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The writing for the upcoming story content - some thoughts on the latest news article
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metheglyn✭✭✭✭✭
✭I've been frustrated, too, by companions speaking over other NPC voice lines, but for this quest line, I'm not bringing a companion along. I feel more like a successful sneak-thief if I don't have someone trailing along after me. Not that I'm always so successful at it--the number of heists I don't complete in time tells its own tale.
I do chuckle sometimes when I'm supposed to be doing something quietly, but there's a companion with me, my big bear is just standing around, and there's a non-combat pet rolling around or being loud/flashy, depending on which one I have out.
Haha, yeah, it is funny to be hiding in a barrel from the lantern people while my kitty rolls around, playing with a butterfly, right in front of them. You'd think they'd wonder where that kitty came from, but actually, they never do look down, do they?
Oof...well, sometimes Sheogorath dialogue isn't so bad. Well, I'll see at some point how this story goes. I won't be starting it any time very soon.
I didn't say you would be bothered.But, back to topic: The problem is that daedric princes don't actually have a biological physical body, but are basically made of energy, so one can't draw conclusions between them, and, say, the average Altmer, Breton or hound, because they're biologically really completely different things.
If we want to get really very technical, we don't actually know what the denizens of Nirn are composed of, biologically speaking. At least one of them is apparently also creatia, so is the Vestige even sentient?You think a mass of tentacles with eyeballs is a form that makes sense for the average mortal mind?
More sense than a confusing pattern of impossible geometry formed from ever-changing rays of light or whatever they might "truly" be. In the end, every brain works with pattern recognition. It tries to make sense of the world, in ways it can comprehend. In some cases this leads to things not actually being perceived as how they actually look - think of optical illusions, for example. Also, colors don't truly exist. It's all just electromagnetic waves of different wavelengths, and our eyes make them look like colors. And eyes of other species see them differently.
So what a daedric prince truly is, and what is perceived by a mortal, might be entirely different things.
I'm aware of how the brain works really hard to make sense of the world, but what I question is that, being confronted with "impossible geometry formed from ever-changing rays of light" you think a mass of tentacles with eyeballs is what the mind would settle on as "making sense." Why not a more humanoid form, as the other Princes appear? Why, when confronted with Meridia would the brain say, "Ok, lady of light." And when confronted with Mora, it would say, "Writhing mass of tentacle eyeballs." And when confronted with Vile, it would say, "Hey, this one has a dog." If a Daedric Prince's appearance is all down to what the mortals of Nirn think they look like, why such variety? Or, conversely, why aren't their appearances more wildly varied, if it's all just down to the individual who is perceiving them?As far as the definition of living goes: cells and metabolism--we don't know if the Princes have those or not, since no one has ever been in a position to confirm that, but I'm willing to bet they don't, since they are made of creatia. Grows, reproduces, reacts on its environment: if growth means 'was once a baby and is now an adult,' then no, they don't grow; Molag Bal at least is said to have children/spawn, so one of them at least has some level of reproduction; not sure what constitutes reacting to the environment, but every time we go to one of their realms, they do something about it. Obviously they are capable of movement. As for evolve: not in the classical Darwinian sense, they don't, but there have been a couple of notable evolutions/changes for a couple of them. So they're, what: half-living? Some weird space between living and not living?
In any way they do not meet the criteria for biological life (meeting just a few of them isn't enough per definition). What they are? Who knows. But them obviously not being the average lifeform comparable to humans or elves is the very reason I find it a pity that they are portrayed in such a "mundane" way, especially lately. There could be something more mysterious and hard to comprehend about them and their actions, considering they are supposed to be something mysterious and foreign.
Some of that portrayal has got to be down the limitations of the medium, but largely it's down to the established lore. As far as I understand it, the Princes can choose what form they want to look like, so that's what we see. I agree they could be less common in stories, and their actions harder for us to parse, but too much of that risks us going too far in the direction of senseless and zany--like Sheogorath times 10.I suppose an enemy could have tried such a thing. Taken that information, run to Cyrodiil with it, found the person in question, (who was hiding somewhere), warned them, and then gotten back to Skywatch in time for the next day's favour. Sure, why not. My character didn't do that. Did yours? I know you don't like Urcelmo--are you his enemy, too?
I don't dislike him, I just didn't find him particularly interesting in base game. He's also lucky that Great House Telvanni has no interest in the war, so I did not forward the info to the Pact.
Which info? The Pact already knew they lost that one battle. The name of one Aldmeri Dominion member who was possibly a member of a rogue group who wants more war? Or the name of the Eye of the Queen? From what I've seen, all the secret spy agencies in each alliance seemingly already know who the spies are for the other two alliances. They're all really quite casual about it already. Does make me wonder how Razum-dar gets any real spy work done since he's so famous. Same with Naryu and Copper Dariah. Well, I guess they mostly delegate anyway.
I've also wondered if ZOS is ever going to move the whole 'peace talks' storyline forward. I mean in game, not just in letters from Lady Arabelle. Obviously the Cyrodiil zone will always be there and always be at war, similar to the way the anchors will always drop even though we ended the planemeld (and the bards will always be singing about how the planemeld is nigh). But would a 'cease-fire' or 'truce' story work, do you think? An official lore end to the hostilities? Or are we doomed to this forever war?What I like is that the Thieves Guild quest has three different ways you can start it. You can pick it up from the crown store, of course (which isn't something I like to do to start quests), you can just happen upon it if you use the Daggerfall wayshrine, or you can get it from Quen herself in the Abah's Landing Thieves Guild. I was there to do a heist, saw Quen had a quest marker, and so picked it up from here there.
Unfortunately, if you do take the quest from Quen in the Thieves Guild in Abah's Landing, that isn't reflected in the dialogue with Skeever Nivo. You can say "Quen's a friend," if you knew her from before, but you can't say, "Quen told me to meet her here." And then, in the end, Skeever will tell you all about Quen as if you don't know her anyway. That's what I meant about the arrangement of the dialogue being a bit off. As far as how much he tells us--he's expositon NPC and, like all exposition NPCs in the game, he tells us all the details. I chose the neutral option with him as the others didn't feel like they fit my character.
I didn't know about the different start locations for the questline. When it comes to dialogue options, I mostly found myself choosing the neutral one so far, just like it had been in Solstice. But it was just quest 1, we'll see how it continues! I hope I'll be able to continue questing later today.
I found myself choosing the non-neutral options more times this go around. I really think they dialled in the responses a little better this time around.I enjoyed the conversation with Quen, and I don't mind that the other characters from the original quest aren't involved. It makes sense that the Guild sent one person to try to establish a new chapter, and as far as her being the one ZOS decided on: she's popular.
It looks like it's still following the old pattern that we saw with chapters, with there mostly being one returning "host character" leading through the new storyline. Not all the time (Leramil was new, for example), but they did that quite often, with Eveli, Lyris, etc.
That's true, but I think this one has more of a reason for it, because it's a direct sequel. It would be strange if we didn't have anyone from the original Thieves Guild involved.I did choose the flirt options in this quest, because to me they didn't seem like flirting so much as teasing familiarity, and Quen's responses fit that, at least in my mind. There will be at least one more flirt option (haven't finished the quest line yet, so don't know how many more times one can flirt with her) that is more decidedly flirtatious (and so I didn't choose that one). I like that they gave some nuance to the flirt lines and I think they made sense for when they showed up.
I just found that dialogue option friendly, showing familiarity in a way, which especially makes sense for characters who have just finished the first Thieves Guild storyline before, or interact with the guild regularly. It would actually have been what my character would have most likely said, but since it was labeled the way it was, I thought I better don't choose it, not knowing if it might lead into a direction I didn't intend. It's a bit of a pity, but I'm really not sure how much weight choosing one such dialogue option might have or not.
I don't know if there's some kind of tally being kept behind the scenes for which player response we choose. It would be cool if the dialogue trees could be more dynamic based on these responses, and that if you're likely to choose the surly response, for example, the future dialogue would show that--like maybe the NPC would become a bit brusque or reserved towards you. However, in this case, for that first quest, the flirty options didn't sound too flirty overall to me, so I felt fine having my character say them to Quen, because they are friends and know each other well enough for that kind of familiarity. I felt like her responses were in the same vein, so I didn't feel weird for having chosen that option.I also got 'caught' by the cartel, but that was because I was too focused on taking the lootable things and the timer ran out. I knew it was a timed quest, but I thought I would be fast enough to grab a bunch of stuff and make it out. Next character I take through, I'm going to concentrate just on getting out unseen (maybe grab one thing) and see how that ends up.
In my case, there was still plenty of time left, so it made me wonder if it was a scripted event that happens in any way. Or maybe using the Blade Of Woe counted as having been detected by the npc and a specific number of detections also leads to that outcome?! It still felt a bit weird as I had the feeling my character was getting along quite fine.
Well, if you still had plenty of time left and still got caught, maybe it was down to all the murder you were doing. I did kill a couple of people, but mostly I was doing my best to sneak by them, and it wasn't until the timer ran out that I got caught.It does sound like you got some sort of earlier version of text that hadn't been cleaned up/translated. What a strange and unfortunate bug.
For me, it wasn't that bad since I could also listen to the correct text, but for people who rely on the written text only, this indeed is an unfortunate bug.
Ah, right, I just remembered: The Night Market will not return at the end of this year. It's postponed to early 2017. Which again made me think that this is mostly a testing ground for upcoming content - if they didn't get the stuff ready to test yet, having the Market return also makes no sense.
Early 2017, you say? Let's get out that old time-travel machine, then! ;-P
No, I know you meant 2027, and I was a little surprised to see that. But they did say it was an experimental zone, so you're probably right and they don't have the experiments ready yet.0 -
Syldras✭✭✭✭✭
✭✭✭✭✭If we want to get really very technical, we don't actually know what the denizens of Nirn are composed of, biologically speaking. At least one of them is apparently also creatia, so is the Vestige even sentient?
The Vestige is supposed to be a perfect copy of the person that was sacrified to Molag Bal, just made of daedric matter instead of what mortals are usually made of in Nirn. If the original brain was also perfectly copied, perhaps sentience is possible.I'm aware of how the brain works really hard to make sense of the world, but what I question is that, being confronted with "impossible geometry formed from ever-changing rays of light" you think a mass of tentacles with eyeballs is what the mind would settle on as "making sense." Why not a more humanoid form, as the other Princes appear? Why, when confronted with Meridia would the brain say, "Ok, lady of light." And when confronted with Mora, it would say, "Writhing mass of tentacle eyeballs." And when confronted with Vile, it would say, "Hey, this one has a dog." If a Daedric Prince's appearance is all down to what the mortals of Nirn think they look like, why such variety? Or, conversely, why aren't their appearances more wildly varied, if it's all just down to the individual who is perceiving them?
If a mortal would look at some object that is composed in a way their brain could not fully comprehend or correctly perceive it, I'd guess the brain, trying to make sense of it, would probably perceive the closest possible comprehensible form to the original incomprehensible one, and not something completely random?Some of that portrayal has got to be down the limitations of the medium, but largely it's down to the established lore. As far as I understand it, the Princes can choose what form they want to look like, so that's what we see.
They can choose to be seen in a specific way by mortals, yes. But that doesn't mean the way a mortal perceives them must absolutely be physical reality. Or who knows, maybe they can actually just project a specific image into a mortal's mind, no matter how far away it might be from their real form? Basically like a form of illusion magic.I agree they could be less common in stories, and their actions harder for us to parse, but too much of that risks us going too far in the direction of senseless and zany--like Sheogorath times 10.
I see that making them utterly confusing would not appeal to many people, but at least a litte bit less obvious and humanized would really be much more interesting to me, especially in the long term.Which info? The Pact already knew they lost that one battle. The name of one Aldmeri Dominion member who was possibly a member of a rogue group who wants more war? Or the name of the Eye of the Queen?
In the right hands, that's useful info. I could immediately come up with a hundred horrible things to do with it. Then again, you're right: The whole spy business in Tamriel seems rather weird.I've also wondered if ZOS is ever going to move the whole 'peace talks' storyline forward. I mean in game, not just in letters from Lady Arabelle. Obviously the Cyrodiil zone will always be there and always be at war, similar to the way the anchors will always drop even though we ended the planemeld (and the bards will always be singing about how the planemeld is nigh). But would a 'cease-fire' or 'truce' story work, do you think? An official lore end to the hostilities? Or are we doomed to this forever war?
I think it could be done. I'm not sure though if ZOS wants to go that way. It's all kept very vague so far. I think if they were truly heading into that direction, we would have already seen some kind of real progress in one of the past storylines, in particular in High Isle, or also last year in Solstice, with the troops of the different factions closely cooperating anway.That's true, but I think this one has more of a reason for it, because it's a direct sequel. It would be strange if we didn't have anyone from the original Thieves Guild involved.
I meant that they really focused on having 1 "host character" again. They could have chosen to bring back more people, but it's the principle of 1 host leading through a story with mostly new faces again.I don't know if there's some kind of tally being kept behind the scenes for which player response we choose. It would be cool if the dialogue trees could be more dynamic based on these responses, and that if you're likely to choose the surly response, for example, the future dialogue would show that--like maybe the NPC would become a bit brusque or reserved towards you.
Since I didn't use flirt options with Darien, I don't know. It might also be a more linear principle instead of a counter, as in one flirt option simply unlocking the next one.Well, if you still had plenty of time left and still got caught, maybe it was down to all the murder you were doing. I did kill a couple of people, but mostly I was doing my best to sneak by them, and it wasn't until the timer ran out that I got caught.
The only "issue" I have with it (well, I'm not really bothered, I was just surprised) is that I used the Blade of Woe and, according to the UI, had not been detected. So getting caught out of the blue was just strange. Maybe I'll try being less murderous the next time. On the other hand, had I not murdered them, that cutscene wouldn't have shown. Which was actually quite an interesting addition, I think. Actually I even think it's a pity some people might have missed it (if it was no scripted event happening to every player).Early 2017, you say? Let's get out that old time-travel machine, then! ;-P
No, I know you meant 2027, and I was a little surprised to see that. But they did say it was an experimental zone, so you're probably right and they don't have the experiments ready yet.
Just a week ago or so I wrote "1927". Happens, I guess, if one mostly works with old documents and writes down historical dates much more often than the current one.
I played the first Sheogorath quest, by the way. A strange decision, perhaps, considering I have not finished the Thieves Guild questline yet (I still haven't progressed it from where I stopped a few days ago, after the end of quest 1), but somehow I didn't want to keep that first Sheogorath quest in my questlog half-finished (especially knowing it's just a short introduction anyway) - I just don't like stopping mid-quest somewhere. So I resumed it from the location where the game had crashed. Don't worry, I'm not going into detail now, as long as you haven't played it yet, just a few general impressions: I was actually positively surprised. I expected utter nonsense, after having read so much negative feedback on these forums, and yes, there's also random weird humour I didn't like much, but there was also more than that.
There are some interesting lore bits strewn in which made me wonder if they would get elaborated on during the questline (the Coldharbor Compact was mentioned, for example), and I particularly found it interesting that Sheogorath actually mentions the aspects of being mortal that feel strange to him - which might be a chance to learn more about the nature of the daedric princes, how much they differ from mortals, and what they might be capable of or not (so, the very things we had been discussing here lately). Something Sheogorath seems (or claims) to find particularly strange is suddenly feeling emotions. Implying the daedric princes don't have them at all. No feelings, no emotional reactions, no actual sensual perception of the environment, too, it seems? I did find that interesting, and if the story explores that more, that wouldn't be bad at all. Actually that generally wouldn't be such a bad topic to explore: A daedric prince trying to find out what being human means. Not just having fun and eating cheese, but actually getting deeper into that topic (though I'm still not sure how it's lore-wise even possible he just becomes a mortal at will - I still find that doubtful, but okay, I won't question it for now). The big question is: Will the storyline lean into this direction, or will what looked like an interesting start somehow get lost in endless random jokes and blabbering about cheese? We'll see.
So far he also didn't feel that obnoxious, by the way. I usually found his speech style overly dramatic and not exactly pleasant, but this time, he actually sounds calmer and less weird (perhaps the current voice acting team was aware that having him sound like in base game for the whole new questline would be annoying - only speaking of the translation I play, of course; I haven't seen the new content in English yet). There's even a certain eerieness in how he, not sounding "cliché insane" in his way of speech but quite normal, makes horrible, cruel statements as if it's just the most normal thing in the world. It's much more impactful if he says these things in a calm, unfazed tone, instead of speaking in some exaggerated, very agitated sounding, "maniacal" way.
Edited by Syldras on August 1, 2026 3:07AM@Syldras | PC | EU
The forceful expression of will gives true honor to the Ancestors.
Sarayn Andrethi, Telvanni mage (Main)
Darvasa Andrethi, his "I'm NOT a Necromancer!" sister
Malacar Sunavarlas, Altmer Ayleid vampire
Soris Rethandus, a Sleeper not yet awake0