Lady Estre after her rescue :



From what I understand, "The Endless War" is a battlezone in Coldharbour where Molag Bal puts his servants that have failed him, and forces them to fight each other over and over, notionally with the aim of winning their freedom.

There are three factions in this endless war, matching up to the three factions of Tamriel, representing the "naughty" of each one. Heritance soldiers , in undead/shriven form and lead by Estre, make up the Dominion contingent.

The Worm Cult are there too. It turns out they have a leader and an origin in another faction, but having only done the Dominion campaign I was never aware of this. Their leader has a Nordic accent. Finally there's some army of skeletons lead by this creepy, jovial bloke with a beard who sounds like a Covenant.

Of course, normally you'd leave them all to rot in hell and kill each other over and over again, but the premise of the quest is that three persons from the Mage's guild, lost in Coldharbour, have been pressed into the armies of these factions and you have to win the game for one of the factions. As a reward, you go free and you can take either the faction leader you fought for or the mages with you. Or you can Intimidate and bring all 4 home.

The rational choice is to rescue only the Mages since they have done nothing wrong to end up in this game. Is there any argument for any of the leaders to obtain redemption ?

1) The Nordic zombie guy heals the injured Breton mage. That's compassion I suppose, though like all the other leaders, he just wants the mage guild npcs to use as elites in their army.

2) Estre shows similar "compassion" for the mage who wants to escape from the game by taking his own life..... so she can use him as a personal bodyguard ofc.. Interesting , this guy is a Dark Elf. I suppose this is a climbdown from the extreme racist position of the Heritance.

Wrongness is the nature, rather than a label, of the racial supremacist.

Were it an assumption it would be.

Altmer pretensions to supremacy are compensatory, born of an egoistic need that is indicative of deeply-seated fear of inferiority.

Compassion, I suppose. High Kinlady Estre hasn't learned anything from the experience. She's nice now because she wants out, but she'll never renounce the Heritance.

In life, she made deals with Maormer, Goblins, and all sorts she would consider "beneath her." She doesn't let her own bigotry conflict with her diplomacy, so long as she is able to accomplish something that suits her.

However, during the quest, Angof the Gravesinger implies that even if he, Thallik, or Estre are able to leave the Cliffs of Failure, they can't ever leave Coldharbour, so there's no danger in releasing them. At least, no danger to Tamriel.

adriant1978 wrote: »

[Disclaimer: I haven't done the quest yet, so maybe this is explained in dialogue]

What's Estre doing in Coldharbour anyway? Didn't she pledge her soul to Mehrunes Dagon towards the end of the Veiled Heritance arc?

There are a series of documents found in Mehrune's Spite (I think) where she and Mannimarco work out some sort of deal, which possibly gave Molag Bal claim to her soul.

I chose her largely because both of the other options seemed completely unrepentant.

I saved her because I figured the more help I had against Molag Bal, the better.
I'm a pragmatist.

I suppose there is the fact that a high profile defector from the enemy's ranks is worth something, even if they're not the kind of person you'd normally associate with. For example, Abnur Tharn.

The Coldharbour version of Estre is much nicer than the Tamriel version, even before the Tamriel version is revealed as an enemy and after the Coldharbour one has been released from the Cliffs of Failure. Although she is oblivious to her living quarters being full of human skulls and implements of torture, merely complaining about the colours being bland. It also seems not to occur to her that she may no longer be welcome "back in Altmer lands" after laying waste to half of them and trying to assassinate the Queen. Seems to have a bit of a blind spot.

Actually, Angof was the only one I felt had a shot at redemption even though I played through as a Dominion character.

I actually felt even after Angof was freed that it was the right choice to make. The other two didn't seem like they had learned anything yet at all.

I worked with Angof myself since out of the three he was only one who admitted his errors and what he had done and wanted to do something right, even without asking anything in return. Other two had not learned anything and could have stayed where they were for all I care.

jesterstear wrote: »

I actually spent a skill point to buy Intimidation just to bust her out of there along with the mages... but why?

I suppose other faction players can be forgiven for not knowing her behaviour in life, but it's got me asking questions about myself.

Yes, good question, why? If you think that says something about yourself, then maybe it does. That is not a statement of incrimination - at all - but if you feel that way, maybe there is more to it than wondering about it.