I believe Todd said in the GI mag something about tech being less prodominent and magic being moreso...so no if you can shoot lightning at someone you dont need to work on making guns

Anyways, it has been done many times before in Movies and Games, so...

The last time the beings of Tameriel tried to make their technology more advanced than anyone's well they got extinct . So I am saying nobody wants to pull a dwemer and get eradicated .

I'm not saying I want guns in TES, but this just doesn't make much sense - it's just an odd way trying to explain something that can't be explained. People in Tamriel fight with swords and bows and they wear medieval style armor. Guns are obviously far better than swords and bows and they would penetrate even the heaviest armor worn by Tamriel's citizens easily. Sure, some very powerful mages may be able to cause an explosion similar to one caused by a rocket launcher. But most people can throw a measly fireball at most, if at all. Why else do Legion soldiers run around with an uncomfortable heavy suit of armor and a silver longsword? If someone came along with a machine gun he could probably defeat the whole Imperial army on his own. Guns would be a huge improvement and from a realistic point of view it doesn't make any sense that the people in Tamriel never seem to invent something new. Especially since the TES world is more violent then almost any place in the real world so there should be enough motivation to invent better killing devices.

But realism is not everything of course. TES games are 'traditional' fantasy games and I wouldn't want cars, guns or computers in a TES game. But please don't try to make up a logical reason for it - there is none. It's a fantasy game world with swords and (now) dragons. Guns don't fit in this setting so they don't add them. Whether 200 or 1000 years have passed since the last game or not. That's all there is to it.

It's fantasy - It's not supposed to be realistic...

Only if they are firing daedric bullets.

How would someone get a machine gun? First the earlier iterations of guns would need to be invented, but they would never get past muskets because they already have things that are superior.

People in Tamriel do make new things: they research and create new spell effects. Why would they waste time and energy doing something so unnecessary as finding alternatives to magic? They wouldn't, because the culture Bethesda's writing team has created wouldn't need to. That's all the explanation needed as to people not inventing new mundane devices. It's not the real world. There are no laws of thermodynamics, instead there are the loose guidelines of symbolism and magic. Therefore the world will not follow the same advancements as ours.

EDIT: And again, this seems to be the Dark Ages of Tamriel, the great Empire has fallen in all but name, so the engineering of the Empire is going away as well.

This.

This is TES, where there′s magic, there′s no gun.

your right

BUT < <<<<<<< big BUT

people in the ES universe have practical magic, magic THAT WORKS and has visible effects, so why would they invent canons and explosives!!!???? they can blow stuff up and burn stuff and kill stuff with magic.

modern weapons were invented out of necessity, to kill people from a long range with minimal risk to oneself, which eventually culminated with the atomic bomb, which showed that weapons are an empty cycle, because making the ultimate weapon will send everyone back to the age of the spear and the sword sort of....

anyway the point is if I can shot from my hand why use a gun that might blow up in my face.

Let me put some perspective, the amount of time Mundus has been around, since recorded history if the first era, some somewhere around 4000 years. Hell, Dyviath Fyr is nearly as old as recorded history. Now, with that in mind, Aruiel's bow was considered the most hot piece of firepower out there, and this was during the creation of Mundus, and it still pretty much is the most hot piece of ranged weaponry out there. In the first era, Pelinal's armor was something out of a science fiction book to the people of Tamriel, and it took roughly 3000 years for metallic armor to really gain much speed (in other words, by the time Tiber Septim started to kick some ass).

And before someone shouts about the dwemer, they did not use and create technology for technology's sake. The ultimate goal of the dwemer was to create a god, and using tech was the means to that end. They didn't focus on making weapons, using electricity, etc for the sake of discovery, they were trying to create what was to become the Numidium. They also regularly gave the physical rules of the world the middle finger, and were highly secretive. Heck, it has been roughly 3000 years since their disappearance, and no one has come anywhere near translating their language, even with their Rosetta Stone.

In other words, 200 years is not even that large of a span of time, and I do not expect there to be much, if any, technological advancement. Maybe some magic, but the empire has split apart, and Tamrial is likely back to what happened in the 2nd era after the fall of the Reman empire, chaos.

Think of this way, intellectual in tamriel study magic. So, all the people who would be creating guns and other such engineering feats are instead creating spells and potions. No matter how hard a brute tries to envision a new method of killing someone, they will never invent a gun.

This for 1 is not our world it is another all together, and they may not have the necessary components for gunpowder, also it is not unbelievable to go 200 yrs and not discover way better technology, ( 500 B.C.- 500 A.D. ) a thousand years and not a great leap technology wise, not for western civilization anyway and the eastern civs did nothing with the technology they did discover for several hundred yrs except make fireworks, it was only after the west saw fire works that they took the tech and started to find a military use for it.

o how little do we know

"modern" society has been here for a few thousand years, BUT what about the 14.3 billion (maybe more) that went before and the 14.3 billion years that are to come, how many civilizations rose and fell, and how many will rise and fall yet??!!!

if you can't perceive it does not mean its not there, oblivious of ur existence as you are from it!

I was thinking this too. Kind of like how Europe went into the dark ages after the Roman Empire collapsed.

As others have posted, it's likely advances in technology are trumped by magic (hence the perpetual medieval/late Middle Ages-like world). The Dwemer were probably the only race to care about industrial technology and they were removed from that plane of existence, leaving behind only the steam engine.

That being said, I do think that since the races have already arrived at a seafaring/enterprising/warfaring age, that it wouldn't be too unrealistic to introduce warring weapons like cannons. That's if they haven't already been used in stories involving pirates like Redguard. I agree that guns are unnecessary, what with bullet wounds presumably being easier to heal with magic than, say, a cleaved head. As a novelty, though, I'd have no problem with one day stumbling across a lost Dwemer flintlock in future games.

I was of the same mind, in this world you would need the Dwemer to invent something like that, as they would probably be the only race even interested in such a thing, unless Gnomes pop up and they always seem to kill themselves off 4-5 times b4 they get any invention to work lol.

Just imagine a daedric cruise missile or a glass tank!



If that was true then we wouldn't have cars (because the first cars were less useful than a strong horse), we wouldn't have computers (because handling the first computers required more effort than simply doing mental math) and probably we would still run around half-naked trying to find some yummy wild berries.

Magic in Tamriel is not nearly as powerful as modern weapons can be. And only few people know how to handle magic that is powerful enough to replace a simple handgun.

This is very theoretical discussion about a world that doesn't even exist. So it's kind of stupid. TES games are fantasy games and there won't be any guns. That is something I can live with and is the only explanation I need. I didn't need an explanation for the lack of toilets in Oblivion and Morrowind either. Probably some people will say there is Disgusto, the Daedric Lord of Feces. He collects all the...you know what...in his Daedric realm and people just hope that he will never open any gates to Tamriel like Mehrunes Dagon did. But I don't want to know. I think it's better that way.

no need for guns when you have mages... dwarves did some interesting stuff with tech but they are gone now... quite litteraly went poof.

Id expect some changes in ehcnating and maybe some tweaks to armor to deal with dragons and such but tech improvements.. no tech is mostly the same century after century in a setting like this.

I actually feared that when I first heard the 200 year gap.But it seems unlikely,thankfully.

Now,I would really want it if the technology would advance IN ITS OWN WAY.Meaning not guns,but perhaps some higher-tech melee and ranged weapons,new-gen spell effects,but these require very serious thinking and designing and still I can see everyone not liking it.So before bringing whole new concept to game history,I just hope they can keep up with Morrowind's design quality =D XDD

I'd disagree with you here. The benefits of automotoring were apparent to anyone who wanted to load heavy cargo or couldn't properly care for horses. And assuming you mean the first digital computers, even they held a massive advantage over people when doing advanced calculations. Technology generally lasts based on what makes its uses obvious. It's worth remembering that while a device may be concieved, it's not always put to good use. The principles of the steam engine, for example,have existed since the 1st C, but weren't used for anything worth a damn from an engineering standpoint until the 18th C.

I'd say if gunpowder were ever 'discovered' in a world like Tamriel it'd be looked on as nothing more than a curiosity. Keep in mind, this is also a place where you can visit a local alchemist for some magical would healing potions or horrific poisons for a few gold a pop.

Magic does not make gunpowder/guns useless.

Guns have the advantage of being used by any idiot with a week of training. A ruler could equip his peasent army in months with cheap guns and pikes and roll over any neighbours using standard medieval technology. Magic on the other hand requires years of practice, training, and intense focus. Mages will always be outnumbered by non-mages. The Empire field armies aren't formed by mages, but by normal dudes in armour with shortswords. And they beat the High elves, Bretons, and Dunmer who are much more skilled magic users.

Gunpowder is also useful for civilian ventures, such as mining: blasting tunnels and whatnot. Sure, a mage could perhaps "blast" a tunnel with a fireball, but that takes lots of energy and requires a highly specialized magic user, making gunpowder more efficient. Or even use it for fireworks ala the Chinese. It is a small leap from those benign uses to weaponization.

Why would anyone even think about adding guns to TES? Come on...

Everything you say there is true. However I don't think the leap is as small as you make out. Yes, the Chinese had gunpowder in the 9th C, but even in our world where we're limited to physical weapons the transferrance to firearms took hundreds of years. It wasn't until the 14th C we developed a portable cannon, and it took longer still to hone it into a more reliable flintlock.

I think the argument here isn't about whether magic would make guns useless, it's whether the inhabitants of a world where magic exists would have the capacity to invent them.

(Edit: On a side note, the gunpowder discussion does bring up some awesome ideas for traps/big weapons. I would have no problem with the addition of Akaviri http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire-lance.)

http://j.imagehost.org/0910/6a00d8341c84c753ef0148c6ead9fb970c-320wi.jpg

no guns please

Can I just say thank you for that post?

hahaha