Does this thread belong here?, pieces of quest Options

[ghastley]

Most of the threads in this forum are naturally about "my character's adventures in a TES world", and the rest are meta-threads about writing them.

I'm coming from a completely different direction, or maybe not. I'm trying to create quest mods for Oblivion with a whole lot of NPC's who have linked stories, and I need all the help I can get with those. It's not entirely a different problem from writing the support cast in a regular FF, but it does leave out the central character, who will be the player, and I don't want to write that one.

I like to build a character in Oblivion and play it for a while before making an NPC from it, as this helps to give me some idea of how a pure mage thinks, or an archer, or an axe-wielding Orc, and I can make the NPC more credible that way. I'm currently playing a stereotypical big dumb blonde Nord called Hidy Heidi, who aspires to joining the Imperial Mountain Riders and patrolling the Jerrals on a white bear. I started her off trying to use poisoned daggers and stealth, but found that it's not too viable at low levels, because the damage she could inflict was never enough for a one-hit kill, and using a dagger put her too close for comfort in the remainder of the encounter. So she switched to a Claymore to better use her Blade skill, although she still tries a sneak attack with a dagger first, some of the time. She'd probably use the Claymore if she got a bear to ride, so maybe it's for the best.

This experience now has to be distilled down to some dialog for the NPC in-game, and that of her colleagues, and that's the sort of thing I'd want to post here for criticism and advice. And the content of books, notes, journal entries for the quests. Many of you have experience of rewriting bits of lore for your narratives, or fitting a new piece into the incomplete jigsaw puzzle Betheda provided, so I know it will help me if it works.

Heidi is intended to become part of this mod, of which only the first two quests have been released as a beta. I have another dozen or so in development, including an arc of quests that happen after the player is both CoC and Madgod, based on the idea of Dagon taking revenge on the player by opening gates in his/her new realm.

[ghastley]

I just noticed that I'd never put up the final(?) chapter of this story. This was written even before I'd finished packaging the mod. Better late(!) than never.


Kaneh's Tale

Aurmazl Kaneh was confused. She'd come back to Brellach much sooner than she'd expected. When she died at Cylarne, as she always did at this point in the Greymarch, she expected to remain in the waters of Oblivion for some time before the chimes called her to return.

Not only was she back early, but the Realm was intact. Everything was still alive and growing. The obelisks were all shut down, as if the Greymarch had never started. What was going on?

Then she had been sent here, to a mysterious archway filled with flame, halfway to Cylarne. She had orders to guard it, and kill anything that emerged from it, but to wait for the Madgod before she entered. Only he would know how to deal with it.

Two figures emerged from beneath the mushroom trees and strode towards her. She recognised one as the adventurer she'd met at Cylarne, when Lord Sheogorath sent him to collect the Flame of Agnon. He'd taken part in the battle, and shown fighting skills that had impressed her.

She didn't know the woman who was with him. She was almost as large as herself, larger in places, if not quite as tall. Her armor was plain steel, not golden like her own, or black like the infernal Mazken wore. She carried a claymore on her back, and wore no helmet, so her pale flaxen hair showed. Probably a Nord from Tamriel, she guessed.

The man came over and announced that he was the new Lord Sheogorath, and that the Greymarch had been stopped. He had defeated Jyggalag, and the new era would be different from before.

"What did happen before, anyway?" he asked.

Kaneh described what had happened in the earlier eras. When Jyggalag became Sheogorath once more, he would wander a dead wasteland until the gnarl emerged from the Fountainhead, and then he knew where to rebuild New Sheoth. As the gnarl cultivators started to replant the Realm, he'd search for the ruins of Brellach and Pinnacle Rock, and use the chimes there to summon back the fallen Saints and Seducers. "I don't understand why he'd want the Mazken back, but that is his will".

The landscape would be bleak at this time, with only small saplings sprouting here and there. The first baliwogs would possibly have hatched, and some scalons might have emerged from the seas. There was little for them on the land yet. The surviving Elytra would stay in their deepest burrows for the same reasons.

The Aureal and Mazken would see to the shutting down of the obelisks, and destroying any remaining knights of order that still roamed the Isles. The priests, too, although they'd shed their robes and hoods. Any mortal still in the Isles could only have been one of Jyggalag's traitors. The forces of Order would have slain anyone else.

In time, there would be a few new arrivals from Sheogorath's shrines in Tamriel. If one proved capable of operating Xylarne, the resonator would bring more. Eventually another would be able to help Relmyna make a Gatekeeper and the Realm would return to its usual state, if not exactly "normal".

But a fiery Gate wasn't usual or normal, and they had to do something about it. Now he was here, she and her two cohorts could do something about it.

"What is this other mortal doing here?" asked Kaneh.

"My name is Heidi, and I've closed an Oblivion Gate before," she said. "I can help."

The Madgod hadn't known about that, so she told them all the story.

"I was just arriving from Skyrim, headed for Bruma," she began. "I was walking down the trail past that farmhouse, Applewatch isn't it? Anyway, I saw this big fiery arch on the hillside behind it, just like the one here. I hadn't seen anything like that before, and I didn't know what it was, so I went over to take a closer look."

"As I got nearer, I heard sounds of fighting, but that stopped before I got there. When I arrived, there were several Daedra lying dead on the ground, and one dead Bruma guard with them. I realized that the other men had gone through the flames into the Gate, and they were now a man short."

"I picked up the dead guard's sword and shield. I took off my dress and put on his boots and greaves, too. The cuirass wouldn't fit because I was too big for it, so I cut the front to make room for my breasts. I think I cut a bit too much.

Captain Burd and the rest of his men were just inside fighting some more Daedra. He thanked me for joining them, even looked me in the eyes when he said that! Mentioned something about improving the men's morale, as well."

"I soon swapped the guard's sword and shield for a dead Dremora's claymore. With my big breasts hanging out of my cuirass, I was doing big swings whether I wanted to or not. It made sense to be using an appropriate weapon."

"By the time we reached the Tower, it was just Captain Burd and myself. I pointed out to him that he'd been losing men because they couldn't heal themselves. He said that they probably hadn't learned, because they always had the Castle healer at hand in their normal duties. He'd been a Legion patrolman before he got the guard job, so he'd needed the skill."

"Burd told me that you were the one that showed him how to close the gates. The one we closed was the last one near enough to Bruma to endanger the town, but there were others he'd heard about near the trails in the mountains. He said if I really wanted to help, I should apply to join the Legion, maybe the Mountain Riders? There was a recruiting Captain at the Lodge just outside the town."

"Of course, Captain Gudrun wasn't at the Lodge when I went there, she was in the Imperial City opening the new office. So I followed, and that's where we met."

"And I didn't find that Mythic Dawn agent you left me looking for in the city, because he'd come here to the Shivering Isles. I suppose he was the one that helped open the gates here. As I understand it, Dagon couldn't open them from his realm, they needed someone on this end to do it?"

"Well, the agent's dead now, so I suppose there won't be any more opening up. We still have to close that last one, though," Heidi reasoned.

Kaneh agreed with that assessment. They all followed the Madgod into the gate.

---

Kaneh didn't like the deadlands. They reminded her of the Isles after the Greymarch, with destruction everywhere, and little growing. Worse, there was lava where there should be water, and fires burning all over the place. The red sky was just ugly!

A creature looking like a scalon without fins attacked them, spitting a fireball in their direction before it charged. The new Madgod identified it as a Daedroth, one of Dagon's creatures.

Most of their opponents however, were humanoid Daedra called Dremora. They all appeared to be male, and they were all dressed in the same reddish obsidian armor, and carring swords and shields of the same material. Some of them wore no helmets, and she could see they had horns. They all had the same arrogant belief in their own superiority that she so despised in the Mazken. And with less justification; at least the Seducers were almost the equal of the Aureals, or they'd never have given her any problems at Cylarne.

The Dremora, however, were no match for the Golden Saints, and the party soon arrived at the Tower and climbed to the Sigillum Sanguis. The Madgod was about to take the stone and close the gate when Heidi stopped him. "I have an idea," she said.

"Now you're the new Sheogorath, you've also got some of Jyggalag's power, haven't you? At least as much as his priests had. So couldn't you "Order" the deadland, and show Dagon a lesson?"

The Madgod had a Heart of Order with him, and Heidi suggested replacing the Sigil Stone with the Heart, to see what happened. There was certainly an immediate effect. The red sky turned grey, and the fire column changed from orange flame to a blue-ish purple. They all remained in the chamber, rather than being transported outside the gate, as usually happened when one closed.

As they left the Tower, they could see Crystals of Order starting to push up across the landscape. The fire towers had shut down, there was an Obelisk near the path back to the gate. And was the lava starting to cool?

As soon as they stepped through the gate back into Mania they heard a crunching sound as crystals replaced the flames in the arch, sealing the gate. Was that it? Was it all over?

Haskill and Dyus didn't know either. Syl might have been able to find something more in her crystal ball, but she was ... a bit distracted ... as usual. They'd have to ask her later.

Kaneh wanted to know more about what had happened, and why the Gates had appeared. Dyus explained all about Sheogorath's scheme to give his power away before he became Jyggalag. Kaneh had never known about him. She was always in the waters of Oblivion awaiting recall when Jyggalag walked, so she'd never seen him, or the destruction of the Isles. She'd only seen the results, when she returned after it was all over.

Without the full power of the Madgod, Jyggalag had failed this time. The man Sheogorath chose to hold the throne had succeeded against all odds, and had broken the cycle. This same man had also helped defeat Mehrunes Dagon's attempt to invade Tamriel. That was why Dagon had attempted to seek revenge by opening Gates in the Isles.

Kaneh was still confused. Was that man truly the Madgod?

"He holds the Throne of Madness, and therefore he has the power associated with it," replied Haskill. "Doubtless when Jyggalag resumes his normal form, he will return to ask for it back. That was his plan all along. Whether the present office-holder hands it over or not is up to him. He is of course a mortal, and I assume that even with the Madgod's power he will not last forever. He has, however, thoroughly deserved his current position, for as long as holds it"

Dyus recalled Arden-Sul. The first time Sheogorath attempted the strategy, he'd become the Duke of both Mania and Dementia, but had succumbed to the madness in each. His personality was just as divided as Sheogorath's - perhaps one reason he was favored for the task - and he'd left contradictory suicide notes in Bliss and Crucible. When the new populations arrived, they'd found them and instituted the two rituals of succession. Arden-Sul hadn't survived to see Jyggalag, he'd predictably taken his own life before the change.

"I had calculated that the same would happen again. That Sheogorath was incapable of devising a plan that he could not himself defeat as Jyggalag. But I was wrong. Because Sheogorath himself underestimated a mortal's abilities, I did likewise."

"Jyggalag has never known defeat before, so he is bound to be affected by the experience," Haskill offered. "This may really have been the last Greymarch. It remains to be seen whether the previous Sheogorath returns, or something else. Without his customary power, he may not be able to return in the same form."