I did not like the writing / story in Gold Road, but I know the problem is me. [Spoilers]

Ingel_Riday

TLDR: title summed it up. I’m going to ramble. Feel free to read the title and peace out. :-P
______________________________
Honestly, this expansion’s writing reminded me of my best friend, who quit around High Isle. He got real peeved, because he was expecting an expansion with spell-swords, crazy Breton wizards doing all sorts of things to cheat death, and the usual shtick you see Bretons getting up to in baseline Elder Scroll games. “Looks like they’re just going to be Renn Faire cosplayers in High Isle, prattling on about knightly orders and druids. This sucks! Does ZOS even understand why we like Bretons?”

What did I say? “Fair enough man, but what you’re describing was a story they weren’t interested in telling. They went their own way. It is what it is. You need to leave your expectations to the side a bit. Appreciate what you have.” He quit. I miss him in this game. A lot.

Well… here I am, almost in the same boat not two years later, feeling like a jerk. Realizing I was a jerk. I don’t like it, haha.

Is the writing in Gold Road bad? No, it’s not. Most of the time, anyway. The problem is my expectations. I know it. I feel it in my bones.

I love the Colovians like my friend loved the Bretons. They’re rough-and-tumble Imperials. Not as diplomatic as their Nibenay siblings, and willing to throw down! I expected an epic story with the Count of Skingrad rallying his battle-hardened soldiers to fend off Valenwood invaders… which Colovia could easily do, if Valenwood didn’t have a Daedric Prince not bound by the Coldharbour Compact. Against a literal god romper-stomping across West Weald, there’s only so much you can do. A tragic, doomed resistance… or is it? That’s where the player comes in. Ooo. Awesome.

Instead, the Colovians are incompetent idiots. Their leader is an ineffectual, inoffensive, forgettable milksop whose only quest involves rescuing his pet cub BurntBiscuits. Theres’ no sign of Colovian troops trying to hold the line at Wildburn, and they are shown to be utterly worthless at two delve forts. Outside of Feldagard Keep, their resistance to the Bosmer is NON-EXISTENT. Just… eh.

The Colovians don’t try to use diplomacy to force the Aldmeri to step in and bring Dawnwood to task (stop your boys or our neutrality ends and we join the Covenant). They don’t use diplomacy to bring in Covenant help (if we fall to Valenwood, the Aldmeri will be able to hit your Craglorn supply lines). They don’t use diplomacy to pull in Southern Hammerfell help (hey Crown leaders, if we fall… war will come to your southern doorstep and the Aldmeri might attack you next to open a front with your Forebear cousins).

The only diplomacy the Colovians engage in? Giving up 1/3rd of their kingdom to wood elves. Willingly and needlessly. What?!

I hate it. It’s not what Colovians would do. Where is their warrior edge? Where is their Imperial acumen? Why surrender so much to a bested foe, bereft of its god and stripped of its main army? The Bosmer don’t fare any better, either. They keep insisting that the region they claimed was barely inhabited and was free real estate… but the first quest in Dawnwood literally involves rescuing people from the ruined city of Ostumir, which was CLEARLY HEAVILY POPULATED AND DEVELOPED. Dawnwood is full of ruined homes, destroyed manors, over-run ranches, and Colovian corpses. How dense and full of denial are these elves? The Bosmer have always been goobers, but they’ve never been willfully ignorant, oblivious goobers lacking a grasp of reality.

And in the end, when the Bosmer realize their forest was a colonizer’s land-grab, do they agree to return the pilfered lands to the surviving owners? To do the right thing and back off? No, they “promise to be good neighbors going forward.” “We can’t give back what Nantharion has taken.” Yes, you could. You could leave. You totally could. You’re choosing not to.

And the Colovians BUY IT. It’d be like if my neighbor’s husband stole half my backyard, my garage, and ate my dog before I finally bested him. “I can’t give back what my husband took from you,” his wife says as she chomps down on a piece of puppy-jerky. “Mainly because I don’t want to. But I will take good care of your garage and western backyard, because they’re mine now, and be the bestest neighbor ever. You’re welcome! I’m exceedingly generous, aren’t I?”

It’s dumb, and it doesn’t even amount to anything. Dawnwood is not even a memory by the 3rd Era. With neither Ithelia’s power nor The Recollection to maintain the new wood, it recedes against the power of Talos’ CHIM / the Colovian war machine and disappears completely. So the Colovians are made to look weak, incompetent, and pathetic for nothing. The Bosmer are made to look foolish, covetous, and oblivious to reality for nothing. It’s all pointless. It’s all meaningless. Overtly so.

And I picture my friend, laughing. “Well Ingel, what you would have wanted wasn’t the story these developers were interested in telling. It is what it is. Problem is you and your expectations. Set those aside and judge this on its own merits. Appreciate what you have, har har har!”

Oi. I hate eating crow. :-/ He’d be right, too. In isolation, this story isn’t bad. If I ignore all the Colovian lore I’ve gotten to read over the years, basic property law, and so on… works fine. I’m just hung up on my own mind. My own expectations.

Anyways… I came back from a break to see this expansion (your 10 year anniversary RNG dolmen / geyser grind broke my Ubisoft-honed “gotta collect them all” spirit, left me partially embittered, and I moved on to other things and hobbies), and I don’t intend to leave again. Not fully. I am going to considerably scale things back again, though. I’m picturing Nibenay agreeing to cede 1/3rd of its lands to noble-savage goblins, or spending a whole Dres expansion running an underground railroad instead of getting to be delectably bad, and it takes the wind out of my sails. I can’t muster enthusiasm for it. I think I’m not the audience for this anymore, at least right now. I need to apologize to my friend.

Oh, while I’m at it… the Fyrelight Cave quest was torture for me. Not just because it was predictable. No… dowries weren’t pay-to-bypass, convenience of life micro-transactions to skip courtship. People had to pay them, and in some countries still pay them, to show their commitment to the marriage and their financial means. If you couldn’t pony up the money, you clearly weren’t of sufficient fiscal /societal status to join with the other family. “Next time, tell him no dowry. Do it right. Actual courtship” was one of the dumbest things I have ever read in this game. It showed no understanding of the very concept of dowry. Eh. "It is what it is. Problem is you and your expectations. Set those aside and judge this on its own merits." I hate myself right now.

Edit addition: fixed some spacing. I have no one to vent this to, so I vented it here. If you read it, thanks. If not, I can't blame you. :-P This is the first time I have genuinely not felt like part of the modern audience. Maybe I'm just too old to get it. *shrug*

FlipFlopFrog

I haven't bought the new expansion yet because I've kinda come to expect everything you've just discussed. The amount of enjoyment I'll get from the main quest is so fleeting It's really not worth the full price tag (and hasn't been worth it since around Summerset.)

colossalvoids

Yeah, I was desperately trying to take ESO's zones / culture portrayal as just their take on it (not taking it too serious), whilst having vastly different outlook myself - from sp games, obviously. But it's way harder nowadays and I'm always staying with some feel of shattered expectations and zones being completely identical. Everyone is the same, the only characteristics identity for citizens is idiocy which is not what I'd prefer lol.

Parasaurolophus

Let me ask you, does everything in 10 years of gaming live up to your expectations?

Pelanora

I think your post was awesome.

I love your idea of a story. I love the idea of the obvious move blocked by the random factor of a dangerous god.

I don't know the lore at all but I disliked the gold road zone story so much I'm not even finishing it. I was bored senseless in necrom but I did it and this was worse.

I'm not here to just click when prompted. I'm here cos I want to think and make choices, in this world. I want agency. I used to have it, in the other zone stories. But not any more.

If I wanted mindless clicking I'd still be farming in Farmville.

TX12001rwb17_ESO

By Imperial Law many of these Bosmer are criminals, Not only are they invaders but many of them actively follow the Green Pact and the Green Pact supports being a cannibal, there is one small problem with that and that is they are not in Valenwood, they are in Cyrodiil where Cannabilism is illegal.

The Count should just have his soldiers set fire to the forest and smoke the criminals out.

OgrimTitan

Ingel_Riday wrote: »

The Colovians don’t try to use diplomacy to force the Aldmeri to step in and bring Dawnwood to task (stop your boys or our neutrality ends and we join the Covenant). They don’t use diplomacy to bring in Covenant help (if we fall to Valenwood, the Aldmeri will be able to hit your Craglorn supply lines). They don’t use diplomacy to pull in Southern Hammerfell help (hey Crown leaders, if we fall… war will come to your southern doorstep and the Aldmeri might attack you next to open a front with your Forebear cousins).

The only diplomacy the Colovians engage in? Giving up 1/3rd of their kingdom to wood elves. Willingly and needlessly. What?!

I hate it. It’s not what Colovians would do. Where is their warrior edge? Where is their Imperial acumen? Why surrender so much to a bested foe, bereft of its god and stripped of its main army? The Bosmer don’t fare any better, either. They keep insisting that the region they claimed was barely inhabited and was free real estate… but the first quest in Dawnwood literally involves rescuing people from the ruined city of Ostumir, which was CLEARLY HEAVILY POPULATED AND DEVELOPED. Dawnwood is full of ruined homes, destroyed manors, over-run ranches, and Colovian corpses. How dense and full of denial are these elves? The Bosmer have always been goobers, but they’ve never been willfully ignorant, oblivious goobers lacking a grasp of reality.

They do. If you were paying attention, you would have found a book saying exactly what you described in little less detail: https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Note_to_King_Nantharion
TESO, TES II: Daggerfall or TES 3: Morrowind and other installments were always relying on passive storytelling as well as on active one. That includes books, notes, visual clues, et cetera.

The "warrior's edge" is also here, there is a scout report intended to prepare an army for a possible engagement, as well as a citizen movement against the Dawnwood. There is no open conflict yet, because the incedent is unprecedented. Imperials would've been a parody on themselves if it was: "Magical forest on our country's territory along the bosmer, those tree-sorcerers? Burn it all." It's not Warhammer 40 000.
People think and consider, just like it would've been in reality. Mirrormoor merging going at the same time and making a bit of distraction itself I won't even mention.
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:The_Vashabar_Threat
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Online:Save_Skingrad!

Dawnwood is not even a memory by the 3rd Era.

This logic is faulty. It's not smart. If you don't see something in the game, it doesn't mean it's not present. Or you consider the books you see in the games to be all the books that are present in the world? I can write up the list of a 100 things or even institutions that should be in the world, but they are not, because we play in the game version of it, with 1 000 000 dungeons and 50 people in total.

In general, I see a lot of faulty logic, lack of attention to the details and a pessimistic perception.

Same goes with High Isle. The design and feel, the visuals and the setting were pitch perfect. It was the first time since 1996 the bretons were the sole focus, too. If your friend were a breton enjoyer, he would have enjoyed at least that, and "that" are no small things. There can be a discussion about the druids, but then again, solely as an idea and a trope they were realised great, different from typical fantasy druids. Their role in the plot of the chapter and the chapter itself are different topics which we won't talk here.

Elvenheart

I too loved your post and all the thought you put into how the story could have been. I have never read any lore about the Colovians, which I guess for me was a good thing while playing through the quests, but your post gives me insight that I didn’t have before and now I can’t help but ask some of the same questions you did about the plot points, especially why aren’t the former owners of the land wanting their land back.

My problem with this chapter was what happened in the end to the new wonderful Daedric Prince.

Edited to add: And since you prefaced this thread with a spoiler alert, I can add the one interesting twist I thought was great - that Fargrave USED to be Mirrormoor!