So the two "clans" seems to be strictly opposing eachother, and since the beginning of their birth, there has been a constant grudge between them, wich have resulted in various consequenses for the mortals on Nirn.

If they ever clashed and were to spend all their knowledge, resouces and powers, wich part would win??

The daedra can take physical form, therefore personally retrive any item or trigger any event, that would be at their advantage.

The aedra has no physical form. In TES:IV - Oblivion's ending, it was merely Akatosh's spirit who merged with Martin and begame the avatar of a dragon. The aedra. They have to rely on their mortal woshippers to accoplish anything physically.

Physical or spiritual advantages, who is the most powerfull? Who would win if they battled eachother? Aedra or Daedra?

As far as I know, they used to be equal in power, but the Aedra lost some of their power when they sacrificed themselves to form the Mundus. So ever since the creation of the Mundus, the Aedra have been weaker. In my opinion, the only reason that Mehrunes Dagon was defeated is because a dragonborn used one of the most powerful artifacts ever created in a plane where the Aedra are at their full power. (I've heard multiple times that Daedra are weaker outside of their own planes of Oblivion, so that could very well have given the avatar of Akatosh the upper hand in the fight, as he was at full strength.) Also the simple fact that Akatosh can't simply appear himself on Nirn, but instead has to rely on mortals becoming his avatar through the amulet of kings shows that the Aedra are weaker than the Daedra. If any lore buff feels like completely shattering what I just said and correcting me, feel free to. Giving the original poster a correct answer is more important than my ego

It's really just a matter of perspective and a little bit of philosophy. There's no wrong answer. If you consider Mundus itself to be an extension of Aedric power, including the many Aedric descendants/aspects/creations which inhabit it, then they're arguably still roughly equal. Then again, that assumes they were roughly equal from the onset, and that may be a false equivalency.

What is power? If it's the power to change, the Daedra win. But then again, multiple Daedra have tried to destroy Mundus and failed thanks to the Aedra and their progeny. It's kind of a wash.

The Aedra always had to rely on mortals to stop the Daedra though. Akatosh channeled the power of the amulet of kings through martin septim and made him powerful enough to stop Mehrunes. But your point is pretty correct, what is power? If power is having brought life to various races, creating a world, and having an entire empire worship you, then the Aedra are the obvious winners. If power is being able to summon armies of Daedra, manipulating and killing mortals, and being able to take on whatever form you please, then the Daedra reign supreme. The OP asked about a direct battle between the Aedra and Daedra though, however I don't see how one could take place, as the Aedra don't seem to take on a solid form and live on through the Mundus. I guess the destruction of the Mundus would mean the end of the Aedra though, unless they live on the in the Aetherius but choose not to show themselves.

From what we currently know about the two groups from a variety of creation myths and in-game events, I'd say it's all largely a matter of perspective.

The daedra are ancient spirits that supposedly abstained from creation and therefore remained largely whole, sentient and in control of their faculties. The Princes appear to be able to make contact with the mortal realm more easily and more frequently than Aedric beings and are the omnipotent gods of their respective domains, but the Earth-Bone aedra are supposedly the foundation of the Mundus, they spawned the mortal races and all the potential that lies within them.

Plus when Aedric power has supposedly been tapped, it's effects have been quite potent (the formation of the Dragon Fires, the Aedric boon of the Soulless One, Auriel's Bow etc.). Though Aedric blessings seem infrequent, they seem to give mortals power they could not otherwise achieve, whereas a lot of daedric 'power' in the Mundus relies on the volition of mortals. This may be because of the Princes purported inability to create in the Mundus, only warp and change.

I want to vote for Mudcrabs. Add that option please, OP.

I wonder if an army of mudcrabs would've been able to stop Dagoth Ur. Probably, considering that you can't ever seem to hit the damn things.

Actually as far as I know, the Aedra lost most of their power, they are pretty close to being catatonic and only manifest their spheres as the "earth bones", the laws of nature on Nirn.

Technically speaking mortals are the aedra, being more or less just tiny tiny pieces of the aedra that formed it all. The only reason Akatosh is still kicking about a little is probably because he was insanely powerful before Nirn was made.

But of course, it all depends on "what" kind of power you're thinking off. As individuals the aedra aren't much, but they have direct influence over everything that is Nirn, and they have in various forms prevented all those daedric princes from taking over who knows how many times... But individually they can't really oppose the daedra.

Imagine the Aedra being the kids who own all the toys but the Daedra are better at playing with them. Or imagine that the aedra invested most of their capital in project Nirn and don't have much left, but collectively own Nirn, while the daedra still have money but not much say in what's going on.

But what is a child, if not a physical and spiritual avatar of those who made it? Arguably, the mortals of Mundus remain as part of the Aedra's power, so they could be considered to be stopping the Daedra themselves, even when they're relying on mortals to perform certain actions. What I mean is that it could all be viewed like a strategy card game, with the Aedra being the players, and mortals being their cards.

That's what I mean. Before the Ages of Man says that most of the "Gods" who first agreed to take part in Mundus left when Magnus did, and they thus theoretically retain most if not all of their power. But whether they could still be considered Aedric is a grey area.

The Aedra gave of themselves to the creation of Mundus. The Daedra did not. In a side by side comparison between the two, Daedra are more powerful then the Aedra. It's just that in terms of servants available, the Aedra come out ahead of the Daedra (as mortal races seem superior in quality to Daedroth, even if the latter is technically immortal).

Though the wild card there would be Malacath, given the Orcs devotion towards him. Then again, the Bretons and Redguards prune back the Orcish numbers with a new genocide every couple hundred years, so...

Don't the Daedra fear the Aedra? I remember reading that somewhere. But don't take my word on that.


I know that at least the ninth Aedra Talos , according to the loremaster, is one of the strongest beings in the universe.
So there's at least one Aedra who's stronger than all Daedra.

That's because Talos has seen the Tower in the Wheel, and thus can control it (within reason).

The "within reason" bit in the most important, since it doesn't make him All Powerful.

I don't think Talos is an Aedra, some even deny that he's a divine at all, even though the fact that you can recieve his blessing and that when you needed the blood of a divine in Oblivion Talos' blood worked pretty much confirm that he's a divine. But back on topic, as far as I know, the Aedra are the et'ada that decided to help in the creation of the Mundus. Talos obviously didn't do this, so he's not an Aedra, but the imperials added him to their divines because, you know, he's a badass.

You know, that's one of the first times and I actually understood one of those complex ways to explain things on this forum. No offense, but would saying that Talos achieved CHIM not have been simpler than that he has seen the tower in the wheel? I know that they're basically the same thing, but the former is much easier to understand for newbies like me.

It sounded more poetic


Edit:
Are Daedra vulnerable to kalpa's end? I recall that story where Mehrunes Dagon is trying to stop it from happening but gets played by Alduin [who is essentialy THE child of Akatosh, an Aedra]
Do they get eaten too?

Lol, I knew that Talos being an Aedra wouldn't go unchallenged.

By Alduin, probably not. By Satakal, well, that's more of an open question. The Redguard creation myth of the Monomyth suggests that virtually all spirits can be at risk from him, regardless of their role (or lack thereof) in the creation of Mundus.

The difference between saying "Talos achieved CHIM" and "Talos saw the secret Tower of and within the Wheel" is the difference between saying "Neo became the One" and "Neo fulfilled a cyclical illusion of Messianic prophecy put in place by the Machines to deal with unsuitable Matrix-denizens." In both cases the latter, by their nature as explanations of a bunch of fantasy balderdash, are harder to grok.

Talos is not an Aedroth. He is an ascended mortal, which DOES make him a god, but of a class with Mannimarco and ALMSIVI, not the Eight Planets. All et'Ada have existed since before Creation, Aedra included.

That's why they are only ever called Nine Divines and not Nine Aedra. "Eight Aedra" would be a true grouping, however.

The Daedra do not get eaten by Alduin. Alduin only eats Nirn, not all of the Mundus, not any of Oblivion, not any of Aetherius. It is reasonable to assume that the Leaper Demon King was not initially a Daedric Prince, rather a Mundane being, given that no Daedroth would care about preventing the Kalpic cycle, and his cursed transformation into the Razor cast him into Oblivion.

Interesting conjecture time:

The reset of the Kalpa, though heralded by the consumption of Nirn alone, has temporal effects that extend beyond Nirn. Convention is repeated; the actors in the play that is the Dawn perform yet again, perhaps the roles are shuffled around, perhaps not. Given that Alduin is the End of Time-made-flesh, this might not necessitate further inquiry. But perhaps there is a different explanation.

The Aedric planets of the Mundus are the dominions and flesh-divinities of the gods, which are not eaten by the World-Eater. Nirn, whose divinity, of course, is Memory, is eaten. Would not the violation of Memory entail a great forgetting? How else would the Aedra not realize they've been doing this Convention thing over and over again?

You know, you got me thinking, that must be the real reason why the daedra want to conquer the mortal world. The daedra seems more powerfull than the aedra, but to gain ultimate power they need to dominate all of mortals, because mortals are the reason for the aedra's existence.

There daedra are completely ignorant. They are too egocentric who and gladly sacrifice any other daedric prince to gain individual power. If they stood together like the aedra they could potentially become stronger than any mortal or spirit ever known.

Good thought.

The daedra have power to impact and change mortals, but when majority of mortals worship the divines and abandon the daedra, they don't have many good cards to play with.

Not all Daedra "want to conquer the world", mind you. It isn't just mustache-twirling villainy for villainy's sake.

Really only two of them do, Mehrunes Dagon and Molag Bal, because both of them used to live there and have good reasons for it.

Mehrunes Dagon was a Mundane entity of Preservation corrupted into a Prince of Destruction, punished by Alduin for hiding pieces of creatia from him; he invades Tamriel in order to find these stolen Nirn-fragments that ruined him and dispose of them.

Molag Bal, in a previous Kalpa, was the king of the Dreughs (who basically ruled the whole world in that Kalpa), and what toppled king wouldn't want to reclaim lost dominions?

But aside from that, no one else is invading. There is no Council of the Daedric Princes plotting an invasion of Nirn; the other fourteen/fifteen don't even care that much.

Fair enough. I was avoiding CHIM mainly because to a true newcomer, CHIM is a nonsense word that means nothing. Tower in the Wheel may not make sense, but I'm at least still typing English.

Interesting, can you show me the source for this?

This is actually easier than I thought it'd be. http://www.elderscrollsonline.com/en-gb/news/post/2012/12/17/creating-eso-the-dreugh

Its sources, in turn, are the Commentaries on the Mysterium Xarxes and the 36 Lessons.

Bal and Dagon's former occupations now withstanding, their spheres tend to overlap into activities that involve smacking Nirn around like a tennis ball in the most obvious ways possible as opposed to say, Boethiah and Nocturnal. Bal less so, but still.

There's not going to be a clear cut answer for you though. The Aedra and Daedra tend to opt through using mortal champions more often then not, and their machinations can often times be derailed by other mortals. The Daedra of course are far more active on that front, but whether or not you equate that to power or pure impetus is another question.

That...actually makes quite a lot of sense. It would explain why Coldharbour is a desecrated imitation of Nirn.

Huh. Maybe I should play TESO.

Mannimarco and Almsivi are Aedra. They are ancestral gods after all. I'd say Talos is also an Aedra, whether he is Lorkhan or not.

But I don't think MK' list can be used here. I believe that list is about the most powerful beings within the Arena, and Daedra are not.