sorry double post

I would love to have it where it starts you off as a child and has you make what your parent you first see looks like so when your older they can say "your the spitting image of your...." Also the tutorial would be through missions as a kid while your growing up, so certain things happen at certain ages. Lastly crap happens your family is killed and you have nothing left in your life to live for until main quest starter happens to give you something and you now have full roaming ability.

I don't want a breakout, I want an assault on the prison by the other faction. From here, you'd somehow learn of each factions ideologies, and are now able to choose to earn your freedom by defending the city of your captors or escape within the commotion and side instead with the invaders.

I love you too, man.

That would be hilarious :laugh:

There are many ways the same scenario could be played out, but I've grown fond of being the ex-prisoner. There is something fulfilling of becoming a hero from a villain.

I love you too, man.

That would be hilarious :laugh:

Not all prisoners are villains tough. Some are convicted by mistake and some are blames and convicted out of spite, bogus crimes or just plain framed

Yeah, Bethesda seems to be fond of the prison tradition so I'm going to be expecting that. They also seem to be fond of tutorial in character creation so we will probably be escaping rather then be formally released.

Well, In Morrowind, we were formally released.

Since Bethesda likes us to make up our own character's history, I predict this:

Our character was captured by an enemy faction and lost his/her memory. A sympathizer from another faction breaks us out and we're free to decide who to fight for.

Well in Morrowind you arrived from the Imperial prison (to Morrowind), in Oblivion you are in the Imperial prison, and in Morrowind the Nerevarine does not return from a trip to Akavir. Maybe you will arrive back from Akavir?

They sent the Nerevarine away to Akavir as a convenient way of sweeping the saviour of Morrowind/Tamriel under the rug. They also avoid having the Nerevarine getting destroyed in landfall if he/she is on another continent.

Imprisoned by a tribe of humanoid eating snow-gnomes!

I would feel uncomfortable not starting in a lowly, damp jail cell. There really is something magical about TES with starting as a lowly prisoner, and then becoming a reincarnation/champion/divine crusader/madgod. You don't see that in other games! That's true player progression my friends!

How about being a slave? You escape from your captors and then sent to save the world?

Prisoner of War sounds good as well.

For people who say they don't want to start in being in prison, then play another game. It's not
like all games start in prison. This is a TES tradition. Also it's not like you spend a good protion
of the game there so it's not a big deal. Daggerfall was good, since you had to "break out" to
escape to gain your freedom.

So maybe we are a slave or PoW trapped in a cave to "break out" to gain our freedom.

Perhaps a dragon will attack the prison keep causing chaos and a frantic breakout??? The possibilities are endless!

It does, but someone could perhaps come up with another interesting, ambiguous starting point. I think the reason prison 'works' is that since it's unclear why you are there, you could be a good, bad, or simply neutral character. Not everyone who ends up in prison deserves to be there, but many do. Since the Elder Scrolls doesn't want to bias too much what the character background is, that works out well.

However, as someone else said, the Daggerfall intro sort of gives you the same neutrality (although, not completely - IIRC, the reason you were on that ship is that you were some sort of royal diplomat, or courier, or something - you were in service to the crown, which gives the character more background than simply being an unknown prisoner (although it certainly allows the character to still be evil, neutral, or good - many's the evil man (or woman) that's served an Empire, and many too, the good, or the simply neutral person who served their emperor because it didn't make sense to fight the system, but had no great love of God or Country, and hey, the job payed well and had its perks.).

What I liked about Daggerfall's was that it was very tied to the story, but you don't learn that till later. It was the witch dowager queen who sent the storm to wreck your ship, because she knew you were coming.

I would personally like to start off as a slop-drudge.

I think it might go like this..


Your in some kind of carriage being brought to a prison in Skyrim from somewhere in Cyrodil. A fellow prisoner nudges you awake, saying "Hey, Old Friend, we just passed into skyrim, have a look outside." Then you look outside and see the environment, swirling snow, possibly some stuff burning from the civil war. You hear guards joking and coughing, someone muttering about the cold. You sit back and yur friend is about to speak when a guard that was sleeping across from you in the carriage shushes you. "No talking between prisoners!" he then looks at you, and stutters, seeing something in your eyes. He reaches forward, pulling you into the light, *Enter Race/Gender here* grunting before letting you go."Y-you, what's your name?" *Enter Name here* He thinks for a moment and clears his throat. "Just keep quiet, we'll be at your new home shortly. Heh." he bangs on the carriage and has some exchange with the guard driving the carriage. The carriage stops suddenly, and the door get's torn open, a guard thrusting a torch in checking the carriage, you can briefly see a city in the distance. The guard shouts at you. "You there, *race of your friend*, out with you!" the friend then leaves the carriage and the door shuts. You then try to look out the window before the guard in the carriage grabs you by the throat, forcing you back into your seat. "What are you trying to do boy? See if it's your sign in the stars? I'll check for you! Tell me what yours is!" *Enter sign here* After this is done you hear some screams and stabbing noise before the cart jerks forward, the guard turns back to ou saying "Nope, your not in the stars tonight." before he sits back, closing his eyes. You look to where your friend was and see something shining. You reach for it and pluck the lockpick off the seat, the guard trying to nap again. You fumble with your chains, careful to set it down gently before looking at the guard, you see his dagger resting on his lap and reach for it, before he snatches your hand. "What're you trying to do, you some kind of Thief?" *Enter class here.* "Hahaha! You bleed all the same!" and right when he's about to stab you, the cart suddenly flips over and crashes, sending you soaring into a ditch, with pieces of the cart landing on top of you, the guards dagger landing beside you. You reach for it and hear screaming, then hear a huge roar and see a flame race across your vision. You crawl out from under the carriage and see burning corpses and the smoldering remains of the cart and horse harnesses. No sign of whatever cause the damage. You wheel around and see the guard from the carriage dieing, his body covered in claw marks and his right arm missing, You move to him and hear him mutter. "They have returned." before he finally passes. You see the twinkling lights of the nearest town and run off towards it. With the intent of warning the count/city guard.

I don't like always starting as a prisoner, but it seems like a TES staple, so for that reason it would be OK with me.

I want to be dropped off by a civvy boat, and be signed in as a citizen, not as a released or escaped felon. Or be in a shipwreck. In essence, I do NOT want to have to go through hurdles to explain away why I am a prisoner in the first freaking place.

I think it's important that the PC starts off with a clean slate. A released con is a great way of doing that.

No reason to change that. It's nice to have consistencies.

That was where FO3 > FO:NV - in FO:NV the PC had a job before (s)he started his mad wander lust and turned from a relative weakling to a destroyer of worlds in a few game weeks. What the hell was (s)he doing before getting shot in the head?

People like having that freedom to create their own backstory.

that would be so cliche lol

I was giving this some thought a while ago, the idea of starting out with nothing and no past is quite important, I believe starting as a prisoner is the best way to do it (i like the tradition as well).

However I understand that some people really do not like having to give a reason for being a criminal in the first place and being a POW involves the PC in the conflict already, so what if instead of being arrested for a crime, you are forcefully drafted into a militia of a petty lord to guard their land?

So after the intro has played you wake up on the floor of a crowded cell, a familiar looking Dunmar named Jiub or something crouches down to help you to your feet. After you are standing he asks your name *enter name* and where you are from *race + face/body gen* he then enters into conversation with you, to ask if you know why you are here, he then outlines who the lord is and explains that the entire group of people in the cell including the PC are to be drafted into the militia to work as guards along the roads. He might then say something like “I hope our stars/gods look out for us tonight, I heard word that we are being deployed soon, shall we pray together? Who do you pray too?” *enter sign/god selection*

After the basics are complete, the guards come and order you all out of the cell *enter basic movement tutorial*; the tutorial should be simple enough that you can just walk out of the cell and follow a path to complete it. Eventually you are led to a courtyard with a carriage (or something mobile worth protecting) and a table covered with rusty Iron weapons, being the closest to the door the guard asks you to pick up a weapon that you want *enter inventory tutorial, once again should be as easy as opening and shutting you bag if you know how* then you are bunted by the guard towards the carriage.

Screen fades out and fades back in once you are on the road and there is an attack of some kind (not directly story related just bandits or creatures or something) after a short combat tutorial, whoever attacks the convoy makes off with some of the guards and whoever you are supposed to protect, the guard captain who is the only remaining live member of the group comes up to you and says something like “ you fought well, just like a *class that you played like* I once knew” this would open up the class gen, then he would ask you to accompany him to rescue the others and you can either follow him and receive further tutorials (and character mess around time), plus a healthy rep boost with the faction they belong to or you can split and head for the next town without incurring any penalty thus ending the opening area.

Having the intro structured like this gives no indication of your past, it introduces most of the basic game mechanics and gives you some starter gear, all while still starting you as a prisoner.
Let me know what you think,

Diablo