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 Post subject: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Jan 19, 2014 6:34 am 
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What features from Morrowind would you have liked to see in Skyrim or would like to see in the next Elder Scrolls game? The main ones that I can think of are the proper journal and throwing weapons but I'm sure there are other things.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Jan 19, 2014 8:18 am 
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For TES VI:
Separate pauldrons and greaves and not the all inclusive cuirasses of Skyrim.
An altar or something like one for custom spell 'building'.
Mark and recall but make them 'master' level spells and not usable for enchanting rings & things. Make it cost to use them.
An expanded crafting system. One including more than the making of potions, armor and some weapons.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Jan 19, 2014 8:36 am 
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I want the vague directions to places and the lack of a compass to hold your hand to the destination. The wandering around lost helps sell the effect of the world feeling so large, and it encourages exploration. I also wouldn't mind fast travel being restricted back to being purchased transport like boats and silt striders, though I rather suspect those features would never be removed. The Oblivion and Skyrim players would throw a fit that their hand holding aids are gone :O

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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Jan 19, 2014 5:41 pm 
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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Jan 19, 2014 6:13 pm 
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I felt like Skyrim should have had a hardcore mode that was a mixture of options from F:NV (you need to drink, eat, sleep, heal wounds properly) and Morrowind (pay attention to the journal, for it is your only friend). So I obviously still want to see it in the future. Likewise, I want the more complex armor sets back. While I usually stick to the same equipment set, it makes me feel as if I have extra control over my character through what they are using.

As a note, while I don't see an issue with saying what features from Morrowind we want to see again, anything else should go into the instead of here.

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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Jan 19, 2014 7:18 pm 
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I would be fine if it was optional, but I didn't like wandering around for hours with vague directions. I'd hate that to be forced in again. As far as what to bring back, I'd like to bring back more spells from Morrowind like Levitate and Water Walking (don't remember seeing that in Skyrim). Also, having 3+ major factions to join (like one of 3 Great Houses) would be cool, in Skyrim it's never more than two.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Jan 19, 2014 7:41 pm 
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In terms of Morrowind, I mixed the choice of apparel, from wearing armor with clothing, to the variety of pieces. While yes, I can recall the annoyance of too many assortments and the pain to hunt them down.. thee can be a middle ground met, while still making it all look really nice. Plus.. I just want to wear a skirt with my armor again ;-;

Also, I kind of miss the selection of weapons, or at least the practical ones, as well as medium armor. I will admit, you could say the journal system was better in some degrees here... but I don't believe we should revisit what Morrowind had. Yes, I did enjoy how your hand wasn't guided everywhere and it actually took some questioning to find your objective, but at the same time.. directions in Morrowind were pretty poor... so if anything, I like how Daggerfall had it.

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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Mon Jan 20, 2014 1:22 am 
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The best 'feature' of Morrowind was the world. A huge part of that was the variety of factions, which involves not only the quantity, but also the relative exclusivity of the joinable factions in the game. You can't play through all of Morrowind's content with a single character, you have to make choices about who you side with and what you do, and not only does that give Morrowind a far greater degree of replayablity than any other TES Game, it also gives the player a sense of power while making the world of Morrowind feel realer as well. In huge part, this was due to the dicotomy between the Imperial culture and the native Dunmer society, best exemplified by the choice between Imperial Cult and Tribunal Temple. This could have been taken farther by adding a joinable Dark Brotherhood and/or Camonna Tong, or another Tong of mercenaries or hunters to contrast with the Fighter's Guild, but the Great Houses alone did a great deal to make Morrowind, in my eyes at any rate.

This richness is mirrored in the variety of the different materials and artefacts in Morrowind, giving the world a sense of authenticity and interestingness. It felt cool finding a piece of high quality armour or weaponry, or coming across a unique item without any quest to it whilst exploring. I remember the guides and the FAQs and the forum posts about things like how to get a set of Glass Armour straight off the boat by going to Ghostgate and stealing it from the smith there. I remember the number of people who went out in search of that lost mine just so they could acquire a Daedric weapon at a low level, or who blitzed through House Hlaalu for a free set of Glass Armour. Those things stood out for people because they felt good, but do Oblivion or Skyrim really have such workaday, yet at the same time so very noteworthy and special, occurrences?

That's what was so great about Morrowind, and what we've lost, at least in part. That element of the design process, which may have came from Morrowind being one of Bethesda's first fully handcrafted TES titles, was what paid off and made Morrowind so magical.

Other than that, I'd personally like to see the variety of different skills and other options of defining your character on paper (Attributes and so on), making a comeback as a newly integrated part of the new character progression system (and Bethesda could add perks while they were at it). Spears, for example themselves aren't that amazing or essential, in my eyes, but the mere fact they were an option meant that you could replay Morrowind again with a new and different flavour, aside from making the world feel deeper and richer.

The same goes for the variety of equipment, which touched on before. Not only could you find so many different items, with both native and Imperial flavours that added to the sense of world, but you could equip them with far more freedom simply by having a few extra equipment slots. On this front, gameplay, and the notion of balancing a skill like enchanting by removing equipment slots, if made a focus, does have its cost and it's this cost too that I hope Bethesda considers carefully when they sit down to work on the Elder Scrolls again.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Mon Jan 20, 2014 2:47 am 
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How about...everything?

I'd like to see a re-embracement of the roleplaying ethos. I want my decisions to actually effect my character and the world around me. In order for that to happen, we must have a dynamic, handcrafted setting. And we must be presented with actual decisions to make.

I'm talking about having multiple dialogue options in quests, that won't all elicit the same response. Making my character build actually impact my playstyle. Making it so I can't become the leader of every faction when some are politically opposed. Making it so choices made in one questline will influence the outcome of another parallel questline. Doing away with invincible followers and NPCs. Allowing me to kill or ally with anyone I darn well please. Allowing for permanent decisions that can't be taken back - just like real life. And allowing for at least the vague possibility of failure. Without this there is no success, and no reward.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Mon Jan 20, 2014 4:57 am 
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BetaB, OD, and DemiV say almost everything that I'd like to see transplanted from Morrowind into TES VI.

Aside from that though, I'd like to see real depth in the questlines. They were so sorely lacking in Skyrim. Figuratively speaking, I sneezed my way through the questlines. I feel like the Twin Lamps faction had a deeper story than the Companions.

I'd also like to see the resurgence of spell effects (as spell effects and not limited to alchemy or enchantments [which annoyed me beyond belief]), their importance ("Is that a high level Magic User? Don't worry, health potions can take the place of Silence!"), and accessibility (hey, if you've got the money, why should a spell be kept from you?).

Finally, I feel like a lot of the skill it took to be a great and versatile Magic User in Morrowind was lost in its successors. I'd like to see a re-exploration of Magic, to where it seems like the only limits really are your own imagination.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Mon Jan 20, 2014 5:02 am 
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I really loved how scary the world was at level 1, and how scared everything had to be of you by level 25. I think that enemies should not be tied so closely to the PC's level, I like the feeling of having areas too dangerous to safely explore... Yet. In the same strand; the ability to take out low-level enemies like a scythe through wheat makes levelling up actually feel like progress.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sat Jan 25, 2014 3:33 pm 
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Morrowind was so huge and detailed and deep, Oblivion just disapointed the crap out of me.. Seriously. Aside from the graphics I was so let down.. I beat it right away and went right back to Morrowind. Something I liked in Morrowind was the interaction with the npcs. I loved being able to ask them all about rumors, advice, their background. Although many things were repetitive and generic answers were often given it made it so easy for me to literally walk around and emerse myself in the whole world.. literally roleplay for hours in a way I have never been able to do in Oblivion or Skyrim.

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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 12:30 am 
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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Wed Feb 19, 2014 10:13 pm 
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There are several points about Morrowind that made it truly the amazing game it is today:

1.) FREE WILL. In Morrowind there were a lot of crucial choices to be made that will affect the rest of the game. An example would be joining only one of the three great houses, or killing an essential character (with some more essential than others, i.e. Vivec.). There is just so much that you have to be careful with and make the right decisions about, and you don't get that from Oblivion (as amazing as Oblivion is) or Skyrim. In Morrowind, you can actually MARRY someone (Ahnassi), become a werewolf, kill 5 GODS, and become the head of nearly every faction in Morrowind!

2.) SPELLS. Spells like: jump, levitate, lock, slowfall, swift swim, poison, blind, sanctuary, sound, Almsivi intervention, Divine intervention, detect animal/enchantment/key, mark, and recall are only available in Morrowind, which really lets you learn something more practical and strategic when casting. Also the apparel can have constant effect enchantments OR they can allow you to cast a spell for free, which is EXTREMELY useful.

3.) LORE. The sheer jump from a game as relatively empty as Daggerfall to something as complex as Morrowing is an enormous feat. There were 59 in-game books in Daggerfall; in Morrowind there areat least 350 books. They greatly expanded on concepts such as Divinity, Dwemer, Chimer, artifacts, and Daedra. There is an enormous amount of information in Morrowind, and to attempt to combine it all onto one book would be sheer lunacy.

4.) QUOTES. There are so many highly respectable people with very wise statements that just make them seem all the more important. Such people include: Dagoth Ur, Vivec, Almalexia, and Dreamers.

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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Fri Feb 21, 2014 2:12 am 
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BRING BACK MICHAEL KIRKBRIDE!


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Fri Feb 21, 2014 8:42 am 
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The above post is the "42" of this thread.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sat Feb 22, 2014 7:03 am 
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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Feb 23, 2014 3:53 am 
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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Feb 23, 2014 5:17 am 
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I remember reading some of Doug Goodall's musing on The Elder Scrolls, in which he discussed Rolston's approach to implementing a number of possible truths, with seemingly no preference as to which should be considered the truth, as the foundation of quest design and lore. We see this in Morrowind, and the TES universe as a whole, in a number of levels, from the macro level of questions about divinity and the Empire, tot he micro level with various different quests and interactions between NPCs.

That, to me, seems to be one of the key philosophical choices that give Morrowind such appeal. The player has agency, not only in what they do in the game world, but also in what they choose to believe about the game world. Almost every faction in Morrowind was one which we were presented with varying perspectives and accounts of, often with no real tendency towards one or the other. This ranged from Ashlander heretics who provide a different version of the Tribunal's rise to power, to the Arcturian Heresy that provides a different account of Tiber Septim's life and character.

I've seen mor eof this in ES:O with some of the lore being presented about House Dres and the Dunmer in their practice of slavery (and I've been meaning to post/working on an OP in which I hope to explore more of this idea). I'm honestly hopeful that in staying true to key philosophical decisions like this, that the wonder and appeal of Morrowind might yet be recaptured.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sun Feb 23, 2014 7:34 am 
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It is my understanding that Goodall actually disliked the relativistic approach you're talking about. Props for the implementation of this actually go to Rolston IIRC.

My interpretation of your statement was that there were other developers you would rather see make a comeback. If you're citing Douglas Goodall as one of them, I have to agree to disagree. Not that I don't respect much of his philosophy on RPGs. But I don't think anyone carried as much weight as KR or MK. And I'm not speaking hierarchically within the dev team. Just in terms of long term impact on the series - how their contributions brought to fruition those elements of TES I most enjoy.

With TESO, I think my reaction will be one of surprise in it either exceeding or falling short of my expectations. Right now I'm in cautious territory. Huge potentiality, but huge risk. There are so many possible pitfalls I don't know where to begin. But I tend to be on the critical and scrutinous end of the gamer spectrum. I do believe they're doing good "R&D" in the lore department, but it's hard to make a judgment until I can experience it firsthand.


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Mon Feb 24, 2014 4:12 am 
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Yeah Goodall was frustrated by Rolston's tendency to not have a single 'truth' for the player to discover, although he wasn't strictly opposed to telling multiple stories about the same events. Personally, I like Goodall, but I wouldn't say that I necessarily want him back, my point was that Rolston's philosophy (as discussed by Goodall) is what I'd like to see make a comeback, and I don't feel that only Rolston or MK can bring back that philosophy (new devs can learn from what they did well is what I'm saying).


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sat Mar 01, 2014 3:26 am 
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Really? Lore? Is that what everyone thinks is the best part of Morrowind? Clearly, Morrowind's single greatest feature, indeed the greatest feature of any game that has ever been made, is the Colovian High Fur Helm.

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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sat Mar 08, 2014 2:09 am 
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The magic - the wide array of spells to tackle everything with. Can't cast invisibility? lob a blind at someone. Can't rally a good defense against a caster? pester them with sound. Need a way to out run enemies in a non-lethal manner? AoE speed altering (my favorite being Levitate 1 pt on target with 15 range aoe and a more substantial version on self). You describe it and there was a way to make a spell for it (but spell lists got way too long for my saves so I had to start condensing down into worthless spells that just held the effect).

The disposition - I don't really know why, but this one really stuck on me after awhile. I grew to like having this system that made various people share information more willingly based on my actions/affiliation etc... I know something is still present in skyrim, but it never felt the same as in oblivion or morrowind (or at least rarely seemed to matter as for some reason most people you needed to interact with were willing to share whatever easily upon meeting them if you had enough speechcraft... I do miss jedi mindtrick illusion spells)

Endless training - I just don't see the point of capping training sessions

equipment options - I really miss being able to mix and match everything from gloves (left and right), shoulders (left and right), and every other item. Sure it got monotonous when trying to min-max, but it let you make some really bad ass looks if you got the right pieces pulled together. (an old favorite was pulling some steel, imperial, a mix of clothing and a few things i don't remember to get a ranger/gladiator looking get up to traverse solstheim in)


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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Mon Mar 10, 2014 7:32 pm 
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 Post subject: Re: Morrowind's Best Features
PostPosted: Sat Mar 22, 2014 3:43 am 
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+1 for the separate pauldrons. I also think the daedric armor style has gotten worse in oblivion and skyrim.


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