Elder Scrolls Why Morrowind is a bad RPG

[S.torch]

Projecting a bit, kid?

Hadly so, I'm not the one trying to hide my tastes behind warped up definitions to fill a perceived status.

Anyway, if you value good writing, books are a superior medium to video games.

And why I wouldn't enjoy it in both RPGs and books? I understand that some people have a low attention span and can't hardly pay attention to RPGs, let alone to a book, but not everyone is like that.

 

[octavius]

Anyway, if you value good writing, books are a superior medium to video games.

So...? It still doesn't mean you don't want a good setting for a video game.

So it's setting now? A good setting doesn't need much writing. Show, don't tell.

 

[Harthwain]

So it's setting now? A good setting doesn't need much writing. Show, don't tell.

It was always the setting for me. And I disagree with not needing much writing. I doubt Morrowind would be as good without the bits of lore that fill its setting.

 

[S.torch]

"Show don't tell" he repeats what his favourite vlogger/youtuber said for the 98324324234th time.

Meanwhile the game has an encyclopedia style dialogue and dozens of books with relevant details about the lore.

 

[octavius]

So it's setting now? A good setting doesn't need much writing. Show, don't tell.

It was always the setting for me. And I disagree with not needing much writing. I doubt Morrowind would be as good without the bits of lore that fill its setting.

The good writing in Morrowind was not the lore in the books. That was of fan fiction level quality.

Except

The Lusty Argonian Maid. (Or was that Oblivion?)

The good writing was the greetings, combat taunts and the conflicting accounts at what really happened with the Nerevar all those years ago.

 

[Harthwain]

The good writing in Morrowind was not the lore in the books. That was of fan fiction level quality.
The good writing was the greetings, combat taunts and the conflicting accounts at what really happened with the Nerevar all those years ago.

I didn't mean just the books. I also meant all the other things you mentioned. Not sure how you're not counting them as either lore or writing.

 

[octavius]

The lore in MW is mostly books and encyclopedia NPC, which generally is low quality writing IMO.

 

[JarlFrank]

I mean the glass armor is the best light armor in the game. Besides the Dark Brotherhood armor, there are 4 types that yield complete sets, but the two weakest of those are already useless straight out of the gate, because you can buy chitin from the first merchant in the game.

Poor progression if you happen to be using light armor, sure, but I don't think that makes for a great criticism of the game overall. Progression in terms of generic armor is just not a very big part of the game.

I never understood the armor progression complaints. I find this a lot better than later TES games that have a more strictly tiered armor progression. In Morrowind, some armor types don't even have full sets so you need to mix and match with others, and some are roughly equivalent to others so they are technically redundant.

But it makes sense for them to exist. The material exists. Someone made armor out of it. So here you go, you can pick it up and wear it.

There doesn't have to be any other reason for the armor's existence beyond that. Morrowind attempts to portray an actual world with a believable economy and society. Of course there's gonna be redundant items. That's not a flaw, that's by design.

 

[deuxhero]

Morrowind's armor progression is actually pretty well done, except for a few horrible flaws ruining everything. Like weapons, armor is roughly in four tiers of poor, normal, good, and artifact. Poor gear (like netch leather or iron) exists purely to arm NPCs without the PC being able to loot anything worth carrying, while a full set of normal gear (chitin, steel) is obtainable by the PC as soon as they loot the starter dungeon. Good gear is exceptionally rare and a major event to find (in theory) but offers significant increase over normal gear, while artifact gear is unquestionably the best in its category and unique. The problems comes from
1: Medium armor is very poorly implemented. It starts exactly on par with heavy armor but lighter, it lacks full sets, is wildly inconsistent in power within the same set, and never progresses past good tier without the expansions (where it's totally tedious to obtain)
2: Light armor's "good" (Dark Brotherhood) and "artifact" (glass) tier options are both way too easy to obtain.
3: Even as an artifact tier armor, glass is way too powerful for light armor. It beats even the best medium armor in the expansions.

 

[Jaedar]

I never understood the armor progression complaints.

It makes perfect sense as a complaint.
For light armor, you have like 5 complete sets which have the same defensive stats (really low) and then it goes straight to the best in class, which is glass armor. Glass isn't that hard to come by, so I guess some people feel it is too easy. Imo the main problem is that the progression goes worst armor -> best armor with nothing in between. Glass is not better than some heavy armors, but iirc it has higher defence than the best medium armor.
For medium armor, it doesn't have any actually lategame sets, and the best set will make ordinators aggro you on sight.
Heavy armor has good progression, daedric is incredibly rare (although there is one character with a full set, but he's important to the main quest so killing him is not advised), and there is a good curve of increasing strength.

And of course, if you have the expansions installed, the dark brotherhood set breaks light armor progression even further.

 

[NecroLord]

Morrowind's armor progression is actually pretty well done, except for a few horrible flaws ruining everything. Like weapons, armor is roughly in four tiers of poor, normal, good, and artifact. Poor gear (like netch leather or iron) exists purely to arm NPCs without the PC being able to loot anything worth carrying, while a full set of normal gear (chitin, steel) is obtainable by the PC as soon as they loot the starter dungeon. Good gear is exceptionally rare and a major event to find (in theory) but offers significant increase over normal gear, while artifact gear is unquestionably the best in its category and unique. The problems comes from
1: Medium armor is very poorly implemented. It starts exactly on par with heavy armor but lighter, it lacks full sets, is wildly inconsistent in power within the same set, and never progresses past good tier without the expansions (where it's totally tedious to obtain)
2: Light armor's "good" (Dark Brotherhood) and "artifact" (glass) tier options are both way too easy to obtain.
3: Even as an artifact tier armor, glass is way too powerful for light armor. It beats even the best medium armor in the expansions.

Heavy armor has the best selections - Ebony, Daedric(you can find daedric pieces of armor only in specific locations or on Divayth Fyr, an essential NPC), Dragonbone Cuirass(artifact), Eleidon's Ward shield(artifact), Ten Pace Boots(artifact), Helm of Oreyn Bearclaw(artifact).
Did I miss anything?

 

[deuxhero]

Heavy is best at artifact tier, but its early game is horrifically bad. Steel (the "normal" tier) has 15 armor. The "normal" medium armor, Bonemold, has 16 armor and some incomplete sets have even better (Dragonscale and some medium chain armor has 20). Good heavy armor, Dwemer, has only 20 armor (equal to some "normal" normal armor), but "good" medium armor (Orcish, Dreugh) is relatively common (every shrine to Malacath has parts and then some), and better than all but artifact level heavy armor (30 or 40)

 

[Blutwurstritter]

What do you call someone who is a gameplayfag, settingfag and storyfag rolled into one?

A person who appreciates quality.

I thought the official terminus was Schrödinger's Fag, but as a humble newcomer, I'm willing to leave the final word to the fully-fledged faggotry experts at this institution.

 

[Zed Duke of Banville]

The good writing in Morrowind was not the lore in the books. That was of fan fiction level quality.

Except

The Lusty Argonian Maid. (Or was that Oblivion?)

Oblivion had the poorly-written second excerpt from the play; Morrowind had the real thing:

 

[laclongquan]

Anyway, if you value good writing, books are a superior medium to video games.

So...? It still doesn't mean you don't want a good setting for a video game.

Games, in particular combat-heavy games which is most RPG is, dont actually NEED setting. See Jagged Alliance 2. Or hell, the early XCOM. Or UFO ET. Or Darklands. Their setting, background is as barebone as it can be, and mostly borrow from popular media from news to movies. What if any difference is just game devs shove in to create some minimum distinction from original source.

Sure, if you can develop a distinctive setting for the games, it's nice. But that risk mediocre-level writings. So do it without does have an advantage of not risking THAT. As any anti-POE players can vehemently vouch for.

"want" show a personal preference. In my particular case, I have nothing much on that score. I dont "want", but I also do not "not-want" either. Very nice if a nice setting, but not ragequittan in tear if not have. I care more about level of writings than setting, which is why I rate myself more of a storyfag than a settingfag.

And a word of caution: if you settingfag want to pretend storyfag to bash on me, bring it on! I am itching to beat some fake-storyfags and take your lunch money.

 

[Butter]

Brother, Darklands is like top 5 RPG settings. You could hardly have chosen a worse example.

 

[Harthwain]

Games, in particular combat-heavy games which is most RPG is, dont actually NEED setting. See Jagged Alliance 2. Or hell, the early XCOM. Or UFO ET. Or Darklands. Their setting, background is as barebone as it can be, and mostly borrow from popular media from news to movies. What if any difference is just game devs shove in to create some minimum distinction from original source.

I guess it comes down whether you want something generic or more distinct. Games like Jagged Alliance (or DnD-derivatives) work on familiarity: a modern world doesn't need much explanation. However, it still took quite a bit of writing to flesh out specific aspects of the game to make them believeable (backgrounds of mercenaries, their relationships with each other, even the premise, etc.). And for an RPG that is aiming to have a more distinct setting, like Morrowind, this is even more true.

In this context I still maintain that you want good writing in a video game to back up its setting, so directing people to books instead is a puzzling advice to give, in my opinion.

 

[laclongquan]

Brother, Darklands is like top 5 RPG settings. You could hardly have chosen a worse example.

And what, exactly, is the setting of Darklands. Isnt it something something medieval, something something european, most likely, germanic , like Holy Roman Empire.
What, exactly, is unique or much invested in the setting of Darklands? That is not coming from historical source, I mean.
The one weakness of Darklands is actually its setting, Holy Roman Empire. I mean, I love that period, kinda like Romance of Three Kingdom but european instead of chinese. But as a storyfag I can tell you straight out that it's niche as fuck. Nobody other than some indepth, esoteric-loving, storyfags would play games in that setting. I mean, the earlier Roman Republic/Empire era at least there's some characters you can name like Caesar, Pompedue, Cleopatra, some stories you can tell, like Caesar rise and fall to power, etc...

What, exactly, is characters and events in Holy Roman Empire you can name? The owner of courier service, Tarick or Thur or something, nobody remember or care. Event? nothing~ There is, but, well, nobody care outside of HRE-major historical students. I think there's a golem origin story, but I think that's Jewish, so it's not Roman, not Empire, and certainly not Holy.


The main reason that, despite its strength in gameplay, nobody would play Darklands much or mention it... guess what? yeah, its background setting, Holy. Roman. Empire~

 

[S.torch]

And what, exactly, is the setting of Darklands. Isnt it something something medieval, something something european, most likely, germanic , like Holy Roman Empire.
What, exactly, is unique or much invested in the setting of Darklands? That is not coming from historical source, I mean.

The "problem" with Darklands it's that is has barebone writing. Not the HRE, the HRE is great.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance takes place in the HRE, and is a very nice game bro.

 

[xuerebx]

So it's setting now? A good setting doesn't need much writing. Show, don't tell.

It was always the setting for me. And I disagree with not needing much writing. I doubt Morrowind would be as good without the bits of lore that fill its setting.

The good writing in Morrowind was not the lore in the books. That was of fan fiction level quality.

Except

The Lusty Argonian Maid. (Or was that Oblivion?)

The good writing was the greetings, combat taunts and the conflicting accounts at what really happened with the Nerevar all those years ago.

Have to agree with this. Morrowind is one of my favourite games but I definitely never read a single book. I never read a single book in the whole ES series. I don't play games to read books, I'd read a book if I wanted that (with that said, having the books in-game still adds value to the game world).

 

[NecroLord]

The in-game books were also written mainly by Kirkbride.
Lots of lore and such.

 

[Lord of Riva]

Daggerfall is way better than morrowind, at least it does not pretend to be anything other than a sandbox.

When I play morrowind I normally play through one of the factions quests and then loose interest, it's fine for that but yeah.

 

[Falksi]

I like Morrowind but let's be honest with ourselves. The last time I played, I found glass armor halfway through and that lasted through to the final boss. That was the only really significant piece of equipment I ever got.

This is also when the economy totally breaks, where money is only limited by Bethesda's classic trick of making it so fucking boring to walk to the store to sell stuff that you just give up on money entirely.

Wait a sec...Glass Armour is the only significant piece of equipment...so the Boots Of Blinding Speed aren't significant at all?

 

[Sarathiour]

I never understood the armor progression complaints.

It makes perfect sense as a complaint.
For light armor, you have like 5 complete sets which have the same defensive stats (really low) and then it goes straight to the best in class, which is glass armor. Glass isn't that hard to come by, so I guess some people feel it is too easy. Imo the main problem is that the progression goes worst armor -> best armor with nothing in between. Glass is not better than some heavy armors, but iirc it has higher defence than the best medium armor.
For medium armor, it doesn't have any actually lategame sets, and the best set will make ordinators aggro you on sight.
Heavy armor has good progression, daedric is incredibly rare (although there is one character with a full set, but he's important to the main quest so killing him is not advised), and there is a good curve of increasing strength.

And of course, if you have the expansions installed, the dark brotherhood set breaks light armor progression even further.

I'm pretty sure bloodmoon added a new set for all type of armor, including medium.

 

[JarlFrank]

Daggerfall is way better than morrowind, at least it does not pretend to be anything other than a sandbox.

Could be if it had more actual content rather than being 99% randomly generated stuff that repeats very quickly.