Thanks. So the way the situation feels to me, the moon was destined to fall. Using souls to power the Ingenium was wrong, despite the massive loss of life that followed its failure. Would you really have wanted the Dunmer people to go on with their lives, at the expense of who knows how many prisoners and other unwilling victims? It's a devil's choice all right. There could be no good outcome when trying to prevent the Ministry from falling.

I have a feeling there was a bit of Vuhon being a dike. Well, the use of the Ingenium wasn't to directly use the souls to power it in order to keep the moon from falling. Instead, it kept a window of Oblivion open, Clavicus Vile in this case. Because Vile has a hard on for souls, Sul mentions he wouldn't have cared how much of his energy was leaving the realm, as long as souls were pouring into Vile's realm to keep the window open.

Where were the three good Daedra to the Dunmer then?

Take a wild guess.

What would they have done?

Despite being labelled "good", I doubt the Daedra give a damn about mortals. Except as toys.

Truer words cannot be said about the princes.

The Dunmer shoulda had Fyr come and open a door to Oblivion and just drop the Ministry in.

You place too much faith in the isolationist Telvanni.

It was a joke. And besides, Fyr has been known to be relatively well traveled and outgoing for a mage-lord. I didn't really put faith in anyone quite frankly. I wouldn't expect the Telvanni to help anyone but themselves. And honestly, I'm sure the Telvanni knew that the MoT was unstable. Why wouldn't they do something they had to know they would be in danger as well.

I just think the Telvanni would be mostly intact after this crisis, is that so hard to imagine? (Because that's clearly what you're implying, that I'm wrong about that.)

What I am saying is you place too much hope for a group of insane, unpredictable, isolationist mages, who never look out of their windows, and only gave the player the title of nerevarine, because they really didn't give a crap. Hell, you could have burned down an entire city of theirs and be allowed back in, because the mage-lords are, quite frankly, a little too preoccupied with their own wealth and research.

Also, they're only rich, because they hoard treasures and artifacts, but that's only for the high ranked guys.

Really, play through their quest line, they really don't look further than their own noses. Aryon is an exception, but even then, he's not THAT much of an exception. He also does keep an imperial guard as an exhibit, plus he's young (for a Telvanni magelord) And the Vvardenfel group are really the most adventurous bunch, the guys on the mainland are worse!

That's not to say I don't like the Telvanni, I loved them a hell of a lot. It's just too much of wanting to keep what people perceive as the cool guys must survive gets annoying because they did such and such, when behaviors presented indicate something else. Plus, it gets annoying when everyone things they're a bunch of nigh-omnipotent wizards, even though a Morag Tong agent or the soon to be nerevarine can slay the most powerful Telvanni on the Vvardenfel or another mage-lord. Plus, it's pretty much only the Mouths and the Mage-Lords who are the biggest power, but even they were having extreme difficulty stopping the invasion.

I've played through the Telvanni more times than any other guild in Morrowind.

Even the most isolationist person would surely recognize a danger that posed a threat to themselves! Even a magelord sitting in his study for hours on end, I'm sure if a servant came along and said "Oh, master there's thirty Argonians outside with their spears ready to prod us!" The mage lord give enough crap to walk outside and turn them to ash because the danger is to themselves.

I'm not saying the Telvanni would be like "ZOMG SAVE TEH WURLD" but any of them would be like "Oh better stop these lizards before they come for me."

Like in Oblivion how one of the rumors talked of the Telvanni closing Oblivion gates. The same exact principle. If the Telvanni didn't care enough, why did they actively close Oblivion gates?

See, you say the part about the Nerevarine and Morag Tong, when in Morrowind, the only Morag Tong agent that even gets a contract for a Mage-Lord is the Nerevarine, and quite frankly, you can't say that they are not powerful based on the fact the Nerevarine could kill them, as the Nerevarine slapped around 3 false gods.

Basically, what I'm saying is yeah the Telvanni wouldn't be world saving superheroes but they would protect their own territory (like mentioned in Oblivion.) And I'm sure an average Telvanni mage is a good match for about 5 Argonian foot soldiers provided they weren't in spear distance.

Hmmm, it's rumoured those pocket oblivion realms have these awesome glowing sphere things with magical enchantments on them. I really dig those sorts of things. You over there, initiate, go get one for me. bliviongate:

Even if that's the case, (which I doubt.) an Initiate that could close an Oblivion gate single handedly could easily handle some Argonians.

"Oblivion" mentions that the Telvanni are having trouble closing the gates, if I remember right. Also, any Argonians that show up won't just have spears, they'll have magicka themselves. But this is nitpicking on my part.

I'm not sure that the Argonians got as far north as Telvanni territory when they invaded Morrowind. The novel "The Infernal City" mentions that there are a few Argonian settlements in the south, but we don't hear of settlements any farther north than that.

The point of my comment about Oblivion wasn't to say the Telvanni are powerful, but instead to show they care enough about their own territory to do something about an invasion.

What I'm saying is if the Argonians made it up to Telvanni territory, even the most antisocial Telvanni sorcerer would surely have done something. (and I'm sure the average Telvanni wizard would easily outclass any mages the Argonians have to offer.

Actually, the argonians did go as far north as the crater Vivec. When Sul came out of Oblivion, he lands back in Vivec, but there were a hell of a lot of argonians and they were performing a ritual at the crater.

Exactly.

And don't forget, the Hist was driving the Argonians. It doesn't matter how powerful a Telvanni mage-lord is- it's basically contending against a horde of mindless people hell-bent on ripping your heads off. Eventually, everybody runs out of Magicka. And then your enemy takes your head.

Besides, this is all after the massive confusion of tidal waves, raining ash, explosions, earthquakes, the Telvanni were anything but organized. And against them was a highly organized hive-mind of Hist-driven Argonians.

I don't quite remember, but I don't think there is any mention of people going east to the Telvanni lands. Or Cheydennhal.

The Telvanni Isles is highland, meaning minimal impact from the tidal waves, the ash all went south due to the wind, and the earthquakes/explosion wouldn't be a factor so far from ground zero.

I guess I don't see how being under the influence of the Hist would make the Argonains more powerful. We're talking about wizards who are thousands of years old, who have studied some of the most powerful artifacts and arcane secrets. I don't think it would be a stretch to say that the Council could destroy the advancing army alone if they all used their powerful magic.

Were talking about one of the most powerful unions of mages, arguably the greatest outside of the Summerset Isles, not a bunch of Mages Guild hedgewizards.

EDIT: And just because the Argonains made it to Vivec doesn't mean they went any more north on the mainland. The north of Morrowind mainland on both sides of Vvardenfell is militarily much much much stronger than the south, and the nature of the natural disaster would leave both of these places relatively intact. (Both areas are highland.)

Redoran was crushed by the nords earlier, not to mention the daedric invasion really softened them up badly. There is no way in hell the northern mainland is stronger on the west side.

We're talking about 40 years later. That's a whole hell of a lot of time. And come on, southern Morrowind hardly even has an army, I don't think Dres farmers, Hlaalu merchants and Indoril priests could compare to even a shattered Redoran army. Why do you think the Argonains utterly walked all over Southern Morrowind? Because Morrowind's military prowess lies up north.

But seriously, you don't think House Redoran could recover in 40 years to become a military power again? There's plenty of evidence of it happening in the real world.

Yeah, but dunmer don't breed quickly, and there was the civil war, in which redoran was on the losing side (if you consider that canon)

Well why wouldn't I consider it canon?

What I'm saying, is even though the Redoran wouldn't be close to where they were militarily before Morrowind, they would still be recovering in power, and would stand a chance against in an invasion, albeit a small chance.

And what I am saying is that they were in bad decline, suffered bad invasions from nords and orcs right after Morrowind, then the civil war in which Helseth, Hlaalu, and Dres were beating them, then ravaged extremely hard by the Mehrunes Dagon, even smashing their new capital and all their leaders. Coupled with slow breeding rates among elves, Redoran was in an extremely bad situation from the get go. With the Red Year, followed by an invasion by argonians, if Redoran didn't flee to Solstheim, they would have been deviated. Redoran was already a heavily weakened house, almost as much as Indoril, who never recovered since the treaty between Vivec and Tiber.