I liked that orc in the dark brotherhood, man he rocked!

With all the clan warfare, it seems like they could add some tragedy to the game. Look at all the books, plays, movies, etc. that involve a group of characters in the middle of a war. I would like for the main character to not be the only person to save the day. Often times, the main character would be nothing without a deep and colorful group of supporting characters who have to make sacrifices, even their lives, in order to further the main characters' quest. It adds drama to the story, and gives the main character new strength when he sees that he's not fighting the battle alone. Our character might be the dragonborn, but simply being the most powerful person in all the land isn't going to be enough to keep the character or the plot going. If no one takes notice that he's saved them from destruction, and they all continue to destroy each other in their civil war, then all his fighting is going to be in vain. He needs the support and inspiration.

I get attached to the wrong people though. Like the Gray Fox. Or Armand Christoph.

I was still able to get attatched to the characters, but not on a really deep level. When I had to kill all my fellow dark brotherhood members, I was stunned. But then I thought, "They're just characters". I want to have a more interactive relationship with the Npcs I meet. Instead of them walking up to you and saying "good day" and then walking away, there should be things to talk about with each character. The whole rumors discussion topic was a little lame. More in depth conversation!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The problem with having more in depth conversation is that they now introduce vocal dialogue. They can't have depth for all the NPCs, though I'd like that for some characters who do require depth, take for example: our mentor, the last blade... can't remember his name...

Not for the combat, quests, skills and levelling, the world or anything else?

Being friends with characters is one of the things I least consider when playing TES games, not that it wouldn't be nice.

Martin was nice and all, but the death of Lucien was the worst moment in all of Oblivion.

I felt a bit uneasy about killing the Grey Prince...

especially since it didn't even feel like he was getting a good final fight, I was beating him so easily.

I got really attached to Anhassi. To the point that I actually moved my character in with her and shacked up.

I still miss furry-face.

I felt attached to the cat in the DB headquarters, the one who called me a "foul smelling ape"

I'd really like to have more memorable and likeable npcs in Skyrim, but i'm sure it will,
as far as rpgs go Oblivion had among the least interesting npcs I have seen, much thanks to the facegen and bad voices. But also thanks to the fact that you didn't
get to know the npcs very well, most of those who appeared throughout the questlines just seemed to be quest givers and not much more.

Though there were a few I liked.

I liked many characters in Morrowind and Oblivion but I agree they should be more detailed. The ones in Morrowind were too static and the ones in Oblivion had too little dialogue. I 'm aware in a game with 1000 npcs you can't make them all unique and interesting and with background stories, but at least 50-60 characters should be very distinct personalities, memorable, with many dialogue options so you could make them your friends and take them as companions.

In some case, if I should have a sad feeling when losing someone,
I porbably had spent something valuable on this person for pure love.
I guess this works in games as well.

However, rather than memorial characters, I prefer memorial decisions.
While TES series does give me freedom to choose, it seldom (or never) gives me difficult choices.
It makes stories way too easy just like fairy tales.

Since Morrowind(I never played earlier TES games), there has been a sort theme with your character uniting the land against a common threat. I'd be willing to bet that there will be a similar challenge in Skyrim. So, that means possibly forming bonds with the leaders of the various factions sort of like in Morrowind (possible spoilers ahead) when you had to unite the ashland tribes and great houses or convincing the Counts to send aid to Bruma in Oblivion.

I made a guild using CM partners. Made like twenty members, moved into the Fosicle in anvil. Whenever i get so attached to em' then if they die I feel really depressed.

Do you also want to get attached to characters in Skyrim?

absolutly not. The character is only a tool to play the game.

Same, he died in the Battle of Bruma for me so I put his armor in my home.

Ya I would say his is the biggest downfall of the elder scrolls games for me, extreme lack of character to really care about.

This.

*spoiler*


Curiously, he died in the Great Gate Battle in Bruma in my game. I still carry his cuirass around, and I am going to store it when I get a home. Yes, I got attached to him And Martin and Baurus. Baurus was like a friend to my character. Too bad Oblivion didnt offer much choice for character interaction, so I pretty much had to imagine they were friends

If I DON'T get attached to them that's failure on the part of the writers in my opinion.

The best way to gauge a well written character is whether or not you start to sympathize with their (an imaginary characters) life and hardships.

Wow, what are you doing here?

In an RPG the whole point of characters are to foster emotional depth within the game, if you don't feel something for them, whatever it maybe then the Role-playing Game has clearly failed in its supposed goal of bringing you into another world.

If that represents a success to you, quite bluntly, you don't belong here, or at any other RPG forum for that matter.

Anybody want a Ruined-tail?

Esbern... Hmm... He needs to be a mentor figure, but also a father figure to some degree. His death should be a dramatic occurence, but should be early-ish too. (I suspect he will die at some point.). Maybe, he will be teaching you all this stuff, telling you your story, adventuring alongside amongst all this... When a dragon comes. It rips him to shreds and then you kill it. Then Esbern will utter the famous last words, and die.

I'm no excellent writer, but it seems satisfactory to me.

Lucien, Ocheeva, and Teinaava were characters I could relate to. They were good friends. Then they died. I was crushed when Lucien gave me the quest, and I thought of simply ignoring that quest... But I had to continue this. Having no house, I tried to gather as many of their possessions and hold onto them long enough to dump it into a house... Crushed when I had to let most of it go. Then I finished the DB questline and returned to my "home," the cheydinhal sanctuary. The new recruits just saddened me, and thus I hardly return there.

You can guess what happened to the traitor guy (I forget his name)

Characters like Ruined Tail would be nice... Having conversations with you, with deep emotion.

Also, I wouldn't mind romance in-game, but I would mind six. This ain't hot coffee. The sad part about romance is how hard it would be to pull off, and the amount of data necessary for it.
The romance I'd like is a relatable character whom converses with you and will adventure with you, bringing personality to the game, maybe chatting with you over a campfire before sleeping. (skimpy bikini pl0x XD)
But seriously, that would make the game so good... Someone you'd attach to, and be desolated with their death. Its all dialogue and behavior to represent personality.
Itd be awesome.

Why would I want to care about the characters in a story? That's just stupid, I want to not care at all what happens to them.

Sarcasm aside, yes, it would be nice to have characters I can actually care about in the game, this is important for telling good stories, after all, why would I want to see if the characters will succeed or not if I don't care about them? Unfortunately, past Elder Scrolls games didn't always do a good job of accomplishing this, which is part of why their stories didn't always really do much for me, they may have some good concepts, but they didn't always succeed in making me feel like the characters actually mean something. I'd still help them if given a quest to, but often, the reason was simply because I wanted the reward and not because I actually wanted things to go well for them, if I was asked to escort a character and that character died, I'd be unhappy not because I liked said character and wanted him to survive, but because I would fail the quest as a result, I didn't really feel bad when I saw any of the Blades escorting the Emperor (And later the Emperor himself.) get killed because I didn't meet them until half an hour earlier, and when you did get to speak to them at all, it was all "We must get the Emperor to safety!" so you didn't have a chance to really feel anything for them.

This is also why I don't approve of Bethesda's quantity over quality approach to companions, I fear that it will lead to companions becoming nothing more than meat shields or pack mules, who I have no interest in beyond whatever use they have to me, and in the event that I manage to get them killed, I'll only be bothered because of the inconvenience of losing a character who can help me fight or carry loot, not that I don't like my companions to do those things for me, of course, but if I'm going to be spending my journey with another character, I'd rather it be someone I have a reason to like.

Sill, making the player care about characters takes work, you can't just say "People should care about this guy." and then have them care, you need to make people care, and for that, having good writers is important. Even if the character's aren't so bad in concept, if the writing fails, the game still won't be able to make them work.

I want to be the Anakin to Esbern's Obi--
No!
I want to be the Luke to Esbern's Obi-Wan... there.