The Elder Scrolls

This is a /v/ related article, which we tolerate because it's relevant and/or popular on /tg/... or we just can't be bothered to delete it.

During the Oblivion Crisis, the Dunmer of House Redoran raised up the shell of the Great Skar to fight on their side, as a Giant Friendly Crab. This series is hardcore like that. They still lost.

The Elder Scrolls is a video game series, and the setting of five main games and a number of spinoffs. Despite being a vidja, it is considered a type II game (indirectly related to traditional games, the first game was in fact based off one of the developer's homebrew settings), and /tg/ is very gay for this series and setting.

These games have a very extensive modding scene, alas, two quarters of it is sickening porn.

/tg/ also has a 40k/WHFB hack named Scrollhammer, and a number of pen and paper games (notably Morrowind PNP and the UESRPG) set in The Elder Scrolls universe.

On a sidenote, Michael Kirkbride (the guy whose responsible for writing the really fucking weird shit in this series)has declared all canon null and void, mainly because of how much he is still butthurt about Bethesda kicking his ass out the door before work on Oblivion began.

Setting

An approximation of the cosmology of the Elder Scrolls. Not shown: mindfucks.

The games mainly take place in Tamriel, a continent consisting of nine separate lands. After being buttfucked by the Ayleid for several centuries, Humanity rises up and overthrow their elven overlords, and took control themselves. After mucking about for another eight or so centuries, a man named Tiber Septiem/Hjalti Early-Beard steps up and leads his armies to conquer all of Tamriel to found the Third Empire. But instead of exterminating all the elves and beast races, they were allowed to co-exist with the other races and a time of prosperity began. Until Emperor Jean-Luc Picard died, and Mehrunes Dagon began to fuck his way from Oblivion into Tamriel, starting a chain of events that resulted in him being kicked back into hell by the Emperor's lost son, Sean Bean. Being Sean Bean meant he died in the process, and without an Emperor the Empire began to crumble. The Aldmeri Dominion (think Ayleid 2.0) sensed their weakness and began a war to subjugate the lesser races. The Empire only barely managed to stop them, and a tense cease-fire is currently in effect.

Creation of the world

Listen to this. This is the main theme of Morrowind, the third game in the series. It also contains the history of the cosmology of The Elder Scrolls. Listen to it, because it's a damn fine tune. But as you listen to it, you might realise there are no spoken words in this music. So how can it tell the history of a setting? Well, sit that five-dollar ass of yours down before I make change.

Long ago there was an entity who had fallen deeply in love, but his brother loved the same person, so he out of jealousy killed his loved one. That brought such distress to him that he fell into a coma of sorts, he "hid in a sun" and started dreaming. Thus he became The Godhead. From his dreams sprung Anu and Padomay, Stasis and Change. These "brothers" (the term used in the loosest sense here, solely on being related but different forces) accidentally created Nir, Grey maybe, personification of creation itself. But Padomay grew jealous of the relationship between Anu and Nir and out of spite decided to break her. Nir was killed and Creation was shattered, maimed for ever. Anu then fought Padomay and they were cast out of time forever, even though they still exist and will always exist as long as there is Order and Chaos. You might have thought to yourself, "Didn't that happen twice?", yes it did. Everything in the Dream mimics original Godhead and his mind, everything comes from it. In this case Anu was avatar of the Dreamer while Padomay represented Godheads brother and Nir their shared love. Same scenario of two mirror brothers, one being force of Stasis, The King and one being force of Change, The Rebel always repeats. The souls or core concepts of Anu and Padomay on which all of creation runs are called, Anui-El (IS) and Sithis (IS NOT). Eventually from endless energies and "blood" of Anu and Padomay came the Et'ada( Et'ada means original spirit while Ada means just generally any spirit), each representing different idea and concept.

Et'ada tended to categorize themselves with Anu or Padomay. Auri-El, Kyne and other Et'ada that represent forces of Order are called Anuic, while more chaotic ones like Mehrunes Dagon or Molag Bal are Padomaic. Later after creation of realms those who were Anuic became Aedra, which means "our ancestor" in Ehlnofex, because Aedra took part in creation of the world we usually visit in TES games, while those Padomaic spirits who did not take part in creation and created their own solo realms became Daedra, which translates to "not our ancestor" (though that was not always the case, Jyggalag for example is a Daedra, but he is clearly Anuicly aligned.)

In the Dawn Era, time, in the shape of Akatosh (Ara, Auriel, Auri-El Tosh'Raka, AKHAT; take your pick), was non-linear. It flowed freely wherever it wanted, without direction, form of shape. In this temporal soup floated the souls of the proto-Mer. Think pea soup, except with millions of Ada of all sorts instead of peas. Time, in this form, was a single point. It was called the Ur-Tower, Ada-Mantia. Except it was not really a point or a tower, but more of a sound.

Bom. (0:00 to 0:01 of the song)

The Et'Ada saw it, and it was good. Except for one. A being born from Padomay who wanted no name, but eventually came to be first known as Lorkhan (LKHAN, Shor, Sep, Shezarr, maybe even Shepard). Having little interest with the rest of the Et'Ada's activities...or more likely inactivity, he spent his time wandering the Aurbis(all of existence), eventually coming to the very edge. He saw the universe, it was shaped like a wheel with eight spokes. Then he look at the wheel from another perspective, he saw that when wheel is turned, it looked like a Tower, a perfect line, an I.

"I."

This was his first word, and he would never, ever forget it. He understood everything right then and there, all of creation and it's true nature was revealed to him.

Wanting to share this revelation with the other Ada but knowing that none of them would be able to comprehend it as they were, he came up with a plan for a creation and showed it to Magnus, The Grand Architect. Magnus went along with the plan and recruited the help of the Et'ada that we know as Aedra today: Akatosh, Dibella, Julianos, Kynareth, Mara, Stendarr, Zenithar and many other lesser spirits that you probably never heard of to serve as the basis of their creation. Except that they did not know this last part, Lorkhan had fooled them and they were drained int creation of the world, or re-creation of long shattered Nir, Nirn was born. When they discovered they were tricked the Et'Ada were not amused. Magnus buggered off into infinity along with his servants, tearing through the edge of Mundus and creating The Sun and The Stars in the process...yeah, everything you see in sky is a giant non euclidean portal to realm of infinite energy, the original crib of Et'ada, The Aetherius. Also all of the magic is Aether which flows through those holes into bodies of mortals to turn into Magicka...so yes, light is pure magic. Others gave Lorkhan his due: Trinimac tore his heart out and Auriel(Elven aspect of Akatosh) shot it out over the sea, where it landed in a spot and created a crater that would gain the moniker "Red Mountain". The halves of Lorkhan's body became the moons Masser and Secunda, the last visible remnants of a corpse god. But this was just as planned, through out the whole thing Heart of Lorkhan was actually mocking everyone, it was laughing at them like a maniac, because Red Mountain was Red Tower, the second Tower, and the beat of his heart would be added to the sound of Akatosh. His Heart would become the prison for The Dragon God of Time.

Bom bom. (0:01 to 0:07 of the song)

This completely, utterly and irrevocably buttfucked spacetime. Because there now was a second point in existence, time could no longer flow anywhere it wanted and had to flow from Akatosh to Lorkhan, the time was trapped. With time becoming linear, Nirn could start to grow. Aedra were drained and "dying", so they had to reproduce, create worshipers or someone that could sustain them. Slowly Ehlnofey, the "Earth Bones", Ada of all forms and shapes, some descendants of crazy reproduction, started popping up. Some created simple truths and laws for Nirn, for example gravity, others reproduced more, creating less energized spirits that slowly stabilized in different ways, slowly becoming mortal. Bom bom. (0:07 to 0:39 of the song)

The Mer, one of the first to mortalize were in not pleased because of this. They blamed Lorkhan for their predicament, naming him the Doom Drum, bringer of mortality, death and the herald of all misfortune. But they made the best out of the situation, and the races of Mer prospered. New Towers came into existence, one by one: Walk-Brass Tower, White-Gold Tower, Snow-Throat Tower, Crystal-Like-Law, Orchalc, Khajit and Tree-Sap.

Bom bom. (0:39 to 1:19 of the song)

But, as time went on (something new back then), more and more happened. New peoples stood up. Empires were founded and fell. The races of Men were discovered, the beast races prospered, and the Empires of Men were founded.

Bom bom. (1:19 to 1:42 of the song)

Yet nothing is eternal. The Thalmor, the ruling faction of the High Elves, desires nothing less than the destruction of the Doom Drum and all of creation so time once again becomes non-linear, mortality would get destroyed and they could return their eternal soup-floating. Removing Lorkhan would stop the music of existence, and everything once again becomes singular.

Bom bom. Bom. (1:42 to 1:55 of the song)

And then... silence.

On the importance of Towers

For every Tower there is a Stone, an artifact that can be used to activate or deactivate a Tower. For Ata-Mantia Tower this is the Moment of Creation itself (making it rather difficult to obtain), for Red Tower this is the Heart of Lorkhan and for White-Gold Tower this is the Amulet of Kings. The Towers serve an additonal purpose besides keeping spacetime from becoming a massive alinear clusterfuck. What is this? Well, it's easier for you to do it yourself that for me to explain. Make yourself a print of the map of Tamriel further down on this page. Then get yourself a pin board and a black, a red, two brown, three white, and two green tacks. Put the map against the pinboard and do the following:

• Put the white tacks through the map in the Imperial City in Cyrodiil, the Throat of the World slightly south-east of Whiterun in Skyrim, and Crystal Tower in the Summerset Isles (northern part, west of King's Watch). (White-Gold, Snow-Throat and Crystal-Like-Law)
• Put the green tacks in Yokuda (exact location unkown) and in Valenwood (somewhere in the middle). (Orchalc and Tree-Sap)
• Put the brown tacks in Daggerfall (southernmost tip of High Rock) and in Elsweyr (again in the middle). (Walk-Brass and Tree-Sap)
• Put the red tack in the middle of Vvardenfell in Morrowind. (Red)
• Put the black tack on the little island deep in the Iliac Bay near High Rock. (Ata-Mantia)

That's the locations of the Towers that keep time flowing. All's fine and dandy with those holding the world together, no? Wrong. Some have been destroyed or deactivated over the course of time; three times this was done by the player. Whoops. Remove the following:

• Red Tower (deactivated in Morrowind by you)
• White-Gold Tower (deactivated in Oblivion by you)
• Crystal Tower (destroyed in Oblivion by the Daedra)
• Khajiit Tower
• Tree-Sap Tower (both located in Thalmor territory, likely deactivated)
• Orchalc Tower (destroyed when Yokuda was destroyed)

Snow-Throat Tower is very much active, but its Stone is unkown. Walk-Brass Tower is very much active, but somehow it is "besieging reality well into the Fith Era", meaning that it's in the future yet somehow active. Which is not a bad thing, since Walk-Brass tower is a fuckhueg robot that has a nasty habit of fucking Time so hard it breaks. So yeah, the only things standing between Tamriel and the primordial time-grog are a mountain and one of the Void Dragon's action figures.

Removing the Tower-Tacks has another side effect: the veil between Nirn and Oblivion becomes thinner. At the time of Oblivion it had even grown so thin that the Daedra could slip into this realm on their own accord. So your actions in Morrowind caused the Oblivion Crisis. Way to go, champ. And what happens if you remove all the tacks? Right, your map falls off the pin board. Because that's what they do: keep Nirn on the bulletin board of reality. And if the Thalmor had their way... it would fall off. This is not a good thing for the races of Men, because this would essentially mean they are retconned from reality. No afterlife, no going to their gods; they would just be gone. Delightful. Or fused into Lorkhan, but really when your options are "Nirvana" and "Oblivion" (the... state, not the place), who wants to gamble?

How to Break your Dragon

You might have heard the phrase "Dragon Break" (both words capitalized) a few times. Simply put, this means cock-slapping Time so hard it breaks and becomes non-linear for a while. But not just any cock-slap, oh no. Imagine a dick if you will. A really big dick (no, this does not make you gay). So big in fact, that even Big Dick Johnson (who gained his nickname from having a really big dick) would say "That's a big fucking dick". Right, you see it? The biggest fucking dick your feeble mind could comprehend? Good.

Now, imagine if you will, Time. How you do this is up to you: a linear progression of cause to effect, floaty magic thingies, sand, a clock, perhaps even a more anthropomorphic presentation in the shape of a loli or a cute monstergirl. Right. Now take the dick and slap Time in the face. Cockslap it so hard that time itself just outright breaks and loses its linearity. This is a Dragon Break. The name itself is derived from the notion that Time is Akatosh, who is a dragon. Hence if you break time, you "Break the Dragon". While inside a Dragon Break time is perceived to pass normally, but when one exits it might appear that a lot more or less time than you observed has passed in the rest of the world.

The first known Dragon Break occured near the end of the Dragon War, where a trio of Nords confronted Alduin the World-Eater, First-Born and Aspect of Akatosh (meaning that somehow he was his own father), the leader of the dragons. The Nords created a localized Dragon Break to fling Alduin into the future so that he wasn't their problem anymore. What a bunch of dicks.

The second known Dragon Break happened during the Battle of Red Mountain where the First Council of the Chimer waged war on the Dwemer. The First Council had control over Numidium and unleashed it on the Dwemer. Numidium had one minor design flaw: every time someone pushed the "ON" switch it took its massive robo-boner (roboner!) and fucked the dragon right up the butt, no lube. This allowed for the multiple truths on the events that transpired on Red Mountain: Ayem, Seht and Vehk stood by their friend Nerevar as he succumbed to his wounds. Almalexia, Sotha Sil and Vivec murdered their Hortator (war-leader) Nerevar. Ayem Seht Vehk = Almalexia Sotha Sil Vivec = ALMSIVI. Everything is true, nothing is correct.

The third suspected Dragon Break occurred during the time of the Alessian Empire (Saint Alessia freed Man from the slavery of their Mer rulers, think of her as booby Sigmar). A cult of the Alessian Order wanted to exorcise the aspects of Auriel from Akatosh, basically substracting the Elf from the Dragon. This is said to have resulted in a thousand-year Dragon Break but it is disputed that this actually happened; some claim that this was little more than a fuckup of the scholars and historians of the time.

The fourth known Dragon Break took place when Tiber Septim unleased Numidium on the Khajiit of Elsweyr. This included the subjugation of Elsweyr, Valenwood and eventually the Summerset Isles. Tiber Septiem threatened to activate it again and have it wreck the Aldmeri Dominion, but they liked their assholes to only be violated by one another so they too stood down. It has been recorded that Numidium was then used to destroy hostile royal families to replace them with the Emperor's puppets, likely by having it step on them.

The fifth and currently final known Dragon Break occurred during the events of Daggerfall, where it was turned on in the Iliac Bay. But because of the nature of Numidium fucking space-time a new lovehole when it activates (hence, "turned on") a number of the states in the region obtained the "FUCK EVERYTHING" button of Numidium and pressed it at the same time. Two days of hilarity later everyone conquered one another until the Empire ended as top dog and everyone swore fealty to the Empire. Because of the events surrounding the activation of the Dragon Break Numidum disappeared and fell into the future, where it still stands as Walk-Brass Tower.

When the Dragon Breaks Akatosh deploys the Jill to fix time so that everything does not fall apart. These minute-menders (akin to angels) tend to take the form of great wyrms who fly around and fix the little bits of time with the power of their Voice (ie: they shout at holes in space-time until they bitch down). If this sounds familiar to you... it is. The Jill are nothing less than the Dragons you meet, fight, kill and soul-rob to increase your own unholy power. So in other words, you have been killing the heralds of a new era. (Or at least you would be if they were actually doing what they were supposed to do- as it turns out, some time before that first Dragon Break Alduin decided that he would rather rule over the broken bits of time himself, and the dragons are bound to obey him without question. So all of reality is increasingly fucked and the only beings who can fix it stopped giving a shit a long time ago. Terrific.)

CHIM

CHIM. It's sort of like this.

That muffled explosion you just heard was caused by a number of people exploding out of sheer rage. Sit tight, because this shit is meta wrapped in an enigma inside a mindfuck.

In Morrowind you can find a series of books titled the 36 Sermons of Vivec. If you pick them up and read them at face value they might appear as parts of a religious text, filled with metaphors, truths twisted throughout the ages, and copious amounts of buttfucking (no, seriously). In these books you will find several references to CHIM, The Tower, and The Ruling King. Now, early on in the books Vivec is shown as the teacher of Lord Indoril Nerevar (more on him below), yet Nerevar does not understand the lessons. Because he was not the intended student. Instead, these lessons were meant for you. Not only for your player character, but for you , the player. For if one attains CHIM, one's physical form becomes a mere avatar of the self.

But now you may wonder, what the Charles fucking Dickens *is* CHIM?

Imagine if you will, a great wheel with eight spokes. The wheel is everything that exists: Aurbis. The hub is Nirn, the world that the series takes place on. The spokes are the Aedra, the Eight Divines. The space between the spokes is Oblivion, where the Daedra reside. Mundus encompasses both Nirn, its moons and the realms of the Aedra. Now, if you were to turn the wheel 90 degrees, you'd be looking at the rim of the wheel so it resembles I. This is the Tower, the Secret of Aurbis, holder of the secret. CHIM. The wheel is the entire universe. Outside there exist only two: Anu and Padhome, stasis and change. Think a great void filled with only two bubbles: there where these bubbles touch exists the wheel. Now, the Tower is not something physical, but an ideal. Something that can be attained, conquered, stolen. For one to reside within the tower, is to know the truth of all that is. This was the revelation of Lorkhan's that made him want to create Nirn.

This truth is that everything is a dream. The supreme power in TES is the Godhead, the unknown creator of all. Everything, Aurbis, Anu, and Padomay; all created in the dreams of the Godhead. Attaining CHIM is to know this, the relentless alien terror that is God and your place in it. Everything you know, are and do is but a dream. Now, if you discover this either of two things can happen. The most common one is to realise you do and don't exist at the same time: you lose your individuality (you zero-sum) and become one with the dreamer, the Godhead, and you disappear in the proverbial puff of logic. The second option is the rare one: to realise that you are part of the Godhead, you *are* the Godhead. If everything is an extension of the same thing, and that the thing can reshape reality with a thought, being a dreamer within the dream.

If you thought that shit was meta, just you wait. The principles behind CHIM can be taken further to mean that the Godhead and it's dreams are a metaphor for the computer running the game and the game itself. In-universe the metaphor of the godhead and being awake within the dream is needed to prevent characters who realize this from zero-summing out of existence at the resulting paradox. It can be inferred that a character who achieves CHIM essentially gains access to the console and the Construction Set. Talos used the Construction Set to retcon Cyrodiil from a jungle land into a generic European fantasy land (Talos has a terrible imagination). Vivec gave himself levitation abilities by using the console to erase the texture file for his chair (no seriously). Whether or not the player achieves CHIM varies. Generally when a player becomes fully immersed in the game, they do not have CHIM. However, a player who gets fed up of getting bugged by cliff racers every five seconds and installs a mod that removes them from the game is using CHIM. They are remembering that the world they are in is a game and altering it as they see fit. Exploits, mods, console commands, etc can all be explained in-universe as the player character achieving CHIM and using it to reshape reality or bend its rules.

Meta as FUCK

It's the end of the World, and I feel fine

We've mentioned a few times that the world of Nirn is slowing being destroyed by a few reason. In a normal fantasy setting this would be a terrible thing and the hero must try and stop it however the Elder Scrolls isn't a normal fantasy setting. One of the dragons, Paarthurnax mentions that when the world ends Alduin, the first born will simply make a new one. Granted he also states liking the current one is a good enough reason to fight Alduin (that and the fact that Alduin is an absolute prick who would rather rule over the broken remains of the old one instead of actually doing his job). This is due to Kalpic nature of Nirn, eventually world ends and Alduin get to turn the wheel/start next Kalpa, hence why he is called the World Eater. He "Eats" the world and they starts a new one. When new Kalpa starts everything is reset to Convention, the moment when Heart of Lorkhan was torn out and from that point on things can go differently in different Kalpa. For example, according to Seven Flights of Aldudagga, one of the Kalpa's had Molag Bal as it's ruler and Dreught as supreme race.

That being said, it is possible to end Kalpic cycle and destroy creation for good, hence what Thalmor are trying to do. They also believe that this will make them Ada(Spirit/God) again.

Gods, Deities and other important people

Most of the gods in The Elder Scrolls are et'Ada, the race of divine beings or "original spirits" that came from the interplay of Anu and Padomay. These spirits are divided into two groups, those who came from Anu, the Aedra, and those who came from Padomay, the Daedra. There are some beings of either indeterminable origin or that reached apotheosis so that they became of power comparable to the et'Ada.

Aedra

The Aedra (Our ancestors in Aldmeris) are et'Ada of Anuic origin. Many of them took part in the creation of Nirn, during which they died, their essences fused together into Mundus. As such they do not have "physical" forms like the Daedra have. Yet their spirits live on in Nirn: as the gods of the world they live in every part of it. While not as powerful and focussed as their Daedric counterparts they are more widespread, worshipped and give their blessings and artifacts more freely than the Daedra. Those who created Mundus are known and worshipped as the Nine Divines, though during some periods they were known as the Eight Divines.

• Akatosh (Auriel, AKHAT) is the Dragon God of Time. He is sometimes described as a human with two heads, a dragon heads and a human head. Often the chief deity of the various religions it appears in, Akatosh is considered the first god and the keeper of time, him being Ata-Mantia Tower, the first point of creation. This creation being "I AM", the first words of Akatosh whose echoes formed free-flowing time. With the creation of Red Tower his freedom was taken from him and he was "coiled" in linear time. At the parts where he comes uncoiled the Dragon Breaks, making time once again non-linear. It is stipulated that when the other Towers came into being and life was kick-started, Akatosh went batshit bonkers and was reduced to a drooling idiot, with humans crawling out of the waters to say, copy, mock; "WE ARE, TOO". There are also theories that Akatosh's soul is fragmented into numerous beings like Alduin the World-Eater, and maybe even all of dragonkind up to and including the Dragonborn. He is the head of the Nine Divines.

• Dibella is the flower-handed (if this means that she's holding large flowers or her hands actually *being* flowers depends on the interpretation) is the Aedric goddess of love, women, the arts and aesthetics. Long story short, she's a non-evil Slaanesh. The worship of Dibella is more personal than the others and is not done in masses or church: it is something personal and intimate done either alone in the pursuit of love or beauty or the consummation of love between two (or more) people. Dibella's portfolio also includes erotic instruction, which can take the form of religious prostitution. This makes some of the cults of Dibella unpopular in some places because they (not entirely unfairly) see the faith as lewd or overly lusty, sometimes forcing the preachers of the faith to practice in secret. She is one of the Nine Divines.

• Julianos is the god of knowledge, law, history, science and, according to non-Altmer and Breton cultures, magic. The Cult of the Ancestor Moth are a group dedicated to the reading and understanding of the Elder Scrolls and hold Julianos in great reverence. After the White-Gold Tower was taken by the Aldmeri Dominion the Elder Scrolls disappeared under mysterious circumstances, and it is currently unknown if this was Julianos' doing or the machinations of the Scrolls themselves. Because of his portfolio, the common man is not quick to revere Julianos, his worship being more reserved for scholars, wizards and all those in the pursuit of knowledge or understanding. He is one of the Nine Divines.

• Kynareth (Kyne, KYNRT) is the goddess of the nature, the air, the elements, rain and the heavens, the patron of sailors and travelers alike. She is the widow of Shor, who is Lorkhan, and was one of the first to agree to Lorkhan's plan for creation. It is unknown if she partook in or opposed the revenge on Lorkhan by the other et'Ada. She was the one to gift the Nords of old the power of the thu'um so that they could save themselves from Alduin's destruction. Kynareth has no churches or other large buildings in which she is worshipped: her masses are carried outdoors: on the earth and under the sky. She is one of the Nine Divines.

• Mara is the goddess of the earth, compassion, understanding and love. Unlike Dibella's intimate and carnal love Mara's love is more agape and compassionate than physical. Mara helps those who help others: those who can love will be loved in return. Depending on the religion she is either married to Akatosh or Lorkhan, or is a handmaiden to Kynareth. In Skyrim the rites of marriage are carried out in the churches of Mara, as they bind those who love each other more than anything. She is one of the Nine Divines.

• Stendarr (Stuhn, THENDR) is the god of mercy and compassion and is the protectior of Men. He serves as the inspiration of those who uphold the law and pleads for merciful judgement. But he knows when no compassion must be shown: he is the patron of the Imperial Legion and there is the order of the Vigilants of Stendarr who will smite daedra, mutants and witches left and right for the good of the empire. He is one of the Nine Divines.

• Zenithar (Tsun, Z'en) is the god of labor, commerce, trade and money. He is popular amongst the races of Man, for obvious reasons. In his aspect of Tsun he defended Lorkhan as the et'Ada attacked him, during which he died. His bones formed the Whalebone Bridge that leads to the Halls of Valor on Sovngarde, and Tsun serves as the guardian to test those who would cross it. This means that Tsun somehow stands guard over his own corpse. As such he is sometimes called "the god that will always win". Zenithar preaches that peace and prosperity will be attained through hard work and honest profit, not war. He is one of the Nine Divines.

Daedra

"Not Our Ancestors" in Aldmeris, the Daedra (singular: Daedroth, not to be confused with the crocodile-like Daedra called Daedroth) are the et'Ada who did not partake in the creation of the world. As such their powers in the world are more limited than their Aedric counterparts. As such their powers are limited to the likes of curses and artifacts, and can only walk the realm in forms that severely limit their powers. Despite serving as the setting's "devils" (in that the word Daedra pretty much means Devil) they are not all different flavors of evil; they range from "hate undead" and "wants to hunt dangerous game" to "prince of destruction" and "king of rape". Even if they are benevolent at times, the Daedra are not to be trifled with and are very dangerous.

Because the word Daedra covers all forms of Daedra, the title "Daedric Princes" refers to the seventeen most powerful of the Daedra. Do note that in this context, Prince stems from the Italian "Princeps" (First) and not from the more commonly used "son of a king". Another reason that the "son of a king" phrase is wrong is because the Daedra are genderless beings, their shapes changing on their whim. Like many folklorific devils, Daedra have true names (their protonymic) that can fuck them up badly. These names are of course closely regarded secrets, the only time it is known that a protonymic was used against its owner was in the game Battlespire where they player fucked Mehrunes Dagon up badly.

• Azura is the Lady of Dusk and Dawn, the Daedric Prince of Prophecy. Though considered a benevolent Daedric Prince, she isn't always nice. She is a spiteful, cruel and petty being, making sure her own prophecies come to fruition (the ultimate self-fulfulling prophecy), when the Tribunal betrayed her she A: cursed them all with dark skin and glowing red eyes, B: raising up a reincarnation of the one the Tribunal killed to kill them in return, and C: do not warn the people of Morrowind when the powers of the Tribunal waned, allowing for a moon that has been held aloft over one of their major cities to hit it so hard the entire island is leveled. What a huge bitch (bluh bluh). On the other hand, the Tribunal turned out to be equally large dicks or insane, it's not like the "curse" of fire resistance and dark skin is all that crippling, she also did warm her dunmer followers to get out, and compared to almost every Daedra, Azura is at least morally gray next to shining beacons of morality like Mehrunes Dagon and Molag Bal. Azura did eventually get her comeuppance at the hands of Vivec, who had her summoned before him so he could boot her out of existence, trolled everyone in the room by pointing out he had used them for his revenge and left reality himself. In short: keep her trust and she's got your back. Stab her in hers and suffer the consequences.

• Boethiah is the Daedric Prince of Plots, mainly the kind that involves stabbing a dude in the back when he least expects it. Boethiah is a tremenous dick to everyone: he pretty much murders all of his followers except those who murder their fellow cultists to prove they are tougher than the others. Despite his massive douchebaggery he is considered to be a benevolent Daedra by the Dunmer: he is responsible for teaching them many cultural and scientific advances and represents their triumpth over adversery. He also clashed with Trinimac, whom Boethiah then ate and shit out as Malacath. Boethiah is one of the Daedra Princes who holds less importance to his appearance; ranging from a man in Daedric armor to a loincloth-clad neckbeard who looks like he's playing a power ballad on his axe to appease the gods of rock to an ugly old hag, making her a huge woman-dick.

• Clavicus Vile is a dick. Like, a huge dick. He's the "jackass genie" stereotype who grants wishes in such ways that they always end in murder. A man wishes for a way to end the curse of lycanthropism on his daughter? Give him an axe. Vampires plead for him to end their suffering? An adventurer comes along and murders them. People pray for him to bring an end to the civil war that's ravaging their country? He does nothing as the dragons burn everything. Like I said: huge dick. Unique to him is that his conscience is a familiar to him, taking the form of an Irish Wolfhound called Barbas that telepathically communicates in a Yiddish accent. Barbas is quite affable, witty and friendly compared to Clavicus, and since Vile is much weaker without him, he manages to curb many of Vile's excesses. Clavicus knows this and as a result is very tsundere to Barbas, to the point that he was willing to give an adventurer a powerful artifact if he killed Barbas. When the adventurer refused Vile's reaction was "Okay then, come back you jerk <3". Like I said: huge dick.

• Hermaeus Mora is the Daedric Prince of fate, destiny and forbidden knowledge. This, combined with the fact that he often takes the form of something that shambled out of the Cthulhu Mythos and owing books with such titles as The Sallow Regent makes it obvious that this guy is Bad News. He is mainly content with sitting on his ass(?) all day erry day reading all the books in existence, then writing more. When he ventures into the world he does so to gain more knowledge or materials to expand his knowledge. The second part in his name, Mora, is the elven word for "woods", harking back to the day where he caught people lost in the woods so he could do unspeakable things with them. While polite he is not afraid to stab bitches, skin them and use their hides as book covers. His realm is a fucking huge library full of acid pools, tentacles, and creatures that are more or less Cthulhu/deep one clones.

• Hircine (meaning: goat-like) is the Daedric Prince of the hunt and patron of werebeasts. Though his favorites are werewolves, this also includes werebears, wereboars, werelions and werecrocodiles. He lives for the hunt, the tougher the opponent the better. Despite playing life like a game of Werewolf: The Apocalypse, he acknowledges strong and worthy opponents, even rewarding them with powerful boons or artifacts, given that they beat him of course. Werebeasts are inevitably bound to him: those who die with the curse of the Werewolf will accompany Hircine on his hunts as his hunting hounds for the rest of eternity. Hircine usually is depicted as a man wearing a deer skull mask, and can turn into a wolf or bear with the mask still attached. The PC shit-kicks one of his avatars in an expansion pack to Morrowind, after Hircine kidnaps him and the other strongest fighters in the land for a tournament/gauntlet of endurance.

• Jyggalag is the Daedric Prince of Order. A dick even by the standards of the Daedra, the sixteen other Princes ganged up on him and used their magic to turn him into Sheogorath. Once every 10.000 years he bursts back into existence and fucks up Sheogorath's crib before returning to wherever. That is, until the PC killed him during the events of The Shivering Isles, breaking the curse on Sheogorath and returning him to his natural state. He now roams Oblivion doing Aedra knows what.

• Malacath is the Daedric Prince of the spurned, pariahs, curses and Orcs. He was once Trinimac, responsible for killing Lorkhan. Until Boethiah ate him for trying to stop the Chimer from getting to the promised land and shat him out as Malacath. As such he's often the punchline of many a joke of his fellow Daedra, to which he replies as being a noblebright combination of Gork/Mork and Khorne. Only Orcs love him, which he is a bit sad about. You should probably try to give him a hug. Unless he tries to punch you for it. Generally takes the form of a huge Orc with some sort of two-handed weapon, as a true man should.

• Mehrunes Dagon is the Daedric Prince of destruction, change, and revolution. Think a mix of Tzeentch, Khorne and Stupid Evil mixed together and poured into the form of a four-armed classic big red devil. He may have once been a kind demon who wanted to stop Alduin from eating the world by hiding bits of it until the dragon ate too much and exploded, but the World Eater cursed him into a realm where nothing could be destroyed or killed for all eternity and told him the only way out was to blow up the bits of the universe he'd saved. This made him overly eager to go out and destroy the world to the point where he acts stupid. As such, he's an easy pawn for pretty much anyone with the clout to get to the guy, and is most often the main villain of an Elder Scrolls game.

• Mephala is the Daedric Prince of plots, spiders, sex and secrets, and maybe also of contradiction, paradoxes and subtlety. Anyway, not an awful lot is known about her except that she's the patron of backstabbing and evil plots. She taught the Chimer how to avoid or stealthily kill their enemies, and helped found the Great Houses. She also likes to tempt mortals into doing her bidding, mainly for the lulz of it. Think of her as a less malevolent and dickish Lolth.

• Meridia is a mysterious Daedric Prince associated with the energy of the living. Only three things are known about her: she is likely a Magna Ge who stayed or was left behind when Magnus left Mundus, she has a HUGE hateboner for the undead and will RIP AND TEAR them wherever she and her followers can find them, making her super lawful neutral, and she's got great legs. She also supported the ancient elves until Pelinal Whitestrake (A cyborg from the future sent back in time to genocide elves, not shitting you) kicked the shit out of them.

• Molag Bal is the Daedric Prince of domination, evil, and enslavement, also known by his moniker "The King of Rape". To get it out of the way, yes he did commit the first rape, with the unexpected side effect of turning the woman into a vampire. On his holy day many cults offer their virgins to him to enjoy. Those who survive his girth return as full-blood vampires, those who don't survive... well, it's hard to say which is the more desirable result. Aside from the rape he also enjoys submitting and enslaving people to his will, corrupting them so he can claim their souls. Oh, and he had sex with Vivec one time. Consensual. Maybe. The text describing it does mention "much biting of spears". Probably the most evil of all the princes: even Dagon has positive aspects and is just crazy because of his rotten situation. Dagon is like the Tyranid to Bal's Sauron: one's just trying to destroy you because destruction is its nature, it's too stupid to realize what it's doing is wrong, and you happen to be handy, while one is going to hurt you, just to hurt you. Because hurting things is fun, and don't you have a pretty little mouth?

• Namira is the Daedric Prince of decay, vermin, the grotesque and revulsion. Described best as the female Nurgle (though the Horned Rat might be a more strictly-accurate comparison), her followers mainly keep to themselves and their repulsive creatures. They only interact with people trying to "save" them (which they very much do NOT want) or when they eat them. Oh, did I mention that Namira is also the patron of cannibalism? Because she is.

• Nocturnal is the Daedric Prince of shadows, thieves and luck. Somewhere in between your mom who is never content with your achievements and always demands more of you and Lady Luck. Except unlike your mom, she's sexy and powerful. And again unlike your mom she does not fuck every guy who talks to her. Nocturnal demands little of her followers and gives little in return, unless her conduit to the mortal world is threatened, which causes her to impose perpetually back luck to every criminal in the world. One of the artifacts associated with her is the Skeleton Key, which is said to be able to unlock anything, up to and including the absolute limits of human potential... too bad you never see this in the game, making it a giant glorified (but unbreakable and impossibly handy) lockpick.

• Peyrite is the Daedric Prince of order and pestilence. Considering that order means sameness and stagnation, this makes him an almost dead-on match to Nurgle. He manifests as a giant four-legged dragon, which has nothing to do with his aspect, and as a pair of giant rats, which does. He's one of the weakest Daedric Princes, to the point that his realm was once partially invaded by Mehrunes Dagon. Alternatively, the game's writers forgot that all Daedric realms look different, but that can't possibly be right. Is the daedric equivalent of middle-management, keeping the lower levels of Oblivion in line while his more-powerful co-workers (a.k.a. every other prince) squanders the company's money on ice sculptures of cherubs that piss champaign. Speaking of which...

• Sangiune is the Daedric Prince of revelry and debauchery, sort of like a less extreme and more specific variant of Slaanesh. Is probably one of the best Daedra to hang out with when he's in a good mood; he also has 100,000 differnet realms, each of which is dedicated to various types of fun and games. He genrally appears as a fat, robed imp with a woman on his arm, but has also taken human and dremora-like forms. One of his quests involves casting a spell at a fancy party to strip everyone naked and then escape the guards, while the other involves a drinking contest with him for the Sanguine Rose, one of his artifacts.

• Sheogorath, is the final piece of cheese needed to complete the puzzle best. He is the Daedric Prince of madness, whimsy, art, and general tomfoolery. He's pretty funny, and when he's feeling benevolent, he does lots of good in the world. When he's not feeling benevolent, watch the fuck out, because he will combine Just As Planned with Chaotic Stupid in the worst and most unexpected way to screw you up a wall without lube, or skip rope with your intestines. There's a series of books that records his beating every other Daedric Prince in some fashion, and a lot of them are just cruel. His artifacts all have significant "lolrandom" elements to them, and his quests are usually really entertaining. May or may not have retired for a life of skipping rocks in some kind of endless river, and recruited the protagonist of the fourth game to take over his realms of wat known as the Shivering Isles.

• Vaermina is the Daedric Prince of dreams, nightmares, and possibly torture. Like Namira, she's a rather unpleasant Daedra and falls more on the side of neutral evil than most of the others. Her quests deal mostly with dreams, such as clearing a temple of her dreaming worshipers to stop the nightmares in a town or kill one of her dreamers who turned traitor. Fortunately, she's not quite as actively malicious as Molag Bal or Boethiah.

Other Gods

There are some that do not belong to the et'Ada yet are of similar or greater power to them. Some of them got their powers through some kind of apotheosis, either self-granted or bestowed upon them. Others just don't fit neatly into either category.

• Arkay (Ark'ay, Orkey, Old Knocker) is the god of the dead, funeral rites and the cycle of nature. Amongst the races of Men his priests oversee the last rites of the dead before they are laid to rest. They also strongly oppose all forms of undead and necromancy and will lead from the fore the fight against those who do not let the dead rest. Arkay's origin is uncertain: one source claims that he is one of the spirits who gained form and thought at the beginning of time and the creation of Ata-Mantia Tower. Others claim that he once was a simple shopkeeper who spent years to decypher a book, only to discover it was a book that explained life and death itself. Near his own death he prayed to Mara for more time to grow his understanding. Instead, Mara gave him the offer to become the god that maintains the balance between life and death, which he chose. The first origin seems more likely given that he took part in the creation of Mundus, but time-meddling could make the second option true as well. And while he is not Aedra or et'Ada, he is one of the Nine Divines with similar powers and bonds to the world that his fellow Aedra have.

• Lorkhan (Lorkhaj, Shezarr, Shor, Sep) is often called the Missing God. He's mostly responsible for the creation of the world, which, to paraphrase Douglas Adams, has been widely criticized and is often seen as a bad move. Most (but not all) elves, are a little bitter about the whole "being trapped in mortal form" thing, while most (but not all) humans are pretty chill with being allowed to exist. Once the Aedra figured out they'd been tricked and were dying, they ripped him up into bits, killing him to death and/or marrying him to tie him down and/or mutilating him so that he would share their fate. It's complicated. What exactly happened to the bits of him is unknown. The Dwemer excavated a stupidly-powerful artifact that they believed to be his heart, while at least one thinker believes that the moons of Tamriel are his corpse, orbiting the world. There's even at least one bit of thought, cloven to by the Thalmor, that all human beings are tiny fragments of Lorkhan, pulled into the world when they're born, and sliding out of it in a shower of pieces when they die. However, unlike the Divines, Lorkhan has at least one mortal avatar, to simplify something complicated, in Talos (below).

• Magnus (who doesn't have any other names, for reasons that will soon become apparent) is the god of magic. Back in the olden days (and we mean so olden that time didn't exist yet and the very term olden was both impossible and meaningless), Lorkhan roped Magnus into his plan to create this newfangled Nirn doohickey as chief architect and designer. He drafted all the plans, put together all the schematics, and, as engineers are wont to do, didn't think one little bit about what he was designing would actually do. Once he realized that the world was essentially a gigantic god-soul-trap/power-drain, he looked Lorkhan in the eye, told him, "Fuck it, I'm out," and left with his army of draftsmen, the Magna Ge. He ripped a gigantic hole in the universe, which became the sun, and all his draftsmen ripped smaller holes that form the stars. And that, as they say, is that. He did, however, leave his staff and one of his eyes behind, and both are stupid powerful. Like, blow up the planet powerful. Ysgramor once killed a whole race of elves to get one. Magnus isn't really "worshipped" anymore, per se, since, unlike all the other gods, he's just gone and has very little influence on or interest in Nirn, though a few deluded wizards (mostly Breton and Altmer, who do not acknowledge Julianos as the god of magic) here and there have tried to make contact.

• Talos (Ysmir, Tiber Septim, the Dragonborn) is the patron of the Empire of Cyrodiil. It is thought that the faith of his subjects granted Talos his divinity, and only by the faith of his people will he keep it. This is what the Thalmor attempt to do in the Fourth Era by banning the faith in him: if Talos (who is Lorkhan) is unmade the Dragon can uncoil and time can once again flow freely. Tiber Septim (his Cyrodiilic name) is revered as a sort of god-emperor and invoked in many ceremonies and daily life as a figure of reverence and wisdom. For lack of others he is also seen as the patron of soldiers and those who fight for the protection of the Empire. He was originally a general for some unimportant dude who wanted to conquer the Reach, and then some thrice-dead Nord king named Wulfharth saw him and decided that Talos could help him satisfy his elf murderboner. He took the form of some sort of dust cloud and helped Talos kick ass, as did the battlemage of the aforementioned unimportant dude. Yada yada yada, they assassinated the guy and made Talos king, after making it look like he was attacked too, founded the Empire, got their hands on the Numidium, and basically got fused into a god by it. Classic Numidium. It's vague and unclear whether he is Lorkhan, is some component of Lorkhan, or has no connection at all, but here's the Thalmor's logic, so buckle up for some imaginary theology: all humans are bits of Lorkhan. Talos was a bit that was so much like Lorkhan that, after death, Lorkhan's mantle of divinity stuck to him. So, by hurting Talos, they're hurting Lorkhan, and by hurting Lorkhan, they're making it more and more likely that creation will be unmade and the elves can go back to being gods while the humans go get fucked by being erased from time because they're not pointy-eared pricks.

• Vivec (Vehk, Vehk and Vehk) is one third of the Dunmer Tribunal, said to be Anticipated by Mephala so worship of her would move to Vivec. His sermons explain much of his birth and life (according to himself at least), where he also likes to write a lot about things like Muatra, his... spear, and how he compared it with Molag Bal's and bit onto his, before giving birth to many of their lovechildren. A recent suggestion by Michael Kirkbride says that MUATRA is Vivec's genitals regardless of his gender (he's both male and female at the same time, but not in the hermaphrodite way), and that when he "put MUATRA in Ysmir's mouth to stop his Thu'um, he might have very well shoved her vagina aroudn Ysmir's head to shut him up. Tradition maintains he ascended to godhood through virtue and wisdom, though other sources claim he stole godhood by using the Heart of Lorkhan, after backstabbing his King, Lord Indoril Nerevar, who had forbidden him from doing so. Also in this way he NTR'd Nerevar by taking his wife, Almalexia, afterwards. Greatly loved by the Dunmer people for doing crazy shit like teaching them to breathe water for a while so he could flood Morrowind to kill invaders. When the Tribunal lost their access to the Heart of Lorkhan, he was the only one who maintained his sanity enough to negotiate with the Talos Empire a treaty so the Dunmer wouldn't get buttfucked before focusing his power on protecting Morrowind from Dagoth Ur. Known to have achieved CHIM, and after the events of Morrowind (the game) uses it in an elaborate ruse for revenge against Azura that ends in him binding her and stuffing his spear in her mouth before banishing her. Of course, she then nuked his country after evacuating her faithful people, so maybe not the last laugh. Last known to be mentioned in a letter supposedly from the 5th era, which is in the future.

Notable People

Other individuals who have been very influential in the history of Nirn. Often they have some link to divinity or another, sometimes created by their own will.

• Pelinal Whitestrake (The Divine Crusader): An ancient hero of the Imperials who came to their aid when they were all slaves rebelling against the Ayleids during the first era. Saint Alessia, known as the Slave Queen for being their leader, prophecised his arrival from a vision granted to her by the Aedra. In addition to having gear like a left hand 'made of a killing light' and a 'chest that gaped open to show no heart, only a red rage shaped diamond-fashion', he was known to scream praises to names no one had heard of yet while drinking the blood of his enemies. In other words, a killer divine-made cyborg from the future and yes, this is confirmed. Was known for going into bouts of Madness where he would charge off alone into wherever large numbers of non-humans were and massacre them all indiscriminately until he calmed down. Truly a hero of the Imperium. Died when he tried to fight the Ayleid sorceror-kings alone and got cut into eight pieces, though not before defeating all of them, at least for the time being. His decapitated head was able to have a chat with his lifelong friend Morihaus for a couple of hours until he finally died, though. Though the whole heartless thing linked him to Lorkhan, enough for the Nords seeing him to proclaim him as Shor incarnate, he hated it enough for one soldier who insisted on it to be smothered by moths that night. Might have been due to his preference for Akatosh, as he sang praises to their 'shared madness' while brutally killing Ayleid captives. Naturally, mer hate him and men love him, even though his name, "Pelinal," is mer and means "star-made knight."

• Morihaus (Morihaus-Breath-of-Kyne): An early hero of the Imperials who fought alongside the Slave Queen Alessia for their freedom against the Ayleids. Is described as a 'winged bull' or a 'man-bull' with a big nose ring, which embarrassed him a lot whenever Queen Alessia disrobed for him. Yes, by 'fought alongside' we also mean made sweet beastlove to. Legend state that Alessia flew atop him. Had a close relationship with Pelinal Whitestrake, whom he called his uncle. Pelinal disapproved of the relationship Morihaus had with Alessia, saying that if he wasn't careful he would beget more monsters in the world. Guess where Minotaurs in TES come from. Was associated with the goddess Kyne/Kynareth for having Thu'um, the ability to shout like dragons.

Races

Tamriel, shown alongside the now sunken islands of Yokuda, the original home of the Redguards, and Pyandonea, a land inhabited by the Maormer, sea-elves.

The first two Elder Scrolls games had eight playable races; the three after that added Imperials and Orcs as playable races, and the upcoming Online game has dropped Imperials as a playable race since it's set before the Empire exists (although oddly enough the fledgling Imperials have been announced as an NPC race).

The races of Tamriel are generally divided into three categories; the races of Men are the various ethnicities of human, the Mer races are the different species of elf, and the Beastmen are explained as "where the fuck did these dudes come from?".

Men

• Imperials: Somewhere between generic west-Europeans and Romans, Imperials are a civilised people, yet very adept at warfare. Many hold high positions in the bureaucracy and politics of the Empire, and form a solid core of the Imperial Legions. The original lore described the Imperial Province of Cyrodiil as being a mixture of classical Roman and southeast Asian, this was watered down in Oblivion to a more generic and acceptable setting for the masses. Unsurprisingly, they're the Romans of the setting.

• Nords: The First Men of the setting. The Nords are basically non-furry Space Wolves, which basically means an entire race of bloodthirsty Vikings. They're notable as the fiercest warriors in the setting. The Nords are in fact the descendants of the Nedic peoples who followed the heroic Ysgramor to the continent of Tamriel after their homeland of Atmora became embroiled in a massive civil war. They then built themselves in the area which would later be known as Skyrim. After the native Elves (who're called Falmer, or Snow Elves) decided to get uppity and tried to fight the Nedes for the control of the stupidly-powerful Eye of Magnus, Ysgramor basically got 500 of his friends together and exterminated the Elves of Skyrim with such fervor and glory even the most grizzled warriors of the Imperium would weep tears of manly respect. They're basically the principal Proud Warrior Race of the setting. And would do well in worship of Khorne if they ever got tired of the Divines. In fact, they're pretty much Warriors of Chaos who haven't turned to the Dark Gods yet, but they will. Oh they will. Why would a True Son or Daughter of Skyrim worship anyone other than Talos!? They're Space Wolves without the wolf fetish.

• Bretons: Best described as half-elves from Bretonnia. Though the inferior elf characteristics have been bred out of race, their thin elven blood makes them adept sorcerers. Their home province of High Rock is one of many quarreling factions, and court intrigue is a way of life. They're a mix of French and Celts.

• Redguard:Hailing from Hammerfell province, the Redguard are skilled warriors, though their individual independence makes them better suited as skirmishers and scouts instead of regular soldiers. They are also skilled seafarers, physically more imposing than Imperials, and managed to fight the Aldmeri Dominion to a standstill, something that the entire Empire managed only at the last second. Their fighters hate the wizards, and their wizards sneer at the fighters, and the few who try to multiclass are hated by both sides. The Redguard are the Moors to the Nord's Vikings.

Mer (Elves)

• Bosmer (Wood Elves):The Bosmer seem as run of the mill Elves at first glance. Then you realise the Bosmer living in Valenwood strictly abide by the Green Pact: a code of conduct that enforces a carnivorous and cannibalistic diet, and forbids the use of vegetable matter as construction material. Resources based off animals (including humanoids!) and materials imported from outside Valenwood are an exempt from this, though. Do have the whole master-archers thing though. They also have the ability to talk to animals, and the ability to transform themselves into a unstoppable horde of ravenous beasts if their homeland is threatened; they famously used this ability to rampage through Cyrodiil and kill Skyrim's King Borgas, who was on his way to the Imperial City to advocate a Skyrim-Cyrodiil alliance against Valenwood.

• Altmer (High Elves): Haughty, long-lived, dismissive of the "lesser" races, skilled mages, et cetera et cetera. This, combined with that their home of Summerset Isle is the birthplace of the Aldmeri Dominion, might suggest that they are all snobbish assholes, but plenty of them reject this life and live amongst the other peoples of the Empire. Also, they really love math.

• Dunmer (Dark Elves): Schisms in the Summerset Isles eventually led the prophet Veloth and followers, the Chimer, to the promised lands of Morrowind. Here they encountered the Dwemer, a race of progressive, very dwarfish elf-kind, against whom they eventually went to war. After their eventual victory and the ascension of three of their number to godhood, they were cursed by the Daedric Prince Azura, giving their skin a blue-greyish tint and blood-red eyes. By the fans, the re-christened Dunmer are often compared to the Jews, mainly because they are disliked by the other people and are forced to live together in a borderline ghetto in Skyrim. (Does that mean that Veloth is Moses? If it does, then doom on you all.)

• Orsimer (Orcs): Descended from a race of Elves who got screwed over and turned into monstrous creatures by by mass torture(which does not seem that outlandish to longtime fantasy fans) by Boethiah. They are fearsome warriors who hold a place of honor in the Imperial Legion. Historically, they periodically had a kingdom called Orsinium in the south of the continent, but that had a tendency to be burned to the ground by the races of man. By the point of Skyrim, they're all either culturally assimilated into other cultures or basically living in walled off communities in the wilderness called 'Strongholds'. In another nod to the original Tolkien orcs, they're also good at blacksmithing and other craftwork with their hands. Their family lives are also really weird in the Strongholds.

Beastmen

• Argonians: A race of warm-blooded lizard people, well-spoken and skilled as both warriors and mages. Some see them as emotionless due to their limited ability to form facial expressions, but mentally they're no different from any other sentient. They are a friendly and intelligent people, but they WILL fuck you up if you mess with them... which they did to the Daedra when they invaded Black Marsh, to the point that the Daedra sealed all the portals to keep from being counter-invaded. Repeat: when a portal opened to the Warp, these guys beat all the daemons and succeeded in invading hell. Bad. Ass. Can breathe water, and have a raging hate boner against the dark elves because of, to put it bluntly, centuries of brutal exploitation and slavery. Oh yeah, and they worship a race of tree creatures who they may or may not be actually descended from. And said trees may actually have survived the repeated restarts of the universe. Somehow.

• Khajiit: Despite being mammalian, the Khajit differ from the Men and Mer races much more than the Argonians. Their skeletal structure and dermal makeup make them appear as giant cats; Call them furries though, and they will end you on the spot. They are skilled desert raiders, merchants and farmers. Their prime export is Moon Sugar, a substance that can be described best as magical cocaine. Also, they are mystically linked to the moons, such that the form they mature into (being born as tiny kittens) depends on the moons' phases when they're born, and varies from cat-men to house cats to gigantic cats that can be used as mounts in battles.

Non-playable races

There are also a number of races that, while not not playable, are rather important in the series.

• Dwemer (Dwarves): Despite being dwarves, they were taller than humans. They were also a kind of elves. However, they're still manly enough for /tg/, because they lived underground, built steampunk robots, and had beards (although said beards were braided in an ancient Mesopotamian/Babylonian style). They have gone extinct sadly, because they were mucking about with a heart that once belonged to a god, and they accidentally erased themselves from existence when they tried to build their own god, in a cave, with a mountain of scraps. This information, combined with the fact they were based off ancient Mesopotamia, hints at they might very well be Chaos Dwarves.

• Falmer (Snow Elves): These guys can't catch a break. After the monumental asskicking they received from Ysgramor and the Nords, the sparse remains of their people fled to live with the Dwemer, who enslaved them and turned them into feral cave-dwelling monstrosities (and used their souls to fuel the aforementioned robots) that are basically like the Wendol from Eaters of the Dead. Seriously, we know from the color of their souls that they aren't even *sapient* anymore. Then they occupied the extinct Dwemers' fortresses after their masters obliterated themselves, living like stone-age savages. A couple of the Snow Elves are still around in an uncorrupted state, and there's hope that the survivors are slowly recovering (or possibly just becoming intelligent enough to launch co-ordinated attacks), but still. *Triple* genocide.

• Ayleids (Wild/Heartland Elves): More elves. Yay. Notable for ruling an ancient, advanced magic-using civilisation in Cyrodiil during the First Era. Also notable for being a bunch of sick fucks. They kept humans as slaves and mistreated them horribly, with such wanton and casual acts of dickery including forcing slaves to work naked for the sheer lols, force-feeding powerful hallucinogens to the slaves again for the lols, creating gardens and sculptures out of human body parts for the lols, and setting human children on fire and then loosing hungry animals on them, again for the lols. Eventually a Joan of Arc wannabe named Alessia teamed up with some badass named Pelinal Whitestrake and together they led a slave rebellion and schooled the pointy-eared bastards in Humanity Fuck Yeah. After a long and bloody campaign, the Ayleid civilisation, and their whole race, was no more. Their ruins can still be seen dotting the Cyrodillic landscape. In fact, the iconic White-Gold Tower of the Imperial City is of Ayleid construction.

Games

Though several spinoffs were made, when referring to "The Elder Scrolls" only the five central games are being referred to.

The Elder Scrolls I: Arena

Jagar Tharn, the Imperial Battlemage and trusted servant of the Emperor Uriel Septim VII turns evil, locks the Emperor inside Oblivion, and takes over Tamriel. His apprentice Ria Silmane discovered this and told the player, so Tharn killed the former and imprisoned the latter. Yet Silmane persisted, and helped the player escape prison and revealed how Tharn could be destroyed: by recovering the eight parts of the Staff of Chaos from all over the empire. The player succeeds, kills Tharn, returns the Emperor and all is well. This was the only game to take place in all of Tamriel.

The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall

The player, a personal friend of the Emperor, is sent to the city of Daggerfall, High Rock to investigate a haunting by the ghost of the former king. Things quickly get out of hand when you discover the Numidium, a massive golem used by Tiber Septim to gain control over Tamriel. There are several mutually exclusive endings possible; canon opted to make them all happen in an event called the Warp in the West, a Dragon Break, where time and space took it up the ass hard.

This game is infamous for a number of reasons. First, it's the biggest game in the history of forever: though a good bit of it is empty space, this game features a map that's twice the size of Great Britain. As in, all of it. Secondly it has more bugs than Macragge during 745.M41 and is about as stable as a card house during Exterminatus. Third, dungeons are randomly generated, meaning you have ruins, ruins EVERYWHERE. Finally, the bizarre instructions. Early on in the game you get a letter from a person who wants to meet you in, say, Westfield Inn, Daggerfall. When you go to Daggerfall though, no Westfield Inn. Then you realise you have to look for the VILLAGE called Westfield Inn.

Oh, and there's a song that sounds like The Animals' House of the Rising Sun.

The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind

If you can explain at least 75% of what's going on on this image, you are a true fan.

Widely regarded to be one of the best vidjas OF ALL TIME. Taking everything good about the first two games, perfects it, raises its ass high and beckons you to make sweet, sweet love to it. Morrowind ships the player to the island of Vvardenfell, in the Dunmer province of Morrowind, where you are to report to the perpetually shirtless crackhead called Caius Cossades to investigate a cult that is growing rapidly in size. This cult is revealed to be the doings of the Sixth House, a clan of Dunmer that was destroyed after its leader, Lord Voryn Dagoth, rebelled against Lord Indoril Nerevar, the leader of the war against the Dwemer. Nerevar died shortly afterwards (though it is unclear if he died from the wounds Dagoth inflicted on him, or that his advisors, the Tribunal, killed their lord so they could use the tools of the Dwemer to grant themselves near-divinity), and the Tribunal took over as the god-kings of the Dunmer.

Yet Dagoth did not die, and when the Tribunal returned to the site of Dagoth's defeat, the chamber the Dwemer had found the Heart of Lorkhan (the heart of a fallen god which grants them their power), Dagoth and his servants were waiting for them. Taking away two of the three tools needed to renew their powers, the Tribunal retreated and built a great barrier (the Ghostfence) to contain Dagoth and his followers. The Ghostfence drains much of the Tribunal's power, making them unable to strike at Dagoth directly. Taking the moniker of Dagoth Ur, he began to reshape his followers into monstrosities, his highest ranking followers being made akin to Illithid, and corrupting the regular Dunmer through their dreams. He also unleashes the Corprus, a horrific disease that turns you into something Nurgle would approve of.

That's where you come in. A decade after the completion of the Ghostfence, on decree of the Emperor an unnamed prisoner is shipped to the island of Vvardenfell. Your co-prisoner, aside from being a total bro, one day becomes a saint by exterminating all Cliff Racers (see below). You quickly discover that you may be the Nerevarine, the reincarnation of Lord Indoril Nerevar, who killed Dagoth Ur many centuries earlier. You also catch Corprus along the way, but are cured with the side effect of making you immune to disease and basically immortal. But it takes more than that to rise up against House Dagoth: you will need to be named Nerevarine by four tribes of Ashlanders (native Dunmer who practice a nomadic life), and Hortator (war leader) by three of the Great Houses. This involves a LOT of running around and talking to people, especially with the Ashlanders and Great House Telvanni. When you have their support you are summoned by Vivec, the leader of the Tribunal, who gives you a Dwemer-made gauntlet that allows you to handle the other artifacts, Sunder and Keening, without them killing you on the spot. At that point you assault the citadels of the Sixth Houes, taking down Dagoth's most powerful followers, the Ash Vampires (think 7' grey-skinned completely ripped Chaos Dwarfs), and eventually Dagoth Ur himself, by way of destroying the heart of Lorkhan with the recovered Sunder and Keening. House Dagoth is once again destroyed, you walk into a clear sky, and are given a magical ring by Azura for your trouble.

What made this game an instant classic was its new and unconventional story(Dune) and setting, its many factions, beautiful environment design (giant mushroom towers ftw), its emphasis on your stats instead of your player skills (combat is more like a pen and paper RPG: there are rolls to see if you hit your enemy, and for how much damage, which severely gimps your effectiveness with warhammers if you're untrained in them, but you're very good with longswords), the metric fuckton of items you can find (there are dozens upon dozens of unique weapons, pieces of armor and magic jewelry to find, there's something for everyone), the desolate beauty of the world, the unusual creatures, taxi services provided by massive ticks, and the smug end boss.

Two expansions were made: Tribunal, where you traveled to Morrowind's capital city of Mournhold after being attacked by an assassin, featuring a large city with its wide underground ruins, the wider Dwemer ruins under them, and the even wider Daedric ruins under them. In Bloodmoon you travel to the frozen wastes of Solstheim, where you got to play Skyrim 9 years before Skyrim came out.

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

Emperor Uriel Septim VII and his heirs are assassinated, and it's up to the player who was unintentionally released from prison to fix that shit by finding the Emperor's last son who had been sought out the last known child of the Camoran Dynasty, the family who had ruled over man for years before Alesseia came and slap their shit. It was the first big-name RPG to appear on this generation's consoles, and made the Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 work for their money.

Two expansions were made: Knights of the Nine was a "Heroic" (If you call taking on the responsibility of a genocidal paladin heroic) Fantasy story that pitted the hero against an evil wizard, and Shivering Isles has the player recruited by Sheogorath, the Prince of Madness, to prevent the destruction of his realm.

Players felt that this game was being dumbed down for the console kiddies when compared to Morrowind, whereas the Oblivion fans claimed that Morrowind was a difficult mess of a game, unplayable due to its learning curve. It was kind of like the 3e VS 4e debate, except both games were actually cool. And both groups were right.

Has received criticism over the fact that your character is largely insignificant in the story line (although many found this a change from the all too common "You are the super magic hero savior Chosen One" storyline that plagues fantasy settings) , and the fact that virtually all NPC dialogue sucked hard.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Also known as the Volsunga Saga: The Game.

You're a prisoner, but in a shocking turn of events, this time you're actually told WHY! Turns out you crossed the damn border illegally, you filthy alien (of course, if you are a Nord it's just chalked up to bullshit bureaucracy). And you're to be executed along with the a group of captured rebels called Stormcloaks, along with their Horus rip-off leader known as Ulfric Stormcloak (who is voiced by Vladimir Kullich). Before you're sent to Sovngarde (Guess what that is. Go on.), a giant dragon god named Alduin the World Eater decides to introduce himself to the world. Alduin being Akatosh's firstborn son while also being his aspect and also being him... it's a bit complicated like that.

Anyway, you escape and after much badass manly Viking dragonslaying, you figure out that you're the translated foreign word, much like in Morrowind. This week, you're the Dovahkiin, DRAGONBORN! With the power of the THU'UM! The ability to project your vital essence into a magic shout in the Dragon tongue! So yes, fighting a dragon is basically one big fucking debate (HA! You fucking wish it was with an Ancient Dragon on Expert difficulty). The only way this could be more awesome is if you can beat dragons in drinking fights.

Oh yes, and you can be a man and join up with the rebel Stormcloaks (as any true Nord would do), or join the Imperial Legion and hold on to what remains of the empire. The Empire used to be cool, but now it's run by some nasally old man and his manfaced bitch second-in-command. Though the actual Emperor is still pretty cool, and has the same hammy voice of the Guards of Oblivion. YES!! You can also join up with the less generic fighter's group in this game called the Companions, and thus gain one of the best battleaxes in the game; Wuuthrad. Which is an elf-killing battleaxe wielded by the father of of the Nordic people. There are also the other guilds such as the College of Winterhold (Mages guild), the Thieves Guild (speaks for itself), and the Dark Brotherhood (assassins guild).

Like Oblivion and Morrowind, two major expansions were made for Skyrim. Dawnguard has you choosing to either side with the vampires or the vampire hunters from stopping a plot to blot out the sun forever (and trying to score with a sexy as fuck vampire princess), while Dragonborn is a fight between the First and Last Dragonborn over the issue of screwing over Hermaeus Mora.

The Elder Scrolls Online

The game will be set thousand years ago, before the events of Skyrim, where Molag Bal, the Deadric Prince of Domination conspires with the Tharn Family (current rulers of the Akaviri Potentate) and Mannimarco, the King of Worms, to use the state of Tamriels civil war to merge Mundus with Molag Bals realm of Coldharbour.

The games' factions will be as follows: The Aldmeri Dominion (Altmer, Bosmer, and Khajit), the Ebonheart Pact (Dunmer, Nords, and Argonians), and the Daggerfall Covenant (Bretons, Redguards, and Orcs).

The player character will be known as the Soulless One, whose soul was taken from him/her by Molag Bal (apparently so that it can justify the countless resurrections in-game).

You start as a prisoner.

It has pretty good lore.

Memes

The reactions of players everywhere to the sequel of The Lusty Argonian Maid.

Like Dawn of War, The Elder Scrolls have spawned a considerable amount of memes.

• HALT HALT HALT HALT. The guards from Daggerfall shout this when you're running from them: it should have been a single HALT, but due to bugs it keeps being looped.
• N'WAH! Shouted by Dunmer in Morrowind onwards. Since you fight a lot of Dunmer in Morrowind, you hear this one a lot.
• STOP RIGHT THERE, CRIMINAL SCUM is Oblivion's most popular meme, and has its own page.
• If you become the champion of the arena in Oblivion, you can be followed around by the Adoring Fan: a Bosmer with an ugly as fuck haircut. He is often taken to Dive Rock, a location with one of the game's deepest drops, and kicked off.
• Cliff Racers are one of THE most infamous enemies in gaming. They're flying reptile things that move faster than you do (without exploits), descend upon you making a godawful sound, and wail on you until you kill them. Jiub, the guy who wakes you up at the beginning of Morrowind, became a Saint of the Tribunal Temple after killing them all.
• Mudcrabs are somewhat of a meme on their own, but in Oblivion they are a frequent subject of discussions between people having seen and avoiding them.
• The Lusty Argonian Maid is a play written by Crassius Curio, a noble of Great House Hlaalu. He is famous for his rather... forwardness with the player (he'll only sponsor you in House Hlaalu if you strip down for him, and will support the Hortator only after a kiss). He is the author of The Lusty Argonian Maid, an infamous work involving an Argonian maid polishing the "spear" of her (self-insert)master. There's a sequel in Skyrim involving a "loaf" "sating" the "appetite" of the maid's "mistress". The latest Skyrim DLC adds in a book in the same style called "The Sultry Argonian Bard" about a "private performance" of the title characters "delicate instrument".
• Wonderful! Time for a celebration! Cheese... FOR EVERYONE! Shouted by Sheogorath during the Shivering Isles main quest.
• FUS RO DAH! is the first Dragon Shout you learn in Skyrim (well, you learn "Fus;" "Ro" and "Dah" come later). It means "unrelenting force," and it's basically a Force push. It is highly effective against pretty much anything, especially if it's got a cliff behind it.
• "I used to be an adventurer like you; then I took an arrow in the knee" is one of the pieces of random dialogue that any NPC guard in Skyrim can say when spoken to, or when you just happen to pass too close to them and they feel like chatting, and a version exists for each different guard voice-set. As a result, while playing Skyrim, you will hear from an awful lot of guards, from all over Skyrim, both male and female, that their promising adventuring careers were cut short by crippling knee-related injuries. The frequent use of the phrase inspired a derived meme wherein it is declared that "I used to X; then I took an arrow in the knee" (sometimes using the line as an interruption to an existing text which happens to contain a line fitting the format). The joke took the form of plaintext or image macros and briefly made the rounds on the internet (including, of course, /tg/) due to Skyrim's massive popularity. It wishes it were as cool as Oblivion's "STOP RIGHT THERE, CRIMINAL SCUM". (As a matter of fact is actually a metaphor for being married.)
• Have you seen those warriors from Hammerfell? They've got curved swords. Curved. Swords. Currrrrved. Sworrrrrrds. Guards from across Skyrim will repeatedly inform you about these currrrrved sworrrrrrds as if it's some kind of hypnotic suggestion. Or just plain suggestion

See also

• Scrollhammer: if the Elder Scrolls and Warhammer had a bastard son, it would probably be like this.
• Unofficial Elder Scrolls RPG: A pen and paper RPG currently in the works.