That was mentioned as possibility by a developer doing the teasing hint routine.


Time has an end, and Alduin is the God of Time. Thus he ends.

Also, linear time is nor fun for a deity.

Do you have the link for the Tosh Ra'ka - Alduin opposition thing?

Well there are many misconceptions, contradictions and confusion about religious figures and dieties in real life, so it is only realistic to have this repeated in fiction.

And good for Bethesda for making a video game with a bit of depth, I have my fingers crossed that other parts of the game will also follow this aswell and along the lines of great literature and movies, include these little things called themes, motifs, character studies, etc. Video games are a young art form, and although there are still some modern movies that disregard these things, the earlier films were basically just scientific experiments and eye candy too (not that is what TES has been), I just hope that Skyrim is not only an evolution in technology or a ridiculously fun, immersive world like its predecessors, but also as an artistic piece, worthy of well, much more than just the money I spend on it or the time playing it. Some games like Enslaved have really great stories, but the reason why they are a video game and not let's say a movie is not always apparent, I hope Skyrim will be a shining example. Anyways, sorry for this probably pretentious sounding side note.

Yes i understand how things work in Nirn, But how is Tosh-Raka the dragon god of time? Just because he somehow transformed into a dragon does not make him Akatosh. Akatosh's avatar is a dragon, but that doesn't make him a dragon. He chooses to make himself look like a dragon.

Amen





Thanks

not quite accurate, when it comes to Alduin.

The Nords evidently have a cyclical view of time, hence all this talk of kalpas, thus, Alduin represents time as a cyclical concept. He rises up to consume the world, and then creates the next one; then he'll later come back and destroy that one, and so on forever and ever.

Time brings an end to all THINGS, doesn't mean time itself has an end or beginning.

Before discussing this it's good to start off with the http://www.imperial-library.info/content/oblivion-shezarr-and-divines. They're an amalgam of two religions. That includes Akatosh.
Right now you're thinking of Akatosh as divine person that chooses his appearances. To a great extend this is not so. Akatosh had his appearance chosen for him when the Nine divines were drafted up. Be it within bounds of the original elements.
One might even go so far as to say that there is no specific divine person, but only a representation of a general force or idea. It'd be hard to melt two religions together without this. It's not like Alduin and Auri-El have that much in common at first glance. But this is actually not that different from real world religions and a bit outside of the scope right now.

Anyway http://www.imperial-library.info/content/daggerfall-light-and-dark provides a good basis as to the nature of the gods.

The story of Tosk-Raka as it's described in Mysterious Akavir resembles the various creation stories described in the Monomyth, the general events around the creation of Mundus. Though not described in the Monomyth, this includes a snippet from Faith in the Empire.



You'll notice the resemblance to the story from Mysterious Akavir. First a big war and then the war-leader ascends to heaven, leaving his followers behind trying to emulate. Given the similarity of all Monomyths even across continents we can assume this to be one as well.

So from this you can conclude that Tosk-Raka is Auriel is Akatosh - and coincidently shift back the assumed timeline of Mysterious Akavir a few thousand years.

But why does Tosh Raka/ Akatosh want to destroy Tamriel?

They don't, Alduin does (and maybe Anui-El). Tosh Raka wants to conquer the world, and Akatosh is happy just hanging around being the benevolent king of the gods.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Gods_A Akatosh is Alduin, is Auri-El. While Nirn still exists, Akatosh is bound to it. To destroy Nirn frees him and the other divines that are bound.

Sorry, I tried to find it when I posted. It's on the Imperial Library somewhere, but their forum post tracking really blows.*

*Unless there's a show post versus show thread option I haven't noticed. Don't hit me, Lady N.


The Divines are dead and probably can't be freed without turning back the clock. (Not saying that's impossible). Alduin wants to destroy the world because that's what the Nords believe he does.

Yes he is, and he isn't. They are personas of the Time God, but they are 100% independent personas. They all exist and are the Time God, even though their personalities are at odds with one another.

And yes, Akatosh is bound to Nirn, but it's a willing binding for him. It's Auri-El that wants to free himself and the other spirits.

I still have trouble with the concept, so stupid questions.


Okay. I'm not sure of the state of the empire at the time of Skyrim, what with the end of the septim line, but things don't look so bright : what happens to the Akatosh-persona if the belief shaping it (all the imperial religion) loses it's strength ? Does it makes other cultural aspects stronger ? As in, a sort of equilibrium between all that the Time God is is broken, and suddenly there's more Alduin (let's eat the world at the end of the kalpa) and Auri-el (let's free ourselves from our binding to the material world) to the Time God at this time than everything else. Or does it not just count ?

And god I hope there's some good writing behind Skyrim. I can see it won't make much sense without it.

I doubt there's any sort of equilibrium or power-sharing deal, but gods (to be precise, aspects of them) can disappear. It happened to Shezarr, an aspect of Lorkhan once part of the Cyrodilic pantheon. That didn't make Shor stronger, but if Akatosh isn't worshiped much anymore, he can't oppose Alduin.

Suffice to say that its very very complicated lorewise. There was an event in tamriel history called the Warp in the West or the Dragon Break. This dude used dragon magic (the shouts we're getting this game) that he made up that he called "what happens when you shake the dragon just so", the dragon being time aka Akatosh. The Dragon (akatosh) BREAKS into pieces, making time cease being linear. Everything happens and nothing happens. ALL possibilities, all myths, they all come true simultaneously. Akatosh (as he is now) isn't Alduin but the two of them together along with all the other pieces of the Original Akatosh make the Whole. Its weird, but you can go to the elder scrolls wiki and search around for the in game literature about the Dragon Break or the Warp in the West.

You're thinking of the Nordic account of the (highly controversial) Battle of Red Mountain, when a Dragon Break did occur, but it was a separate event thousands of years previous to the Warp in the West. The multiple versions of various gods dates back to the Dawn Era when time was nonlinear naturally.

5 Songs of King Wulfharth for a good Nord-ish bit of lore, everyone.

akatosh is more than three people... im pretty sure akatosh is also auriel... atleast, thats what i read.

gods are complicated, no mortal can truly understand them, i think.

Its basically like like any religion. The different races have their own stories, and things get forgotten or twisted as time goes on. What's so cool about TES is that the gods aren't clear cut. Are they really there or not? Obviously there's some higher power playing around up there, since the player has talked to or acted with many of these beings, but are they really gods or just beings of higher power? The stories that explain Nirn's creation are all different depending who you ask. One god may be good to one group, but evil for another. Its all really just faith.

The lore is way over my head cause of that too. Hard to keep the stories/names straight.

Okay. Well, that'll make imperial dialogues interesting, at least - I do hope we'll have various cultural points of view on the Skyrim events.

There's been four dragon breaks : first try of the Numidium, Tribunal and Heart of Lorkhan, Maruhkati Selective, and Daggerfall hero (warp in the west). Correct ? What do you think of the likelihood of that happening again ? I tend to consider it's a might cool way of explaining away a mighty cool thing - multiple endings. Since Alduin's part of the Skyrim plot, there's some à propos to that too.

I just hope the game actually delves into all this. Having considered and pondered it all, I'm going to feel awfully disappointed and like I just played a very anti-climactic story if all that happens is we fight a giant dragon and then the world is saved LOL.

Indeed. It becomes even more interesting after reading the Nu-Mantia intercepts : the Numidium, The heart of Lorkhan, the White Tower, all seem to play the same role maintening the barrier between Mundus and Oblivion (Dunno if there's anything in Arena of the like - the crystal tower ? Can't find much on the origin and the role of the Staff of Chaos). They've been compromised in some way, as underlined by Alduin's wall. And Throat of the World apparently plays the exact same role.

If they don't expand on that...

Yeah, I hope the Throat of the World will be explained in-game as one of the towers, and what exactly that means (or at least give us the pieces to try and theorize about that for ourselves.) Oblivion, for a game very much rooted in the central myth of empire (the Amulet of Kings and the covenant with Akatosh regarding Oblivion,) really didn't go very deeply into the lore and intricacies thereof in its narrative. I'd like to see Skyrim do a better job of integrating the more granular, hard to interpret parts of the lore into its plot. That might be too much to hope for, but I'm hoping they at least drop enough hints and subtle suggestions (even if only in book form) that we can read between the lines. That's what I LOVED about Morrowind.

*Nods* Even if you've got goldfish brains like me, you had to know at least some pieces of Lore to get around the MQ of Morrowind - which gave an impression of depth, a whole culture whose surface you're barely scratching. Sadly, for Oblivion and SI, that was not the same. The plots actually became interesting and started to make some sense to me when I read outside the game. Let us struggle in a mythical mess we're struggling to understand, Bethesda !

I think Akatosh isn't only Alduin, but also responsible for Dovakiin. Like http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perseus in Greek mythology.

Zeus ordered Poseidon to send his http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cetus_(mythology) to destroy Greece, but at the same time he helps the demi-god Perseus by giving him artifacts (like levitating shoes) so that he can defeat this monster.