Sylvermynx wrote: »

Hmmm. I wonder if there's a lore forum here? I know there was a great one for Skyrim before the debacle that is the bethsoft forum today.

I belong to a guild, Society of Scholars, that's all about lore and making the game fun for the members (eh.... I'm kind of "quiet" - I can only do one thing at a time, and if I'm playing I can't be chatting....) You might look up Robo_Hobo in game and ask for an invite? Hmmm.... but you're not on PC NA are you? In which case, you could see if there's a similar guild on your platform. I've got various questions answered since I joined....

There is a lore forum on this site. It’s under Lore.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/categories/lore

The Green Pact specifically refers to not harming the vegetation of Valenwood. Still, you see a lot of meat based food/drink, like. Dubious Camoran Throne.

Plenty of Orcs steal. Sure they have their own code of honor as a society but it doesnt mean individuals cant find their own moral compass and follow it. Theyre just not known for stealing because the idea of a thief is deeply seated in the citizens of Tamriels minds as someone small, agile and sometimes furry.

Bosmer outside of Valenwood often shrug off their religious practices and consume and harm plants. Says more about the social and cultural pressures of Valenwood than that of Y'ffre. When you cant walk down a path without worrying about some extremist demanding you lose a hand for accidentally snapping a branch that had become overgrown and blocked the road. You tend to adhere to that expectation out of fear. Finally breaking free of the influence of those dictators. You tend to loosen up and start eating leafy greens.

Just a note on roleplaying from my perspective - ESO classes and their ingame mechanics should be treated as OOC only and they should not be used IC as such.

This approach may save both you and the people you roleplay with some headaches.

OOC = out of character
IC = in character

A bit confusing for this game because depending on context “IC” also stands for Imperial City.

Apparently in the time of ESO, summoning Daedra is a crime for Altmer and potentially punishable by death, yet Pet Sorcs do it all the time.
There is one quest on Auridon that says so and the guy saying it can probably not be taken literally. He does say it even applies to Atronarchs but from the context it seems like he just claimed that to make himself seem less suspicious. Dremora seem to be too much though.

One thing I've done a lot of that is apparently not quite lore friendly is playing Argonians that stick to one gender.

There's some text in Morrowind that refers to Argonians as having "life phases" tied to their gender, which I always kind of ignored as a fluke. But with Murkmire coming up, it looks like I was wrong! There's a book that references Argonians being open to gender changes, and I've heard that there is some in game dialogue from an Argonian talking about having switched gender during their life (though I can't find the link).

I've pretty consistently played my older Argonian characters as being either male or female (which I guess is reasonable given that they were raised outside of Black Marsh), so I'm going to take Murkmire as an opportunity to play an Argonian character that's a little more fluid.

kadochka wrote: »

jabrone77 wrote: »

You know what Bosmer eat after a battle?

It's gross

The bodies, right?
Or is that just Namira followers...?

They must eat enemies they kill in battle, regardless of who or what that enemy is. They also have a limited time to do so, though they can solicit the help of family members. That's part of the Green Pact, so not related to Namira.

Vampire Templars are a ridiculous violation of lore, and I say that as someone who plays one. Templars draw power from Stendarr (or related deity, depending on pantheon, given that the Second Era was still pretty fluid in that regard), who is very specifically opposed to vampires. Also, they channel the powers of light, life, and the sun. So, polar opposites of vampires. The only way it'd be worse is if they drew power from Arkay.

Related: Vampires who use the Dawnbreaker ability. The Dawnbreaker ability channels the power of Meridia... Meridia, who is specifically noted for her deep and abiding hatred for all things undead. So, really, if vampire toons use Dawnbreaker, by the standards of lore they should really be doing that damage to themselves.

One way to look at it is this: stealing is disallowed by most societies in real life: its not just illegal but also considered morally wrong and you'll meet with a lot of disapproval if you do it. Does that mean no one ever steals anything? Or only in special circumstances where they think it's morally justified?

People don't always follow the rules, even if they were born and raised in the culture that created those rules. There's all kinds of reasons they don't - they might think the rules are wrong, they might not care, they might find themselves in a situation where they feel they have no choice...

Also in TES a lot of the 'rules' about each race's culture and behaviour are a lot more nuanced, they're very rarely absolutes. For example all Redguard are absolutely opposed to any and all forms of necromancy. Except the ones who practice it, who form cults every few decades and try to take over or cause havoc. Their culture is very strongly against it - to the point were all of Hammerfell is protected by magical wards that stop the dead from being risen - but you tell enough people they must never do something and there will always be some who want to do it because it's forbidden.

There's even more variation when things aren't so strictly enforced. For example as a general rule dunmer don't worship the Eight Divines, they follow the Tribunal Temple and their 3 living 'gods'. But then some dunmer do worship the Eight, and others worship daedra (sometimes justifying it by calling some of them the good daedra) and others worship some mix of deities or nothing at all.

If you want to role-play it certainly helps to know the lore and culture of the race you're playing as, but there's numerous ways to adapt it if you want to do things that aren't normally allowed. Which can be as simple as having them grow up in a different area, so they weren't raised in that culture.

max_only wrote: »

What’s more interesting are all the Templars out there who are in a culture that don’t believe in Aedra specifically. Or all the daedra summoners (Sorcerers) from anti daedra cultures.

My templar isn't a follower of the Eight Divines (she's a khahiit and her principal deities are Khenarthi and Azurah) but she's also not a conventional templar. She's more of a stealthy battlemage, focusing on what the younger scholars are starting to call destruction and restoration magic.

She's the latest incarnation of the character I play in all TES games and she's only a templar because this game forces you to pick a class instead of individual skill lines and that was the nearest I could get to the two magic schools I normally use.

max_only wrote: »

OOC = out of character
IC = in character

A bit confusing for this game because depending on context “IC” also stands for Imperial City.

Thank you for explaining it.

@Davor - I do apologize for using the terms OOC and IC automatically, without considering that not everyone was familiar with them.

My point was that roleplayers often ignore most game mechanics while roleplaying in MMORPG's, because it would make no sense to have thousands of mighty Archmages each leading the Mages Guild and such. The Daedric pets roaming the cities freely without the city guards as much as raising an eyebrow is another example.

When I am a Redguard from Hammerfell and I have no choice but to kill the undead in my homeland. Or when the people on the docks tell me I am not from there or raised with their beliefs, when my character was.