I was going to put this in the spoiler section, but I figured I could sum it up without even telling the stories.

There are no ranks. You do a couple of quests, and you immediately become a leader/messiah/honorary member... when you've done f all!

Seriously, it is so silly that a game of gargantuan size like Skyrim has side plots that are absolutely TINY... ok here's a little spoiler about the College of Winterhold...

Really?

Now I will admit, the Dark Brotherhood, while being insanely short compared to oblivion, was awesome and suspenseful in comparison too...

Anyone else feel disappointed by the shortness of these guilds?

Short yes, somehow I enjoyed it much more than Oblivion's guilds tho.

The College of Winterhold is the only one I've done so far. I was rather disappointed with the College. . .

They will sell you training (in terms of skill levels), but don't actually offer any real, actual training, in terms of teaching the player how the magic system works. . . you're left to mostly figure that out of your own devices. . .

You basically get one good magic Staff at the end of all that, and a nice enchanted robe (and access to the Arch-Mages quarters, for what that's worth, which isn't terribly much - it does give you some alchemy ingredients, some soul gems, etc, and access to alchemy and enchant labs, but those are pretty much everywhere).

You don't really get much reward until the very end of the story arc - with Oblivion (and Morrowind), you got decent quest rewards after almost every quest (magic trinkets, new spells, mages staff, etc) that gradually helped you to become a more powerful magic user.

The story arc doesn't really introduce you to interesting locations in the world in terms of, well, an example from Oblivion - you learn about Black Soul Gems, and the alters where you can make them; there's nothing similar with the College of Winterhold quest line. I found a note somewhere in one of the locations I was doing the College quest, called "Atronach Forge Recipe" - which sounds very interesting, but I have absolutely no clue what or where the Atronach Forge is (it sounds like an arcane device for making semi-permanent Atronachs, but I don't really know for sure). Might've been nice for the College Quests to introduce me to that.

Basically, I felt my time at the College did little to help me learn how to be a better mage in Skyrim, or to give me much good mage equipment, except for that Robe and Staff, which, admittedly, are very nice, but that's about it.

Also, the story was rather linear and unsurprising, with no real plot twists that weren't glaringly obvious from the start. I have one more complaint, but I'm going to have to put it in a spoiler block:

that's the thing tho everything is short to fit more things in.

short but sweet....loving the game ....

Theres another problem related to this. No way after finishing the quests of the college and become the ________ your char would go back to do basic quests in cities or other guilds.

So, if you roleplay, your only option now is the main quests and finish the game.

Later, you can build a rogue and enjoy the thieves guild and the dark brotherhood.

Very disappointing indeed. For a game that is driven on content, it is pretty limited quest wise.

The guilds in Skyrim are pathetic.

I will agree- I found the guilds I've been in far too short for my liking.

I can understand that there's only 4 or 5 'main story' missions, but Bethesda has the radiant story system. The game would have been much improved if they had said 'we don't have any work for you, go talk to the others', if you had to complete some Radiant Quests before you could proceed with the next story quest.

That said, if you want to keep roleplaying the Companions, you can, thanks to Radiant Story. But it does feel very weird. "Hey, new guy who joined us 2 weeks ago! You're in charge now!"

It was guilds or dungeons. They went with dungeons. Only so much will fit on that disc.

Damn consoles :down:

I'm curious how you could do the entire Winterhold College quest line and not come across the Atronach Forge down in the Middens, because, as you ask, the College quests do indeed bring you right past the atronach forge.

Personally, I though the college quests were excellent. Sure, it wasn't the super huge drawn out 2 day quest fest the Telvani quest in Morrowind was, but it was excellent. I started them at level 5, ended them at level 17, with an entire set of excellent gear and a Dragonpriest mask.

The Arch Mage quarters are also my favorite choice of residence right now. Tons of storage, all of my trainers and spell vendors in short walking distance, AND an alchemists and enchanters table... Plus, it's free. What more could you ask for?

I was very surprised too how short the Mage′s Guild questline was. Yes, it was disappointing. My girl is Archmage, but I don′t think she really deserves it due to her meagre magic skills. But maybe it′s because of her patience to have played hide and seek with the Morokai for half an hour ... I would have wished for something more elaborate, that would have taken more time and made the reward feel more justified.

..what? What on Earth do consoles have to do with how short quest are? That doesn't even begin to make sense.

Consoles are responsible for graphical limitations, and the pcs bad UI. That's about it.

I was disappointed with all the guilds this time except the dark brotherhood. It was the only better one. The companions might have had a better plot but was poorly executed.

pc players put the blame on consoles for everything... its not like if skyrim was pc only they would get more content... o wait they get mods so they need to stop their [censored]ing.

OT: yeah theyre short but i feel they tell more interesting stories (ive only done dark brotherhood and college, just started companions).

I did two guilds at the moment (Colledge and Companions) they can be summed up with : short and lame, with no real connection to be either a fighter or a mage.

Oblivions and Morrowinds questlines where much much better.

I agree that the College main quest line was a bit too short to feel satisfied by beating it, though it sort of makes sense with the breakdown of the Mage's Guild even if the logic of letting the person who joined a day ago become leader is...faulty. Not to mention your aptitude for magic plays no role in advancing through the story beyond 'can you cast the most basic spell options'--in Morrowind you had to achieve certain skill levels to advance, and in Oblivion you had more hoops to jump through to join and then advance internally.

However, as far as the Thieves Guild goes, I rather enjoy the 'rebuilding' aspect of it--they're dissatisfied and unhappy and there's treachery afoot so it makes slightly more sense that the person who resolves the issue becomes the leader. By separating leadership from improving, you have to do more work to raise the reputation of the guild and get a larger pool of followers/guildies. It's much easier to resolve treachery than it is to influence others--I like having to do more to earn that.

DB is 50/50--there's again a larger story-reason for the new guy to take over--last remnants, falling apart, internal dissension, etc--but one would think that they, too, would be a more wary group and slower to trust the new guy with bigger tasks. However, blasting through the route to become leader is still longer and more satisfying than it was for the College.

Ok, so the thing about the Middens is there's multiple "paths" one might take to move through the middens. Apparently, I took the wrong path. I guess I need to explore there a little bit more lol.

Yeah, i have to agree, I am loving everything about this game and bang my head on the wall when i am reading some of the stupid complaints people are posting but this one is very valid. The guild questlines just dont have the feel of starting out as a newb, and working your way up to become the leader. The companions guild was the first i played through to completion and I was a bit dissapointed....loved the story line but just didnt have the depth it needed. I joined, then not too long after i was the leader and i was getting comments from companion npcs how they can remember how it wasnt that long ago i was a whelp....well thats cause it was only a few days ago...lol.

I dunno how ppl can say anything in this game is short. If you play like I do where your quest log never has less than 10 things for you to do mayb 3 or 4 of which are Guild related on top of the 20+ miscellaneous tasks. I have to actually say "You haven't done anything for [insert guild here] for awhile go do a few quests for em" Now i'm sure if I only did guild quests back to back i could complete em all in a matter of hours but where is the fun in that? THere is plenty of stuff to do in this game break up the order you do things. I still have to go steal plans from the Silver Hand at lvl 33 and have barely started the college quests.

Well for me personally its not a matter of length, as much as it is a matter of no levels and sense of achievement from starting at the bottom and working your way up the ranks to become leader.

I wish they would have done it the Morrowind way. There you actually had to have used a magic skill to a certain level before you could get promoted. Radiant story = Too lazy to come up with interesting and fun quests to fill the world with. Speaking of which, I get really ticked iff with the AI when they say "Aren't you that someone from the winterhold college"... I am the ******** Arch-Mage, not some random dude that just got there. **** YOU!