanni mage took a shine to Sergeant Seyne up in Bleak Rock, and I RPed (more or less to myself) that he made overtures toward her, and sought her out elsewhere in the game (I lost track of her after Ebonheart). It would have been very nifty to be able to actually play a romance storyline... perhaps ending with her becoming a permanent companion (it could likely be done by making her a "pet").

I don't know what would be involved with that, but it would be fantastic to see, and would add a layer of interest to the game.

ArchMikem

I always figured they'd end up in a polygamous threesome.

Don't forget that Bosmer married to a Khajiit in Grahtwood. Its adorkable how tiny he is next to his feline fancy.

yiasemi

Well

bellanca6561n wrote: »

Not very Jane Austin...not very ANYTHING feigning to be fantasy past, much less fantasy medieval. It has to assume an alternate history of an alternate world where reproduction is not a factor.

Well that's your problem, taking a Eurocentric, post-Constantine take on literature in history. Go back further than the Catholic Church taking over the Roman Empire and suddenly the gays are there, inlegend, literature and history. Everything and everyone is going down in Seutonious' The Twelve Caesars, Achilles, Alexander the Great , Julius Caesar. Even the ladies were allowed a bit of Sapphic literature, but even the Greeks started making rubbish up about the horse-riding female Scythian riders who would be pumping them full of arrows. Can't have the slaves (as women were in the "civilised" cities) demonstrating independence and even military prowess. Here's a quote from Seutonious on Julius Caesar, a brilliant general and mad, bad soldier who forged an Empire."Every woman's husband, and every man's wife."
I also recently read a very interesting book on the gay history of London by Peter Ackroyd, very interesting in showing through historical records how tolerance has waned and waxed throughout history, how transexuals, gays lesbians and all sorts of people finding their own paths lived alongside everyone else, just that religion imposed laws and punishments that at times were observed, sometimes brutally, and at other times almost forgotten.
It's true though that often in history all cultures frowned on same-sex relationships to some extent. We ought to have more prejudice than there is, but then again why can't all of us have our "fantasy' world. I guess that's why I have to hear of my own relationship (she's a footballer not an Argonian lol) being described as peculiar. Probably is come to think of it, just about everyone I know is peculiar, and that's what makes us all bloody marvelous.

Turelus

Morgha_Kul wrote: »

Certain races are known to be rather racist (such as the Dunmer). So, I think it somewhat out of character for any Dunmer to be in a relationship with another race. The pairings should keep the personalities and history of the races and cultures in mind.

That's like saying someone can't have free will because of culture and race though.

Sure it goes against common Dunmer views, but it's the exception not the rule. If they had 100 Dunmer in ESO fall in love with Argonians then maybe I could see the complaint. This is also an era where some Dunmer are more open to working with Argonians. It's only Dres I believe who are super annoyed about it?

starkerealm

Let's party like it's 2014 in this thread... because that's where it came from.

Turelus

@starkerealm I didn't even notice the dates.

See, if ZOS would just give me my Necromancer class already this would end... (or happen more often)

starkerealm

Turelus wrote: »

@starkerealm I didn't even notice the dates.

See, if ZOS would just give me my Necromancer class already this would end... (or happen more often)

@Turelus, dude, you're on the forums. You're already a Necromantic Ambassador. What more could you want?

Morgha_Kul

Ah, I think that was my fault. It came up in a search, and I didn't check the date.

Turelus

starkerealm wrote: »

Turelus wrote: »

@starkerealm I didn't even notice the dates.

See, if ZOS would just give me my Necromancer class already this would end... (or happen more often)

Turelus, dude, you're on the forums. You're already a Necromantic Ambassador. What more could you want?

Work and life is busy, less time to spew my opinions all over forums.

Morgha_Kul wrote: »

Ah, I think that was my fault. It came up in a search, and I didn't check the date.

It's an interesting thread which I missed the first time around so I don't mind. I think as long as we don't all break into massive arguments then the mods won't even notice or care.

starkerealm

Turelus wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

Turelus wrote: »

@starkerealm I didn't even notice the dates.

See, if ZOS would just give me my Necromancer class already this would end... (or happen more often)

Turelus, dude, you're on the forums. You're already a Necromantic Ambassador. What more could you want?

Work and life is busy, less time to spew my opinions all over forums.

Morgha_Kul wrote: »

Ah, I think that was my fault. It came up in a search, and I didn't check the date.

It's an interesting thread which I missed the first time around so I don't mind. I think as long as we don't all break into massive arguments then the mods won't even notice or care.

Usually, the threshold is, if the discussion is still relevant. Which is part of why I dug out that alternate version of the necro meme, rather than the normal one.

It's when the data is outdated that they get shut down hard.

Vicarra

One of the things I like most about ES games is how they don't cater to "traditional" fantasy tropes all the time. Put another way, I like that they don't kowtow to the fragile egos of offended little snowflakes who can't handle that non-straight people dare to exist. By not enforcing stereotypes, they are playing to the biggest strength of the ES series - player freedom.

Beardimus

This is a Necro record surely?

You get an achievement & title sure!

yiasemi

As the original post referred back to medieval and 18th century literature, I fail to see why it shouldn't be resurrected. The people posting necro memes would be far better to try answering what is the burning Y-fronts/boxers topic of today. Jane Austen would have enjoyed our game, I suspect she would be an enthusiastic pugger.

IT is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.
However little known the feelings or views of such a man may be on his first entering a random dungeon, this truth is so well fixed in the minds of the surrounding CPers, that he is considered as the rightful property of some one or other of their toons.
``My dear Mr. Bloodsucker,'' said his lady healer to him one day, ``have you heard that Summerset Isle is let at last?''
Mr. Bloodsucker replied that he had not.
``But it is,'' returned she; ``for Mrs. DPS has just been here, and she told me all about it.''
Mr. Bloodsucker made no answer.
``Do not you want to know who has taken it?'' cried his wife according to Mara impatiently.
``You want to tell me, and I have no objection to hearing it.''
This was invitation enough.
``Why, my dear, you must know, Mrs. DPS says that Cloudrest is taken by a young man of large fortune from the PCEU server; that he came down on Monday on a newly axquired crown mount of hideous colour to see the place, and was so much delighted with it that he agreed with Mr. Tank immediately; that he is to take possession before the next patch and some of his guildies are to be in the house by the end of next week.''
``What is his name?''
`Bring 4th Ur 1st Male Sun, lol.''
``Is he mentally intact or simply confused?''
``Oh! simply confused, my dear, to be sure! A single man of large fortune; four or five thousand gold a day in his trading guild. What a fine thing for our girls!''
``How so? how can it affect them?''
``My dear Mr. Bloodsucker,'' replied his healer, ``how can you be so tiresome! You must know that I am thinking of his joining our guild.''
``Is that his design in settling here?''
``Design! nonsense, how can you talk so! But it is very likely that he may fall in love with our guild house and rp nights (the cross-dressing ones, and therefore you must visit him as soon as he comes.''

ZOS_JesC

Greetings, we've closed this thread because the information is outdated. Thank you.