Hello again. I have a question about exploration in Oblivion.

Often the game gets criticized for being "bland" or "mostly empty" (ridiculous if you ask me, I think the game is the opposite of bland), but it did raise an interesting question I had.

Is exploration in Oblivion worthwhile?

I have played for approximately 90 hours on my new character, and have found and explored quite a few points of interest. However, I noticed a few things in my travels.

One, I noticed there seems to be no hand-placed loot in the game world. Is this correct? Everything in chests, coffers, containers, etc, seems to be leveled, random loot. I have yet to stumble upon a cave and find "Legendary Item of Awesomeness" hidden at the end of the cave. For comparison, a game like Morrowind had hand-placed loot all over the place, and if you knew where to look, you could locate some of the best items in the game early on. I could travel to this certain cave, brave the terrors inside, and at the end of the cave be rewarded with an item that was unique, interesting, and in some cases, find an item of legendary Tamrielic lore.

So really, I ask myself, is it worth exploring each of these caves and ruins and forts and etc in Oblivion? So far I would say yes. Even though I have found mostly leveled loot, it's been fun piecing together the story of each of these places and having a fun adventure taking on whatever cast of bad guys the area has to offer. It's just been fun. That's one aspect of Oblivion that gets overlooked. It does seem like every area has a story to go with it.

I just went into the Ayeleid ruin Ceyatatar, and fought conjurers who were summoning Daedra. There were books about Daedra on the tables along with alchemy gear and other Daedric-related things. It told a story, which I thought was awesome. Here was a cave where these evil magicians were living with Daedra. Very cool indeed.

But has it been rewarding? I think it has, but I'm curious to see what others think about it.

So my final questions would be -

Is it worth exploring every ruin, cave, hideout, point of interest in Oblivion?

Is there any hand-placed, unique loot in the game world to be found by simply exploring?

And please, no spoilers! Don't respond with, "if you go into cave X you will find item Y!!". I don't want to be spoiled to the locations of these items if they exist, so please, none of that.

Thanks!

If you're looking for hand placed items of awesomeness, there are very very few. I can only think of one actually and you would be unlikely to find it purely by random exploring. Most of the unique loot items are associated with quests.

My character doesn't care a bit about loot however, and after 1850 hours of living in and exploring Cyrodiil, I see no end in sight. Traveling, visiting, clearing dungeons just for the thrill of the hunt never gets old. At least that's my fortunate experience.

If you're looking to become amazingly powerful and rich from a single item, then Oblivion isn't your game. Oblivion excels in landscape - the beautiful hills, the swaying grass, and the varied environments. Dungeons are all unique in terms of design, although there are only three or four tile sets.

As Acadian said, it's the thrill of crawling through a dungeon that makes exploring in Oblivion so much fun. You never know what's going to be around the next corner!

Don't explore every ruin, cave or fort in one playthrough. In my opinion this is no point of exploration.

Create different characters with different motivations - perhaps one might be a scholar interested only in Ayleid ruins, the other one a warrior looking for loot in old forts and so on... my current character entered only one Ayleid ruin so far and even that was because of an associated quest. Otherwise he avoids the ruins because he feels very uncomfortable in them. That way you will get different experiences from forts / caves / ruins.


Yes and no.
Yes, it is worth exploring but not with the same character and in the same playthrough. It is also worth exploring the same locations with different characters. One character may sneak all the time and the other one might storm the fort, smashing everything standing in his way.

Thanks for the responses!

I love exploring in Oblivion, but I do admit that it could probably do better if it had more hand-placed loot. I understand they wanted to make most of those items quest rewards, but it would be very cool to stumble upon some unique items in caves or ruins.

Still, I find it great fun just exploring each cave or ruin or mine that I find, when I'm in the mood of course. Like Solitudian said, you never know what's around the next corner! Fun times!

Do not listen to the people who claim that Cyrodiil is "bland." The people who say Cyrodiil is "bland" are unable to perceive or appreciate subtlety. These people are tone-deaf to nuance. They are the kind of people who think Thomas Kinkade is a good painter.

There is remarkable variety in the game world. The difference between Cyrodiil's southern marshlands, its snowy northern mountains, rolling grasslands and towering deciduous forests are anything but bland to me.

Oh I agree. I don't listen to those people. It seems that people just parrot things about Oblivion these days. It's become popular to hate the game.

But no, I don't think it's bland at all. Every cave and ruin I've been in has been unique and interesting. I don't fast travel so I get to walk the land plenty, and it's got some very subtle differences in terrain throughout the map. I especially love the swampy marshlands of Blackwood. But it's all beautiful.