These are old ruins built on top of older dwemer ruins and so on. Like infinite turtles.

Actually the Dwemer build first in the Velothi mountains (the border mountain range between Skyrim and Morrowind). They moved to Vvardenfell later.

I've been neck-deep in the Morrowind Dwemer assets for about 3 years now working on a mod and there are alot of stone components aswell as metal components. If you look closely at the largest Dw. tower in MW you'll see that it has a large chunk taken out of it - a stone chunk. So do others. Dwemer ruins are about 60/40 stone/metal composiotn otTomH so the ruins in the shot aren't that far off the MW assets.

I think people automatically think of the metallic towers as they're the most distinct but I say inspect them further - you'll see the stone. From that shot there still seems to be a mix so I'm optomistic. It feels like Beth. is going all out for this one :goodjob:.

I'm fine with the redesign.

Also, it's not like the Dwemer in another province was bound by Dwemer law to produce identical looking structures like they had on Vvardenfell. As for the lack of metal, Vvardenfell is an area that is incredibly rich on minerals compared to Skyrim perhaps.

My theory:

Dwemer would not use metal because these were temporary dwellings on the journey from Hammerfell to Vvardenfell. Being on the move would mean limited resources and that includes metals. What metal they had or could get would first go to weapons and machinery, they wouldn't be lining the walls with the stuff.

I'm quite pleased that Beth are taking a new visual direction with the Dwemer. Suggests some thought has gone into the matter. Although it's a bit surprising for Pete to just drop that revelation on us like that!


Says who? Surely this can't be canon...

A book in Oblivion actually. "Commentaries on the Mysterium Xarxes Book Three
by Mankar Camoran"

Oh, it is actually namechecked in-game? My bad!

Why won't people call them Dwemer instead of Dwarves? is that some kind of funny as High elves are to Altmer and Wood elves are to Bosmer? Dwemers context is Deep elves no? they were only Dwarves among Giants.. blast you to hell Oblivion

Sorry, but Oblivion was way to simplistic - the central port of a huge multicultural empire had no sight of foreign traders and culture, the whole place was supposed to be an enormous heart of a very diverse empire, it's not even about the jungle, it's about the fact that when you imagined the great Imperial City you expected anything but bland, mono cultural unimaginative gray pile of rock. Every road leads to Rome, you know the saying, and the same was supposed to be true for the Empire and the Imperial City, what we got is not even close to what all the previous stories about the city and it magnificence implied.
Oh, and the "change" fact was only invented in Oblivion it self, in one book... They probably realized how badly they dropped the lore and invented the last minute "rescue" which is just lame.



House Dwemer is specifically mentioned in Morrowind many times. They as well as House Dagoth where one of the houses of elves that later became Dunmer. At last that's what all Morrowind books say.



Yep, me bad, it's kind of hard to remember sometimes that they all "morphed" But it was the same people, just looked differently before.

Because "in-universe" there is a debate if Deep Elves was a correct translation of their name or not. A potentially Dlyxexic translation of it has it as Smart Elves instead.
You also have the Dwemer named Dumac Darfking. Take in consideration as well that Dwarves is the name imperials use to describe them.

People keep assuming the word 'dwarf' means 'short person'. It really doesn't. That's something that has eveolved over a long time. Original dwarves are no shorter than any other men.

But the Other Merish don't have a parallel pet name that the Dwemer do :/ where they are known (unfortunately) as Dwarves, there are no similar names for High elf Altmers, Wood elf Bosmers , and Dark elf Dunmers. and yes I am apart of the group who hear's Dwarves and instantly gets a knee jerk reaction when its used to describe the Dwemer, knowing full well the Dwemer where no shorter than the avg elf :.

Alright enough off topicness

velothi Mountains run the eastern lenght of Cyrodiil, why would they go through enemy territory to reach hammerfell when they
could have scoured through Cyrodiil, unless of course we are talking Pre-nord arrival which then would make sense.

Dwarf != short. I just said that.

But i thought you were agreeing with me and saying Dwarf didnt neccesarily mean short D: or is the exclimation mark = not

In programming the exclamation point with an equal sign means "does not equal". And it looked like you were saying dwarves were short, because you said that them being called dwarves upset you because Dwemer are not short (and the connotation is that Dwarves, in opposition to this, are, causing your unpleasedness at the term).

Post-nord and post-alessian rebellion. Either way they were going through enemy lands. I guess they figured they'd take the strait route.

Dwemer, Deep elves.
Skilled craftsman and smiths.
they were very interested in pursuing the scientific arts.

so this town. Markarth. looks like an old abandoned dwemer mining community.
you see many entrances into the walls of the surrounding mountainside. which leads me to believe that it was a mine of sorts before it was anything it is now. also it is possible that multiple building types may have been built in the same place.

we really need to try hard to realize that the dwemer could have had more than one architecture type.
remember the big jump from imperial architecture in morrowind to imperial architecture in cyrodil?
i would imagine that this is along the same lines.

I was surprised when playing Oblivion and then Morrowind to find the huge architectural difference between Cheydinhal and Seyda Neen when compared to most of the other places in Morrowind, like Vivec and Balmora.

I'll have to postpone my judgement until I actually venture inside that place. But from the outside I would have never guessed it to be of Dwemer origin (if this is supposed to be the case).

I'd better be seeing steam powered machines and cogwheels though, and not some race of ancient Gimli's and Gloin's! The Dwemer were a unique race whereas Dwarves are just generic fantasy.

Look at the far right tower in http://images.uesp.net//4/41/MW-place-Bthanchend.jpg pic as posted earlier, and then at the tower in http://static.zenimax.com/bethblog/upload/2011/01/Markarth021.jpg.
They look pretty close to me, especially considering the graphical improvements that are coming with it. I wouldn't expect anything to look identical.

Close in that they are both roundish and at least partially made of stone. Not so much in any other way though.

You fool!

Tolkien based his Dwarves (Dwarfs, actually. Tolkien deliberately spelled it wrong and it has become popular) on the Norse Myth of Dwarves as skilled forgers for the Gods. They made many of the Gods' weapons and armor, such as Mjolnir (Thor's Hammer) if memory serves. Therefore, Dwarves (Dwemer) in Skyrim follows Norse mythology, not necessarily Tolkien Mythology.

Until the Dwemer remove their Assyrian helmets, unpleat their Assyrian beards, get short, squat, start using axes all the time, and wear Norse helms and have Norse names, and lust after Gold... they're not Tolkien's Dwarves.

i see no similarity. none.
but i suspect that Vvardenfell structures were made that way to cope with the geological activity from red mountain, and harness that energy, hence the steam powered devices.
however Markarth seems to be a mine of sorts, i suspect that the more Dwemer like things are not skin deep, you have to go looking for them inside the structures.
BUT what does seem interesting is that the tower in the screenie has arrow-slits. RATHER LARGE arrow-slits!
Dwemer Balistas?
and its surrounded by water! Dwemer Steamboat?
FOOD FOR THOUGHT!

As people have already pointed out(but I'll be more to the point) Dwarves didn't use to mean short. In mythology, they were just elves that lived underground, which is essentially what TES dwarves are.

Also keep in mind, the Developers didn't come up with Dwemer first and then say, hey... we can call these guys Dwarves too. They took the concept of Dwarves, and repurposed it, and then to give them a lore correct elvish name, they called the Dwemer. So for the developers, they are essentially Dwarves and I am sure that is what they are to most common folk in Tamriel.




As far as I know, the Dwemer were an altogether different sect and race of elves from the Chimer. They did not follow Saint Veloth to Morrowind. Yes, as far as the Chimer were concerned, they were essentially another "House" but they were nearly entirely separated from the culture and ways of the House Chimer of Morrowind. BTW, they did not become Dunmer at any point, they were gone by the time of those events but in any case, not being of the same race as the Chimer, they would not have become Dunmer. Also, the Chimer did not disappear with them, which also suggest that they were different enough to be consider a separate race.

So, in conclusion:

Dwemer ceased to exist after the became the skin of their Robot God.
Chimer(people who followed Veloth to Morrowind) became the Dunmer.

They both had golden skin, because golden skin is the natural color for Mer, especially the closer you get to the original elves.