The Trial is the ending to a three thousand year story, that's all. In my opinion, Vvardenfell's story was too epic to be left open, as is the nature of the video game. If people want to disregard it for that reason, then that is only fitting, given the nature of the event both in and out of game. Hogithum will likely play little to no part in the history of Tamriel. MK said goodbye to the character in another thread, mostly.

There is that. Note that people refer to both blight storms and ash storms. The Blight is 100% Dagoth's doing, and he probably could have manipulated the weather. There is no change in Ald-Ruhn's weather, though, and I chose to believe that that is not gameplay. The heart created Vvardenfell's climate, but I do not think that it sustains it. Part of the reason is that anything that makes Morrowind less weird depresses me extremely.

... but funnier!


It's not a question of who wrote it - and I said that before. It's a question of internal consistency.

It's probably the fundamental difference between shows like Buffy and Star Trek: Voyager, and soap operas. In quality fantasy/sci-fi, the characters' behaviour is always 100% internally consistent, with any behavioural changes introduced gradually over many episodes so that the pay-off might elicit a gasp but looking back you should have seen it coming all along. In a soap, good characters turn bad and good again with no real reference as to why they would suddenly behave against type. They serve the plot, rather than the plot serving the character. However unbelievable the situation they find themselves in, shows like Buffy et al maintain the viewer's suspension of disbelief by never having them do anything that character Would Never Do. Willow might go bad, or she might be heroic, but such shifts take place over 48 episodes rather than being crammed into a 30-minute show, and the motivation for doing so is clear and persuasive.

The only weak point to my mind was Buffy Season 6, which suffered horribly from Writer On Board. Two writers with two very strong and conflicting agendas dominated that series - as TV Tropes puts it, "Pretty much the entire sixth season of Buffy The Vampire Slayer had the characters (particularly Buffy and Spike) changing opinions, morality and emotions depending on whether or not Marti Noxon was writing the episode that week. For example, one week Buffy is shown to be trapping lovelorn Spike in an abusive relationship. Then next, he's preying on an emotionally damaged Buffy... "


Because the vengeful, angry Vehk is not the Vivec we meet in the Palace in Morrowind. They are two wholly different characters. He speaks differently, behaves differently and has totally different (apparent) motivations. He is a mortal who has taken on the mantel of a god and found it too heavy to bear. He's old and tired and just wants to go to sleep. He's ready to give up his godhead and pass on as he should have done a thousand years before. He bears absolutely no resemblance to the figure speaking in the Sermons.

I can find a very simple explanation for that, and it's not because Vivec is too complicated for my mortal mind to understand, or because he is too capricious to be categorised. It's because the Speaking Vivec was written by a different dev to the Book Vehk and they clearly didn't agree on how they saw the character as being. For the purposes of the trial, the Speaking Vivec should have been the one represented, because that is how Vivec chooses to present himself. If he was supposed to resemble the Sermons guy, that is how he would have spoken in the game. I simply interpreted the Sermons - as probably did most who saw them - as the visionary rambles of one in a dream-state. Not the lucid conversation of one who wants himself understood.

Really, though it was the portrayal of Azura that just didn't fit with any representations given of her in Morrowind or Tribunal. Basically, that's not how she talks.


Which is why I mentioned the mines, but no - inactive volcanoes make verdant islands.


Indeedy. I actually see it as being similar to http://www.ionianyachtcharter.com/images/light_house.jpg, a lush green island off the coast of Greece, dominated by a volcano that last erupted in 1955.


It depends on the Nerevarine. If he is indeed Hortator - leader of ALL Great Houses on Vvardenfell - and especially if he (or she!) is Hlaalu himself, then that might put a different spin on it. In my mod, the Nerevarine used his Hortator powers to force the Houses - and even the Ashlander tribes - to agree to share power and split the proceeds of this new-found wealth, for the greater good of Morrowind. In my own mind, I saw it as inevitable that this would cause a short period of great prosperity and happiness on Vvardenfell - a reward for the Nerevarine's efforts, and a time of celebration for the people. It occurred to me that it might be this that arouses Skyrim's jealousy and provokes their invasion as they see Morrowind suddenly getting too wealthy and too powerful in a very short space of time.


Indeedy. I always liked the guy. Nice to me on the boat that time, and all that. :foodndrink:

My understanding is that the person who wrote the dialogue for Vivec in Morrowind had substantial conversations with the person who wrote the sermons and who played Vivec in the trial. The different "flavors" of Vivec were intentional. The different personalities reflect different situations - the young, playful, sixual, and dangerous godhead; the divine monarch bearing a weight which he has mostly brought upon himself; and finally, the warrior-poet freed from the burden of his role as political leader and bent on vengence, with ages upon ages of arcane knowledge to help him suceed. It's also a matter of the audiance. Vivec's conversation with the Nereverine is more or less private, and he can afford to be candid.

As for Azura, again, it's a difference of situation. In Morrowind and the Tribunal Expansion, Azura is helping/manipulating the player. In the Trial, well, Azura's aim is somewhat similar to Vivec's, if you think about it.

It's the conciliatory Vivec who speaks to the Nerevarine who is inconsistent- with his doctrine, his actions, with his teachings, and thousands of years of history. The encounter in the palace is a facade, or dissembling, or maybe just a rare moment of humility. None of this is really at odds with the other Vivec, he's still lying through his teeth to you. The Vivec in the palace is the old, tired one, bowed by responsibility. At the Trial he is freed from that and returns to his old outrageous self. Being a god, his personality is larger than life. In a way it is ennobled into his sphere. Azura is the goddess of Dawn and Dusk, he is the God of Vivec's Id and Ego. If you don't see that there are two Vehks, then you just weren't paying attention.

The Vivec of the trial is the Vivec of legend, the warrior and the master, indulging in a spate of irresponsible chaos. The statesmen and the hermit was a completely separate being, one that you killed. He wasn't angry. He was furious and grieving, generally, but at the trial he was ecstatic. He laughed so hard the ceiling shook. You should have seen it.

I'm not really sure why Ken Rolston wrote Vivec that way- some of it wasn't very interesting. But he sure as hell didn't mean to clash with the real character. This is lore, and I don't regard Morrowind as a first person game here, with priority given to the camera. What an ineffable deity said to one person doesn't win out because it took place in my quest journal.

You're wrong about the sermons, by the way- Vivec is simply describing the impossible with inadequate words. The sermons are a character, while the Vivec that mortals see is a consistent lie.

Oh, and something would be seriously wrong if Azura was talking like a cinematic while she was being [censored] and fed through a typewriter. "Gods are always eloquent" sounds like a god-awful trope. They're aliens who never let you get a good look at them, and Vivec smashed all the lights and mirrors.


That's fine, if Red Mountain is inactive. Vvardenfell is a desert, too. There are parts of the Galapagos I wouldn't want to raise crops on.

Nice place for a stronghold or a trading settlement, yes. http://princess.elricm.net/Ghostgate.htm, whichI moments ago became aware of, no. Good lord, no.

Maybe what it boils down to is that, as far as the millions of people who played Morrowind are concerned, for such a key event the Trial is not to be taken too seriously or at face value because it is inadequately supported in written content. Most all of the reasons why that is happening are above in this thread, but allow me to try and bring them out in a more focused manner.

Looking at your view of Vivec, Pawprints, the only way to describe him in 'modern' thinking is (forgive the harsh and clinical word) schitzophrenic ... and then one might say that in making himself a God he revealed the nature of his mind in his appearance ... etc. Even given that, the Trial does not really work because it has attempted to rely on theory presented elsewhere to present emotional depth - and also the game itself is not adequately supportive of such a revelation.

You have said (and I accept all that) that the Devs discussed - and use that to support the position that you say they have held ... trouble is that it is not properly realised in the Lore as a whole - and most especially in-game. Too much of it is elsewhere for it to work here if you like. Accepted, it is likely far more real among the devs and their close followers.

The Stomper's point, included here, about the emotional content and build-up is absolutely valid. Although The Trial may have been fun for those directly involved, what is offerred here and in that book at TIL is not enough to achieve a natural crossover to the wider audience - that is where it all fails to comunicate - and why you have such an uphill task and have to spend so much time and effort explaining it.

You are going to have to add something ... maybe one new story minimum from 'inside' Vivec's mind that transparently includes the transition from one side of his character to the other and in a way that is emotionally satisfying to those who will wish to resist sense of it if you want to make your point stick - and it had better be brilliant or it will fail.

ps - all hail Jiub once again - who is what this fascinating thread is supposed to be about - oops - :facepalm:


Epictetus - walk the paths of Vvardenfell and fly over its broad valleys and furrows - you will see plenty of wonderful places that can be cultivated ... or used as pasture ...



Agee it requires closure ... just not feeling that has been achieved - yet. Perhaps becuase th edevs are not ready themselves to do that little thing

QUOTE


Beg to differ on that last - it was clear to me that the Ash Storms were getting worse - and that various people were concerned. The red/orange tinge to them was simply an indicator of the presence of the Blight. People were more worried about the Blight aspect perhaps.

Is it possible that The Heart was actually svcking the life out of most of the vegetation and so only the hardiest varieties could survive?

I mean that the frequency of bad weather in the game does not actually change. Ur was probably harnessing any number of natural forces, but only complementing what was already there. (Ashlands- Just add Blight! Racism- just add Statue!) The Heart doesn't need to go around killing dandelions, it just needs to sit around in the volcano that is suffocating the island with a pillow.

And I'll reiterate that Vivec in the palace stands out from his other personas more so than Vivec in the Trial. There is 2920, of course, but Tedders had him riding a horse. A horse!

And for everybody who missed the connection between the hermit in the palace and the half-hysterical racist-


At Hogithum he jettisoned the role he had played as Master of Morrowind over so many years, a responsibility and divinity that really didn't suit him. Exit Vivec, stage left.

It should be pointed out that the http://www.imperial-library.info/obscure_text/census_daedra.shtml references the events of the Trial, and the only reason it isn't an "official" text is that the author missed the deadline. So, say what you will, but at least one developer obviously intended for the Trial to be official.

The Vivec in the Palace was a thinking being - and that sits well with me. He thought in more than greed ... so I assume he was not the Greedy Man ... and your quoted piece sits better with me - and works well with the mer in the palace, better than Hogithum Hall.

You appear to assume that duality is necessarily bi-polar - but that is so ... inadequate ... after all that is well ascribed to Jygg and Sheog already.

Vivec always impressed me as far more sophiscticated than the crude acts that the face value of ves sermons laid claim to. To me they were qa mask behind which he hid from the world.

I have no quarrel with ves wishing to withdraw - and that might well include a reverting to 'bad habits' but I cannnot see it happening in the fashion that Hogithum Hall conveys simply because he felt to me to be at a stage in his existance that was well past that sort of childishness - though he may be ripe for a new and different kind of childishness

Concerning St. Jiub, easter eggs should not be considered lore, and to me this rumor seems to be just that. Otherwise, we have to put M'aiq the Liar and everything he talks about into lore.

First, even with cliff-racers being so damn annoying, I can't see Morrowind without them. They are simply an important part to the impression of Morrowind, and if they ever take us back there I for one hope there are still Cliff-racers, just maybe a less annoying. Of course also we have to wonder just how Jiub would actually do this task, as well as what doing this would mean. Without the predatory Cliff-racers we might have a spike in Netch population.. and then what? lol

Finally, really who wants to see Jiub's image on a shrine? Not me, that would just ruin it. Jiub was cool, but Saint Jiub is just not for me. Have him do something more realistic and interesting, like organize a prison riot for wherever he was headed.

Lord? Dont you mean Saint?

There were no snakes in Ireland to start with....... :grad:

It seems you weren't the only one venturing

that's simply impossible cliff racers are ubber gods and eternal they are the reason for the daedric princes don't live in the mortal plane

:lmao:
thinks ... :blink: - meet 1999 - genocidal uber god killer!

Saint or no, the part about him being killed by the Daedra is probably true...

You just can't fight them without a shirt. You're gonna get injured.

St. Jiub gives me justification to use a cliffracer-remove mod for the character I am RPing as post-oblivion crisis.

It's probably true, but one it's supposed to be like St. Patricks day, and two it's a reference to how much people LOATHED Cliff Racers

We hate our cliff racers... Necromancy?

TES:V - Mannimarco's Flying Castle and Zombie Cliffracers

Well considering you heard it In the game made by Bethesda, then no it's obviously fake.
A lie just for the hell of it [/sarcasm]

Seriously though, I got a good laugh at that, I always knew Jiub was awesome, and as far as I am concerned, anyone who gets rid of cliff racers wins at Elder Scrolls full stop.

Saint jiub > Nerevarine, obviously.


Who cares if Nerevarine died at the bottom of a hole in a cave somewhere in Akavir, We need to find out where Juib went!

I was more making a subtle hint at the thread but alright
Jiub had to send them somewhere right. Why not to a floating undead city?

Whoa! Your rabbit just hissed at me...
Country bashing... That's a first for me.

But yea, let's not take everything we hear in-game to heart people. Or anything involving video games for that matter.