First, a bit of background. I got Oblivion a long time ago, and loved it, but didn't really know how to play it. I was still new to video games, I'm not sure if I even finished it. I wanted to do everything, and eventually the game just became a hunt for quests, checking the wiki to see if I'd found everything. It wasn't fun, it was an obsession.

So I quit, got into other, more action-oriented games. After a while, Mass Effect, then Dragon Age pulled me back into RPGs. I loved the characters in those games, I loved watching my Commander Shepard grow without my input. I wasn't planning on that.

My friend convinced me to give TES another shot. I figured I might as well start at the beginning, and downloaded Arena. It's fun, but I still feel I'm missing something. It's all so empty, just a bunch of ways to level up. I poked around these forums for a bit, and became convinced I'm doing something wrong.

Am I unable to roleplay? In Mass Effect, I just chose dialogue responses based on the little I knew of my avatar, and before I knew it, I had created a strong, caring woman out of a bunch of pixels. I never felt the same way with my Oblivion characters, probably because I wasn't forced. There's no how-to guide for roleplaying. I could create a background for my character, but I always seemed to get distracted, forget who I was.

I thought of how to try and make my TES playthoughs more interesting and meaningful, and had an idea: I could write a journal for my current character, in-character, updated every game day. The journal would not only contain my character's adventures for the day, but also his/her thoughts, feelings, etc. I thought this would turn my quest grinding into a personal journey, a real story.

But is this a good idea? I've done a lot of creative writing, but never really been in-character for a video game. Is it realistic to expect to create a developed personality based on a background I designed and a bunch of experiences in a video game? Will this really make me enjoy the game more? Is it just silly? Has anyone else done this?

The thing with TES, unlike Mass Effect, is that YOU make YOUR character, not BioWare's character. Now, Oblivion (unless heavily modded) and Arena are not going to be the best games to do that fully, but Daggerfall and Morrowind would be a great first place to go.

Morrowind is sold on Steam for cheap, and should easily run on any computer 5years and older without much issue. Hell, even my [censored] laptop from 2006 can run it well enough, even with some character model overhauls. Daggerfall even more so, as it's still a DOS game.

Now, to start RPing, you should make some restrictions yourself. Such as, if you're a warrior character, you should NOT join the DB, TG, and MG. Make a backstory too, and give an idea of the personality of your character. Maybe your character also prefers certain weapons and armor over others.

If you want to play a Beth game other than TES, FO3 and NV are also good choices.

It might also be easier come Skyrim, due to you actually having dialogue trees instead of selecting "Rumors."

Or "Morrowind," "Vvardenfell," "Almalexia," "House Hlaalu."

At least in Daggerfall, your character actually strung together a sentence based on what topic you were asking about and how you were speaking.

I'm planning on buying Morrowind and playing through all the TES games. I'm just wondering if anyone's done the journal thing before, and how it worked out.

I have a very good imagination when I choose to apply it, and I've come up with character histories before, but I always forget them and tend to just play on autopilot.

Just so you know, Daggerfall is free, and is downloadable on the TES website.

Yeah, I've done that.
It's practical too; you can keep things like alchemy recipes and maps and directions written down in it. And it really does improve immersion and make your character and his time in the world seem much more real and engaging; I enjoy it immensely.

In fact, just the other day I saw some people talking about doing exactly that for Skyrim (making journals for their characters), and they made a forum for roleplaying stuff for TES. I haven't checked it out yet, but you might be interested: http://z13.invisionfree.com/The_Skyrim_Tavern

edit: Qawsed Asap, I forgot what the link in you signature was and clicked it again. Now this tune will playing on my computer for hours, and in my head for days :bonk:

Ya mean like writing custom entries into the journal? http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=Mods.Detail&id=2577 and http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=15294 does that.

Hrmm...I should try to do that, especially amongst my intellectual and/or adventurous types.

I've tried that a few times in the Baldur's Gate games. It can be pretty fun, but after a while, I ran out of ways to say, "Today I killed a bunch of people and stole their stuff."

I have done exactly that from Arena to Morrowind: Tribunal so far. I'm planning to contnue it through Oblivion to Skyrim.

The best way I found to do it was try to keep how my character would act in mind, yes, but in large I would take screenshots pretty often and then after I was finished playing I would write the journal based off the screenshots. Somehow, I always find more to write about looking at my screenshots in hindsight, as you would your memories while writing a journal, and it made it easier.

My adventures in Arena and Daggerfall were short, since I wanted to get through to Morrowind. However, in Morrowind the journal is now around 200k words, and has transformed to more of a story than a journal because there is so much that happens. I also kept a library of the better screenshots in a seperate folder, in chronological order.

I enjoy table top roleplay, which was part of my owjn inspiration to do this, but it was mostly because one day I realsed I have spent thousands of hours in TES and have nothing to show for it. These journals and screenshots will be something I can always look back on, but at this point seem to be something that might not be done for a loooong time.

I'll show you how mine is laid out. Grammer and spelling will be off, since its just a personal project that I never intend to be widely seen.

-Second day in Arena-



-Small segment of Day 293 in Morrowind, Tribunal to be exact-



On Mass Effect and such.... Bioware games are my favorites for their stories and character interactons. However, I play them, beat them, and don;t touch them for around six months, beat them, repeat. I play an Elder Scrolls game once a week. It's the difference between buying the LOTR Extended Editions and playing Lord of thew Rings Online. Both are great, but serve different purposes.




Yeah, thats why I can only do these things with Bethesda games, since you can effectively 'live' in the world. You still can run into the problem depending on how you play, but its lessened if you are actually roleplaying. Even for a hero, a band of thieves with bows is a worrying prospect. Each battle is another time you 'ticket' might be stamped.

I have tried the "writing about my characters adventures" approach in the past, but it never really worked out for me. I ended up thinking more about doing stuff that would look good on paper than actually enjoying the game, heh.

What I do when roleplaying a character is to write up a backstory beforehand, decide various personality traits based on that backstory, and then try to remain consistent with those traits when playing the game. Of course, the main quests - in both Morrowind and Oblivion - do their best to prevent you from doing so*.

Alixen's approach is also good if you have the patience, and I agree that it would be nice to have *something* to show for the countless hours spent playing a game other than just the memories.

Other than that, I guess that just getting into your characters "head" and acting accordingly would be sufficient.


*
Morrowind example: Many of the early Blades quests involve breaking some sort of law, be it Imperial or Dunmer law. Suffice to say, my "Lawful Good" Redoran did not particularly enjoy robbing an ancestral tomb for an Orcish Necromancer. (Luckily I had LGNPC Nerevarine installed, and promptly sold out Sharn to the Inquisition as soon as she gave me the information I wanted.)

Oblivion example: My rogue Telvanni in exile character had to rely on a Mages Guild Argonian to figure out the Commentaries despite having figured them out by himself already. He was also forced to work with the Blades against his will despite there being no need to do so. He also easily translated the Mysterium Xarxes by himself, but was still forced to rely on Martin to do so. (Granted, only a snippet of the book is shown to us in game, but still.)

You don't need to rely on Tar-Meena unless you want to or can't figure it out yourself. The only thing she's needed for is her copy of volume 2 and the lead to get volume 3.

Morals bend knee to convenience.

Haven't played Oblivion in years, so I can't really remember the exact nature of my problem. If memory serves, the quest refused to progress or allow me to progress before I went to see Tar-Meena. Could be I just misunderstood something back then.

Once you get all four books, you can go straight to the Tomb of Prince Camarril, and never need to ask Tar-Meena for help figuring out the "code" in the commentaries. You do need to see her to find out where you can get book 3, and get her copy of book 2 if you don't have it, but you never need her help on finding the secret message.

That Journal Mod sounds like fun. I'll try an use it. It will help me keep track of all kinds of things I'm doing.

Anyway, just think of the things your character would do and act according to his/her personality. A backstory is useful especially when you don't know what choice you should make. Maybe your character would make a choice based on past experience. You've done creative writing so I think it's really easy for you to come up with a character.

Gameplay wise, just play Personally, I've never kept character journals but soon enough I'll try that journal mod, not for RP purposes though. What TES lets you do and Mass Effect doesn't is that in TES you can come up with your own replies to characters. In ME you must choose one reply out of a bunch. Both are two of the best game series out there though.

Have fun with the games. By the way, if you play a spellsword, battlemage, agent or even a monk, you can easily justify joining the Fighters Guild - you need the money, that's it.

That's exactly the kind of 'grinding' mentality I have, and am trying to avoid.

@ Alixen: That's great stuff! I was planning on doing an in-character journal from a first-person POV, I don't have your awareness of lore and vivid imagery/imagination of events to try something that broad in scope. Thanks for the advice about screenshots, I'll try that.

That's very true. The problem comes (especially in BG) in that it's really hard to make yourself play as a real person would, and it's really hard to write an explanation for why you spent a month sleeping in a room with a red dragon, casting exploding skulls and setting traps every eight hours. I guess you really have to either give up on playing effectively, or give up on writing accurately. The journal doesn't need to know about how you shotgunned five bottles of ground deer heart right in the middle of battle.


TES focuses on choice-of-quest, not choice within quest. Ayiocco killed Caius Cassodes, and chilled with the Telvanni. Stares-into-Abyss refused to participate in the politics of some of the mages guild leaders, and so he never gained entrance into the Academy. Uther turned down most of these strange murderous requests that were passed his way, and spent most of his days collecting herbs for himself and for others, turning them into potions, and selling them. Occasionally the plight of an especially sympathetic plaintiff, such as the family whose farm was besieged by goblins, earned his attention.

^ is really why the MQs have to be end of the world scenarios, that's really the only situation that draws the attention of all the various knights, rogues, and magi.

In Morrowind's case, the threat is not revealed until several quests into the main quest. It's actually a problem, since from a roleplaying perspective, only a select few character types would actually bother following the orders to seek out Caius Cosades to begin with. Many of the characters who *would* do so, would be appalled at the thought of going to a Thieves Guild den to seek out a moon sugar addict (The fact that it's a cover wouldn't necessarily be obvious.), and even more so when he starts asking the character in question to break the law repeatedly so his informants will give him information. (Trading in Dwemer artefacts? Illegal by Imperial law. Desecrating ancestral tombs? Disrespectful, illegal by Dunmeri law and by extension - due to the Armistice - Imperial law.)

It is horrific how many times i've gone back and changed things in my journal because I learned more lore. Or mistakes I'd made. It was actually the project that MADE me learn the lore. I realised that if I was going to effectively play someone as involved in the world as a hero would become, I would need to know more, and it sort of snowballed from there. I'm still finding lore mistakes I have to go back and change. It started as a fun little project but has become something of an obsession. I wish I could keep it simple; at this point its taking a week after each 'play session' to write out the events and then sort the screenshots I want. I played through Tribunal - and i'm hoping that I might finished and chronicled Bloodmoon by the time Skyrim arrives.

Honestly, its less awareness of lore than always having this section of the site on tab, aswell as the Imperial Library and the UESP. As for the vivid imagery/imagination, thank you for the compliment, but that too is actually a side effect of the project growing beyond what I planned. Each day in Arena and Daggerfall was around eight or so paragraphs, with the weeks and months of travel skipped with a small summary. However, with the pure depth of Morrowind I found each day stretching out beyond a thousand words. Also, as the character comes more 'alive' wth experiances, they will have more to think about and say. If you really get 'into' this I predict yours will grow in a similair way.

I use FRAPS - and as I noted I find it easier to write afterwards with screenshots, and more thought occur, because i'm in a different mentality. Ingame, i'm playing a game. When i'm finished actually playing, I can look at things as a writer. At the least they might offer an aid to memory.




Yeah, my character stood no chance of beating the Giant Robot before Sotha Sil (I forget its name) and so I don;t go into depth with the battle, just describing it as her keeping her distance and shooting, as a sngle blwo at close range would squash her. Almalexia praticaly one shotted her, so I used the ring of Helseth as a roleplay tool, and made it the only reason she survived over a dozen potentially mortal wounds. The expansions are hardcoe. =(




I actually looked into all the storylines and made my character with them in mind, rather than being honest and just leaping in and roleplaying as things happened. Mostly because I want to carryt eh character through games. Anise is an Imperial-Raised Dunmer (to fit the Nerevarine prophecy, with the Dragon-born part fitting for Skyrim) who studied as an Apprentice Nightblade in the Imperial court which gave reason for her to be friends (though not student of) Ria Silmane and gave her a way into the Arena story, and after saving the Emperor it gave an in to Daggerfall as the Emperor's most trusted agent and friend. She gave the Mantella to the Underking (and her 'death' was undone by the Jills - or one version of her died, while the others versons lived) and as such was considered a traitor to the Empire, which led to her being a prisoner in Morrowind. In Tribunal she plays puppet to Helseth and Almalexia because she wants to try and buidl bridges between the two and needs to earn eaches trust first. I'll be getting her to Oblivion by having her shunned by other powers of Morrowind, the Nerevarine title having no 'power' behind it, and assassination attempts from the Morag Tong driving her away, while Helseth arranges a false expedition to Akavir. After Oblivion she will live out her life happily with her companions (each Companion taking leadership of a faction, while she is only Grey Fox and CoC) until they die of age, and she wanders into Skyrim over 200 years later.

I used the fact that the letter threatens you^^ Vvardenfell is a small place and inhospitable, and the letter makes it clear that you are not expected to abuse the Emperor's mercy by denying his request. Anise figured that she was still really a prisoner, but in the indentured servtude manner rather than being imprisoned.

Sorry for the double post, but i've been fnding the forum only occasionally lets me edit posts.

Welp. 7 nos, 5 yeses. That plus Alixen pushed me over. The new Nathius will hit Arena after midterms.

BTW, do non-thief classes get to see much illegal action? I like stealing stuff, but I don't want to pick a weaker combat class. Is it possible for, say, a Battlemage to pick the occasional pocket?

Bah. I'll probably do multiple playthroughs anyway.