I concur with this assessment. Sload are not "Evil", nor are they "Good." They are "Different" and "Alien." This is why I think the Thrassian Plague was not created out of enmity, but more likely created for political or economic reasons, as I postulated earlier.

The sload strike me as being highly "Mundane Thinkers" (EG, they less inclination to hold the reverences of "Divinity" that EG-- Humans have.) and as such do not have the same kinds of scruples that we have. What TES authors describe as "exagerated" emotions toward loss or incompetence might not really be exagerated, but just misinterpreted emotional outbursts from an alien mindset. Given the behavior of N'Gasta, I would suppose Sload society advocates "Creative" problem solving, the ability to adapt and flourish in adverse circumstances (including intellectual pursuits), and a somewhat unspoken exaltation of freedom from moral entrapment.

What to humans would seem like "An obvious choice to choose the good and righteous path", might seem like silly superstition to a Sload. The sload strike me as the kind that HONESTLY believe that there is simply no such thing as right, nor such a thing as wrong. There is only that which can be shown reliable, true, and useful. This is why I suppose that the "Emotional outbursts" of sload concerning incompetence is in fact a real emotional outburst, and not one put out in the name of grand theater. Incompetence would seem to be highly despised by sload society, as it would be seen as a sign of being fundementally incapable, and therefor worthless. It is not logical to use an ineffectual agent to accomplish ANY task-- and as such, the sload that sent the agent, believing that they WOULD accomplish said task, only to have that agent fail, would reflect poorly on the sload in question themselves-- a very unpleasant thing indeed, and quite worthy of being lamented.

It may also explain the Sload's preference for using reanimated servitors, since the reanimated are less willful, and less likely to stray from their master's commands, and are thus more efficient, and better reflect the capabilities of their master's intellect. It seems logical to me that a powerful, and effective necromancer with good, and efficient renanimations would be highly venerated in Sload society, as it would reflect favorably on their reliability and intellect.

I find it a reasonable assumption that the Sload consider the Thrassian Plague incident to be a "Colossal failure" on the behalf of it's orchestrator-- for failing to contemplate all of the applicable factors into the plan. They wouldnt have found any kind of moral objection to using a plague against another species, (Or even internally, against their own species for that matter.) What they would have found repugnant would have been the fact that the reason it failed, is because of improper planning and calculation (Eg, Incompetence.) As such, because the plan resulted in Thras being shelled out of existence by the allied Tamrielian Navy, I feel the sload would hold the creators and planners of the Thrassian Plague plan in high disdain, and as examples of how NOT to formulate and carry out a plan.

They strike me as being firm adherents to notions like "The only time stealing is wrong is if you get caught" and such associated ideologies. ("If the system lets me do it, then it is not cheating", etc..)

In short, the sload strike me as an entire race of sociopaths, who are actually beyond such a description.

This plays in perfectly well with the Moral Ambiguity of the TES universe, since to THEM, we would appear as a bunch of bleeding heart sympathetic fools who are slaves to romantic notions of pure foolishness, and are incapable of understanding 'true reality.' As a result of being so beholden to such totally inprovable and untestable notions, they would find us to be highly erratic, unreliable, chaotic, and outright inscrutably insane. They might even wonder how it is we even function as societies at all.


The sload show us a side of ourselves that most people are unable (or afraid) to commune with or associate with, because of its alien feel, even though it is indeed an inseparable part of ourselves. They show us our inner sociopath, which is concerned only with our own success, and how we can make use of what and or who is around us for our own comfort and amusemant.

On the one hand you say Nagasta is the only one you/we have seen? On the other you feel that the character of this individual supports your view because in the absence of other information (as with the written Lore) you are inclined to go along with that.

Your presentation is persuasive - but your argument has not yet taken into account the Daedra who appear to be either amoral or to consider that morality from a mortal viewpoint need not apply to them. Rather Daedra seem to take their moral viewpoint from their Prince's preferences formally while doing whatever they want. Are they dissimilar from mortals in this?

By comparison how can the Sload be amoral (morality being the view of the general concensus as to what is right and proper) and at the same time be totally and homogenously reflective of the attitudes of their race and society? Surely one should argue that the Sload are totally moral to a degree not seen in other races if one follows the view you have presented in rebutting the possibilities I was trying to explore earlier in this thread?

So basically the crux of the thread is that 1999 wants Sload to be gentle, benign, pacifist kelp-hugging hippies unjustly defamed by the horrible, baby-killing Cyrodiils.

Well whatever. Giant amphibious slugs just don't have the glamour to be a misunderstood race of good guys. They're repulsive monsters and meant to be so.

"morality" "good" and "evil" are human inventions designed to measure our situation and outlook on life. anything that causes us pain, whether it is physical or emotional, is "evil." anything that causes us happiness or gratitude, etc. is "good." good and evil do not however exist in nature. modern humans are unique in the fact that we have time to worry about our emotions and form viewpoints. if one of our children is killed we grieve, we get depressed, we may decide to never have children again. animals however do not see the murder of a child as evil because it is a natural part of their life. there are plenty of animals who make hundreds of children, knowing full well that 90% of them will die. we used to be like that too, but the absence of regular death has made us rather soft as a society. anyhow, my point is that good/evil, moral/amoral exist only within the bounds of the society that defines them. it should not be hard to imagine that the sload do not have such standards.

Sure, you could argue that sload are moral. but they are moral in accordance to the culture of their society -- one that values competence and skillful execution. they are not moral in accordance with our modern culture which favors things like life love and kiddies.

i fail to see what daedra have to do with sload in terms of this argument.

If that isn't a case of http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BeautyEqualsGoodness, if there ever was one.

I doubt that the repugnancy of Sloads holds up against the flesh-sculpture abominations that the Ayleids were wont to make of their slaves.

Wrong. Just because something is too ugly to be anything else than evil doesn't mean that, on the other side, if something is pretty is has to be good.

I couldn't find Evil Is Bad on Tv Tropes wiki, but they come together quite often.

Both are used in the more simple forms of story telling and only subverted after the backstory evolves. Since most of the Lore (if not all) is from the Older TES games, it stands to reason the SLug-tOADS from Thras may not be as repulsive now as they were made up to be.

I wasn't heading that way either Gez - what I am getting at is that the actual deeds of the Imperials and other Tamriellian races and the Lore generally does not incline me to outright accept that a single member of a species is definitive, nor will I believe that a single source of Lore is either. What if the juvenile or breeding Sloads turn out to be beautiful by human or mer standards? [edit I see I am echoing Harke the Apostle from a different angle] How will you argue then?

The information presented has to be looked at as informative rather than definitive at this stage.

Beauty and the beast? - All that is gold does not glitter - Appearances can be deceptive?

There are ugly humans (hard to find them in TES one must admit ) who are truly benificent. However we only have one Sload and it is possible that by his race's standards he is beautiful or ugly as well as it being possible that his character is in no way representative of his race because he is crazy by their standards - just as the senior members of the Mages Guild were almost without exception Necromancers at one time - did that make all Imperials and members of the Mages Guild Necromancers?

I am not saying that the people who wish to define Sloads in absolute terms have to be wrong - I am not saying that their obscure texts have to be wrong ... I am looking to see what might be possible in Elderscrolls terms if the Obscure Texts only show one side of the story - I explore other options that can be based on a critical look at the assertions within the aforementioned texts and the supposition that Ngasta is an exceptional and not a nice Sload in Sload terms as well as Tamriellian terms. And this is how just about all TES Lore has been built up. That each race and religion has a different take on the same thing.

The idea that Sload think totally differently to other races is fascinating - and also the concept of them being evil or amoral - but that is not the only fascinating way to look at it.

ps - look at a top dictionary and examine all the possible meanings of the word 'obscure'. Some things are deliberately obscure in that they are created to hide other things.

What if the controlling body/consensus within Sload society all those centuries ago sent ambassadors and traders to the Imperials who matched the nature of the visiting Imperials best (and the mages in that first Imperial exploration party were amoral necromancers) ... and kept the other Sload well out of their reach? What would that say of the Sload? Is it somerthing that other races might do? There are a lot of exciting things that can come from examining different views here with a clear eye ...

There again Ngasta might have been a representative of an extreme faction that gained temporary power - nb Dagoth Ur, Mythic Dawn, the Imperial Imposter etc ...

And hey, it may turn out that all the Sload are evil, immoral , etc all rolled into one - but please, not because they look that way unless you are positing a direct controlling link between Sload looks and Sload character - because that would mean that a Sload who is placed under a beauty Spell would then become benificent.

What one has to consider, is that the Aurbis is a world of myth, and related effects.

It is written from the standpoint of the human mind being the subject of debate. (Rather, a very complex mind that generates human like sentiments, as well as totally alien sentiments, and personifies these things in a metaphysical reality.) [this is from obscure texts]


If there is a common mythotrope, it will exist inside the Aurbis in some fashion. Likewise, its "other" will also exist. Thus, it IS possible for a damned ugly race to be benevolent, (look at modern Orcs under the new rulership of Orcinium.) but it is just as likely that ugly==evil as well. (it has yet to be revealed if returning to being noble, and kightly will mythically revert the orc race to a more elven appearance or not however.)


Since this an act of literature aimed at human consumers [the game, and associated materials], then all of the descriptors will have a disgustingly irremovable human bias in them. Sadly, even something intended to be roll cast as an "Other" like the Sload are not immune to this convention.


As Albides pointed out, the role of "The Other" in literature is usually to tell us something about ourselves that we are unwilling (or unable) to contemplate with full acceptance. This is where the inescapable human element comes into play. They have to be human enough to seem familiar, but alien enough to make us shocked at the same time.

This, however, is not an open invitation to fully humanize them, as that would negate their usefulness as a literary "mirror of truth."

The sload are meant to be taken at face value, and then thought about.

That it was severely retconned.

Seriously, though, the whole thing is that it's an universe of fiction driven by story archetypes. So it's going to be highly anthropocentric.

Can you imagine a parallel Earth, exactly like ours down to the smallest detail, except for one thing: in the Star Wars movies, the alt. Lucas made Jabba the Hutt the noble Jedi hero and Princess Leia the evil crimelord.

If you can contemplate this idea without finding it's hopelessly goofy, congratulations, your point can hold water at least on your side.

I read something a while ago which said that the Sload only have reproductive organs while they live in the water, before they "evolve" into land living creatures. What if Sload soaps are those reproductive organs? Disturbing thought, although I don't think it's the case...

Gez, I see those as different stories - not roleplays that invite the players to define their own morality and beliefs.

But again a fixed tale gives you your idea still = Beauty and the Beast. This is because the real strength is in the emotional reality and the fact that strong events reattach the lines in the most fascinating ways. Sure it plays upon steroetypes and uses emotional manipulation to overturn them quite satisfactorily. In real life you will see many extraordinarily beautiful women with ugly-looking men. Not because those women all want to look better as compared to their men (though some do) but because those men have personal qualities that make them special in the eyes of those women.

When you say that what matters is something other than the numbers this is what you are talking about. And it works - so long as you observe various conventions carefully along the way.

http://img49.imageshack.us/img49/8520/beastxk6.jpg isn't gross and grotesquely ugly as a sload or a hutt is. Monstrous and frightening, yes; gross, no. A sload is gross. The Beast is as gross as a Khajiit; in fact there's a http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Furry_fandom that'll find him handsome and sixy.

You could have been closer to a point if you had chosen http://img443.imageshack.us/img443/6816/uglyvk3.jpg, as he is grotesquely ugly, but it's a different thing altogether; Quasimodo (like the Beast, in fact) is a freak, a human trapped within a ugly shell of a body. His deformation can be repulsive, but it attracts pity more than revulsion. Quasimodo and the Beast are both fundamentally human, they're malformed humans.

A sload isn't a freak, isn't a normal person trapped in a misshapen body. A sload is a inhuman monster. Like the hutt or similar ugly aliens, its appearance is as disgusting as its morality. The ugliness is used to emphasis its inhuman quality and to prevent empathy. It's a type of ugliness that is different from those of the aforementioned freaks, as it makes them more remote and less sympathetic.

I suspect that if you refer to N'Gasta you would be quite correct about both his looks and his (inner) nature. But apart from that we do not have in-game pictorial representations of a broad range of Sload. Now if the writers of the Obscure {[according to various members of the TIL forums (as seen in various posts)]} read semi-official) Texts (hope I got that right now ) were basing their assertions on the appearance of N'Gasta alone, one might be forgiven for doubting whether the characters they have created to be authors of the Sload-related texts are in fact clued up on Sload realities generally. I just like looking at the possibility that N'Gasta and his pals are the cess-eating slugs at the bottom of the Cess pit - but maybe somewhere far above there might be something finer - like a high class restaurant.

When a group of people decide they dislike something intensely, or like something intensely, they are inclined to stretch the truth in support of their assertions. The writers could be forgiven for deciding that the entire Sload race is precisely like N'Gasta and his associates. The entire Sload race may be so, but the over-the-top nature of many of the assertions is going to make any serious investigator sit up and check the facts given. When people get worked up about things they often become over-assertive.

I've been looking at this from a point of view that says: 'Now what else might come from this - looking forward to TESV rather than solely looking back at the past glories'. My anolysis says that gamesas won't sit on its laurels if it sees new possibilities for TESV. It might decide to go with the total evil view - or it might not. If gamesas changes the apparent status quo and goes with a view that not all the Sload are totally evil, wot me worry? That would not weaken the Obscure Texts or make them any less useful or less valid - what it would do would be to unarguably change the import of their content, which I feel that as it is can still be interpreted in various ways.

You remember in Henry IV Pt1 Prince Hal's soliloquy that begins something like: "I know you all and will awhile uphold the unyoked humour of your idleness" Well later he becomes King he says bye-bye to Sir John Falstaff and the gang in the next part. There is a reason for having a part1 and a part2. They had their fun, but he always knew they are a bunch of crooks and nere-do-wells who refuse to change their nature and now he has a serious job to get on with. The story starts out one way and ends up going another. Falstaff goes from being one of the great comic interludes in Classical Literature to fulfilling an altogether more trajic role. gamesas might likewise well choose to change direction re the Sload for different reasons ofc = he who pays the piper calls the tune.

It seems that it's all in how one views things, isn't it? I picture sloads making marvelous soap and perhaps scented candles to sell in little wayside shops.
More seriously, I look forward to meeting and killing my first sloads.(it's all that free soap and candles that drive me to this).

What if it turned out that Sload Soap is made...of people!

What if it turned out that sload soap isn't even made of sload? Maybe it's made of a material that only sesembles a sload's skin but is not actually that of a sload? I really haven't even read through the thread because the arrogance of one person makes my head hurt, so I'm probably wrong anyhow. You all can correct me if that's the case. But do it nicely, please.

I don't think that Sload can be closely compared to Jabba the Hutt.

Jabba is a greedy sonofanerfherder, and overall a stereotypical crime lord, but does exhibit some emotion.

Sload, on the otherhand, I'd like to regard as hollow and emotionless, acting only as what directly benefits the individual.

Plus, Jabba was not a master of Teleportation magic and Necromancy. This, in my mind, is what makes the Sload truly frightening.

Actually, after wading through 5 pages of this it kind of made me think of people wandering down beaches clubbing baby sloads. I hadn't given a lot of thought to sloads. Other than the soap was likely made from them. By now, I personally want to club baby sloads.

and then I wonder...

has anyone made a sload mod yet?

I'd love to see a sload too, bring it on.
I also wonder if they might not make fine leather coats if properly tanned, or perhaps a nice pair of boots.
Sload parents and their lack of concern for their offspring are reminding me of modern parenting techniques employed by the heavy drugged masses of today. It's amazing what wonders antidepressants work. Hmm maybe the sloads are drugged too?

No, I think they just make soap out of them. Of course I'd really like to know what the Telvanni Mouth was going to do with the soap. (In all seriousness). I seem to recall it was only vague in the game. It's been so long, I don't even remember who it was for.

there have been attempts for morrowind, but not sure if they ever got finished. the animation is the hard part, that thing doesnt fit on a traditional skeleton.

i hope TES games get boob-physics so that sload can jiggle when they wobble across land :clap:

Thanks, now I have a horrible picture inside my head that I cannot get out. :yuck: *shudders*

Be careful what you suggest. Someone may try to start a petition to have it included in the next game.

Lol. Every time I think of 'boob-physics' I think of Soul Calibur. Lady Nerevar, I know what you mean... but for some reason I'm just crossing my mental images here. It's causing me to twitch and stutter a little. I believe you were looking for a more realistic movement of something that is shaped as the Sloads are. As I've said though, I just have an awful Soul Calibur Taki-Sload image going through my head. Lol, and I already have a headache, this isn't helping!