Usually just petty thievery, though for skyrim I'll probably add something to it (though my character does do a lot of thieving they haven't gotten caught), maybe false imprisonment, or planted evidence.

In oblivion I did have one fun character who was a member of the Kvatch guard who was arrested by a corrupt imperial guard while going undercover to bust a skooma ring in the Imperial city. Had a lot of fun with that one because it tied in with so many actual quests in the game, maybe on my second playthrough through skyrim I'll do something like that.

They didn't say that you're in prison for being a Dragonborn, I guess someone misinterpreted someone elses post and everyone just went with it from there... I'll research just to be sure.

Todd spoke about being a prisoner in a podcast-

As for the Dragonborn thing, it more of a spoiler, but not anything I'd consider a major spoiler-


As for how my first character got into prison in Skryim, he's an adventurous youth. A little too adventurous. He saw a dragon and thought it'd be smart to mount it. So he waited until it flew near a high peak and he jumped onto its back. The dragon, pretty pissed that something is on its back, tried getting him off his back, but to no avail. My character is pretty nimble for someone his size. While he was busy trying to get my character off his back, he crashed through a tower at a funny angle, broke his neck, and continued to speed forward (curse you momentum!) until he finally met the ground....and about a dozen villagers and a shop.
Guess they didn't take to kindly to my characters fun....

He found his wife in bed with a brenton (he and his ex wife are nords) so he slaughtered them dead,He sat on the bed chuckling and laughing, when the guards came he slaughtered 10 of them jumped out of the window went into the woods one night, next thing he knew he woke up in chains struggling, then a guard told him he was going to die then knocked out

According to the GI article you decide that latter on as your forge alliances to fight the world eater (anyone notice there seems to be a lot of world eaters in popular fiction these days?), so I wonder how that will be addressed in a way that isn't the cliched good(anti-imperial) vs evil(imperial). If I wanna be evil I'll play both sides against each other, mop up the survivors and take total control for myself damn it!

And now a new character:
I am Snopes, a redguard thief. I http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OISVifPRRi8

When is it said that you're sold into slavery in Morrowind? You're being sent there from the Imperial Prison to be released, and go work for Caius Cosades. There's nothing about slavery.

Why would Anti-Imperial be considered Good?

... damn Redguard stole mah horse. :stare:

It really depends what the Empire looks like as to which side is choosing good or evil. It's entirely possible that both sides will be written to be sympathetic, or it may go the route of bad guys pulling the strings when it comes to both sides!

Someone said you're in prison for being the dragonborn, and someone else may have said this already, but that's not it. Todd said that you make your own reason. You find out later that you're the dragonborn. They are writing the game as if you don't know when starting, but they aren't hiding it since they know anyone actually looking the game up already will know this. It's bound to be a surprise for a few fans of the series that don't follow video game news and happen across it in a store.

As far as my character goes I'm going to play a Khajiit stealth magician. Whether stealth or magician will be more prominent depends on how much fun the magic system in the game is and on how well spells complement stealth play. I like the idea of taking a race and playing a non-traditional class, even if Khajiit magicians are not unheard of in the games. I think my character will have perhaps been too curious eavesdropping on some political manner, and will have been caught with the execution being a means to silence him, even though he actually didn't hear anything of value.

I've toyed around with actually making a Khajiit-like name for him, but the problem with Khajiit names is that they can change. I'd likely end up as J'Something or S'Something later in the game. I could start with Jo'something indicating a magician/scholor or Dar'Something indicating a theif but that runs the risk of being a bad name if I don't stick to primarily that style of play. Jo'Somthing-Dar would work but that would end up looking arrogant/foolish according to lore. S'Something is probably the best choice for being a neutral name.

What can I say, worlds are delicious and nutritious.

Think you're forgetting the over abused cliche of the 'evil empire'. Really, I blame Starwars for this one.


And tastes just like chicken! But seriously, it seems like a 'world eater' is the threat of every other sci-fi/fantasy out there. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unicron, http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Planet_killer, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galactus or any of these http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_planet_killers... man humanity is such a sad lot, everything is so doom and gloom.

I like to leave it a mystery. At this point, it's TES convention, tradition.

I think it's really cool to rise from a prisoner to the mighty hero.

X2 ^

My character for Skyrim got caught with a caravan loaded with skooma (a lot of skooma) coming in from Morrowind. My character backgrouind will be a Dunmer assassin that sells poisons and a lot of skooma in Morrowind (a drug runner).

My wood/high elf archer: Was hunting in the wilderness and accidentally shot a guards horse and killed it.
My high elf/breton mage: Tried out some necromantic spells
My human/dunmer/argonian assassin: Caught sneaking around a restricted area of a castle
My nord/orc/imperial swordsman: Accidentally killed a guard in combat with bandits and his guard comrades had you arrested.

I would like the beginning to be like this:
You are in your cell
You get taken to an arena with a huge audience where you are about to be beheaded
Then a dragon flies into the arena scaring everyone
Without knowing how, you blast him away with a dragon shout.
The guards release you and lead you through the sewers/streets to somewhere quiet
They quiz you
Then someone comes and reveals that you are Dragonborn.

Sound good?

We won't have dragon shouts this early. But,yeah, I like it. Maybe the dragon would scare everyone off, providing an opportunity to escape.

It's tradition

The only people with the highest degree of political acumen, combat prowess and common decency are prisoners of course!

The day you don't start as a prisoner in an ES game is the day when...:

...Gordon Freeman can no longer use a crowbar.
...Fallout becomes G-rated.
...the next Starcraft game introduces a fourth race.
...Myst introduces blood and gore.

Jokes aside though, I like Bethesda's take on it. You start in prison, you create an idea about why you're in prison. As Daggerfall proved, it doesn't have to be a prisoner scenario, but it's nice to start the game with a blank slate with no hints whatsoever as to what kind of background you got. You imagine why you're there and where you're coming from, and that plays a part in shaping your character (mentally).

Oblivion - My Imperial was an ambitious and untested young guardsmen in the Imperial Watch who was dismayed at the lack of actual crime fighting to be done in patrolling the city. As a result, he took some tips from citizens and did a bit of work on the side investigating about the corrupt fines Auden Auvidius was levying upon innocent citizens. He was lower-rank than Avidius, so when he finally tried to accuse him alone to avoid putting victims in danger, he was stripped of his rank and thrown into the Imperial Prison. After escaping, he finally gets Avidius arrested with the testimony of Ruslan and Luronk and is inducted into the Imperial Legion again and works his way up to the rank of Commander (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=oblivionmods.detail&id=5918).

In Skyrim - My Nord will have had a hard life by the time the game begins. He had once been a proud thane of the one of the more peaceful glacier barbarian tribes on the Northern coast of Skyrim until his wife and young daughter were slaughtered by an enemy tribe while he was away with a war party. Distraught from the loss of his family, he left his tribe and began to frequent the taverns of Dawnstar, where he eventually became the bouncer of one tavern when the barkeep saw his strength in fighting during a brawl. As he descended into full alcoholism, the locals recognized his fighting ability and challengers came to face him in duels. Eventually, he would sorely beat a favored son of King Thian of Solitude, who would have the formerly proud warrior arrested and set to be executed.

I stole a spoon

Times are harsh, man.

my character was a lazy argonian cruzin the vast lakes and what not when he got caught in a net from nord fishermen who then turned him into the police as both a spy and a vilater of private fishing property.

obviously its tradition and todd explained why they keep doing it...though i assume this has already been said i feel like throwing in my two cent

edit: i can one up you! i picked up a spoon because it was in the floor and now im a criminal scum. and they wont even give me a fishy stick before i die :sadvaultboy:

My character pulled a Caravaggio

My Wood Elf, Aragon was involved in a love affair with the the of the watch's wife. oh and she was Argonian

Skyrim - a Dunmer refugee from Balmora, former House Redoran spy that infiltrated House Hlaalu. Caught in the midst of a well payed hit on a very suspicious Argonian florist and imprisoned to rot away in a dungeon in a far away location, only to be freed by a former slave-turned-lover Altmer woman with a thing for scruffy looking Dunmer...hehehe.

Since I start at level 1, I always keep my backstories pretty modest.

In Skyrim - My High Elf was a sailor, wait, not just a sailor, he was the admiral of a fleet of Skyrimian ships. He was well respected and well decorated for leading raids on colonies of Krakens and sea dragons while navigating maelstroms and never losing a single ship. It wasn't until one day that he set his fleet to port and was visiting the local tavern that he went to grab his tankard of black ale that he accidentally picked up a random spoon and was thrown in the town jail for theft. Stripped of his rank, title, and his entire fleet, he waits in a jail cell for the authorities to inform him of what his final punishment is going to be.

I mined rocks from inside an abandoned mine and sold them to gullible people as parts of crashed down "Ministry of truth".