Is he trolling?

Sure, it's inspired by a lot of stuff - especially Tolkien. When TES was made, 1994, almost all fantasy novels and series were inspired by Tolkien, I'd say. A lot of it still is. The concept of Elves not being little short Santa people, but lithe, powerful warriors skilled with the bow and arrow. But still, you can't get mad at a fantasy game for having elves. Plus, I love the way Bethesda has injected some real originality into how they deal with the races. Not having actual Dwarves/Dwemer in the games? Brave move.

As for being inspired by Roman stuff - who the hell cares? You know what George RR Martin's epic fantasy a Song of Ice and Fire (a Game of Thrones, etc) was inspired by? History. That makes the fantasy more special and the atmosphere more realistic.

I don't see a problem. It could be that you're trolling, but I don't know.

I am just trying to be honest...but I have to tell you that we are at a point in time where most every idea imaginable has been done so much that everything appears cliche, it's not that Bethesda doesn't purposely take inspiration from some things but in some cases they have no choice since if they repeat with the same stuff that is unique to TES, people will get bored.

You missed my point I think. I think it has MORE in common with China than it does with Rome. Not that either one are very similar at all to the Empire represented in the lore other than superficially. Though I probably did not stress that last point enough in my first post.

No, no I get your point I was just wondering what specific that it shares with China that isn't commonly represented in most other monarchies or Empires. Most of your points aren't unique to China or characterized by the Chinese.

Those points are mostly unique to china when they occur all at once in an Empire. Keep in mind these are pretty much superficial and really do not get into the whole weird Cyrod stuff. I think I should have been more specific though.
-No other country has been built up, taken down and rebuilt as many times as China while still maintaining most of its base culture for thousands of years. Name one nation or empire that can say the same. They share that with the Imperials Allesian Empire, Reman Empire, Septim Empire and Mede Empire. Do I need to name the various Chinese dynasties?
-What other big empire had two very separate peoples that the power switches back and forth from? Colovians in the more rugged north areas and Nibeneans in the fertile southern areas. Northern Chinese officials in the North who deal with the rugged terrain up there and the Southern Agricultural Chinese who basically feed all of China in the South. This is a pretty weak point but it helps tie them together more imo.
-Mandated Rule-The emperor gains power through descent as the will of the gods is in their blood. The Chinese and Imperial empires both function with Dynastic Imperial Rule. The emperor is also believed to be in direct commune with the Father of Heaven/Divines. Akatosh and Tian(?). Cannot remember name and I am doing this from mobile. The emperors themselves seem to operate in similar ways.
-tolerant of other Religions and cultures. Though that did change later. Romans were more about be like us or never earn citizenship!

Not much but enough that I see more similarities between the Chinese than the Roman Empires. Not that either really has much in common with the Cyrodiilic empire. I really doubt the Imperials were based off any factual info about the two great empires. More like it was inspired by a misinformed barebones stereotypical Roman Empire then twisted with as many of their own ideas as the Lore makers could fit. More or less.

I don′t mind the similarities as I don′t feel they′re thrown in my face. They still manage to make up their own story and until proven otherwise, I don′t think the Romans had a store named Slash N Smash

Those points are mostly unique to china when they occur all at once in an Empire. Keep in mind these are pretty much superficial and really do not get into the whole weird Cyrod stuff. I think I should have been more specific though.
-No other country has been built up, taken down and rebuilt as many times as China while still maintaining most of its base culture for thousands of years. Name one nation or empire that can say the same. They share that with the Imperials Allesian Empire, Reman Empire, Septim Empire and Mede Empire. Do I need to name the various Chinese dynasties?
-What other big empire had two very separate peoples that the power switches back and forth from? Colovians in the more rugged north areas and Nibeneans in the fertile southern areas. Northern Chinese officials in the North who deal with the rugged terrain up there and the Southern Agricultural Chinese who basically feed all of China in the South. This is a pretty weak point but it helps tie them together more imo.
-Mandated Rule-The emperor gains power through descent as the will of the gods is in their blood. The Chinese and Imperial empires both function with Dynastic Imperial Rule. The emperor is also believed to be in direct commune with the Father of Heaven/Divines. Akatosh and Tian(?). Cannot remember name and I am doing this from mobile. The emperors themselves seem to operate in similar ways.
-tolerant of other Religions and cultures. Though that did change later. Romans were more about be like us or never earn citizenship!

Not much but enough that I see more similarities between the Chinese than the Roman Empires. Not that either really has much in common with the Cyrodiilic empire. I really doubt the Imperials were based off any factual info about the two great empires. More like it was inspired by a misinformed barebones stereotypical Roman Empire then twisted with as many of their own ideas as the Lore makers could fit. More or less.

- Ehhh that might be pushing it to try and forge a bond; the Islamic Caliph's come to mind however when you speak of rise and fall of expansionist powers that go through a series of fluxs in power and leadership. Major difference is each Empire is a spiritual successor to the last, and isn't just a succession of fall and rise of different powers. The only one that breaks the mold is the Mede Empire, which is a coup.
- Just about every Empire in existance. Rome itself varies greatly in culture from and East and West while The United States cultural divide runs along North and South. In both examples power fluxated between both along the cultural divide over their existances. You can make the connection between the Empire and all three Rome, US and China, but I wouldn't attribute the influence to just one.
- The Mandate of Heaven was the Chinese justification for ruling China; there is no such justification through Imperial religion. It wasn't so much about the God's ruling through man, it was man ruling through the God's and the Mandate of Heaven could be lost, since the God's favor could change and the Mandate could be bestoed upon an Usuper who had the power to over throw the current regieme. Almost every Chinese Dynasty laid claim to the Mandate of Heaven despite changes in rulership. Dynasties are common in every monarchy. France, England, Russia, Roman Empire, China ext. which doesn't really strengthen a Chinese link to me nor does the Divine Right to rule which was a staple of European Monarchies. As for the Emperors, well now their more subject to man than they are God. The Emperors of Tamriel when not born into power were chose by the Elder Council for the most part and Chinese Emperors were seen as God's, while Tamriels Emperors were not.

I just found it interesting you think China and was looking for a good debate. The Roman conncetion is waaay over done in my opinion and its nice to see some other comparisons, I just don't see much a Chinese influence.

See my quote above. The visual similarities svcker you in, then all of a sudden the people you thought were Vikings are more like a very white cross between Egyptians and Hindus. Or the people you thought were Romans are more like a grecko-chinese 18th century American. Or the folks you thought were African turn out to be more like a wholly original 'anti-Imperialist" culture with porcelain armor who can cut atoms with their bad-ass sword-moves.

Eh? The Redguard are conquerors first and foremost. 'Imperialist Africans' was the idea behind their general concept early on.

I'm talking about a new idea behind the conquering itself. You have people running from disaster and meeting other people then saying "we need to build some houses now get out of our way." It's a motive thing.

Sometimes I think the 'extended' lore might as well be seperate from the games though, other than minor references bordering on easter egg level (painted cows) or a small selection of in-game books, the game itself doesn't present the wierd lore much at all. It's hardly integrated, Nords will come off to most as just Vikings, Imperials as Romans too, which is annoying, and frankly not their fault.

Morrowind was probably the best at visual and dialogue presentation of strange concepts, and I'm not some kind of MW elitist, it had it's own batch of problems, so don't start blowing horns and getting tetchy, it just seems obvious in that sense.

I think that Babylon fits the description about as well as China: a series of rises and falls over a 1000+ year history ("normal" for any monarchy, where the quality of the leader determines the fate of the country), a divinely mandated ruler, flat southern swamps and plains versus northern highlands (which eventually became Assyria, and briefly conquered Babylon several times), etc.

As pointed out, while some of it is obviously Roman inspired, other parts appear to draw inspiration from other cultures. It's a strange blend of the familiar with the outright weird, yet Bethesda manages to make it work together.

BTW - the curved Roman "scutum" shield was used by most of the Imperial Guards in Morrowind, Obllivion's Imperial Guards used the more universal round or oval shields (which the Romans also used).

Yea, Oblivion's imperial armor was way cooler, to be honest i thought pretty much every imperial thing was cooler in Oblivion than in skyrim.

I for one love to see real life cultures and mythology at the heart of fantasy lore. I think the trick is to expand upon this. Like in Morrowind we had very obvious central and eastern Asian influences but they were blended so much through imagination it became less obvious.


I think we still have it in Skyrim. The are woolly mammoths, giants, dragons, ancient Dwemer cities built underground or in the side of a rock face. werewolves, vampires, walking dead, magic etc


The whole of Tolkiens Lord of the Rings was based on germanic / norse mythology and ancient folk lore. That influences from the Bible. I don't hear anyone saying the knights and castles in LOTR looked too Germanic. I think the trick in fantasy is to get what we already are familiar with in ancient folklore and expand on it in as big a scale as possible. Such as cities built in solid rock or on the top of mountains. towers reaching to the skies. massive step pyramids full of wizards. warriors riding in little forts built on the back of elephants that are the the size of a house. cities under the sea etc etc

The biggest rip off in my eyes was the dragon story of skyrim, just dragons. Im sorry to all the dragon lovers, and theres lots of them. Almost to the point of by just adding them the game went up a star or two in ranking. A lot of rpgs seem to be doing dragons these days.
otherwise no complaints, in fact I love the romanesqe feel of the imperials, or any thing tolkein related.

Don't underestimate the influence that ancient Greek epic poems had on Tolkien. He was first and foremost a Professor of English Literature, and was quite knowledgable about the earlier "classics". His fantasy world borrowed heavily from that source, as well as from the obvious Germanic, Nordic, and Celtic traditions and mythology. He apparently placed a lot of emphasis on his elven epic poems, but the stories were what sold.

I'm saying that pretty much all the non-visual things aside from dying in battle nets a special afterlife aren't particularly Norse, and really most of the Visual ones aren't either. Somehow, Nords feel Viking-ish, but on really very much examination at all they don't have much similarities. Sovngarde to Valhalla, great mariners, tall and fair. Then their religion has a god eating and recreating the world for ever and they have very complex and effective embalming traditions more reminicient of Egyptians than anything else. Likewise, the Imperials "feel" Roman at first, but really, a lot of the similarities are visual or superficial and when they aren't they are usually expanded.

Trust me. It's not all easter eggs and forum posts. Weird Tamriel is alive and well and looking you in the eye under all that snow. I'm not saying it doesn't borrow things, but Tamriel's borrowing spits things back at us changed.

Mount and blade factions can be directly compared to real word history, TES can be referenced to real world history i'd say it barrows the cool things..

Calling the OP a troll...really? Trolling is when you post inflammatory stuff with the sole intention of getting a negative/angry response from people, I seriously doubt this is the case here as I believe he genuinely thinks what he is writing.

As for the post, well, I personally think he has a point. This was discussed to death with Oblivion too, that somehow it had become some generic middle ages fantasy with what looks like an invading army from...hell. In my opinion even though the two main cultures in skyrim have extremely strong parallels to the real world cultures, I do think it is a big improvement over Oblivion. At least in Skyrim we got falmer, dwemer ruins, nordic ruins, unique cities and somewhat unique dragon lore. In oblivion we got Aylied ruins and the rest was generic as hell as far as I remember.

Despite all this, and the fact that Beth probably in the end knows that bizarre bug huts wont get them sales compared to epic helmetted dragon slayer, I think at least we are starting to see them attempting to fit a bit of both in. I personally think the generic fantasy is there to draw in the, for a lack of a better generalization, "young console crowd". Plaster the cover of your game with viking warriors fighting dragons, sell to thousands of teen console owners and those not interested in ES. Then in the background put in the game they probably want to make, of course the die hard Elder scrolls fans want to see more unique, weird and different elder scrolls stuff, but money makes the world go round.

Imperials have Latin names, but they're always pronounced (incorrectly) in English rather than Latin. It would sound very different if Imperials actually used Latin pronunciations.

Their ranks aren't actually very Roman at all. Instead of legionaries, they have legionnaires. The legatus is the highest recognised military rank, but those are the only two I can think of in the games; legionnaire and legate. There are no vexilarii, centurions, cataphractarii, numidarum, sagittariorum, cohorts, exploratores, praetorian guards, etc.

I've only seen one Roman haircut. Not much variety.

Daedra in arenas would require a constant mage presence, with the mage's full attention on keeping the daedra under control and only attacking his opponent. The Doors of Oblivion explains the kind of focus that would be needed, if you're interested.

I'm not seeing the resemblance between Tullius and Caesar, based off of Caesar's bust. Tullius doesn't even have an aquiline nose.

With the changes to Imperial armour, maybe they do wear togas in Cyrodiil now.

Imperials are a lot less Roman-like than they look. If you do some reading, they're a very interesting and even unique culture, just like the other cultures in the Elder Scrolls. All of them have similarities to actual cultures, but it's hard (if not impossible) to make a culture with no similarities at all.


Most of MK's out of game lore is mentioned in the games. The 36 Lessons of Vivec and Mythic Dawn Commentary 3 mention CHIM and reshaping the world (which pales in weirdness compared to the part with Vivec and Molag Bal ). One of the Commentaries also mentions the Wheel. Heimskr (the Talos preacher) in Windhelm quotes the second part of From the Many-Headed Talos. Some of it could be considered "easter eggs," but CHIM in particular is discussed in the game books in too great detail to be considered that. The Godhead and kalpas aren't too unusual. They're very similar to Brahma and kalpas in Hinduism.

I did mention game books, and I don't count that as particularly good integration into a game-world at all. If you mean the loony priest in Whiterun, well, that's a loony priest. It hardly counts.

By wierd I just mean outside of the usual fare in RPGs. CHIM is irrelevant to gameworlds really. To take Tengan's point on the interesting religion, I haven't delved deeply into Skyrim, but from my conversations and questing I've learnt nothing about Nordic religion. Only the Divines, which while some are Nordic in origin, have been presented exactly as before from what I can tell. And I can't recall anyone mentioning Shor, though I daresay there's references to him, I was hoping to hear 'For Shor!' (which is hilarious), at least one time! Many RPGs present their game lore much better, through deeper interaction with other characters. I miss the big lists of questions, responses and topics. And stuff like the circles of zerthimon was genius.

I'm not saying the lore isn't representated at all, the embalming is cool (though it wouldn't have killed them to throw a few lines about it to the quest centric priest of Arkay in Solitude), but I do think that the distinguishing features aren't emphasised in game, it's perfectly reaonable that someone not deeply into lore would think 'Fantasy Vikings'. I'm more defending the OP's viewpoint from a casual perspective, than anything else.

I am not sure you understand the difference between Low and High fantasy.

Simplified.

Low Fantasy: Little magic
High Fantasy: More magic

Tamriel is in no way low fantasy.

Some races have Earthly counterparts, but it isn't nearly as dramatic as you make it sound. The Imperials were inspired by Romans, the Nords were inspired by Norseman and the Redguards were inspired by the Moors, but that's as far as you can go without exaggeration.
I don't see how the similarities/differences matter as long as you enjoy the game.

I don't mind TES borrowing from real cultures, unless we've got to return it.

That's because Beth decided to throw the imperial Pantheon into Skyrim. You could say the nords assimilated it during the imperial reign in Skyrim.

And alot of divines between the Pantheons are the same anyway: Kyne being Kynareth, Stuhn being Stendar. And so on.