They also built Crystal-Like-Law...somehow, despite apparently being not very advanced magically. (And White-Gold Tower, unless we want to make an argument for counting the Heartland High Elves as separate from the Summerset High Elves at that point in history. Still leaves the enormous shape-shifting magical monstrousity of Crystal-Like-Law though.)

lordrichter wrote: »

Blame the Vestige for that. The Vestige is the one who saves Summerset Isle from laziness and teaches them the importance of being always at the ready to defend the Crystal Tower. The Vestige can rest easy knowing that by the time Tiber Septim comes along, the Altmer had built up impressive defenses strong enough to counter anything short of the Numidium.

This reads like the plot of The Last Samurai. Tom Cruise teaches a bunch of Samurai how to fight. An outlander teaches a bunch of natives how to defend their land. Dear God, the Altmer are so pathetic.

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

Blame the Vestige for that. The Vestige is the one who saves Summerset Isle from laziness and teaches them the importance of being always at the ready to defend the Crystal Tower. The Vestige can rest easy knowing that by the time Tiber Septim comes along, the Altmer had built up impressive defenses strong enough to counter anything short of the Numidium.

This reads like the plot of The Last Samurai. Tom Cruise teaches a bunch of Samurai how to fight. An outlander teaches a bunch of natives how to defend their land. Dear God, the Altmer are so pathetic.

I suspect that in my case, it was more that the embarrassment of needing my Dunmer Vestige to save their bacon was the impetus for the Altmer and the Psijic Order to work on their defenses which they, in all fairness, weren't expecting to have their present defenses bypassed by one of their own.

In my case, it was an Imperial Vestige. Tiber will eventually banish the descendants in that family as traitors for what they did to help the Aldmeri Dominion.

psychotrip wrote: »

So, is there any actual valid answer for this though? Are we just meant to assume that the Altmer, suddenly become just as advanced and badass as the old lore (which Zenimax claims was just an "exaggeration") says they are?

We are free to make our own valid answers. Until a better one comes along, I am going to assume that the Altmer got complacent and that the events of ESO were a wakeup call for them. Did they actually achieve the strength that Tiber Septim thought they had, or was it all smoke and mirrors crafted by the Altmer to prevent the attempt? We are also free to make up that valid answer.

Korah_Eaglecry wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

So, is there any actual valid answer for this though? Are we just meant to assume that the Altmer, suddenly become just as advanced and badass as the old lore (which Zenimax claims was just an "exaggeration") says they are?

Somewhere in between?

The truth is that if the Altmer was as advanced as theyre made out to be, there would be absolutely no reason to go there as the Vestige. Theyd be more than capable of handling any issues that may arise much better than some adventuring hero could.

Its likely that the events of summerset playing out and requiring an outsider to come in and fix things were due to a level of arrogance and shortsightedness on the Altmers part. And Tiber Septim believing them to be so powerful it required a manufactured god to take them on was an over estimation of their power and as a result overkill.

There's a middle ground between being needlessly toned down and "grounded" and being so perfect that you never need help with anything. Didn't we just get back from an island with a hollowed out meteor suspended in space and a magitech city full of robots? I think you can still create a compelling conflict with a suitably high-fantasy culture. You just need to be willing to do so. Zenimax clearly was not.

Morrowind gets to be weird and "advanced". Summerset does not.

Your explanation is logically fine but narratively uninspired and creatively dull. Too bad it's likely the correct explanation now. Tiber Septim just overestimated them after all...ugh.

Korah_Eaglecry wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

Your explanation is logically fine but narratively uninspired and creatively dull. Too bad it's likely the correct explanation now. Tiber Septim just overestimated them after all...ugh.

Youre more than welcome to enlighten us all on what would have been so inspirational and creative in your opinion.

Pretty much anything that doesn't use the unreliable narrator trope to retro-actively justify this IP's creative bankruptcy.

I'm not trying to mock you. Your explanation is the best we can possibly do with what the devs have given us. I'm just...so...sick of this pattern. I'm so tired of this continued watering down of the world in favor of "realism" and "groundedness".

It's not even a consistent shift in style. On one hand we have tribals who possibly put the stars in the sky, "primitive" nords with mechanized ruins accomplishing feats of engineering far beyond their real world counterparts, dark elves with advanced industrialized irrigation and cloning magic, living gods with magitech robots...and yet the most ancient and (as previously described) "advanced" culture on Tamriel lives in gray, medieval Disneyland castles in yet another European forest. Unless it's an aldmer hand-me-down, it's probably less impressive than anything we've seen on the rest of Tamriel.

And when criticized for it we're told, point blank, that despite everything we've seen before this point, that the world is "mundane", the people need to be grounded, and that if magic stopped existing most people wouldn't notice.

They don't use realism as a tool for relatability, or a means of immersion or consistent storytelling. They don't use the unreliable narrator to inject mystery and ambiguity into the world. They use these tropes as crutches, to absolve them of any criticism or complaint. After watching this tactic used again and again for years, it's just getting silly at this point.

Or it could be years of idle boasting by prideful Altmer you know. With only some individuals eg Telenger, Vanus achieving the greatness that Altmer can reach or some individuals from the Sapiarchs

Korah_Eaglecry wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

So, is there any actual valid answer for this though? Are we just meant to assume that the Altmer, suddenly become just as advanced and badass as the old lore (which Zenimax claims was just an "exaggeration") says they are?

Somewhere in between?

The truth is that if the Altmer was as advanced as theyre made out to be, there would be absolutely no reason to go there as the Vestige. Theyd be more than capable of handling any issues that may arise much better than some adventuring hero could.

Its likely that the events of summerset playing out and requiring an outsider to come in and fix things were due to a level of arrogance and shortsightedness on the Altmers part. And Tiber Septim believing them to be so powerful it required a manufactured god to take them on was an over estimation of their power and as a result overkill.

Or maybe the defense of the Tower was restored fully by then and counter a Tower you use another Tower

LMar wrote: »

I understand your disappointment with how Altmer arw portrayed in ESO psychotrip i really do, but this isn't the full extend of the Altmer. ZOS just made do with what they could play with in ESO. They still have the mightiest navy and lazers protecting some towns. Eg see the quest in Firsthold and magical defenses in Sea Keep. I'm sure later games will show Altmer closer to what we imagined

It's good to criticise works of art/games/literature but your later posts seem to all be just disappointment. Perhaps you need a break from Summerset and to just see it with what it is. Just game mechanics in an MMO. Don't give up on elder scrolls just because of one chapter.

Also perhaps the secret to the Altmer is that they pretend to be a mundane Disneyworld to outsiders now that they are visiting but secretly they've hidden everything magical and put veils of illusion on their crystal buildings to look like stone.

For the record Nicolene (DC npc) also said that the towers in skywatch, auridon glimmered like crystal and we've been there since launch

The problem is it isn't just one chapter. It's a consistent pattern. Remember when the Imperials were surpsiringly creative and unique in their culture, beliefs, and homeland? Until, of course, we actually got a chance visit their homeland. Then it all got retconned. Because that's what this series does.

There's no reason for me to give them the benefit of the doubt because we've seen this all before. And I'm not expecting anything different from Summerset in the future.

The mainline games are not going to contradict ESO. That would split the series into two distinct canons and make things even more confusing. Not only that, but according to Matt Firor, all of this was signed off by and approved by Todd Howard. This is how he sees Summerset.

So, unless we want to believe that every single city on Summerset gets burned to the ground without a trace, all the generic greek ruins get magically replaced by something less derivative, and all the things Zenimax said were too "unrealistic" suddenly become acceptable...then this is what Summerset is going to be from now on. This is the Elder Scrolls guys. Everything unique about it is just a transcription error.

Also perhaps the secret to the Altmer is that they pretend to be a mundane Disneyworld to outsiders now that they are visiting but secretly they've hidden everything magical and put veils of illusion on their crystal buildings to look like stone.

Look man I really don't wanna be mean but...do you hear yourself right now? Have we as a community really gotten to this point? Is this the logical conclusion to us desperately trying to rationalize every plothole, every retcon, every creative snafu that this series shoves down our throats?

We both know this isn't true. We need to stop holding onto this notion that this series is secretly just as unique and creative as it was for one brief moment in 2002. The Elder Scrolls is, for the most part, a typical medieval fantasy world. And that's how it will remain.

There's still bits that reflect the old lore, and while i don't expect the main series games to contradict ESO (I've seen the interviews and read the articles don't worry) i do expect them to showcase some of the more epic stuff. I do worry too, I've seen Skyrim and Oblivion after Morrowind, but I've also seen new lore that is pretty good.

I'm not sure where Bethesda is taking the series but i haven't lost hope yet.

Perhaps read this interview too

https://www.imperial-library.info/content/julian-lefay-jensen-reddit-ama

Todd, after taking over, seemed to have taken a slightly different approach

I don't think the Altmer would need to be the crazy powerful magicians they claim to be for Tiber to not be able to conquer them. We know that the Altmer have been pushing back the Sea Elves for century now and because of that their navy is supposedly the best in Tamriel. To conquer the Summerset isles Tiber would have to engage in maritime warfare against the best navy of the continent. Something I don't believe he was ready to do. Of course this all changes when you have a literal walking brass god on your side.

psychotrip wrote: »

Ogou wrote: »

I don't think the Altmer would need to be the crazy powerful magicians they claim to be for Tiber to not be able to conquer them. We know that the Altmer have been pushing back the Sea Elves for century now and because of that their navy is supposedly the best in Tamriel. To conquer the Summerset isles Tiber would have to engage in maritime warfare against the best navy of the continent. Something I don't believe he was ready to do. Of course this all changes when you have a literal walking brass god on your side.

But see this just shows how little the history of the game matches up with what we actually see.

The Altmer supposedly have the greatest navy, and have been fighting a 3 sided war at sea since the dawn of time.

But...how?

Their ships don’t look any better than anyone else’s, they don’t seem to have a way to mass-produce ships faster than anyone else, they don’t have a natural advantage on the water like maormer, and they don’t have advanced magic to compete with the sload.

This is my overarching point with this thread. They’ve changed around the core aspects of the altmer to the point where their historical accomplishment don’t even make sense anymore.

They do have advanced magic to compete with the Sloads. The defenses of Crystal Tower have been keeping them at bay. Major, major spoilers: Certainly the Battlereeve in charge of dealing with the invasion doesn't seem too worried about dealing with it once she's alerted to the fact that its actually happening. And why would she be? She's got hordes of outlander adventurers to throw at the geysers, so that she doesn't even have to ask Altmer farmers to give up their path to Alaxon to go fight!

As for the navy stuff, well, the Altmer navy is in a bit of trouble right now. Ayrenn's father managed to get most of his navy destroyed while trying to chase a Maomeri fleet back to Pynadonea. Then, the Maomer managed to sink a significant Dominion fleet near Khenarthi's Roost at the beginning of the game. However, we see in the Covenant questline that the AD navy and privateers are enough of a problem for the Covenant to consider using necromancy on Betnikh, and in the Pact questline, the navy has launched and is supplying an invasion of Shadowfen. So I'd guess the navy, forced to rebuild once after Hidellith got it destroyed, is pretty overextended from the demands of the Cyrodiil and Three Banners War, leaving the home coasts open to attack by Maomer fleets.

Now, admittedly, I have my doubts about using ballista on sea serpents in the Greenshade questline, but on the other hand I'm willing to give a pass on gameplay there because its pretty hard to do engaging ship-to-ship combat in a video game without making that the focus of the game. That's not how I would expect the Aldmeri navy to do it for reals, but I'm not expecting ESO to do actual naval tactics unless they decide to introduce a PVP Navy.

psychotrip wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

Ogou wrote: »

I don't think the Altmer would need to be the crazy powerful magicians they claim to be for Tiber to not be able to conquer them. We know that the Altmer have been pushing back the Sea Elves for century now and because of that their navy is supposedly the best in Tamriel. To conquer the Summerset isles Tiber would have to engage in maritime warfare against the best navy of the continent. Something I don't believe he was ready to do. Of course this all changes when you have a literal walking brass god on your side.

But see this just shows how little the history of the game matches up with what we actually see.

The Altmer supposedly have the greatest navy, and have been fighting a 3 sided war at sea since the dawn of time.

But...how?

Their ships don’t look any better than anyone else’s, they don’t seem to have a way to mass-produce ships faster than anyone else, they don’t have a natural advantage on the water like maormer, and they don’t have advanced magic to compete with the sload.

This is my overarching point with this thread. They’ve changed around the core aspects of the altmer to the point where their historical accomplishment don’t even make sense anymore.

They do have advanced magic to compete with the Sloads. The defenses of Crystal Tower have been keeping them at bay. Major, major spoilers:

The main quest covers this. The defenses of Crystal Tower had been holding the Sloads at bay, but they've been weakening steadily because no one expect Iachesis to have been mind magicked into stealing the heart of those defenses. Now that the magical defenses have weakened sufficiently due to K'tora's plot, the Sloads are able to make their move. Unfortunately, the whole situation with returning the heart, cleansing it, and Nocturnal briefly taking over the Tower kinda does a number on the Tower's defenses, and so the final act of the story is you persuading the (surviving) Sapiarchs and the Psijic Order to let bygones be bygones and work together to protect the Tower again.

Certainly the Battlereeve in charge of dealing with the invasion doesn't seem too worried about dealing with it once she's alerted to the fact that its actually happening. And why would she be? She's got hordes of outlander adventurers to throw at the geysers, so that she doesn't even have to ask Altmer farmers to give up their path to Alaxon to go fight!

As for the navy stuff, well, the Altmer navy is in a bit of trouble right now. Ayrenn's father managed to get most of his navy destroyed while trying to chase a Maomeri fleet back to Pynadonea. Then, the Maomer managed to sink a significant Dominion fleet near Khenarthi's Roost at the beginning of the game. However, we see in the Covenant questline that the AD navy and privateers are enough of a problem for the Covenant to consider using necromancy on Betnikh, and in the Pact questline, the navy has launched and is supplying an invasion of Shadowfen. So I'd guess the navy, forced to rebuild once after Hidellith got it destroyed, is pretty overextended from the demands of the Cyrodiil and Three Banners War, leaving the home coasts open to attack by Maomer fleets.

Now, admittedly, I have my doubts about using ballista on sea serpents in the Greenshade questline, but on the other hand I'm willing to give a pass on gameplay there because its pretty hard to do engaging ship-to-ship combat in a video game without making that the focus of the game. That's not how I would expect the Aldmeri navy to do it for reals, but I'm not expecting ESO to do actual naval tactics unless they decide to introduce a PVP Navy.

So that's one thing they can counter. Valid. Still doesn't explain away the rest of this. It's also yet another example of the Altmer not really having anything advanced that isn't an aldmer hand-me-down. The few things that make the Altmer unique were not made by, or improved by, or refined by the Altmer.

To your point about the navy: you make it seem like a pretty mixed bag. We also have yet to see what makes their navy so supposedly superior. We're just told that it is.

On the whole though my point still stands. These retcons have made the historical accomplishments of the Altmer make much less sense.

The Altmer Navy is simultaneously supporting the invasion in Cyrodiil, an invasion of Shadowfen, raiding off the Covenant coasts, and helping beat back an maomer invasion of Greenshade and Malabal Tor, even after having lost a major fleet at Khenarthi's Roost. Anyone would be overextended in that sort of situation.

Remind me what their competition is doing?

The Covenant is invading mostly using portal magic, while their fleet in Bal Foyen and Davon's Watch gets wrecked by Tanval Indoril. They manage to extract a spy from Dominion territory, and that's about all I can recall. Their privateers seem effective enough on-screen, but the Captain on Betnikh is desperate to use necromancy in order to protect the Covenant from the Dominion, indicating who's actually winning the sea battles. Mind you, I'm sure it doesn't help that they let zombies overrun their port in Sentinel and the redguard defenders won't actually fight zombies.

The Pact has one beachhead in Auridon, and that's all I can recall. Tanval Indoril needs the help of a volcano spirit to destroy the covenant fleet, so that tells you something about the Pact's navy right there.

If you remember more than I, feel free to fill in.

Yeah, its not like the Altmer Navy is supreme over everyone else. If they were, it wouldn't be a three-way continent wide war. But overall, we see a lot more of the Altmer Navy than anyone else's navy, both the good and the bad. The war with the Maormer is a war of attrition, as far as we see, so frankly, the Altmer aren't doing too badly to stand toe to toe with the Sea Elves, especially in the middle of a 3-way continent wide war.

LMar wrote: »

Or it could be years of idle boasting by prideful Altmer you know. With only some individuals eg Telenger, Vanus achieving the greatness that Altmer can reach or some individuals from the Sapiarchs

Spoil :
Thinking about it, in the end of the main quest line, I expect very few Sapiarch to be still alive. They have been decimated by that scheme.
Yet all the high feats of the altmer society are under the control and the boundaries edicted by the Sapiarchs.

So one can expect that a new generation of Sapiarchs is arising in replacement, and these Sapiarchs (who join forces with the Psijics) are going to enhance that "boundaries".

I must confess this does not remove/fix the retcons and the unreliable narrator, but perhaps a hint to adress OP issue.

psychotrip wrote: »

PrayingSeraph wrote: »

You and I have very different taste. I cringe at the idea of Tamriel becoming some magical fairy land that tests everyone's suspension of disbelief. Or having Cyrodil be a jungle which not only goes totally against the cool roman theme but overplays the jungle theme since both Valenwood and Southern Elsewyr are jungles.

I might find realism boring but I find it immersible. Summerset in ESO was breathtakingly beautiful, and I'd hate to see it into a headache inducing sensory overload that which summerset was initially described as...

There's a middle ground between magical fairy fantasy land, and getting something resembling what was described to us, as opposed to the exact same low-fantasy medieval europe drivel we've seen in a million different games.

I assume you must have hated everything we've seen in the past two DLCs, correct? Because I'm not looking for anything beyond that level of "weird". I just want different flavors of creativity and "weirdness" for the different parts of this world, rather than watching the developers quarantine it all to the east, and draining the personality from the rest of the world.

For one, paradoxically, I would have liked more "magically advanced" high elves like we see in countless other games. This kind of middle ground.

For example we could see how the "Thalassian elves" in Warcraft (Blood Elves in WoW) or the high elves in Lineage II (some really nice concept arts out there) were designed.

But I suspect the devs to be willing to avoid this kind of "middleground" for some reason, so they had the choice bewteen skyrocketting the magic prowess of this race to make it insane and astounding (but maybe unreasonable for the game engine), or lower it down to the same level like the Bretons.
Obviously they chose the latter.
I'm rather fine with it - but I can understand the letdown feeling for all those who expected for the two other options ^^'

LittlePinkDot wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

VaranisArano wrote: »

psychotrip wrote: »

lordrichter wrote: »

Blame the Vestige for that. The Vestige is the one who saves Summerset Isle from laziness and teaches them the importance of being always at the ready to defend the Crystal Tower. The Vestige can rest easy knowing that by the time Tiber Septim comes along, the Altmer had built up impressive defenses strong enough to counter anything short of the Numidium.

This reads like the plot of The Last Samurai. Tom Cruise teaches a bunch of Samurai how to fight. An outlander teaches a bunch of natives how to defend their land. Dear God, the Altmer are so pathetic.

I suspect that in my case, it was more that the embarrassment of needing my Dunmer Vestige to save their bacon was the impetus for the Altmer and the Psijic Order to work on their defenses which they, in all fairness, weren't expecting to have their present defenses bypassed by one of their own.

In my case, it was an Imperial Vestige. Tiber will eventually banish the descendants in that family as traitors for what they did to help the Aldmeri Dominion.

Tiber Septim is just another tyrant, not much different than Altmer, Dunmer slavers, or any other non democracy. Either way, they each believe that their way is the best way.

You act as if there's only democracy and tyranny... It doesn't work that way, fyi.