The Ultimate TES game, What would you like to see Bethesda do? Options

[Vital]

I'm not sure if this is the right place to post this but it's not directly related to Skyrim, Oblivion or any of the older games and is a general discussion about an RPG series (The Elder Scrolls) so it seemed the best fit

Just to clarify: This is not a "Which TES game is the best" thread. It is a thread to discuss the various features seen in any of the TES games, whether you liked them or not, how they could've been done better, why they should've left them out, what they should've had instead/as well, etc etc...

Ultimately it is a discussion about what would be the ideal Elder Scrolls Game in your opinion and how Bethesda could combine all the failures and successes of the previous games in order to create this. If you're already happy with one game, how could it be made better? (It can't be perfect )

Feel free to talk about different mods and games other than TES and how these could be implemented into the game as well.


To start:

I personally would love to see a combination of Morrowind, Oblivion and Skyrim (these being the only TES games I've played in depth) put into one game. The alien environment, number of factions, lack of hand-holding and so on from Morrowind, combined with the brilliant questlines and general feel (I can't explain this one but it just.... is) of Oblivion and the better combat, crafting and mechanical superiority of Skyrim.

This is just a brief description of some of the things I would like to see. I could write a 30 page essay on this and if this thread gets response I will put more stuff up. Anyway, what are you guy's thoughts?

[RaderOfTheLostArk]

I have issues with the way that Daggerfall did character creation, but I agree that it could be the basis for a better one. The idea of trading weaknesses against strengths when creating the character is the right one, but they failed to link them, so you could pick weakness to paralysis, for example, at the same time as immunity to it. That would have been better on a slider, with immunity at one end. I'm not sure what belongs at the other end, though. Inability to move?

There are some attributes that are inherently binary, like waterbreathing. You either do, or you don't, and percentages don't make sense. These are perhaps the ones to distribute, one per race, as differentiating bonuses.

And by Race, I mean man, mer, cat, lizard, and maybe some new ones, rather than the artificial cosmetic ones we have now. These should also act as factions (although others should exist) with some inter-faction disposition consequences. It would be good if the edges of the races overlap a bit, with the ability to create an elf who passes for human, or vice-versa.

Morrowind's variety of transports was welcome, but its "walk everywhere, or you'll fail if you run" wasn't. It also made a few places hubs and thus diminished all the others. An expanded Mark/Recall that effectively let you add you own hubs was a popular mod, if only so you could go home to dump your loot.

In Oblivion, I found myself using the same "wait for it" style in my own mods. The way you get people to do all the quest lines is to make them wait for the next step in each, and look around for something to fill in the time. This was much better than Skyrim's tangling one quest line with another, so that you have to join the College to do the MQ, etc.

Skyrim's mechanics, such as the event-driven scripting and Radiant quests are a must for a mod-maker. I'd keep the choices of the perk system, but tone down the effects of the steps. Especially the sudden ability smith with a particular material.

Oh, absolutely on Daggerfall. It wasn't perfect by any means, but due to the variety of things you could do with it and the depth I thought that had the best character creation in TES, at least in concept. Building off of that would be welcome to see. But along with refining strengths/weaknesses, the division of major/minor skills, etc., I'd like to see at least some of this to be at least mostly optional, if not completely. If somebody does not want to deal with the details of their character and make them completely average, let them. If you want to add flavor and spice things up by tweaking the minutiae, go for it. That's a general overview of what I'd like to see from character creation.

I still wish for fast travel mechanics to be kept, but have enough "natural" means of transportation to be able to cater to a wider variety of players. I like having the multiple means of transportation, but sometimes I'm just lazy and want to fast travel. Having mark and recall back would add some more variety, and through perks you could even set 2 or 3 marks to recall to.

I have some ideas for smithing, but that is a topic for another time.

This topic is dangerous for me, as my "ideal" TES title is feasible only on a more advanced form of the Holodeck seen in the old TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation. I'll throw out a few ideas that don't require so elaborate a setup. Even so, at least one is impossible with current PC horsepower, more are impossible or at least impractical on console, and one is might be highly unpopular.

World Size: Daggerfall got it right. If we're talking "ideal", this is a must for me.

Fast Travel: Here's my unpopular stance. In a game world the size of Daggerfall, I'd abolish the sort of "casual" fast travel seen in Oblivion and implement a more limited system. My thought is that fast travel should be confined to sanctioned teleport authorities, along with clandestine "shady" practitioners available to those who choose a "dark" path. Teleport service comes at a cost, which can be quite steep depending on distance traveled (and the agency one deals with). On the other hand, those required to travel long distances in the execution of official duty can obtain "passes" from an authority allowing free travel to specific task related destinations. (The game might also have other forms of fast transport such as Morrowind’s Silt Striders, but these would travel in real-time at whatever speed is realistic for them, as do Oblivion/Skyrim horses.)

Jobs: My ideal TES entry would sport a wide variety of “meaningful� career professions the avatar could avail him or herself of if they so choose. Road Patrols provided by the Oblivion mod “The Elder Council� are an obvious and fairly simple to implement example, as are its embryonic tax gathering assignments. These need more sophistication, but if properly implemented can provide avatars with lifetime work. Again, this are examples only. There should be a great wealth of professions of all sorts.

Guild Leadership: Of the five TES entries, I prefer Daggerfall’s advancement mechanics and mundane quest assignments, along with Oblivion’s story-line quests. An avatar should not be offered leadership position within a guild unless meaningful responsibility comes with the title. (These would then fall under Jobs.) If leadership is offered, avatars’ should be able to opt out for whatever reason.

Part of me does want a world the size of Daggerfall. That was part of that game's charm. In the interest of feasibility, I'd rather keep the scaled-down, heavily detailed worlds of Morrowind onward.

Regarding your jobs paragraph, something I'd really love to see is more guilds and a wider variety of them including brand-new ones. As an avid history lover, I'd love for an historical guild of sorts that delves into the past of the province that we are in.

And for guild leadership, I agree on the optional part. It should not be an office thrust upon the player and there is nothing they can do about it. But if the player wants it, they should be able to have it. Obviously if it was realistic they would have a lot of responsibilities to attend to, but in the interest of fun (it is a video game after all) I'd rather these be toned down and/or optional.

[Decrepit]

Part of me does want a world the size of Daggerfall. That was part of that game's charm. In the interest of feasibility, I'd rather keep the scaled-down, heavily detailed worlds of Morrowind onward.

I hear this argument between size and detail quite often, but don't buy in to it, especially as we're talking "ideal". My ideal TES title would be both Daggerfallesque is size and richly detailed, its graphics quality at least on par with Kingdom Come: Deliverance.

[RaderOfTheLostArk]

Part of me does want a world the size of Daggerfall. That was part of that game's charm. In the interest of feasibility, I'd rather keep the scaled-down, heavily detailed worlds of Morrowind onward.

I hear this argument between size and detail quite often, but don't buy in to it, especially as we're talking "ideal". My ideal TES title would be both Daggerfallesque is size and richly detailed, its graphics quality at least on par with Kingdom Come: Deliverance.

Fair enough. I was just trying to come up with what is most ideal to me but was still in the realm of what is likely currently technologically possible. But I digress.

I wish we could have a mix of Arena and Daggerfall in terms of scope. All the cities and main quest locations from Arena (if lore-wise are still standing, in the same place, etc.) would be available, and then jam-packed with locations like in Daggerfall, and each province has a scope similar to High Rock and Hammerfell in Daggerfall. We would also have multiple modes of transportation and fast travel, but if you wanted to you could travel on foot to each location. A couple things I wish we could have seen in Skyrim is the Fortress of Ice from Arena and some lore on what exactly happened to the Arena city of Snowhawk. I really appreciate how Online has some main quest locations from Arena (e.g. Crypt of Hearts, Selene's Web). I'd also like to see the ruins of Crystal Tower, and what a modern-day version of the Adamantine Tower is like now. All of this is graphically at least on par with Skyrim or Online.