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The Elder Scrolls Online is an MMORPG entry of The Elder Scrolls series developed by ZeniMax Online Studios. Taking place in the Second Era roughly 1,000 years before the events of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, you play as a hero attempting to stop the Daedric Prince Molag Bal from taking over Tamriel and recovering your soul that was taken by him. Things are also complicated by the fact that the Imperial throne has sided with the evil Prince, and now Tamriel is in an all-out war between Cyrodiil and three alliances vying for control of it.
It was released on April 4th, 2014 for Mac and PC (with a 3-to-5-day early start for preorders), with the PS4 and Xbox One versions set for a June 9, 2015 release date. On March 17, 2015, the payment model changed to only require the initial purchase, with an optional premium account system offered as well.
When playing the game, you must choose one out of three alliances; unless you have a special account upgrade, the alliance depends on which race you choose. However, after the "One Tamriel" update, the alliance chosen no longer is a big deal outside of Cyrodiil, and you can move to another alliance's starter zone to do its story arcs instead. Races, likewise, do not have a big role after Wrathstone, even if some are better suited to stamina or magicka than others.
The Alliances and the playable races are as follow:
- The Ebonheart Pact, consisting of the Nords, Dunmer/Dark Elves and the Argonians as they work to strengthen their fragile alliance. Which is easier said than done when the Argonians have been the favourite Slave Race for the Dunmer for generations, and Nords not being exactly the best diplomats of peace, along with a Succession Crisis of their own.
- The Daggerfall Covenant, consisting of the Bretons, Redguards and Orcs. Like the Pact, they work on keeping peace due to the peoples' history with each other. Namely, that the Bretons and Redguards have attacked and discriminated against the Orcs for a long time, and they are still working on just accepting them as people. Not to say the Bretons and Redguards' relationship is any better.
- The Aldmeri Dominion, consisting of the Altmer/High Elves, Bosmer/Wood Elves and the Khajiit. Though their alliance is more stable compared to the others, they still struggle with multiple succession crises of their own.
- Among the other races not affiliated with the alliances, the Imperials is the only one playable. You can be Imperial if you upgraded your account to the Imperial Edition, and can choose whichever alliance you wish.
- Templars — Followers of Stendarr who use light and Sun magic in both melee combat and ranged spells to smite the wicked and protect their allies. Templars are typically healers, due to the multitude of buffs and supporting effects they can bestow upon the party, but can also serve as very capable damage dealers of both kind and decent tanks.
- Dragonknights — Having learned hidden fire arts from the Akaviri, Dragonknights shield themselves in fiery armours and battle with fire, and also possess a degree of control over the earth under their feet, which they can wield for a multitude of purposes. Dragonknight tanks are second-to-none owing to their massive shields and self-healing, the Stonewalls to end Stonewalls, but their suite of fire and poison damage skills also let them perform well as damage dealers, and can also be used to heal and buff their allies' damage.
- Sorcerers — Formidable magicka-users who invoke the power of storms and summoning in battle. They are usually seen as magicka-damage dealers, but can use their self-preservation and self-buffing as tanks, and has one summoning pet that can heal multiple targets.
- Nightblades — Assassins that use shadow magic and life essence manipulation, they are mostly used as stamina-damage dealers. However, by stealing life energy from enemies and occasionally themselves, they can also heal themselves and allies, as well as making it harder to get hit.
- Wardens (added in Morrowind) — Servants of nature, they summon animals and plants temporarily to aid in battle, as well as huge spikes and sheets of ice to protect themselves. This class was introduced as a hybrid class that balanced its role-capabilities in ways the base-game classes had not yet, with each skill-tree specializing in one class with some mixing.
- Necromancers (added in Elsweyr) — People who raise the dead to aid in battle, they also use the remaining souls of the dead to their advantage and are able to draw upon all elements in their attacks. Like the Wardens, the Necromancers are supposed to be hybrids with a skill-tree for each role, with some mixing.
- Arcanists (added in Necrom) — Spellcasters who channel the power of Apocrypha through a Tome of Eldritch Lore. Arcanists have the unique combo mechanic of "Crux", which they can build and spend to make certain skills stronger. In addition, several Arcanist skills have dynamic resource costs, giving them unprecedented build flexibility.
Due to the majority of DLCs being based on Player Versus Environment, assume all contents are this unless stated otherwise.
- Imperial City: Adds a new zone, the titular Imperial City in the heart of Cyrodil, as a unique hybrid of PvE and PvP. You must constest with both the forces of Molag Bal and other rival players, as well as introducing two new group dungeons; The Imperial City Prison and the White-Gold Tower. Due to being the last post-launch content to feature Molag Bal, it is considered the end of the Five Companions arc. It was made available for free 5th of September, 2019.
- Orsinium: Arguably the first actual Chapter ever released, before that content model officially became a thing. Adds the zone of Wrothgar with the titular city, as well as the game's first solo-arena, Maelstrom Arena. You are called to Wrothgar to assist Kurog, the King of Orcs, in rebuilding Orsinium and bring all the Orc Strongholds together under one leader, though not everyone agrees with King Kurog's vision. Gives small hints of stories and zones to come.
- Thieves Guild: Adds the zone of Hew's Bane in Hammerfell, the Khajiit-centered trial Maw of Lorkhaj, and allows players to join the notorious titular faction, which had its own questline and skill tree. Along with this pack came an update that reintroduced the Crime mechanic from the main series, now called the Justice System, allowing players to steal, murder, commit robberies, fence goods, et cetera.
- Dark Brotherhood: Much like Thieves Guild, it introduced the infamous Dark Brotherhood to the list of joinable factions, with its own questline and zone called The Gold Coast in Cyrodiil. Most notably, it reintroduced stealth take-downs, which can be performed on humanoid enemies with the Blade of Woe for a One-Hit Kill. Further hints of things to come.
- Shadows of the Hist: An Argonian-themed dungeon pack containing two group dungeons set in Black Marsh: The Ruins of Mazzatun, where you must help save enslaved tribes from the Mazzatun tribe, and the Cradle of Shadows, where you help a Dark Brotherhood assassin find her companions. Further hints of things to come.
- Morrowind: The Chapter released in 2017, becoming a DLC in 2018, and the start of the Daedric War arc. You travel to Vvardenfell to assist Vivec in maintaining his power, and prevent a coup from an unknown traitor. The expansion added a new player class; the Warden, a nature themed character that fights with flora, fauna and ice. It also added new PvP content in the form of the Battlegrounds, a 4v4v4 arena type game-mode, which would later become base-game, and a new trial, the Halls of Fabrication.
- Horns of the Reach: A Nord/Minotaur-themed dungeon pack containing two group dungeons set in southwestern Skyrim: Falkreath Hold, where you help the people of Falkreath against a siege by the minotaurs, and Bloodroot Forge, where you must stop the minotaurs by destroying an ancient forge.
- Clockwork City: Continues the Daedric War arc. Added a zone and questline taking place in Sotha Sil's eponymous mechanical realm.
- Dragon Bones: A dragon-themed dungeon pack containing two group dungeons: Fang Lair, where you must stop necromancers from reanimating a dragon skeleton, and Scalecaller Peak, where you help an alchemist stop a plague from spreading due to the skeleton dragon's former Dragon Priest.
- Summerset: Released in 2018, becoming a DLC in 2019, and the conclusion of the Daedric War arc. Taking place in the isle of Summerset for the first time since The Elder Scrolls: Arena, Queen Ayrenn opens the border to everyone, but an unknown plot by many old enemies threatens to consume the entire island. The expansion adds a new crafting skill for creating jewelry, joining the Psijic Order for the first time with a skill line focused on time manipulation, and a new trial, Cloudrest.
- Wolfhunter: A werewolf-themed dungeon pack containing two group dungeons; March of Sacrifices, where you join in one of Daedric Prince Hircine's hunts for a boon, and Moon Hunter Keep, where you help the Silver Dawn take back their old mansion from an ancient werewolf.
- Murkmire: Adds the titular zone and questline south of Black Marsh, originally supposed to be the second Adventure Zone before they dropped the format, as well as a four-player arena, Blackrose Prison. You go to Murkmire to stop ill-meaning people from using ancient Argonian relics for their own cause.
- Wrathstone: A dungeon pack where you help explorer and adventurer Tharayya gather the two halves of the Wrathstone for a client. The beginning of the Season of the Dragon arc.
- Elsweyr: Chapter released in 2019 and the second installment for the Season of the Dragon arc. Dragons reappear and are wreaking havoc in Elsweyr, and it is your duty to help the land of the Khajiit. The expansion adds a new playable class; the Necromancer, a highly requested class that involves the manipulation of corpses and souls. It also adds a new trial, Sunspire, and a new world event involving dragon attacks.
- Scalebreaker: A dungeon pack and the third instalment for the Season of the Dragon arc. You must fight two dragons in two different dungeons, although not everyone are interested in going against them, making your job harder. Released August 12th, 2019.
- Dragonhold: Adds the Southern Elsweyr zone named Pellitine, and is the conclusion to the Season of the Dragon arc. Gather allies, both new and returning, to reform the Dragonguard order and stop the dragons once and for all. Released in October 2019.
- Harrowstorm: A dungeon pack and the first installment of the Dark Heart of Skyrim story arc. This pack contains two group dungeons; Icereach, where you must team up with an old friend to stop a coven of hagravens from creating a magical storm, and Unhallowed Grave where you must stop a necromancer from summoning an unholy army with the help of a vampire. Released in February 2020.
- Greymoor: The fourth chapter that was released in June 2020 that is the second part of the Dark Heart of Skyrim arc. Taking place in Western Skyrim, a vampire lord is wrecking havoc on the land by controlling dark monsters. This expansion adds a rework to vampires that will be available to everyone, a new gameplay involving antiques, a new world event, the ability to explore Blackreach, and a new trial, Kyne's Aegis.
- Stonethorn: A dungeon pack and the third installment of the Dark Heart of Skyrim arc. You must help Ravenwatch member Gwendis investigate two known generals of the Grey Host. Released in September 2020.
- Markarth: Originally titled Darkstorm, Markarth is the final DLC in the Dark Heart of Skyrim storyline, and introduces the eponymous hold in the Reach region of Skyrim as well a new section of Blackreach and the second solo-arena released, Vateshran Hollows. The plan of the Grey Host is finally revealed, team up with the members of the Ravenwatch to stop the Grey Host from completing their master plan involving vampires. Released in November 2020.
- Flames of Ambition: A dungeon pack and the first installment of the Gates of Oblivion storyline. One dungeon, The Cauldron, involves teaming up with a Dremora to save a Dunmer's father in exchange for a certain treasure and the other, Black Drake Villa, has you try and recover an ancient book before cultists burn the area around it to the ground.
- Blackwood: The fifth chapter of the game, and the second part of the Gates of Oblivion storyline, released on June 2021. Set in the Blackwood region shared with Cyrodiil and Black Marsh, it features the return of the Oblivion realm of Deadlands, previously scantly explored in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, the Vestige and their allies must face off against the Daedric prince of Destruction, Mehrunes Dagon, and the vast legions of Dremora at his command. This chapter adds a new companion system where an NPC accompanies you anywhere besides PvP areas and Arenas and a revamp of the Champion System.
- Waking Flame: The third installment of the Gates of Oblivion questline, released on August 2021, with two new dungeons being introduced to the game; The Dread Cellar where you must investigate presence of the the Waking Flame and Red Petal Bastion where Lyranth requests your help to retrieve a powerful artifact. Along with it came with a free update with an expansion of the Cyrodiil PvP Campaign system, as well as some considerable meta changes.
- Deadlands: The fourth and final part of the Gates of Oblivion questline, taking place in the city of Fargrave as well as a small pocket within the titular plane of Oblivion itself, as the Vestige strives to put an end to Mehrunes Dagon's shenanigans. Released on November 2021.
- Ascending Tide: A dungeon pack and the first installment of the Legacy of the Bretons storyline. Help out two sailing crew in two group dungeons. Coral Aerie has you investigate a cult called the Ascendent Order and Shipwright's Regret has you collect plans for an upgraded ship to prepare for talk of peace. Released March 2022
- High Isle: The sixth chapter in the game and the second installment of the Legacy of the Bretons storyline. Taking place in the never before seen Systres archipelago, in particular High Isle and Amenos, talks of peace between the Three Alliances is threatened by political intrigue. This chapter contains an in game card game called Tales of Tribute and new companions.
- Lost Depths: A dungeon pack and the third installment of the Legacy of the Bretons. Help out a druid in the Stonelore Circle at both Earthen Root Enclave where you must ward off an invading Druidic Circle and Graven Deep where you team up with a former pirate she hired to seek lost information at an underwater ruin.
- Firesong: The final installment in the Legacy of the Bretons storyline, taking place in the remaining Systres isles of Galen and Y'ffelon. Centuries of peace between the Systres' Druidic Circles is threatened when vicious Sea Elf pirates and ambitious Druids of the reclusive Firesong Circle threaten the isle of Galen.
- Scribes of Fate: A dungeon pack and the first installment of the Shadows over Morrowind storyline. It contains two dungeons; the Scrivener's Hall where you stop a coup within the ranks of the Scribes of Mora, and Bal Sunnar where you assist a member of the Psijic Order track down a time anomaly within an isolated Telvanni settlement.
- Necrom: The second installment of the Shadows over Morrowind storyline. It adds two new areas - the Telvanni Peninsula in Morrowind, and Apocrypha, realm of Hermaeus Mora. The Vestige must travel between the realms to protect Mora's darkest secret, which if revealed could cause reality itself to unravel.
- Gold Road: The third installment of the Shadows over Morrowind storyline. Continuing the story from Necrom, the Vestige travels to the West Weald region of Cyrodiil to confront the forces of a long forgotten Daedric Prince.
Provides examples of:
- Aborted Arc: While the game was subscription-based, they would update for free with continuing stories in dungeons. After the game went pay-to-play and would instead release new dungeons in downloadable content, many hinted stories in dungeons have been left behind.
- In Direfrost Keep, we do not know how the quest-giver would attone for his ancestors, or where that door by the side-boss leads to.
- In Arx Corinium, there is a door by the bridge lever that obviously leads somewhere, but we will never know where.
- In Volenfell, Tharayya takes the quest-item and awakens something ancient that might have lead to another story in a second part. The events are never mentioned again even when Tharayya returns for a DLC-dungeon.
- Blackheart Haven, the quest-giver seems to steal the last boss' powers, speaking about his "new master". Though there are hints to who this master is, this is never followed up upon.
- In Elden Hollow II, the quest-giver is possessed by a powerful Daedra, and you have the option to spare him so his sister can look for help. The daedra threatens to come after you, but this story is not followed up on.
- In Selene's Web, there is another closed-off hall behind the giant bear boss that might also have lead to another section of the dungeon in a second part.
- In Vaults of Madness, the quest-giver shows obvious hints of madness and not having good intentions, and you get the idea that he has ill-intended plans for the future. We never see him again.
- At the end of the Ebony Mine quest in Morrowind, you have the option to give the alchemical formula the villains were using to create artificial ebony from "volunteers" to the Hlaalu Councilor who sends you to deal with the quest's Arc Villain for double the normal quest payout. You'd expect that this would lead to him screwing you over and using the formula for his own ends, since this is House Hlaalu we're talking about, but nothing comes of it and you never hear of the experiments again.
- Absurdly High Level Cap: Aside from the standard 50 levels per character, the Champion Points system cranks this up to eleven with at least 3600 more. That being said, CP levels are shared across all of your characters, so in practical terms, only your first Vestige has to surmount this Absurdly High Level Cap, the others do not have to.
- Abusive Precursors: The Ayleid, or Wild Elves, were this to Tamriel, enslaving most of the other races and generally treating them like animals. The Dwemer were this as well but not to such an extent.
- Achievement Mockery: The game gives you an achievement for swimming out too far and being eaten by slaughterfish.
- Acid Reflux Nightmare: Discussed by a cultist of Vaermina in Cyrodiil: "I worry that we misread Vaermina's intent. A nightmare may be inspired by a spoiled serving of swamp eel pie. Then would it be Vaermina's will we follow, or the swamp eel's?"
- Action Prologue: All the tutorials so far.
- In the base-game, you have been murdered and your soul brought to Coldharbour in the middle of a revolt, and you help Lyris to get out.
- In Morrowind, you have been captured by slavers and helps an assassin kill the slave trader to get out.
- In Summerset, you are trapped in your own mind and are helped by a Psijic Order member to get free.
- In Elsweyr, you learn your mechanics and setting during a dragon attack.
- In Greymoor, the prologue has you rescuing the Friendly Neighborhood Vampire Fennorian and escaping with him, while also teaching you how to disrupt harrowstorms.
- All actual prologue quests have you travel around the world and fight enemies to progress.
- Adam Smith Hates Your Guts: Becomes more apparent during the late game than it is before you've reached level 50. Prior to CP 160, which is the level cap for gear scaling, having a lot of gold does not mean much since there's not a whole lot of meaningful stuff you can (or need to) get with it, outside of housing, therefore you likely will not notice the rather slow rate at which it is gotten. After CP 160, suddenly, you'll find yourself needing a lot of it to repair your stuff and buying rare materials from the guild market to upgrade your gear, due to the absolutely miserable drop rate of those items, and then the low gold income starts to rear its head. Legendary-tier upgrade materials can cost a small fortune per unit due to how rare they are, especially Chromium Platings for jewelry crafting, so unless you have a dedicated gold-farming character focused solely on farming things to sell, buying just one of those can set you back a good while of earning. That being said, as long as the meta does not change, once you've managed to upgrade all of your items to Legendary quality, this stops being a problem, and you can start invoking it on other players.
- Adaptational Wimp: Horkers, which in this game are completely passive and die instantly from any damage whatsoever. In Skyrim, they weren't exactly a major threat but were at least capable of fighting back.
- Added Alliterative Appeal: The description of the random "Swan-Satin Bathing Thong" item you can get as loot when stealing things. "Sleek and sensuous singing-swan style satin string sporting silver sequins, from Snip & Stitch, Skywatch."
- Adjective Animal Alehouse: "The Sleepy Eaglet" in Skywatch, and "The Screaming Mermaid" in Port Hunding.
- Adventurer Archaeologist: Tharayya from Volenfell and the Wrathstone dungeons. Lady Clarisse Laurent fancies herself this, but much of the adventuring and archaeology will more often than not be your job (and Stibbons') instead of hers. With the Scrying and Excavation skill lines introduced in Greymoor, you yourself can become one, and a remarkably true to life one at that, since you'll be spending the majority of your time following leads to antiquity sites, carefully digging the items up by hand, and then sending them to the Antiquarian Circle for research and appraisal.
- Adaptation Deviation: The six playable classes are a confusing bunch.
- Half of the playable roster (Dragonknight, Templar, Warden) were made specifically for Online and have never appeared in the series lore beforehand, while Necromancer did exist as a class in the prior titles, though it was exclusive to NPCs and wasn't one that you could choose when building your character.
- The typical Sorcerer class in The Elder Scrolls is one that's a Magic Knight. What sets a Sorcerer apart from a common Mage is that the former a spellcaster that's clad in heavy armor and incorporate physical weaponry into their repertoire, while the latter is a Squishy Wizard.
- Largely averted with the Nightblade, which is about the only class that's at least superficially faithful to how it was depicted in the series canon.
- Aerith and Bob: Multiple:
- Bretons are based on British and Celtic culture, so many of their names are more familiar for a Western playerbase than the elves' names, who are more fantasy-sounding.
- This can also apply for some Nord names, as many of them have Nordic influence. In particular Skald-King Jorunn, who has a regular Norwegian woman's name.
- A.I. Breaker: Many world bosses can be cheesed simply by finding an odd-looking part of the map geometry, usually a pillar or rock outcropping that cannot be reached without some finagling. While not all boss arenas have these features, many do, and unless a given boss can summon a lot of adds, has a pull ability to dislodge you from your vantage point, or a teleport skill to get right up there with you, which can be somewhat commonplace during the late game, nothing's going to stop you from simply sitting in one place raining arrows and spells down on their helpless heads. It gets even easier if your class has a reliable self-heal or Life Drain to counteract the damage dealt by ranged adds or the boss' own projectiles, though this kind of cheesing only applies to bow users or mages, for obvious reasons.
- Alas, Poor Villain: King Kurog in Orsinium. He truly wanted to further Orc rights and make them a people equal to all the other races, but went too far. His friend Bhalrog speculates he was also heavily manipulated by his mother. There is a grand funeral prepared for him due to what he meant for the Orcs.
- The Black Dragon from Dark Brotherhood. She was forced to kill her Sanctuary and then act as if nothing had happened, then was manipulated by the Order of Akatosh to exact revenge for their own goals. In the end, she is killed and brought to the Void by the Wrath of Sithis, terrified for her eternal soul.
- In the New Life Festival quest "Old Life Observance", some of the departed souls you can pay respects to include various villains and antagonists from previous content, most of whom either had sympathetic motives, tragic backstories, or both. In addition to Kurog, examples include Veya from the Daedric War arc, Kassandra from Murkmire, and Little Leaf from Craglorn.
- The Alcoholic: Many throughout the game, but Vicecanon Hrondar in Shadowfen particularly stands out. This becomes a plot point, as the Argonian trackers fail to smell that he's been killed and replaced by a duplicate because it's obscured by his usual stench of mead.
- The Alliance: All three major playable warring factions are comprised of three major races each. They will also join forces with you against Molag Bal during the final stretches of the main quest.
- Almost Dead Guy: After the quest "The Final Assault", one of the final quests in the main questline, King Laloriaran Dynar is dying, but he lives long enough to thank you for your help and say how proud he is that his final day was spent protecting Nirn, and he gives you his sword.
- Always Check Behind the Chair: Treasure chests, Heavy Sacks, and Thieves Troves are often found hidden in out-of-the-way locations.
- Exaggerated in the trial Sunspire in Northern Elsweyr, where there is a
Breather Level of sorts between the side-bosses, and the trial chests are hidden behind walls, by cliffs and such.
- Exaggerated in the trial Sunspire in Northern Elsweyr, where there is a
- Amusement Park of Doom: Hadran's Caravan in Reaper's March is an amusement park/gambling den where travelers can race, eat, drink and watch various attractions...and it also just happens to be a front for the titular owner's slaving operation.
- An Adventurer Is You: Many of the classes can take on the different roles, but...
- Templars are often healers, but are very versatile - they are good at tanking, damage-dealing, and have a dedicated skill line for healing magic.
- Dragon Knights tend to be tanks, who have good durability and AoE options.
- Nightblades tend to be your stealth specialists, with a lot of moves devoted to stealth, being undetected, or debilitating opponents
- Sorcerers have lots of ranged, magicka-based abliities, as well as being able to summon lesser Daedra to assist in combat.
- Wardens from the Morrowind update are a tanky support class that use animals for limited offense and enhancements, healing plants, and protective sheets and spikes of ice.
- Necromancers from the Elsweyr update use positioning around dead mobs and allies to strengthen abilities.
- Ancestral Weapon: Many quests are related to family heirlooms, many of which are weapons.
- And I Must Scream: After you defeat the centurion the Harmonic Auditor was trying to fuse his soul into, he explains to you that he will be stuck in his body, motionless and without company, for decades until he goes mad and finally dies, and begs you to end his suffering.
- And the Adventure Continues: After finishing the Five Companions story-line in the base-game, you will most likely still have other alliances to visit, dungeons to explore and downloadable content with their own story arcs.
- And This Is for...:
- In the Morrowind expansion, during the Balmora questline, Veya kills Captain Brivan, who was responsible for her brother Ulran's death. As he falls, she declares, "That's for Ulran. Choke on your own blood, you bastard."
- In the Greymoor expansion, after you kill Pentarch Khorb, Lyris says, "That's for Queen Gerhyld, you bastard."
- Likewise, after you kill High King Svargrim, Svana says, "That was for mother. For Solitude. And for every soul in Skyrim."
- And Your Reward Is Clothes: A few costumes are obtained by reaching a certain character level, completing certain quests, collecting certain objects, etc. The most difficult costume to obtain - and therefore easily the most exclusive - is the Emperor's Regalia
, which is unlocked if you become Emperor in an Alliance War campaign. While Emperors are periodically replaced based on AP score, former Emperors are still able to access the costume if they've previously unlocked it.
- Many cool-looking crafting motifs can only be collected as Rare Random Drops from doing dailies or in dungeons. Similarly, there are also very rare crafting motifs can only be reliably found while questing in trials on veteran mode. These allow you to customize the look of your character like a costume, but on a much more diverse and free-form level.
- Angrish: High Kinlady Estre does this when you first speak to her in Coldharbour if you previously thwarted her attempt to depose Queen Ayrenn:High Kinlady Estre: I'm here because of you, you vile, sniveling, sorry excuse for a... argh!
- Animal Motifs: Each Alliance is represented by an animal on their banners and sometimes armor: an eagle for the Aldmeri Dominion, a dragon for the Ebonheart Pact, and a lion for the Daggerfall Covenant.
- Barbas, in his Dremora form, wears armor with a dog motif. He is forced back into his usual, Irish wolfhound-esque form after his defeat.
- Animalistic Abomination:
- Occasionally the Daedric Princes take on animal-like forms when they appear to you; for instance an Aspect of Hircine appears to be a ghostly deer.
- Barbas, as usual, appears as a "Windhelm Mutt". In actuality, he is a humanoid dremora with a terrifying amount of power, he just assumes his dog form to avoid blowing his cover when out and about.
- Animated Armor: High Isle introduces Soulrazer Knights, giant, burning suits of armor possessed by vengeful spirits. There are also several mount types available in Crown store crates that follow the same concept and theme.
- Animorphism: In Stormhaven, an Argonian goes through a ritual to transform into a crocodile, since she's always felt she was born in the wrong body.
- An Interior Designer Is You: Online has a surprisingly large selection of homes for the player to acquire and furnish. Generally, houses located in base game areas can be purchased for (exorbitant sums of) gold unfurnished, whereas buying them with preplaced furniture will cost you (similarly-exorbitant sums of) Crowns, and DLC homes are only purchasable with the latter currency. After acquiring a house, you can finally put the huge collection of furnishing designs you've amassed during your adventures to good use, and the game offers no shortage of collectible decorations that you can place down on every conceivable surface, just to flex on your less-wealthy friends.
- Another Side, Another Story: You can go through one of the other two faction's main quests with the same character. Previously available only after completing the main quest, this was justified with some Daedric magic, and the question "what would have happened had you washed up on a different beach?"
- In Horns of the Reach, each dungeon tells a side of the overall story. In Falkreath Hold, you help the villagers against the a reach-clan attack and kill a minotaur leader of the Dreadhorn Clan, severely weakening the Reachmen-Minotaur alliance. In Bloodroot Forge, you stop the Dreadhorn Clan's plan to use Bloodroot Forge's nirncrux to empower their warriors.
- In Dragon Bones, you must stop the necromatic reanimation of a powerful dragon skeleton in Fang Lair, and you must kill the resurrected Dragon Priest loyal to said dragon in Scalecaller Peak.
- Anti-Frustration Features:
- Most of Craglorn's content is designed and balanced for group play...except for the Hollowing Sepulchere Delve, which is balanced for solo play like normal Delves due to clearing it being a requirement for the Clockwork City prologue quest.
- An example of a post-release feature being implemented into the game would be Vitality Bonuses when running veteran trials. Prior to this introduction, all veteran trials had an alloted amount of "lives" for your current party, at around 500 respawns per attempt, which sound like a lot, but when taking into consideration just how many times you will likely die during a run, now multiplied by at least twelve, it really adds up. With Vitality Bonuses replacing lives, now it's an incentive for teams to try and clear contents with as few deaths as possible, and is only really of importance if they're running for a spot on the weekly leaderboards, instead of clenching themselves when a boss fight happens to avoid drying out their team's shared stock.
- Merchants no longer have a gold reserve in their inventories for use in trading, so you can theoretically pawn off half of Tamriel's collective gold value in junk items to the innkeeper down the street in one go, without having to carefully balance between buying and selling to keep their coin purse in the positive, as you had to in the mainline titles.
- Anti-Human Alliance: The Aldmeri Dominion is explicitly against a human-dominated Tamriel. Queen Ayrenn makes it clear it is not because she hates humans, but because their race is young, lives short and thus they cannot rule well for such a diverse people, many whose lifespans are thrice their length. This is in willful ignorance of the fact that two out of three of the races that form the Dominion are just as short-lived, and whose civilizations have been thriving for eras specifically because of their short lifespans that spurred them to evolve and change.
- Anti-Regeneration:
- The Minor/Major Defile debuff does this to both you and your enemies, by reducing the strength of incoming heals, which also include passive health regeneration for players.
- You get this applied to yourself as a vampire. Your passive health regeneration gets weaker and weaker the more you feed, which is explained as the Vestige becoming more and more corrupted by undeath, down to a trickle at stage 3, and a stage 4 vampire no longer generates health whether in combat or not, forcing you to either chug potions or make use of your newfound powers to sustain yourself until you regress back to lower corruption levels.
- On veteran mode, if a player dies during any boss fight in Cloudrest, they will be afflicted with a debuff called "Shadow of the Fallen". What this does is that it creates a shadow clone of the deceased player, which will then teleport randomly around the arena to harass their teammates. While your shadow is alive, teammates trying to revive you will take extremely high damage, enough to kill a ~40k HP tank in less than five seconds.
- Then there's the uncommon but significantly dangerous heal absorption mechanic. It does exactly what the name suggests, in that a set value of healing done to your character will be negated, and passive health regeneration will not work while it's still up. The only way to strip heal absorption is to be healed through it, which makes it not very critical on its own, but will leave you vulnerable to being killed by the actually dangerous attacks that will invariably accompany it instead, especially if it targets the tank(s) of the group whenever it appears.
- Apocalypse Cult: The Worm Cult is everywhere, and actively works to further Molag Bal's destructive schemes against Nirn. Many zones also have smaller-scale cults to contend with (some of which are offshoots of the Worm Cult) such as the Bloodthorns, the Supernal Dreamers and the Withered Hand.
- Arbitrary Headcount Limit:
- Enforced in PvE. Dungeon parties are limited to four players, and trial groups twelve, regardless of if you're going up against a local warlord or a Daedric cult that threaten the very existence of every mortal on Nirn itself with their schemes. To make things even more ridiculous, story quests are strictly singleplayer-only, which often pit you against Daedric Princes that threaten to consume Nirn on a whim and make the typical trial bosses seem like small peanuts by comparison.
- In the game's extended lore, the Welkynar gryphon knights of Summerset. There can only be exactly four Welkynars active at any point in time, representing the four cardinal directions. While they can take on apprentices, these charges are not considered fully-fledged members until their mentors die or retire from service, whereupon they will take up the positions of their predecessors.
- Arc Number: In the base-game, the Five Companions arc is number five, in which you must replace the betrayer of the group.
- This comes back during the Season of the Dragon arc, where you had Khunzar-ri and his Kra-Jun, which together were five. Among the group was a betrayer, just like with the Five Companions.
- Arc Villain: The game usually provides a main antagonist for each zone, as well as for group dungeons, trials, arenas, and other dungeon-themed content.
- For the Base Game:
- The Breton General Vette of the Daggerfall Covenant for both the Bleakrock Isle and Bal Foyen zones.
- The Goblin War Chief Ozozai and the Dreugh Kra'gh the Dreugh King for the Fungal Grotto I group dungeon in the Stonefalls zone. Later on, the Dunmer Vila Theran is this for the Fungal Grotto II group dungeon.
- The Breton General Serien is this, along with the Chimer Bone Colossi Balreth and Sadal called the Brothers of Strife, for the Stonefalls zone.
- The Dunmer Tervur Sadri is this for the Darkshade Caverns I group dungeon in the Deshaan zone. Later on, a giant Dwarven Spider called the Engine Guardian serves as the final obstacle for the Darkshade Caverns II group dungeon.
- The Dunmer Magistrix Urili Vox is this for the Deshaan zone in the Base Game, as leader of the Maulborn.
- Sellistrix the Lamia Queen serves as this for the Arx Corinium group dungeon in the Shadowfen zone.
- The Altmer Dominion Alchemist Ruuvitar serves as this for the Shadowfen zone.
- The Nord Witch Drodda of Icereach serves as this for the Direfrost Keep group dungeon in Eastmarch.
- The exiled Nord Prince of Eastern Skyrim, Fildgor Orcthane, serves as this for the Eastmarch zone.
- The Khajiit Fighters Guild member Aelif is secretly is this for the Fighters Guild questline.
- The Daedric Prince Sheogorath serves as this for the Mages Guild questline.
- The Dunmer Combatant called The Lava Queen serves as this for the Blessed Crucible group dungeon in The Rift zone.
- The Nord Worm Cult necromancer Thallik Wormfather is this for The Rift zone. Together with the Giant spirit of Sinmur after the zone quest "Shattered Hopes".
- The Redguard ruler Headman Bhosek serves as this for the Stros M'Kai zone.
- The Reachman Necromancer Vardan is this for the Betnikh zone, as leader of the Bloodthorn Cult on the island.
- The Spider Daedra called The Whisperer is this for the Spindleclutch I group dungeon in the Glenumbra zone. Later on, a Nord vampire named Vorenor Winterbourne is this for the Spindleclutch II group dungeon.
- The Reachman Necromancer Angof the Gravesinger is this for the Glenumbra zone, as leader of the Bloodthorn Cult.
- The Breton sibling bandit leaders Allene Pellingare and Varaine Pellingare serve as this for the Wayrest Sewers I group dungeon in the Stormhaven zone. The siblings return as the Arc Villains of the Wayrest Sewers II group dungeon as now undead bandits.
- The Daedric Prince Vaermina serves as this for the Stormhaven Zone, as the patron deity of her Supernal Dreamers Cult wreacking havoc in the region.
- The Twin Xivilai Ilambris-Athor and Ilambris-Zaven serve as this for the Crypt of Hearts I group dungeon in the Rivenspire zone. Later on, their master Nerien'eth, an undead Altmer Lich, serves as the Arc Villain of the Crypt of Hearts II group dungeon.
- The Breton Vampire Baron Wylon Montclair serves as this for the Rivenspire zone, as the leader of rebelling House Montclair.
- The Imperial treasure hunter Quintus Verres is this for the Volenfell group dungeon in the Alik'r Desert zone.
- The Redguard siblings Uwafah and Alasan, along with their sister Shiri, are this for the Alik'r Desert zone as leaders of the Withered Hand necromancer cult. After all three siblings are killed, their resurrected father Suturah briefly is this too to the zone.
- The Skeleton pirate Captain Blackheart is this for the Blackheart Haven group dungeon in the Bangkorai zone.
- The Imperial Magus-General Septima Tharn is this for the Bangkorai zone, as leader of the Seventh Legion invading the region and is a far greater threat than the Reachmen invading the north of Bangkorai.
- The Maormer Ambassador Ulondil is this for the Khenarthi's Roost zone, as the mastermind behind the assassination of the Silvenar Edhelorn and supporting the invading Sea Viper Maormer forces on the island.
- The undead Altmer High Kinlord Rilis XII is this for both of the group dungeons, The Banished Cells I and The Banished Cells II, in the Auridon zone.
- The Altmer High Kinlady Estre of Skywatch is this for the Auridon zone, as the secret leader of the Veiled Heritance supremacists, known as "The Veiled Queen".
- The Thalmor Canonreeve Oraneth is this for the Elden Hollow I group dungeon in the Grahtwood zone. Later on her Daedric master, a Daedric Titan named Bogdan the Nightflame, is this for the Elden Hollow II group dungeon.
- The Altmer Prince Naemon is secretly this for both the Grahtwood and Greenshade zones, returning in the latter as an undead lich called The Shade of Naemon.
- The Bosmer Razor Master Erthas is this for the City of Ash I group dungeon in the Greenshade zone. Later on a massive Dremora named Valkyn Skoria is this for the City of Ash II group dungeon.
- The Maormer leader of the Sea Vipers, Stormreeve Neidir, is this for the Tempest Island group dungeon in the Malabal Tor group dungeon.
- The Bosmer Werewolf Ulthorn the Hound is this for the Malabal Tor zone.
- The Bosmer changeling Selene is this for the Selene's Web group dungeon in the Reaper's March zone.
- The Imperial mage Javad Tharn is this for the Reaper's March zone, as the one responsible for the Imperial invasion, as well as the one who used the Dark Mane to corrupt Mane Akkhuz-ri.
- The Mad Architect Dutheil is this for the Vaults of Madness group dungeon in Coldharbour.
- The Dunmer arena announcer Hiath the Battlemaster himself is this for the Dragonstar Arena group arena in the Craglorn zone.
- The Celestial Warrior is this for the Hel Ra Citadel group trial in the Craglorn zone.
- The Celestial Mage is this for the Aetherian Archive group trial in the Craglorn zone.
- The Imperial Regent Cassipia, mortal leader of the Scalec Court, is ultimately this for the Craglorn zone, transforming briefly in the end of the zone questline into the Celestial Exalted Viper, to try to usurp the Celestial Serpent's place, so she instead can conquer Nirn.
- The Celestial Serpent is this for the Sanctum Ophidia group trial in the Craglorn zone.
- For the Imperial City DLC:
- The Grievous Twilight Lord Warden Dusk is this for the Imperial City Prison group dungeon in the Imperial City zone.
- The Xivkyn General Malivus is this for the Imperial City questline, as Molag Bal's chief enforcer in the Imperial City.
- Molag Kena is this for the White-Gold Tower group dungeon in the Imperial City zone, initially posing as dissapeared Empress-Regent Clivia Tharn, ruler of the Empire of Cyrodiil.
- For the Orsinium DLC:
- Voriak Solkyn is this for the Maelstrom Arena solo arena, being your final foe in the arena.
- the Orc King Kurog himself is secretly this for the Orsinimum questline, having grown tired of not all Wrothgar's chiefs swearing loyality to his kingdom and now plotting to secretly assissinate said chiefs.
- For the Thieves Guild DLC:
- The Dro-m'Athra Rakkhat, initially possessing the Abbot Kulan-Dro, is this for the Maw of Lorkhaj group trial in the Reaper's March zone.
- The Imperial former Guildmaster of the Thieves Guild, Nicolas, is secretly this for the Thieves Guild questline, posing initially as the newly arisen Merchant Lord of Abah's Landing, Lord Cosh.
- For the Dark Brotherhood DLC:
- The Imperial Primate of the Akatosh Chantry, Artorius Ponticus, is this for the Dark Brotherhood questline, as the leader of the Order of the Hour attacks on the Dark Brotherhood.
- For the Shadows of the Hist DLC:
- The Argonian Tree-Minder Na-Kesh is this for the Ruins of Mazzatun group dungeon in the Shadowfen zone.
- The Hoarvor Daedra Velidreth the Lady of Lace is this for the Cradle of Shadows group dungeon in the Shadowfen zone.
- For the Morrowind Chapter:
- The Nocturnal Shrieke Dyzera is this for the Morrowind prologue.
- The A.I The Assembly General is this for the Halls of Fabrication group trial, facing you finally as a Dwarven Colossus automaton at the end of the trial.
- For the Horns of the Reach DLC:
- The Minotaur Domihaus the Bloody-Horned is this for the Falkreath Hold group dungeon in the Craglorn zone, leading the siege on the city of Falkreath.
- The Reachman Gherig Bullblood is this for the Bloodroot Forge group dungeon in the Craglorn zone, as patriarch of the Dreadhorn Clan.
- For the Clockwork City DLC:
- The Nord mage Bonafryd is secretly this for the Clockwork City prologue.
- The three Dunmer saints of Saint Llothis the Pious, Saint Felms the Bold and Saint Olms the Just are this for the Asylum Sanctorium group trial.
- The Daedric Prince Nocturnal is this for the Clockwork City questline, as the power behind the Daedric invasion of the realm.
- For the Dragon Bones DLC:
- The undead Nord Dragon Priest Zaan the Scalecaller is this for the Scalecaller Peak group dungeon in the Stormhaven zone.
- The Nord necromancer Orryn the Black is this for the Fang Lair group dungeon in the Bangkorai zone. During the final battle, he merges with the Dragon Thurvokun's skeleton, which he had searched for in Fang Lair to begin with.
- For the Summerset Chapter:
- The Altmer Viscount Lelorion is this for the Summerset prologue.
- The Sea Sload Z'Maja is this for the Cloudrest group trial in the Summerset zone.
- The Redguard Psijic mage Josajeh ends up being this for the Psijic Order questline, trying to rewrite history using the stolen Staff of Towers.
- For the Wolfhunter DLC:
- The Orc werewolf Balorgh is this for the March of Sacrifices group dungeon in the Greenshade zone.
- The Khajiit werewolf Vykosa the Ascendant is this for the Moon Hunter Keep group dungeon in the Reaper's March zone.
- For the Murkmire DLC:
- The Imperial smuggler Margus Derius is this for the Murkmire prologue.
- The Naga-Argonian Drakeeh the Unchained is this for the Blackrose Prison group arena, as the final boss of the arena and leader of the Blackguards.
- The Argonian Kassandra is this for the Murkmire questline, using her position as benefactor of Cyrodilic Collections to search for the fabled Remnant of Argon artifact.
- For the Wrathstone DLC:
- The Dwarven Colossus called The Stonekeeper ends up being this for the the Frostvault group dungeon in the Eastmarch zone.
- The Ayleid King Narilmor is this for the Depths of Malatar group dungeon in the Gold Coast zone. At the end of the dungeon, he transforms into the Meridian Guardian known as the Symphony of Blades.
- For the Elsweyr chapter:
- The Imperial Captian Martio Calsivius is this for the Elsweyr Prologue.
- The Dragon Nahviintaas is this for the Sunspire group trial in the Northern Elsweyr zone.
- For the Scalebreaker DLC:
- The Khajiit Vampire Nisaazda and the Nord Vampire Grundwulf are both this for the Moongrave Fane group dungeon in the Northern Elsweyr zone.
- The Dragon Maarselok is this for his own eponymous the Lair of Maarselok group dungeon in the Grahtwood zone.
- For the Dragonhold DLC:
- The Dragon Vahlokzin is this for the Dragonhold prologue, as he stole the Horn of J'darri that you are trying to recover to fight back the Dragons of Elsweyr.
- The Dragon Laatvulon serves as this for the Dragonhold questline, as leader of the New Moon Cult aiming to destroy Tamriel. This is ultimately subverted after Laatvulon is killed two thirds into the Dragonhold questline, revealing that he had been serving Kaalgroontiid, the Big Bad of "Elsweyr", the entire time, who then returns to take over the remnants of the New Moon Cult for the rest of the questline.
- For the Harrowstorm DLC:
- The Reachman witch Mother Ciannait is this for the Icereach group dungeon in the Wrothgar zone, as leader of the Icereach Coven, who is a major antagonistic faction for the Dark Heart of Skyrim story arc.
- The Nord tomb robber Kjalnar Tombskald is this for the Unhallowed Grave group dungeon in the Bangkorai zone, looting the tomb for a mysterious benefactor. This benefactor is revealed to be the Ashen Lord Rada al-Saran, leader of the Gray Host, who hired Kjalnar and his Draugrkin graverobbers to loot the tomb of the Gray Host reliquaries containing the remains of fallen Gray Host members.
- For the Greymoor Chapter:
- The Reachman Werewolf witch Sister Balra of the Icereach Coven is this for the Greymoor prologue.
- The Nord Vampire Lord Falgravn is this of the Kyne's Aegis group trial in the Western Skyrim zone, as the one responsible for the invasion of the island.
- For the Stonethorn DLC:
- The Altmer Vampire Lady Ingerien Thorn is this for the Castle Thorn group dungeon in the Western Skyrim zone.
- The Nord alchemist Arkasis the Mad Alchemist is this for the Stone Garden group dungeon in the Blackreach: Greymoor Caverns zone.
- For the Markarth DLC:
- There is not a definitive Arc Villain for the Markarth prologue, as the prologue deals with researching the Gray Host's past actions for the entire arc. The closest to an Arc Villain would be either the Altmer Vampire Count Verandis Ravenwatch, if you completed the Rivenspire story arc before or otherwise the Altmer Vampire Exarch Turvon after resurrecting the Vampire with a stone husk in Grayhome. After the resurrection is complete, the given Vampire will go into a frenzy for blood and you will need to calm him down with brute force in order to question him about their involvement with the Gray Host.
- For the Base Game:
- Armor Is Useless: Zigzagged.
- On the one hand, your armor class dictates how well you will be able to stand up to damage and of what type (e.g. Light Armor can absorb more magical damage, but is weak to Physical types, and Heavy Armor is vice versa).
- On the other, however, you can alter your apparel to look however you please due to the free-form nature of the Outfits system. How well-built your character looks to be means absolutely nothing, as your actual gear properties and passives will determine your sturdiness. Certain Costumes further make matters more complicated, and some Heavy Armor sets are literal examples of Chainmail Bikini. This means that someone decked from head to toe in platemail might very well be a Squishy Wizard who die to one solid hit from a monster. Conversely, with a proper set of Heavies, you can tank the hardest hitting bosses in the game in your underwear if you so choose by putting on the Nordic Bather's Towel.
- Armor-Piercing Attack: Generally, certain classes will have access to some form of skills or passives that allow them to disregard a portion of the enemy's physical or magical resistances. Some boss enemies can do this to you as well, thus necessitating your own damage mitigation skills and healers if you're tanking. Weapons-wise, maces and mauls serve as an option to circumvent enemy armor by offering higher physical penetration, as does the Sharpened trait. On a more technical level, any attack that deals Oblivion damage inflicts the entire displayed amount to the target regardless of their resistances.
- Arrows on Fire: Enemies will spill oil on the ground and yell "Light it up!", and then enemy archers shoot flaming arrows into it to set it ablaze.
- Artifact Title:
- Averted for the third game in a row. Multiple Elder Scrolls can be found within temples in Cyrodiil which can grant blessings for all the players in a particular alliance that control them during PvP.
- Mostly played straight in Player Versus Environment, as the Elder Scrolls are mentioned in the main game, but do not have a direct role in the present. One downloadable dungeon, White-Gold Tower, revolves around a plot of Molag Bal to steal an Elder Scroll, though.
- Artistic License – Chemistry: Pewter is the chief crafting ingredient for the most basic of jewelry in the game, and is refined from handfuls of grains found by mining deposits found in the game world. Real pewter is an artificial alloy created from tin, with antimony and copper being present as hardeners, and does not occur in nature as ore that one can mine.
- Ask a Stupid Question...:
- After the quest in Camlorn, you can ask Darien Gautier if he knows where Angof is. He replies that yes, he had a drink with him earlier where they discussed their love lives and his plans for world domination... no, of course he does not know where Angof is.
- In Shornhelm, you can ask Skordo the Knife what he's doing in locked in a cage. He snarks that he needed some quiet time.
- Asskicking Leads to Leadership: If an Alliance captures all six forts around the Imperial City, the highest-scoring player from that faction becomes the Emperor.
- Assist Character: The Sorcerer class can have daedric monsters as combat pets, and can temporarily summon a storm atronach as an ultimate. The Warden is supposed to be The Beastmaster, and their ult is a permanent bear companion.
- As You Know: In many quest-related dialogues, you can ask the non-playable character what they are supposed to do, or who they are, and the character will explain and recap everything. They have begun poking fun at you when you do this, though, as they do not understand how you can have forgotten so soon.
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Ascended Fanfic: The crafting "deconstruction" mechanic have been drawn comparison to Ars Metallica mod for Skyrim where any vanilla (and compatible) weapons, armor, and equipment can be smelted for material.
- Athens and Sparta: The Ayleid city states of Delodiil and Abagarlas. Delodiil was progressive and populated by artists and scholors, and its people worshipped Meridia. Abagarlas was a military state whose people worshipped Molag Bal. Abgarlas's King was so jealous of Delodiil that he planned on sacking it and sacrificing every one of its citizens to Molag Bal, but by the time he and his army arrived, Delodiil had vanished, and Abgarlas had been sacked. The Coldharbour arc reveals that Delodiil was absorbed into Coldharbour, Molag Bal's realm, and becomes the main trade hub during the Coldharbour quests. Abgarlas is explorable as a dungeon.
- Autosave: Being an MMO, everything that you do is automatically saved, making a life of crime a bit riskier in comparison to other Elder Scrolls games.
- Awesome, but Impractical: Forcing locks. While it starts out at a very low success chance even for Simple locks, with enough investment into the Ledgermain skill line, you can eventually force open even Master locks somewhat reliably. For a Thieves Guild character, it is a very valuable skill to have, since it lets them swiftly swoop in, crack open a lockbox, and make off with the loot before anyone can see them, whereas picking it normally could take too long and cause detection. But, there is a catch: forcing locks open does not award you with any experience, whether for your character or the Ledgermain skill line, so most players will still opt to pick them manually instead.
- Backstab: There are several skills or item sets that deal more damage if used behind the target. Also, hitting a heavy attack while sneaking will briefly stun the target: as being discovered negates this bonus, melee attackers have to hit from behind, although it's technically possible for a bow user to achieve this even if the enemy is facing them, due to their range.
- The Blade of Woe provides a literal Back Stab, in that it can only be executed from behind an unwary victim. A successful stab kills them instantly regardless of health, but will only work on lesser dremora and mortals of the ten playable races, whereas undead and other, stronger enemies (i.e. bosses or those with special health bar frames) No-Sell it.
- Badass Army: Every faction has one. Even Molag Bal and his army of Dremora qualify, completely unflinching in their every action.
- Badass Longcoat: The Breton Hero in the cinematic trailers. His outfit is sometimes purchasable in the Crown Store, though the longcoat has been shortened and glued to your legs when you run.
- Bad Powers, Good People: Applies mostly to Necromancers, and to an extent, Vampire and Werewolf players. The "bad powers" part is heavily emphasized by how most of their available class skills are marked as "criminal acts" that will make city guards and civilians leery if witnessed, but ultimately all Vestiges are still technically on the side of good, regardless of how morally-dubious you're playing your character as.
- Bag of Holding: While your backpack starts out small, with some investment, you can eventually increase this limit to a whopping 200 slots (210 by owning two Crown store-specific pets, the Mournhold Packrat and the Bristleneck War Boar), which allow you to hold far more items than a person would logically be able to, some of which can range from being as big as a chair to a small building. And then there's the Craft Bag, which you get for simply signing up for ESO+, which lets you carry a practically infinite number of all your crafting materials, baits, and more. Most players upgraded to ESO+ simply for the crafting bag, which is the most immediately life-changing privilege it brings, since then their inventories will no longer be inundated with materials that they're not using.
- Bad Future: One of the final quest arcs in Reaper's March involves travelling to and exploring a potential future where Javad Tharn's plan to conquer Elsweyr succeeds, and the Disaster Dominoes this would inflict on the Dominion. Basically, the Khajiit are enslaved by Javad, the Bosmer willingly become slaves to the Wild Hunt in a desperate attempt to save themselves, the Veiled Heritance is reformed under Ayrenn's bitterly disillusioned Battlereeve and successfully assassinates almost all of the Dominion's remaining leadership, and what's left of the Dominion is conquered by the combined forces of the Covenant and Pact as Ayrenn prepares to make a suicidal Last Stand.
- Bat Out of Hell: Giant bats are relatively common creatures. There are even werebats on one island in Valenwood (though they only appear in bat form).
- Battle Couple: Using Pledges of Mara, you and another player can get married, or "bonded", as the game calls it. Both of you will gain your own Ring of Mara, which if worn will grant a 10% experience bonus to you and your spouse as you adventure together.
- Battle Harem: The wives of an Orc chief, as they are the highest-ranking orcs in a clan outside of the chief himself (and possibly his mother), must be able to fight besides the other requirements for marriage.
- Beast Man:
- The Khajiit and Argonians are based on cats and lizards respectively, and the Khajiit can be born in the shape of a regular housecat or tiger depending on the moon phase it was born under.
- There used to be another race based on foxes, the Lilmothiit, but they are extinct.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Plays a role in several sidequests, concerning people who made the mistake of trying to bargain with a Daedric Prince.
- Because Destiny Says So: Sotha Sil had the power to save the life of Proctor Lucianna Pollo's son, but told her bluntly the circumstanses made it so he chose not to do so. In general, Sotha Sil is someone who ponders and toys with the concept of destiny and inevitability.
- Benevolent Boss: Implied. Although you do not actually interact with your hirelings nor do you visibly pay them for their efforts, their mail correspondences make it clear that they hold you in very high regards, and trust you enough to divulge many of their very personal troubles and share the tales of their adventures with you that they never would with anyone else.
- Benevolent Mage Ruler: Downplayed, Mistress Dratha over Vos, though she has fallen ill due to the actions of the usurper, Savarak Fels. For a Telvanni, she is benevolent, because she leaves the people of Vos alone and treats them like adults, which is enough for them to love her.
- Best Served Cold: Discussed in the book Wait Till Next Time, in which an Orc author declares that — Covenant aside — the Orcs are only biding their time until they can repay the Bretons and Redguards for the past invasions of Orsinium.
- Big Bad: The Daedric Prince of Domination himself, Molag Bal.
- Morrowind has Barbas, Clavicus Vile's "conscience". However, unlike his other appearances, Barbas is cunning and ruthless here, manipulating Vivec himself in a desperate bid to get back on Clavicus' good side after Clavicus banished him for an unspecified reason. Doubles as the Final Boss.
- In Summerset, Mephala is built up to be this, being the only member of the Daedric Triad to not have a focus yet, and for a good while, she is. However, towards the end of the main quest, she passes the reigns over to Nocturnal.
- In Elsweyr, it is Kaalgrontiid, a dragon who led a number of his brethren in an invasion of Elsweyr long ago, but ended up sealed in the Halls of Colossus. Abnur Tharn and you, if you do the prologue quest accidentally freed Kaalgrontiid and the other dragons, allowing them to rampage once more.
- In Greymoor, it is High King Svargrim who betrayed his kingdom to become a vampire with the Grey Host vampire clan terrorizing Western Skyrim lead by the Greater-Scope Villain Rada al-Saran.
- In Blackwood, it is Mehrunes Dagon, who just like in Oblivion, wants to merge his realm of the Deadlands with all of Nirn.
- High Isle has the Ascendant Order with the Ascendant Magus as the main threat during the storyline with Lord Bacaro as the Ascendant Lord acting as the villain for the entire Legacy of the Bretons arc.
- Big Bad Wannabe: Euraxia Tharn in Northern Elsweyr. While she conquered a large part of Elsweyr before the dragons appeared, she believes her partnership with the dragons is between equals, while they do not.
- Big Fancy House: You can visit (and break into) several manors in the game, such as the one in Skywatch. The Homestead update also allows you to own manors.
- Big Good:
- The Prophet.
- Meridia often plays this, but is still as ruthless as any other Daedric Prince.
- Morrowind has Vivec, who enlists you (and your friends) to protect his people.
- Summerset has the Psijic Order helping you save the Altmer.
- Elsweyr has Lord Gharesh-ri.
- Greymoor has Princess Svana.
- Count Verandis Ravenwatch is this for the Rivenspire arc. He would later reassume this role during the Markarth questline.
- High Isle has Lady Arabelle.
- Big Shadow, Little Creature: There is a quest on Vvardenfell to assist an archeologist. When you first encounter him in an ancestral tomb he has you investigate what appears to be a large menacing shadow, failing horribly to hide how terrified he is. The source of the shadow is actually a tiny spider that happens to be right in front of a lantern, and the archeologist splutters, saying that is obviously what he had expected.
- Bioluminescence Is Cool: Some mushrooms and plants from the Morrowind zones. The mind landscape that the Sloads create in Summerset.
- Bittersweet Ending:
- The Stonefalls Arc: The Covenant is pushed back and the Brothers of Strife have been contained. Unfortunately, Serien managed to kill Garyn with his last breath, driving his father mad with grief. Tanval eventually manages to regain his senses but must sacrifice himself to stop Sadal.
- The Rivenspire Arc: You stopped Montclair from turning everyone in Rivenspire into vampires, but Verandis returns to Molag Bal with the Lightless Remnant. Furthermore, no matter who you choose to take over leadership in Shornhelm, there will be people dissatisfied by your choice.
- The Grahtwood Arc: Queen Ayrenn is ratified and accepted as queen, and in the process of making this happen you help a lost high elf out of her prison, bring an infamous war criminal to justice, save a city from Sheogorath, and prevent a powerful Dremora lord from escaping her prison. However, Ayrenn's brother is consumed by his greed and anger toward his sister, forcing you to kill him, and the entity that trapped the high elf is never even encountered by the player.
- The Reaper's March arc: Javad Tharn is dead, the Dark Mane is permanently destroyed, the Stonefire Cult is dismantled, the Colovian offensive is halted, and the surviving Lunar Champion is crowned the new Mane. However, the new Mane is still devastated by the loss of her sister, and the previous Mane Akkhuz'ri will spend the rest of his life in shame over what he did while under the Dark Mane's control.
- The Banished Cells 2: The Keepers are dead, most of them having been killed by your hand after Rilis corrupted them, and their leader, the only one who resisted the corruption, sacrificing himself during the final battle against Rilis. However, Rilis is finally killed for good, and the purified spirits of the Keepers can now rest in peace, their long duty finally at an end.
- Orsinium: You stop King Kurog and Forge-Mother Alga from massacring strongholds that refuse to turn their faith from Malacath to Trinimac. However, the hope of the Orc people has fallen and many are saddened that their hero became a villain. The Trinimac faithful lose a lot of their followers due to Kurog's previous support. Furthermore, it was primarily Kurog and Alga who wanted the Orcs to be part of the Daggerfall Covenant, though the more traditional and isolationist new king does claim he is willing to renegotiate with High-King Emeric regarding the terms of Orsinium's presence in the Covenant. Also, depending on how you handled the infiltration of the Vosh Rakh base, either the High Priestess of Orsinium or one of your adventurer companions is dead, and in the latter case, another of your companions ends up badly crippled, possibly for life.
- Summerset: You defeat Nocturnal and prevent her from unmaking reality itself. However, it takes the Heroic Sacrifice of both Earl Leythen and Darien Gautier to get there. Darien is revealed to be suffering an And I Must Scream fate at the hands of Meridia, which also retroactively makes this a bittersweet ending for the main quest, in which Darien was your ally and Meridia was the closest thing to a Big Good. Not only that, but it's heavily implied that Meridia, once your ally, now holds a bitter grudge against you for "corrupting" her Knight.
- Cloudrest: You manage to vanquish the monstrous Z'Maja and free Cloudrest of her sinister grasp. However, the city is already devastated beyond saving, and if you completed the trial by first fighting the three corrupted shades and their gryphons, then the Welkynars will have been devastated to the last man, leaving Olorime as the only survivor. However, should you decide to take on Z'Maja without destroying any of the shades, which is no small feat even on normal, you can avert that last part, ensuring that the Welkynars will live on to rebuild the city once the crisis is over.
- Scalecaller Peak: You and Jovud's team manage to destroy Zaal the Scalecaller and her cult and stop them from spreading their plague across Tamriel, but in a last act of spite towards you, Zaal's spirit infects Jovud with her disease, dooming him to spend the rest of his now very much shortened life quarantined within the Peak in order to prevent the plague from spreading. This can be averted if you collected certain items within the dungeon, but good luck finding them on your first run.
- Season of the Dragon Epilogue: Kaalgrontiid's bid to become the Dark Aeon is foiled and he and his most powerful lieutenants are defeated, Elseweyr is united once more under Queen Khamira, and the Dragonguard has reformed under Sai Sahan and is prepared to defend Tamriel from future Dragon attacks. However, Abnar Tharn sacrifices himself to contain the out of control Aeonstone power left behind by Kaalgrontiid and prevent it from destroying Tamriel, and while his death is not outright confirmed, its unlikely we'll ever see him again.
- The initial ending for Markath, before the "epilogue" that unlocks when you clear both it and Greymoor's main quests. Lady Belain is defeated and Rada al-Saran's plan to use the Dark Heart is foiled, saving the Reach, but Arana is mortally wounded in the final battle and dies shortly after Belain's defeat, and hundreds of Markarth's people were killed by the Grey Host during their attack on the city.
- Blackwood: You managed to stop Councilor Vandacia from succeeding in his plan to merge Nirn and the Deadlands together before Mehrunes Dagon became too powerful. However, Destron has been absorbed into Dagon, Sombren and Calia have to go to the Deadlands in order for the latter to control her powers, and the fourth Ambition of Mehrunes Dagon is still missing, making them vulnerable to the Daedric Prince's plans.
- Gates of Oblivion Epilogue: Mehrunes Dagon's final plot is foiled and the remaining Ambitions are forever beyond his reach due to Lyranth absorbing their power into herself, but in order to accomplish this, you had to kill your old friend and ally Sombren, who had been driven mad by the power of the Mysterium Xarxes. In addition, Lyranth makes it clear afterwards that her alliance with you is over and that she can't guarentee she won't become your enemy if she crosses paths with you again.
- Legacy of the Bretons Epilogue: You finally managed to defeat the Ascendent Order, have the three Druidic Circles reconcile with each other, and begin the peace talks between the Three Alliances but Frii had to sacrifice themself to be the new volcanic spirit, it'll take a long time before the other Circles trust the Firesong and the revelation that the Ascendant Lord was Lord Bacaro will definitely be felt for a long time.
- Black Knight: Veteran Dragonknight and Nightblades are previewed in black armour most of the time when creating a character.
- Blind Seer:
- The Prophet has gone blind after reading Elder Scrolls, but he is still quite perceptive and has some power.
- This is the fate of Terran Arminus in White-Gold Tower as well.
- Border Patrol: Try swimming too far away from a shoreline, and prepare to be eaten alive by a school of slaughterfish. Cyrodiil's Imperial City also has a moat around it inexplicably filled with them, so falling in there will make you fish bait in a few seconds regardless of the water's depth.
- Boring, but Practical:
- Post-Update 30, medium armor. While it's only good for one very specific playstyle, assuming you're not running a hybrid setup, and lacks the specific bonuses unique to light and heavy armor, medium gear is also not beholden to any of their drawbacks, which can be rather severe depending on the type of content you're playing.
- Discussed and lampshaded in the Outlaw motif books.
An Outlaw's pauldrons are layered and durable but do not project far from the shoulders—you do not want to get caught in a tight place because you are wearing fancy winged shoulder cops, after all. - Boss Rush: In the final main quest, you can optionally choose to face the various Arc Villains you've defeated up to this point once again.
- Bottomless Magazines: Bow-users never go out of arrows.
- Bow and Sword in Accord: Very well possible for any class - the class does not limit what sort of weapons can be used.
- Bowdlerize: The earier games describe Molag Bal's realm of Coldharbor as having
every surface covered in blood and excrement. Evidently, the designers thought this would be too gross, as the realm in-game is just dark and freezing cold.
- Breakable Weapons: Surprisingly averted for actual weapons, which do not degrade with use or player death. The most that can happen to them is running out of charges, if the weapons in question are enchanted. Played straight with armors, however, which will degrade with sufficient use (and you dying a lot) until they break, whereupon you will lose their protection values and set bonuses, if any.
- It used to be that equipment would also slowly lose its capabilities as it degraded (armor offered less physical resistance, weapons would hit for less), but that was mercifully patched out.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: Sheogorath is fond of this, as he will casually detail the plots of other The Elder Scrolls titles, and all but telling you that a choice in a quest will give you "2 Skill Points."
- Break the Cutie: Regardless of who lives and who dies, the events of Orsinium put Eveli through the wringer and all but shatter her idealistic beliefs about what makes a true hero.
- Bribing Your Way to Victory:
- Very downplayed with the Crown store.
- While the Crown store and various purchasable packs do offer a lot of conveniences, such as instant research tokens or quick head-starts to rarer skill lines like vampirism or lycanthrope, neither of those let you purchase any game-breaking thing like gold or high-level gear by shelling out real money. The most instantly gameplay-impacting thing it can give you are XP vouchers, and while it is possible to buy your way out of grinding up certain skill lines and finding skyshards, both of these require you to have done those same things yourself, but manually on a different character beforehand, so it's not like you could start a fresh account and buying up all of those nice things immediately.
- Played somewhat straighter in the form of the Digital Imperial Edition Upgrade which is only purchasable with Crowns after the original Imperial Edition of the game was deprecated. Owning it grants access to the exclusive Imperial race, which is fantastic for tanking, especially after the Nord Nerf of Update 30, but doesn't see much use otherwise.
- On a lesser level, many quests let you choose between doing a favour to continue a quest, steal an item, persuade or intimidate the character to give you the thing you need... or you can pay them, usually 69 gold, to just get it quickly. The Altmer New Life Festival quest assumes you will rather pay those 69 golds rather than kill some bugs so much that killing those bugs is an achievement.
- Very downplayed with the Crown store.
- Brick Joke: The Alliance Trailer begins with a Nord fighting undead Werewolves in a cave. At the end of the trailer, one of those werewolves bursts out of the ground in an attempt to flee, only to be quickly dragged back under by the Nord, who climbs out himself a second later.
- Broad Strokes:
- While the map of Tamriel in Online is remarkably accurate compared to the provincial areas of older titles, the developers did take a lot of artistic liberties with how they depict these regions. The most startling difference Online makes is the addition or removal of certain landmarks that may or may not have appeared in the other games. While this can be understood as these locations need to be expanded in size to accommodate a large amount of players, the changes made to them are usually dramatic, such that they do not look the least bit like how they did in games that chronologically succeed Online, and some dungeon placements do not make any sense (e.g. Windhelm and Riften look nothing like their Skyrim counterparts, Winterhold and Dawnstar are just straight-up missing from the game map, as is much of the marshland north of Morthal, although Solitude and Markarth are basically unchanged from how they last looked). A disturbing amount of locations that show up in Online will just magically vanish several thousand years later during the Third Era without the least bit of acknowledgement from anyone.
- Downloadable content is supposed to work on their own without playing the base-game first, so any recurring characters have usually no big role in the base-game. However, some content does assume you defeated Molag Bal and got your soul back, if only because they stopped quests where not having a soul is helpful.
- In Wrathstone, you can do whichever dungeon first and the next dungeon will act as the final dungeon.
- In Elsweyr, where the Mane could be useful to have, you instead get the representative, the Speaker of the Mane. This is because the Mane changes during the Aldmeri Dominion Story Arc, and you get to choose which of two will be the new Mane.
- Dialogues often do change if you enter a DLC in the middle of a Story Arc, like if you do Clockwork City without doing Morrowind first, so that people will act as if you get involved for the first time. Small details and dynamics will fly past you with that, though. It does not, however change dialogues in Morrowind if you finished Clockwork City and Summerset.
- When Mulaamnir offers to let you and Abnur Tharn go in Elsweyr, it makes more sense if you played the prologue quest first, where you technically helped Abnur Tharn free the dragons, than if you did not, in which the dragons will let you be just because they think you would be an annoying bug they would rather not put effort in.
- Brother–Sister Incest: More like Twin-Brothers-Incest in Elsweyr. The twin Imperials in the Stitches make many suggestions about having a sexual relationship with each other, and seems to consider letting you join.
- Brutal Honesty: You yourself have the option to be this in multiple quests, bluntly telling an NPC exactly what happened to their friends, loved ones etc regardless of how much the truth hurts. Sometimes this is shown to be the better choice then lying, sometimes its not.
- Bury Your Gays: Little Leaf and Regent Cassipia downplay the nature of their relationship at first, even when directly asked. One only exclaims her true devotion after you've killed the other defending her. After both are defeated, you can find a journal written by the former professing her love in return, but the game continues to drive home how irreversibly dead you've just made them for the rest of the quest. Besides them, examples of overtly queer characters are extremely minor.
- Butt-Monkey: Stibbons, Lady Laurent's much beleaguered manservant. Depending on your actions throughout Lady Laurent's quests, he can, in order, get bodyjacked by the spirit of another manservant, turned into a Goblin, get temporarily fired after stupidly leading a Dominion assault force right into the heart of the Redguard homeland, accidentally turned to stone, abducted by a Winged Twilight who then tries to seduce him, and finally imprisoned in a Lotus-Eater Machine by a trio of Dark Seducers.
- He is not safe even from the downloadable content. In Orsinium, he is frozen by an artifact, in Morrowind he is encased by a spider web after reading a Daedric scroll, Murkmire has him transform into an egg after performing an Argonian mating ritual, and Blackwood has him captured by a necromancer and being duplicated into dumber version of him. At least in High Isle, he gets a break where it's Lady Laurent who gets humiliated instead and is able to come up with a solution to save her.
- Call a Rabbit a "Smeerp": Outside of a few specific encounters, nearly every kind of large predatory feline in the game are labeled as "Senche", or something along that line. These include lions, tigers, leopards, and generally any big cat that's not part of a Khajiiti furstock, and crop up even in areas well outside of Elsweyr.
- Call-Forward:
- The Morrowind chapter reveals the reason why Mistress Dratha does not allow men in Tel Mora during the events of the third game. Turns out, she's a believer of the Nerevarine Prophecy (which was foreshadowed beforehand) and in order to make sure that the Nerevarine will show up, sells her soul to a Dremora in exchange for immortality. The Dremora states that he will return for her in disguise as a mortal man, hence her banning all men from living in Tel Mora.
- During the temporal displacement shenanigans in Nchuthnkarst, Kireth Vanos mentions suddenly finding herself in Morrowind, but Vivec City is a smoldering crater and the larger part of Vvardenfell had already sunken below the sea, foreshadowing the events of the Red Year that would take place about a millennium later during the Fourth Era.
- Speaking of Morrowind, its main questline centers around a Daedric plot to sap Vivec of his divine powers. During the last third of the chapter story, Vivec had become so devoid of strength that his grip on the Ministry of Truth began to falter, causing Bar Daau to start resuming its course again, only to be halted once more when the Vestige restored power to the living god. Pretty much the same thing happened after the conclusion of The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, only this time Vivec's powers are irrevocably removed from him, and with his disappearance a short while later, Bar Daau finally crashed onto Vvardenfell, resulting in the events of the Red Year.
- While adventuring through the Depths of Malatar, you can come across a letter that mentions Umaril the Unfeathered, whom the Hero of Kvatch will fight in the same location during the finale of the Knights of the Nine questline in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.
- Deadlands has you work with Divayth Fyr on tracking down the source of the counterfeit Ebony Blade. At the end of the quest, he gained some knowledge on how to replicate the ability, setting up an explanation as to why Volendrung in Morrowind was unenchanted.
- When you progress through the Morrowind main questline, you will meet and talk with Volrina Quarra, still in her human Imperial form, in Molag Mar. She mentioned that she was attacked by vampires of the Berne clan in Galom Daeus (which at this point is already a Berne clan lair), losing her brother Vergillius in the process, and has been wanting to seek revenge. Volrina would later form her own vampire clan from her bloodline in Morrowind.
- Call-Back: Quite a lot:
- Sheogorath, naturally, references all the previous games during his questline including name-checking the Staff of Chaos and Numidium. Which is odd considering that those events will not be taking place for another 800 or so years. Archmage Shalidor is also a questgiver in this plotline.
- A naked Nord sends the player on a quest to find the witch that robbed him.
- There are some references to Arena lore; Arena was originally conceived as a game where you go around fighting gladiator teams, and each town had a named team. Some of the random factions you come across in ESO are named after one of those teams, and the team names in the Morrowind expansion's battlegrounds also come from there.
- The dragon Nafaalilargus, one of the bosses from The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard, returns in Dragonhold under the new and more proper name in Dovahzul, Nahfahlaar.
- Dragons, essentially mobile world bosses fought in Elsweyr or Dragonhold zones, will periodically attack you using their Thu'um.
- Cap: There are several ways in which this will manifest in the game.
- Your character level is capped at 50, and you'll start gaining Champion ranks beyond that point (Veteran Ranks prior to the Dark Brotherhood update). Champion levels are respectively capped at 3,600 at the time of writing. Accordingly, your gear stops scaling at CP 160, so that's the safe point where you can start worrying about getting the best endgame sets as they can't get any better stats-wise.
- The two forms of Damage Reduction, Spell and Physical Resistance, are capped at 50% and represented by the total Armor value of your gear. At level 50, the hard cap for both Resistances is around 36,400 Armor score for 50% damage mitigation. While it is possible to go beyond 36,400 with buffs and some skills, any excess value will be disregarded.
- Accordingly, the stats that counter these, Spell and Physical Penetration, are capped at 18,200 each, which translate into a 25% maximum penetration.
- Your Bag of Holding has a finite carrying space, of course. While it can be upgraded, the maximum bag space is 200. Your bank works similarly, but caps out at 240 slots instead.
- You are limited to how many furniture items you can have in your home, and of them how many of each type. Generally, these caps change depending on the size of your house, with larger homes allowing for more types of furnishings and more articles of each category. Having an active ESO+ subscription will further double this limit, allowing you to place even more things in your house.
- Some currency types have rather low upper limits to how many of them you can carry with you at any given time. Event tickets are limited to 12 units, tops, and you can only have a maximum of 500 Transmutation Crystals on you at any given time, increased to 1,000 with an active ESO+ subscription. The other currency types don't seem to have a hard cap, especially gold, but considering how Online still uses a 32-bit memory system, one can make an educated guess that it maxes out at a staggering 2,147,483,647g.
- Card-Carrying Villain: Nocturnal during the Daedric War arc. The dragons in Elsweyr.
- While the Alliance War is meant to run on Gray-and-Grey Morality, whenever a rival Alliance member or group is an antagonist in your current Alliance's quests, nine times out of ten they'll be portrayed as almost cartoonishly evil. Alexandra Conele and Ruuvitar both stand out in this regard.
- Cartography Sidequest: The Player Character's map already includes the entirety of Tamriel's geography, so achievements are given for discovering the points of interest in a zone, completing caves, completing a certain number of quests in each zone, and finding a particular character in each zone, not by discovering terrain.
- Cast from Hit Points: Certain abilities don't cost Stamina or Magicka to cast, but drain your Health to activate like Equilibirum, Blood Altar, or Malevolent Offering. While you can't kill yourself with instant-cast skills like the former two, those that drain health over a set duration like Malevolent Offering and its two morphs can do you in if you use them while close enough to dying.
- Cave Behind the Falls: Several of these exist, including a minor one along the coast in Wrothgar, and the one behind the Mournhold temple that contains the portal to the Clockwork City.
- Charged Attack: You can charge an attack by holding down the button longer; this is called a heavy attack and makes the attack more powerful and restores either stamina or magicka.
- Chekhov's Gunman:
- There are many non-playable characters who will have a role in the quest, where you can talk to them and they will speak normally with you, or telling you to get lost until you have something important to say.
- You meet the man who will become the new Silvenar long before it is revealed that he will take over the mantle.
- The Chosen Many: The collective protagonists of this game, befitting MMORPG nature.
- The Chosen One: You are the only one fighting Molag Bal's Daedra and Dark Anchors, but from each player's view they are the only one who has escaped from Coldharbour and returned to Tamriel after having their soul stolen, and is working with the Five Companions.
- Late in the main plot, the Prophet mentions that "all other Vestiges will have their souls restored", more or less confirming the existence of other heroes who may have escaped Coldharbour like the Player Character, but did not get to meet the Prophet and join the Companions. However, the first subtle hint of this is dropped during the Prophet's first conversation with the Vestige after they escape Coldharbour, where the Soulless One is advised to "join with others (...) seek others who share [their] courage and valor".
- Circus Episode: The quest "Manor of Masques", which takes place in the House of Reveries, a sort of mix between theater, circus and talentshow.
- City Guards: Prior to Update 6, guards were just in cities to help make cities appear more populated. Update 6 adds unkillable guards, specifically named "(City Name) Guard" or "(Alliance) Guard". When you have got a bounty the guards will come after you when they see you, either to collect the bounty or to attack you.
- Clock Punk: The Clockwork City and its robotics, with a healthy dose of steampunk.
- Close-Enough Timeline: One quest in the Daggerfall Covenant has you going back in time in order to find out how to defeat a werewolf. If you decide to alter history by finding the lover of the guy you took over, once you get back to your proper time, the mage that made it possible and his bickering friend are now females and there is now a living descendant of the the man you possessed and his lover who shares the same name as her but otherwise everything stays the same.
- Color-Coded Item Tiers: All loot items are categorized by rarity using the common color scale of white (Common), green (Fine), blue (Superior), purple (Epic), and gold (Legendary), and gear of certain qualities can be improved to a higher tier by using rare tempering materials. Mythic items are special one-piece set relics that can be found by scrying for their components, and uniquely have the orange color code with filigreed item card frames.
- Collection Sidequest: DLC content starting from Orsinium usually feature achievements that require you to scour the zone maps and collect a certain amount of relics and return them to where they belong (or, in the case of the Thieves Guild, steal them and put them on display in the Den). The Dark Brotherhood DLC has a different spin in the form of the Litany of Blood, which requires you to go out into the world and kill specific NPCs with the Blade of Woe. These collection sidequests typically award a Memento or Costume upon completion, and are required for the zone-specific Hero achievements.
- Combat Medic: Specializing in the Restoration Staff weapon type, or the more healing-oriented class-skills allows you to become one. A perk in the Support Skill line, only available in Cyrodiil, increases the power of your healing when you are near a Keep, fittingly named "Combat Medic".
- Combination Attack: "Synergy". Some attacks will give another nearby player a prompt that they can activate the Synergy, which is a bonus attack done at the same time at no extra cost.
- Commonplace Rare: Clothes. And, no, we do not mean light armor, we mean the clothes you see worn by most of the townsfolk. You can only obtain articles of common clothing by stealing them from containers and then paying fences to (snirk) launder them.
- Completion Meter: In the Murkmire update, they added the zone guide, that tells you how many wayshrines, skyshards, delves and more you have found and completed.
- The Computer Is a Cheating Bastard:
- Most melee moves by enemies will hit you, no matter how much you try to dodge it - you can be ten feet away and a tiger swiping its claws will still make contact somehow.
- Enemies' spells and arrows can go through walls and change direction to follow a target. Yours cannot.
- If an enemy chases a player too far away, they wll start running back to their starting position. While they are doing this, they regain all health and cannot be hit by any attack, even ranged ones. This essentially means Hit-and-Run Tactics such as kiting (normally frequent in MMORPGs) is useless here.
- Continuity Nod:
- Most of Molag Bal's generals that can appear at Dark Anchors appeared in previous games; Lord Dregas Volar, Hrelvesuu, Menta Na, Gedna Relvel, Kathutet, Amkaos, Ranyu, Anaxes, Medrike, and Velehk Sain.
- In Morrowind, there was a legendary enchanted dagger called the "Fang of Haynekhtnamet". If you find yourself in Shadowfen and wander southeast of Stormhold, you can actually fight him (or the latest member of a series of Haynekhtnamets). There is a chance that he will drop a unique dagger
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- Dark Brotherhood features Mirabelle Motierre, a presumed ancestor to Francois and Amaund Motierre of Oblivion and Skyrim respectively.
- Abnur Tharn, a supporting character in the main story, is an ancestor of the Big Bad of The Elder Scrolls: Arena.
- Recurring characters in downloadable content will have additional dialogue options if you did their quests previously.
- Continuity Snarl:
- Shalidor mentions reassembling the fragments of the Numidium. However at the time of the game, the Numidium is still intact (and in the safekeeping of the Tribunal).
- Non Player Characters in Morrowind note that the Tribunal haven not made their annual pilgrimage to Red Mountain, a reference to the events of Morrowind. However the return of Dagoth Ur will not take place for another 300 years. That said, there might be other reasons the Tribunal are not making the pilgrimage like being busy with the Alliance War.
- The Lusty Argonian Maid, a recurring joke since its inception in Morrowind makes an appearance in Online. The play's author, Crassius Curio would not even be born for another eight hundred years or so. An in-game newspaper contains a review of the play, which handwaves its early existence as being a traditional story with many derivatives based around the other races.
- Ruminations of the Elder Scrolls was written in 4E 195 by Septimus Signus, but is found in the library of the Cult of the Ancestor Moths in Cyrodiil. However, the Moth Priests deal with Elder Scrolls, which have all manner of unusual effects on more or less everything, so it's very possible some shenanigans occurred in a later time that sent a copy of the book back to the Second Era.
- Convection, Schmonvection: Appropriately for the series, radiant heat is no big deal to anyone unless it's an explicitly-mentioned plot point.
- The majority of the Stonefalls questline has you questing around the hills and cliffs surrounding Ash Mountain, a freshly-erupted volcano with that's still spewing lava all over the place and destroying the landscape. Many of the quests even have you be fighting in or around lava floes that haven't even cooled yet, and yet nothing bad will happen to you should you linger, as long as you don't step into the actual lava itself.
- The Earth Forge, visited during the Fighters Guild questline, is a smithy placed smack-dab in the middle of a huge lava-filled cavern, with only a single tiny entrance for exhaust. Yet, nobody seems to feel anything negative while there, especially Merric at-Aswala, your resident blacksmith and armsman, who gets within spitting distance to the forge's searing hot coal bed with barely an apron on and some leather clothing, with much of his skin exposed to the heat. Later on, he switches his leathers for a full suit of platemail armor, which is arguably even worse all considering.
- Cooking Mechanics: The Provisions skill-line, where you cook different kinds of foods and beverages. Food will increase the amount of resources, while beverages will increase resource recovery. Special recipes from events might do a bit of both.
- Cosmetically-Advanced Prequel: The culture of the past is far more vibrant and active than what appears centuries later. The attention to detail based on the style of later games in the The Elder Scrolls can make the standalone games seem quaint in comparison. The Morrowind expansion depicts a more developed Vvardenfell than The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, and the regions of Tamriel are given far more detail than the procedurally generated areas of The Elder Scrolls: Arena and The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall.
- Cosmetic Award: Completing most achievements will net you a new dye color. If you obtain certain champion ranks, you will unlock a special costume to wear, and you will earn the Emperor's Regalia if you become Emperor. Several dungeons and quests also can give you a vanity pet or a skin.
- Critical Hit: These can occur, and the likeliness of it happening can be boosted. They have no graphic indicators, however, leaving you to either turn on the damage numbers or to memorize how much of an enemy's HP bar your abilities reduce to know when you crit. For damage-dealing builds, aiming for a high crit chance is your best bet at improving your DPS.
- Critical Hit Class: Nightblades. Although crit chance is basically the One Stat to Rule Them All, it's especially vital for nightblades, who live and die based on the dice roll of their criticals, as the class by itself doesn't deliver nearly as DPS damage as the more outright "offensive" kits such as Sorcerer or Templar, but has a strong emphasis on dealing high bonus damage augmented by criticals, which is further bolstered by the Pressure Point and Hemorrhage passives. A high-crit Nightblade who has hit their stride can deal disgusting amounts of damage if they can maintain pressure on their target, which is further amplified the lower said target's health is. Even for the much less popular Nightblade tanks and healers, the class' innately high crit lean can still be vital for scoring critical heals, which are among some of the best restorative potentials in the game if your dice roll is good.
- Crosshair Aware: You will see a red ring on the ground when an enemy prepares for an attack
- Curb-Stomp Battle: The battle in the "Arrival" trailer. The three faction leaders that we saw in the "Alliance" trailer take on a platoon of dremora. The Breton ends up possessed and attacking the Imperial City with an army of undead while the other two barely escape with their lives. Pretty much almost the entire time all three of them are very hard-pressed to stay alive, and the only reason they live is because the High Elf woman brings down one of the chains attaching the Dark Anchor to the ground, causing a massive statue to collapse on top of the battle area.
- Cut and Paste Environments: Many dungeons and buildings use the same layouts. This is especially noticable in the base-game; less so in downloadable content, though still there in healthy doses.
- Cutting Off the Branches:
- The game has a downplayed version of this trope. Oftentimes the player's choices will be overidden in future content, but there will usually be an explanation for why things are different than what the player did or at least an acknowledgement of the discrepency. For example, an enemy you can either spare or sentence to death will return very much alive and if you chose the latter will have a story about how they escaped death.
- Regardless of your choice of which Companion to sacrifice to power up the Amulet of Kings during God of Schemes, the events of Dragonhold, Elsweyr, Orsinium and Greymoor basically made it clear that it's Varen who ultimately perished. Even if you've selected either Sai or Lyris for the task, they would still show up later on, alive and very confused.
- Cyborg: The Clockwork Apostles of Sotha Sil are mechanically-augmented with prostheses in order to enhance their performance. The Vestige can also assume their mechanical appearance by using the Apostle outfit style.
- Cycle of Hurting: Many enemy types have heavy attacks that stagger or knock you down on your back for a considerable length of time, even if you do try to break out of their CC, and when faced with a lot of them, they can take turns wailing on you with these attacks, trapping you in a stunlock until you die or get lucky and find a break in their pattern to block. Almost any heavy attack can qualify, but special mentions go to Clannfears with their pounces, and the many variations of Zombies (Harrowfiends, bloodfiends, Ra-Netu, etc...), due to their tendency to travel in mobs. Being assaulted by three or more Clannfears at once is usually a death sentence for non-tanks.
- Damage-Increasing Debuff: Several skills can augment the damage a target receives. Generally, if a skill reduces an enemy's resistances it will apply the Breach (for Spell Resistance) or Fracture (for Physical Resistance) effects. Other skills are more specific, like Focused Aim, which increases damage received through bow attacks only.
- Damager, Healer, Tank: While the usual MMO trinity of roles is present in the game, it offers a bit of malleability as the classes are not bound to a specific role and, due to how the combat system works, a party is much more effective if every member can deal damage, cycle through utility buffs and sustain themselves in some way.
- Damn You, Muscle Memory!:
- For those used to The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, anyways - in Skyrim, power attacks break through block. In Elder Scrolls Online, power-attacking a blocking enemy will get you stunned. Additionally, landing a power attack restores your Stamina (Magicka if using a staff); in previous games, using a power attack depleted Stamina.
- In Skyrim, vampires who don't feed regularly will advance in stage and become more monstrous. In Online, it's the opposite, so players who habitually fed on NPCs to maintain their early stage vampirism in previous games will actually advance their corruption this time around and be slapped with the drawbacks that befall a late-stage vampire, which is very hard to get rid of without waiting for several hours at a time, or consuming a high-level and difficult to produce drink that's not readily available. Furthermore, feeding on NPCs will invariably kill them, whereas it did not in previous games, so players trying to get a quick snack from a sleeping citizen may suddenly find themselves with a bounty for murder.
- If anything, the current state of vampirism can also cause muscle memory issues with those infected prior to Greymoor as well. Pre-Greymoor, vampirism behaved much like it did in Skyrim except for the sun damage, where you'll gradually advance in stage and must feed regularly to stave off the negative effects if you don't like them, and feeding simply stunned the victim instead of killing them.
- Speaking of vampirism, being a vampire can seriously mess with your muscle memory if you're already a member of the Dark Brotherhood, as feeding and using the Blade of Woe are bound to the same key, and their prompts are triggered in roughly the same positions. As such, a vampire player might accidentally feed upon their would-be assassination target and increase their corruption level and have to deal with the hassle that it brings.
- In prior titles, archery is done by equipping a bow in your hand with arrows equipped in the inventory, hold block to aim, then hold down the attack button to draw the string back and release to fire, with the shot damage and travel distance being dependent on how long it was charged before firing. In Online, holding block with a bow...just has your character holding it up to their face and blocking, and hitting attack in that state will have you bash instead. Actually shooting is done by either tapping or holding the attack button, neither of which has any bearing on how far your arrows will fly since they will all hit whatever your crosshair is aimed at, as long as it is within their Arbitrary Weapon Range, with the only change being how much damage their impact will deal and, if it's a charged shot, restore a bit of stamina upon a valid hit. There is no longer a need to compensate for projectile arc by adjusting your aim height and draw weight.
- Dark Is Not Evil:
- The Fang Lair dungeon makes a point to discuss how the necromatic arts are not inherently evil, which is further discussed in Northern Elsweyr where there are both good and evil necromancers, and you yourself can be one.
- The Nightblade class use shadow magic and are usually previewed in dark gear.
- Darkness Equals Death: Played with in the case of the Cradle of Shadows dungeon. At one point, the party will need to trek through a spider-infested cavern network, where being in the dark slows everybody down to a crawl even at full sprint, on top of the constant health drain, and the mobs there will only take 10% of your normal damage, including the two boss fights. All of the above can quickly result in a total party wipe, unless you take your time to light the many braziers dotted around the tunnels, or if you have a healer with you and they know what they are doing. And there are a few achievements for getting through that entire segment without lighting a single brazier, and pre-lit ones that are extinguished by the bosses must not be turned back on. To top it all off, this mechanic returns with a vengeance during the final boss fight against Velidreth, doubly so with Hard Mode enabled.
- Daywalking Vampire: Vampires of the Second Era are different from their later counterparts by the lack of a vulnerability to sunlight, allowing them to walk about during daytime with no ill effects. Their transfigured victims, commonly known as Bloodfiends and Harrowfiends, are also likewise vampiric and share their resistance to sunlight. This immunity seems to be limited to those turned by Noxophilic Sanguivoria, however, as the handful of ancient, "traditional" vampires such as Valeric in Eastmarch still seem to be harmed by daylight, however their strong vampiric essence seems to lessen the effects of it to the point of merely being a discomfort.
- Death from Above:
- The bow-ability Volley has you shoot an arrow in the air, and have multiple arrows fall down in your chosen Area of Effect.
- Templars have the abilities Backlash, where a spear of light slowly falls upon the enemy to deal damage, and Spear Shards, where you throw a spear of light up and has it land in your chosen location. Their Nova ultimate also comes from above.
- Dragonknights' ultimate ability Dragon Leap has you leap in the air and land on your target, dealing huge amounts of damage.
- Death Is a Slap on the Wrist: Justified Trope in that due to being offered to Molag Bal as slaves and having their souls stolen, all of the PC's get resurrected infinite times. This is even written into the game lore: you can find a book detailing the concept of a "paragon" soul, a special kind of soul that allows Soul Shriven to not deteriorate and instantly revive. The only penalty is armor damage. That said, player characters can still do this after they get their souls back, which is never explained.
- Decadent Court: The Veiled Heritance, which is lead primarily by Altmer nobles that think they are better than other races.
- Deconstructed Character Archetype: Of Superior Species. Summerset has pretty much shown how the perfectionism of the Altmer have affected their land. The cities are indeed beautiful, but there are plenty of ruins and slums hidden underneath for the seedy underbelly. Their magic is indeed advanced, but they are afraid that other races are catching up to them and there are strict politics in magic. The people there are indeed beautiful and smart, but that is because they cast out anyone with any disability. The separation of the land of the Altmer from everyone else does give the land unique beauty, but at the same time, unique problems no other provinces have as well such as invasive species, Maormer, and the Sload.
- Defeat Equals Explosion:
- Fire atronachs explode upon death.
- Undead enemies can rarely explode in a blast of blue fire, leaving behind an AoE effect that damages and slows you.
- Defector from Decadence: Imperials as a race, who can join any Alliance. They are described as 'outcasts' from Cyrodiil, who have turned against the Daedra-worshipping majority of their race and would conceivably aid any alliance in order to 'free' their brethren from Molag Bal's influence.
- Deliberate Values Dissonance: Exaggerated, since this takes place in nearly every province in Tamriel:
- The Great Houses of Morrowind casually engage in the slavery of Argonians and Khajiit, with some of them abandoning the practice (publicly) as a requirement of the Ebonhart Pact. With the release of Morrowind, you can find a warning from the Ordinators outright threatening heretics - which explicitly spells out worship of the Divines, Malacath, the Aldmeri Gods, and especially Daedra Worship - with "re-education" or execution if they practice their faith openly or proselytize. Also, if you are an Argonian, expect to get treated poorly by the locals, with interactions ranging from dirty looks to outright death threats.
- The Orc chiefs practice polygyny, and when you get the option to question this there is often someone who is unhappy by it but still stays due to traditions. The Double Standard is also addressed from time to time, with some Orcs justifying why polygamy applies to men but not to women. It is also a big deal in Wrothgar when a chief might be a woman, and she has to pose as a man to even be considered. An Orcish historian also states that even theorizing that a certain legendary Orc hero may have been a woman is considered scandalous.
- The Bosmer typically uphold the Green Pact, which maintains that plant life is sacred while animal and humanoid lives are expendable. Not following the Pact is considered the highest sacrilege, aside from one faction of Bosmer Combat Pragmatists who do not uphold the Pact due to wartime rules. The tenets of the Pact also impact Bosmer diet, making them strict carnivores and at times even cannibals.
- The Khajiit and Bosmer both have a positive outlook on theft, with there even being a common law about it called the Right of Theft. This law dictates that if a theft were clever or skillful enough, the thief may demand some sort of payment or boon from the victim. The victim's debt even applies to a new thief, if they take the item from the original one, as this is a plot point in a questline.
- The Khajiit celebrate casual drug use through Moon Sugar, a narcotic substance which is a key ingredient of skooma (although they look down upon skooma itself due to being too addictive and an appropriation). Several important rites of passage or ceremonies for ascension into positions of power involve going on Moon Sugar-induced Vision Quests.
- The Altmer, even at their most tolerant, are proud eugenicists with other elements of fascism. In particular, it is considered betrayal to marry or breed outside of their race, as they consider themselves the last "pure" example of the original Aldmeri. Less extreme Altmer may oppose the slavery, oppression or dehumanization (so to speak) of other races, but they still see them as unevolved, impure or child-like.
- In the House of Reveries in Summerset, you can read a play that's the Altmer version of Cinderella (a poor serving girl gets dressed up for a ball, hoping to woo a noble). However, the happy ending is that the noble has no interest, courts someone of his own class instead, and the serving girl realizes her folly in trying to rise above her station in life.
- Delusions of Eloquence: Jester King Jorunn, who appears during the Jester's Festival.Jester King Jorunn: "This one has forged a humorousness for you, fair queen."
Jester Queen Ayrenn: "Oh, my! You shouldn't have. Let's hear it!"
Jester King Jorunn: "What do you call a Bosmer who arbors eating his neighbors?"
Jester Queen Ayrenn: "I... what?"
Jester King Jorunn: "Dinner!"
Jester Queen Ayrenn: "Oh! Hah! Hah! Ah... you... really shouldn't have." - Demoted to Extra: The entire Western Skyrim hold of Falkreath is restricted to merely being a group dungeon instead of playing any part in the Greymoor storyline. In fact, it seems to have been excluded from all of Skyrim as far as the world map is concerned, being accessible from Craglorn of all places, which is part of Hammerfell. Likewise, the hold of Whiterun is similarly reduced to bit part references and doesn't make an actual appearance, even though there's still a huge whopping gap on the world map between Eastern and Western Skyrim where it should be; Dawnstar is similarly snubbed and isn't even mentioned as much as Whiterun is, even though a good portion of Western Skyrim's map also contains parts of the Pale, and the entire landmass that makes up Winterhold is just straight up missing.
- Detective Mole: In Summerset, the Russafeld quest involves you investigating a recent murder. After investigating the situation with two Jurisreeves (Lorne and Soravil), finding more bodies, learning about Lorne and Soravil's shared past, and realizing that there is more than one murderer, you and Lorne eventually discover that Soravil's behind the whole thing; he wanted revenge against Lorne for rejecting him when he tried courting her after their spouses had an affair and subsequently died.
- Difficult, but Awesome:
- The Nightblade class is capable of outputting obscene levels of damage to even large and boss enemies...if you know how to play them. As it currently stands, Nightblade is a very clunky class to play owing to the many Nerfs aimed towards its skills throughout the years and the plethora of "Noob Trap" skills on offer. Even on its own, this class requires very precise skill rotations to reach optimal DPS, so your fingers have to constantly be dancing around on the correct buttons that you need to develop a tight muscle memory on. Good sets and buffs also make or break a Nightblade, especially Stamina-based ones, making Nightblade a very demanding class to play right on so many different levels compared to other, naturally-strong kits like Magicka Templar, Necromancer, or either flavor of Sorceror.
- If you have Elsweyr and Dragonhold, then going dragon hunting can be a very profitable job. Each dragon drops a sizable cache of valuables that can be sold for a small fortune, as well as unique alchemy ingredients you can't find elsewhere. The catch is that dragons are a force to be reckoned with, boasting somewhere in the range of fifteen million HP each, compared to a world or trial boss that typically has only about one to two, maybe five million tops, and possess very powerful attacks that can make very short work of a lone player. As they are designed for groups, it is basically impossible to hunt dragons alone, and even in large crowds, a given player can be expected to die several times throughout each fight, so it's both a very demanding and resource intensive venture, but if you manage to consistently pull this off, you'll be finding yourself much richer in due time. Most players know this, therefore you can expect to always find a group every time a dragon is spotted, and they also respawn basically constantly within walking distance of wayshrines, so you can just hop around the map repeatedly to make big money without much trouble.
- Dishing Out Dirt: As a Dragonknight, the Earthen Heart skill line allows you to manipulate the earth under your feet to aid you in battle, either to provide you and your allies with shields formed out of rock, or immobilize enemies by encasing them in dirt. You can even toss small boulders the size of a basketball at your foes with the Stonefist ability that apply a Stun every third successive hit on a single enemy, and can afflict them with Stagger if the Stone Giant morph is chosen.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Some NPCs will try to kill you if they witness you stealing something or catch you pickpocketing, or see you killing livestock.
- Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: The final battle against Molag Bal in the main game, and Barbas in Clockwork City.
- Diminishing Returns for Balance:
- Rolling to dodge can help you get out of the way of strong attacks that may do a lot of damage or even kill you, and doesn't cost much Stamina to perform to begin with. But, there also exists a debuff called Dodge Fatigue that you cannot cleanse, which ramps up the Stamina cost with every successive roll, causing this maneuver to become very resource intensive very quickly, which serves as a deterrent for players just rolling all over the place to avoid damage and crowd control, especially in PvP.
- While questing, your party size can have an impact on how much loot and experience each of you are earning. When paired up with another player, both you and your partner will receive a 10% boost to every experience gain you receive, but in groups of three and up, everybody will start earning less, significantly so in fact (all experience gains are halved for large groups). The same thing happens when many players contribute to a single kill, as the experience will be split among everybody present who had participated in it, so more people crowding around a world boss will mean less experience for everyone. When it comes to public events, certain ones will not award any loot at all if more than twelve people participated in them, such as the Barathrum Centrata encounter in the Imperial City Sewers.
- Champion Points are designed to be this. When you first unlock Champion ranks, each point will give you a very tangible difference when put into the associated skill trees. However, the more points you commit, the smaller their bonuses get, as their values are rounded down, to the point where you'd need to commit close to a half dozen CP just to get a single percentage increase, since the value per point becomes incredibly tiny.
- Item Trait researching lets you learn powerful properties that you can then apply to your gear, either by crafting or transmuting them, but with each trait researched on a particular article of equipment, the next ones will take significantly longer to complete. The first trait on anything can be completed in as little as a bit over 6 hours with no skills, but every trait after that will take twice as long to finish, with the ninth trait clocking in at a whopping 1536 hours. That's more than two months just to complete one research on an item that you've learned most of the traits for, assuming you have no skill bonuses or Instant Research tickets to use, so better hope you've got what you needed beforehand, especially if you're doing Master crafting writs or making set items.
- Disc-One Final Boss: In Dragonhold, Laatvulon is the Big Bad for most of the main quest, but the moment he falls, Kaalgrontiid, the Big Bad of Elseweyr, suddenly returns, takes command of Laatvulon's remaining forces, and puts his own plans into motion.
- Distressed Dude:
- In Glenumbra, you can run into Odei Philippe for a short world quest - his tailoring supplies are all lost in a wolf (and werewolf) infested pass. Upon getting them, You meet his wife, a Lion Guard, on the other side, to whom you turn them in and complete the quest. She treats him like a baby, implying that he sleepwalked, but with the implication he was trying to escape. Poor guy.
- Prinze Azan in Alik'r Desert, who you must save from peril twice. He is embarrassed about that.
- In Coldharbour, you encounter Stibbons, who has been abducted by a winged twilight who is attempting to seduce him. Upon being freed and trying to make his way to the Hollow City, he gets abducted by female daedra again.
- Vivec himself, after getting conned out of his power by Barbas.
- Divide and Conquer: Certain trials actually offer opportunities to do this. As of the time of writing, only two trials have this as an applicable mechanic, Cloudrest and Asylum Sanctorium, where the main map technically only has one big boss fight, but the players are given the choice to track down and kill off the smaller minibosses on the sides before engaging the central enemy itself. If a miniboss is killed separately, it will not appear later on during the main fight, and its mechanics skipped. As a tradeoff, finishing a trial with fewer miniboss adds will reward lesser loot, while beating a run with every possible side boss in the same fight will award the most gear, typically in the highest quality available.
- Divided We Fall:
- The climax of the Aldmeri Dominion Story Arc shows a possible future where the alliance were split. It did not look well.
- The alliance leaders refuse to make a temporary alliance against Molag Bal, even if that ends up making everything much more difficult, and winning the Three-Banner War might mean nothing if he wins anyway.
- Dodge the Bullet: You can roll dodge away from incoming attacks or through a line of fire by using your Stamina.
- Door to Before: Most dungeons have a door near the entrance that can only be accessed from the other side of it, once you complete the dungeon.
- The Dragon:
- Mannimarco serves Molag Bal, although he is also The Starscream, wanting to obtain power greater than the Prince's.
- In Northern Elsweyr, the dragon Mulaamnir is the Dragon to the dragon Kaalgrontiid.
- Draw Aggro: Puncture and Inner Fire are the only two skills that force an enemy to attack the user, and vital to any tank in dungeons. Taunts are deliberately designed to be single-target only, so that a tank can pull away a strong enemy to give their squishier teammates an easier time, instead of grabbing the attention of every hostile target in range, which could lead to the death of the taunting player. While it's usually enough to taunt a big enemy to face away from the damage dealers, most trial bosses will still have mechanics that affect other players than the tank that must be dealt with separately. Notably, however, having more than one player taunting a given target in too short of a time frame will lead to "Over-taunting", in which state the enemy will become immune to Taunts for a short while, which can be disastrous in trials.
- Dreadful Musician:
- Vigard the Sparrow, the off-key bard who was run out of Gnisis in the Morrowind expansion.
- There is an audio clip nicknamed "shittyflute" that features a flute playing a very off-key rendition of Red Diamond. Not only can you find some non-playable characters in the Dark Brotherhood missions playing this tune, but they also added it as a placeholder to the "Auditory Simulator" factotum in the Clockwork City, and kept it because the idea that a robot does not know how to properly make music was hilarious.
- In Summerset, there is an Altmer playing a lute very badly at the headquarters of the House of Reveries. A nearby member of the troupe tells you that the musician hopes to join the troupe, and if you point out that he is not good, he will agree, but point out that every beginner starts somewhere.
- Dressing as the Enemy: Several quests involve you donning a disguise to fool enemies into letting you pass, or at least making them less likely to detect you. However, there is usually some archetype (typically Sentries or animals) that is never fooled, and will expose you if they attack. Your chosen race will not affect how effective your disguise is, even if the disguise does not have any sort of head covering, or you are not the race you would be pretending to be. On the flip side, there exist whole costumes that are carbon copies of those worn by your enemies, but wearing these has absolutely no disguising effects, as they are merely skins applied over your current loadout and not actual disguise items.
- Dual Wielding: One-handed weapon types can be dual-wielded; there is even a skill line for dual-wielding. Oddly enough, there are no provisions for using just one of them at a time like in prior titles, as there are no skill lines that benefit the use of singular one-handed weapons.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?:
- Zig-zagged. On the one hand, most zones allow you to accomplish feats that NPCs are scripted to remark upon, and sometimes even make enemies no longer spawn, and NPCs will usually praise your efforts. On the other hand, if you cross the arbitrary line that makes you enter another zone, you get little respect, and more petty, dangerous, dirty jobs, to boot.
- Argonians in Vvardenfell should not expect any respect from the locals, given the long standing rivalry. But even after you have saved the continent, the only Dunmer who will respect you are Vivec and the people of Vivec City. This also applies to the Khajiit, albeit to a lesser extent.
- In Vvardenfell, one of the daily quests involves tax fraud. You might have saved Vivec and Vvardenfell, an even the world multiple times, but tax fraud seems to be a fitting job for you, apparently.
- Early-Installment Weirdness:
- The two first downloadable contents stand out from the rest. Usually, a DLC will either be two dungeons, a small zone or the annual big zone with a new gameplay feature. The first DLC, Imperial City, is a Player Versus Player zone with two dungeons. The second, Orsinium, is a big zone which was always a DLC, whereas other big-zones began as Chapters bought with real money that were later made into DLC.
- Craglorn is a base-game zone that was introduced post-launch and has nothing to do with the Planemeld overall. This is because it was introduced while the game was subscription-based, and they planned to regularly introduce new zones for free. This was changed when the game went buy-to-play, but it can still feel weird to go from a five-zone-long Alliance arc and simultaniously save the world from Molag Bal, to a self-contained zone about the Celestials.
- The first post-released story arc "Daedric Wars" took a long time to complete, going from previews in Orsinium, the Dark Brotherhood, and Shadows of the Hist DLC to Morrowind to Clockwork City to Summerset, with two self contained DLC Dungeons between the three. "Season of the Dragons" onward follows a DLC Dungeon Pack, a Chapter, another Dungeon DLC group, and a small DLC zone.
- Easily Forgiven: Played straight. You can be the most unscrupulous thief and Omnicidal Maniac Tamriel has ever seen, with staggering innocent body counts, thousands of gold in bounty on your head, and guards hounding you in every city you set foot in, but the instant that bounty goes away, every single NPC you talk to will resume their Hero Worship of you as if nothing has happened.
- Early Game Hell: In two ways.
- For new players, leveling your first character is usually incredibly frustrating and time-consuming due to the lack of, well, everything, be it gear, experience, skill points, Champion levels, builds, et cetera..., coupled with the huge hurdle to surmount that is the extremely lengthy zone questlines and all of the exploration that come with them. You'll slowly transition out of this phase around the ending of your initial alliance questline and the main story, and subsequent content will gradually become easier as you hit the gear score cap of CP 160.
- For experienced players, leveling their other new characters can reintroduce them to this feeling, as they will no longer have access to their super-powerful gear, high-level skills, recipes, and so on. While it is going to be easier than your first time around due to Champion points also carrying over to new characters, and housing, crafting bag materials (requires ESO+), and collectibles are shared across your entire account, your new Vestiges are simply that, new, and has to be raised from the ground up, which can take about as long as your first time around, if not more, owing to their play style differences.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: For all the death, destruction, and betrayal that occurs, the ending of the "Legacy of the Bretons" arc is surprisingly upbeat. Lord Bacaro is defeated, ending the Ascendant Order's threat once and for all, Frii becomes the new Guardian Entity of the Systers, the Society of the Steadfast is able to continue its original mission of helping war refugees under Captain Margurite, Stefan Monard begins making progress in improving relations between the Breton nobles and the Druidic Circles, the Circles themselves begin to become more open and allied with each other now that Orliath is no longer corrupting the Firesong, and most important of all, the Alliance leaders finally begin the negotiations towards ending the Alliance War, and while there's no guarentee it will work, the newfound respect the leaders have for each other after everything that's happens indicates that there is a chance.
- Easter Egg: In the Morrowind chapter, a reference to C0DA appears in the in-game book Sermon 37:Go here: world without wheel, charting zero deaths, and echoes singing," Seht said, until all of it was done, and in the center was anything whatever.
- Easy Logistics:
- Your bows now no longer require you to carry actual ammo to fire. The only concern you'll need to have with them is how much charge they're having, and if you're using an unenchanted bow, then you can just keep firing forever without any ill effect.
- Played straight with Soul Gems. Whereas in the previous titles, NPC souls have different "sizes" that require specific types of gems to capture, and "smaller" souls will yield weaker enchantments as well as restore less of an item's charge, every soul in Online is treated as identical in value. Furthermore, enchanting in Online is done via glyphs, so the use of soul gems of varying sizes no longer matters. This means that there will be a lot less fiddling around with gems and risking your neck capturing the souls of larger creatures for your own businesses, since now the soul of a lowly mudcrab will restore as much charge to your weapon as that of a gigantic dragon.
- Eating the Enemy: What some Bosmer tribes practice, to the point that they will starve themselves before battle to be able to eat their enemies whole. Given the impractical number of bodies being produced by the war, it's implied that this practice has fallen out of use outside of tribe-on-tribe battles.
- Eats Babies: In Shadowfen, one of Ruuvitar's Bosmer lieutenants has been eating Argonian eggs at the Hatching Pools (the eggs are very close to hatching, so whatever's inside is close to fully formed). One of the Argonian egg minders sends you to kill him.
- Eldritch Location:
- Coldharbour, Molag Bal's realm of Oblivion.
- The Clockwork City.
- Eldritch Ocean Abyss: Implied with the Summerset cinematic trailer.
- Elemental Powers: As a Magicka-damage dealer, you can choose between three staves: Inferno Staff, Lightning Staff and Ice Staff. The Destruction Staff skill-line's abilities will change element accordingly.
- 11th-Hour Superpower: Shortly before the final battle Abnur Tharn sacrifices one of your companions to power up the Amulet of Kings, and grant you the ultimate power. with this power boost, you can three-shot the titans that try to stop you even with an average build, not to mention one-shotting all the dark seducers who get in your way.
- Emote Animation: Over two hundred of them. One of the most popular is /lute, which has your character play one of the bard songs on the lute.
- Enemy Mine:
- The Ebonheart Pact is comprised of the Dunmer and their two most hated enemies, the Nords and Argonians. They are only working together because of the threat posed by their mutual enemies. In-practice however, the members of the faction are capable of cooperating decently enough.
- This is also the reason the Khajiit joined the Aldmeri Dominion. The Altmer helped them when the Knahaten Flu struck, and explained that they would need the help of the Khajiit to defend Tamriel from invaders. To quote the lorebook "The Eagle and the Cat": "To fight against mutual enemies - ah, that was a logic we Cat-folk could understand."
- There is also Eyevea, the Mages' Guild headquarters. You can be a ranking Ebonheart officer having a polite conversation with a top researcher from the Dominion, and that is the norm.
Dunmer: "The centuries of hatred between my people and... most of Tamriel seems somehow petty in a place like this."- Certain sidequests involve you working together with members of a rival Alliance to face a common, greater threat.
- Early in the Bangkorai arc, the leader of the Reachmen invading the region temporarily allies with you to oust the Imperials from Evermore, since she wants to be the one who conquers it.
- While Clavicus Vile, Nocturnal, and Mephala were all opposed to one another during the events of the Daedric War arc, by the time of Summerset they have united in an attempt to take over the Crystal Tower. Once Nocturnal betrays the other two however, both Vile and Mephala will ally with you to get back at Nocturnal, even joining the pact Sotha Sil made with the other Daedric Princes.
- Played straight with all three Alliances during the endgame. With the threat of Molag Bal's Planemeld looming over the entirety of Tamriel, the three faction leaders begrudgingly agree to form one big, if tenuous, armistice, in order to mount an assault on Coldharbour and put a stop to the God of Schemes' plot, since if he had won, neither of the alliances would benefit from the ensuing chaos, victor or not.
- Energy Weapon: The Templar class' Radiant Destruction ability, often nicknamed "Jesus Beam" by players, which deals up to 480% more damage to low-health enemies. Also the Soul Magic ultimate Soul Strike.
- Equal-Opportunity Evil: The Gray Host is a small confederation of powerful vampires, werewolves, werebats, and various types of undead, who schemed to enslave and rule over the mortal races of Tamriel during the First Era before being slain by the Bangkorai Garrison, and now serve Molag Bal in undeath. Additionally, their rank also has a very diverse racial background, being led by a Redguard, and an Altmer, a Nord, and a Reachman serve as their more notable Exarches (or served, in the case of the Altmer, who's none other than Verandis Ravenwatch). Their founder was a Nedic king, as well.
- Equipment-Hiding Fashion: You are allowed to design and dye mix-and-match outfits that completely replace the visual of your weapons and armor. New styles are learned from regular loot, rewards, events, achievements, and premium currency.
- Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas: King Kurog, for all he has done, genuinely loves his mother.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: At one point during the Riften questline, you need to make a ritual sacrifice in order to pass through a sealed door. You have the option to sacrifice a member of the Reachmen, a race of Chaotic Evil Hagraven worshipers. If you do choose him for the sacrifice, you have to trick him into thinking you are leading him out of enemy territory. On the way to the door, he will proceed to tell you about his eight-year old daughters, and how they cried when he went to war. There is horror in his voice when he discovers you are not there to free him.
- In Elsweyr, Euraxia Tharn genuinely loves her son, Javad Tharn. Hurting him is a sure way of getting on her bad side. Javad is the Arc Villain of Reaper's March, so if you completed the Reaper's March questline before going to Elsweyr, you have killed Javad and Euraxia will be even more hostile to you when you meet.
- Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": You, the player. People will refer to you as the Vestige, Newcomer, Outsider, friend, five-claw and more.
- Everything Fades: Dead enemies fade a while after being looted.
- Evil Army: Many, most recently the Euraxian Army in Elsweyr.
- Evil Empire: The Akaviri Potentate practices slavery and worships Molag Bal.
- Evil vs. Evil: The conflict between the Dark Brotherhood and the Order of the Hour in the eponymous DLC. The Brotherhood are obviously no saints, but the Order is shown in both the main quest and sidequests to be extremely corrupt, and its leader not only had the previous head of the Order murdered to secure his position, but is heavily implied to have orchestrated the events leading to Lyra's Sanctuary being purified, sending her right into his hands.
- Expy: The three main factions (Ebonheart, Aldmeri, Daggerfall) are each roughly equivalent in theme to Dark Age of Camelot's Midgard, Hibernia, and Albion, respectively.
- Evil Pays Better: The crime system can be very profitable, especially for new players. What is more, the quality of treasure you can pickpocket, steal from owned containers, or loot from murdered civilians is tied to your Legerdemain skill...and your Legerdemain line rises as you fence or launder loot. It is fully possible for a thief to be your characters' financier. If you take perks in the Thieves Guild line (requires the Thieves Guild DLC), the payout only increases.
- Evil Tower of Ominousness: The besieged White Gold Tower, well visible from even the outskirts of Cyrodiil with a gigantic Dark Anchor portal looming over it, is this, and you get to storm it in the dungeon map of the same name. The Direnni Tower seen off the coasts of High Rock and Hammerfell is a lesser example of this.
- Extreme Omnivore: Werewolves with the Devour passive. They can eat anything from deer and goats, to other wolves, to Daedra and even Dwemer constructs. Basically, if you can kill it, you can eat it.
- Failed a Spot Check: Despite emitting a tall column of light, some skyshards can be surprisingly easy to walk right past, especially if the player is focused on a mission and not paying particular attention to the surroundings.
- The Fair Folk: Spriggans, and the Nixad that were introduced in the Dark Brotherhood update.
- Fake Longevity: The Companions system gives off this impression due to how progression is determined.
- For starters, your Companions will only gain experience from combat and only for 25% of the amount earned per kill, and completely ignores the Enlightenment XP buff available to CP characters, meaning that one can't simply rely on quests to shore up their levels like one could with their main. This affects both their level and skill line progression, which can make unlocking specific high-tier abilities a massive chore without constantly grinding combat zones like Craglorn. Fortunately, event XP buffs and scrolls do apply, so making use of them can alleviate this problem somewhat.
- Secondly, their version of the guild skill lines (Fighters Guild, Mages Guild, and Undaunted) are leveled by doing daily quests, which are limited to one each per character per day, so unless you have multiple characters to do these with, you can be looking at just shy of three weeks worth of dailies just to get one them to rank 10 in all three.
- Thirdly, companion gear is painfully difficult to accumulate and build around. They are both rare (dropping mostly from bosses and group events at a low rate), cannot be improved via crafting skills, and cannot be transmuted like regular gear can, leading to the inevitable reality of players selling rare items with the desirable traits for ridiculous prices (read: millions of gold at the cheapest) over guild traders. Even after an update which increased the drop rates of these items from non-boss sources, the best in slot items are still very hard to come across even if one were to grind for them.
- And lastly, companion rapport is gained so slowly (and lost so quickly if you do the wrong things) due to a cooldown in between each gain that one really can't speedrun it if they try. To put it into perspective, companion quests are offered at Friendly and Close relationship statuses, respectively, which translate into 1,500 and 2,750 positive rapport, meanwhile the most significant gain you can get per day per character is 125 from completing a daily quest for their favorite guilds. Worse still is that the game doesn't tell you any of this, as it lacks both a numerical tracker for rapport values and a detailed guide on what actions will influence your relationship with which companion, leaving you to figure all of this out by yourself. And to top it all off, rapport is not shared across your account unlike companion level and skills, so you will need to grind for it separately on every single character that you're using a given companion with.
- Falling Damage: Present, like any other mainline Elder Scrolls title. Notably, falling damage is rather considerable just for dropping down from heights as low as a cabinet, and falling down one story is usually enough damage to instantly kill any non-tank, since fall damage is not mitigated by armor.
- Fanservice: For Valentine's Day 2020, Zenimax released a mini dating sim
in which the player can have a sexy encounter with fan favorite characters Razum-dar, Naryu Virian or Darien Gautier. For Valentine's day 2021, they updated it to include Eveli and Fennorian.
- Frontline General: Unfortunately downplayed in that ranks in Alliance War are largely for show, as you don't receive regiments of troops to command. The definite upper ranks (discounting Emperor, which is separate, and players of any rank can be crowned if they meet the requirements) of the Alliance War mode consist entirely of them, and they can be you. The lowest tier of which is General, as denoted by a single five-pointed star, going all the way up to four stars at Overlord, and finally five at Grand Overlord, at which point you will have basically outranked every single military commander of the three factions other than their rulers. In order to even be at this stage, you will have to be very good at PvP and/or play a lot of it, and any seasoned Alliance War veteran can tell you it will be a significant time sink on top of all of the other shenanigans you'll be participating in outside of Cyrodiil.
- Fantastic Racism:
- The game is riddled with it. The Ebonheart Pact consists of the Dunmer and the two races that were their worst enemies before the Akaviri Invasion. The Veiled Heritance in the Aldmeri Dominion see the Bosmer and Khajiit as lesser races (although they seem to hate every other race just as much and even a classist attitude towards working class Altmer and below). Many human members of the Daggerfall Covenant still struggle to accept that the Orcs are a sentient race. Those are just a few examples. Needless to say, most characters despise races from the other alliances, though members of races from rival alliances can often be found in alliance cities living in relative peace with the normal alliance races.
- There are many non-playable characters in Summerset that changes dialogue depending on whether you play as an Altmer or not; they will be dismissive, patronizing or downright hostile if you are not, while respectful and sharing if you are Altmer.
- Fantastic Slurs: The Dunmer have "s'wit" and "n'wah". Khajiit have "jekosiit".
- Faustian Rebellion: The vampire coven that players can join is of the Bloodline descended directly from Lamae Bal, the first and oldest vampire in existence, and thus the first Daughter of Coldharbour. She hates Molag Bal for certain reasons, and intends to turn her bloodline against him. And she is still alive. At this point, her crusade against Molag Bal has become a full-blown Roaring Rampage of Revenge, with her also hating Arkay, whom she believes abandoned her in her time of need.
- There is also Virgar the Red in Coldharbour, who offers assistance in the war against Molag Bal if the Vestige helps her free her vampire brood from the Daedric Prince's control.
- Faux Affably Evil: While Sheogorath tends to present himself as all fun and games in previous titles (save for Shivering Isles), we see a particularly malicious side of him in this game. It still does not stop him from being utterly hilarious, however.
- Fembot: Subverted. Factotums in the Clockwork City are "female" by default due to their female voice record. One of the few factotums with a male voice is the Precursor, and it has a beard to make it stand out from the rest.
- Fetch Quest: There are plenty of these.
- Fighter, Mage, Thief: The three main fighting styles.
- The four release classes were themed after this dynamic, with Dragonknights being Fighters, Templars and Sorcerers being Mages, and Nightblades are the Thieves, while the later additions like Warden and Necromancer tend to fit better with the second group. That being said, these do not necessarily apply strictly to any of the six classes due to their generally flexible kit options. These specializations are also represented through the three leading Celestials, the Mage, Warrior and Thief.
- Additionally, the three races that comprise each of the three factions are also provided with this balance in mind, though a few of them have racial bonuses that can blur the lines somewhat, especially after the reworks of Update 30, hence why some of them can appear under several categories.
- Fighters: These are races with high natural fortitude, and thus tend to serve best as tanks. Nords, Argonians, and Imperials fit the bill best, with Redguards and Bretons coming up second.
- Mages: Exactly What It Says on the Tin, and covers both healers and damage dealers. Bretons and High Elves are the prime candidates, with Khajiits and Dark Elves also being strong contenders. Argonians also qualify, but their racial passives tend to skew more towards healing than damage dealing.
- Thieves: The diametric opposites of Mages, they tend to be great stamina damage dealers. Orcs, Wood Elves, Khajiits, and Dark Elves are the usual picks for this role.
- Filler: Most downloadable content that are dungeon-packs or mini-zones are usually standalones and not part of a Story Arc. Clockwork City and the 2019 downloadable packs are exceptions, as they are parts of the Daedric War and Season of the Dragon arcs.
- For players that prefer solo-playing, the dungeon-packs can be viewed as this.
- Finish Him!: Refers to the "Execute" mechanic, whereupon certain abilities will start doing significantly higher damage to an enemy as their health dips low enough, allowing the player to finish the fight more quickly (e.g. the Nightblade class' Assasin's Blade skill and its morphs do 300% more damage to enemies at and below 25% health). The Execute threshold varies between abilities and specific encounters, but 50% and 25% are the most commonly used values. As a counterbalance to this, many dungeon and trial bosses will also start throwing out considerably harder hitting and complicated mechanics in this phase that can result in a Total Party Kill if not managed well.
- Fire-Forged Friends: You and Bazrag gro-Fharun become allies by fighting through a caravan attack and prison together.
- The two non-playable characters in Moon Hunter Keep begin distrustful of each other, and end up at least with some respect and forgiveness.
- Fishing Minigame: It is possible to fish, and achievements can be unlocked for catching all the rare fish in a particular area. The achievements for catching all the fish in a faction actually earn you a dye color for your armor, and if you get the Master Angler achievement for catching all fish in all base-game zones, you can get a boat decoration for your Homestead house.
- Five-Second Foreshadowing: A minor NPC outside the School of Leki's Blade in the Alik'r Desert will, if spoken to, tell you the legend of Rada al-Saran, a legendary Ansei who once broke Leki's (The Redguard War God) sword in half after a three day duel. Much, much later, Rada himself appears as the Big Bad of Greymoor.
- Flash Step: The Sorcerer class has an ability where they can get ahead with a blink of an eye.
- Flechette Storm: The Nightblade class' Impale ability allows them to throw an enchanted dagger at their target, and Lotus Fan unleashes a flurry of knives around your point of impact after Flash Stepping. Hidden Blade and Steel Tornado under Dual Wield let you do the same but costing Stamina instead of Magicka. Some item sets also throw a fan of knives when their five-piece effects are triggered.
- Flipping the Bird: There is an emote for it... which literally has you toss a bird in the air, flipping it.
- Fluffy Tamer: The Warden class has an ultimate ability where they have a grizzly bear as a combat pet.
- Food Porn: The anniversary cake mementos, in particular the five-year-anniversary, look gorgeous and delicious.
- Forced Transformation:
- Prince Naemon from the Aldmeri Dominion turns into a monster when he tries to usurp Queen Ayrenn for the throne.
- In a quest in Sentinel, a Khajiit sells potions that turn people into animals, much to the surprise of those who drink it. One man gets turned into a rat. Another, who'd asked for a potion that could make him nimbler and faster, gets transformed into a monkey. One woman orders one to trick her husband into transforming into a dog.
- Foregone Conclusion:
- The three alliances are each vying for control of the Imperial City and the Ruby Throne in hopes of conquering the rest of Tamriel and imposing their specific vision: The Daggerfall Covenant wants to restore the Second Empire, the Ebonheart Pact wants to turn Tamriel into a confederation, and the Aldmeri Dominion wants to usher in a new age of elven rule. However, all of these factions are doomed to fail in the long run even if one finally ends up winning the Three Banners War, since by the time Tiber Septim comes along at the end of the Interregnum and unites all of Tamriel for the first time under the Third Empire, all of the alliances have been gone for centuries and the old prejudices and rivalries between the provinces have returned in full force.
- Molag Bal's attempt to fuse Tamriel with Coldharbour is doomed to failure, as ESO takes place before all the previous Elder Scrolls games.
- Barbas' coup to destroy Vvardenfell will fail and Vivec will live, since the game takes place before The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind.
- Kaalgrontiid and the other dragons freed from the Halls of Colossus in the Elsweyr Chapter will end up either exterminated or re-contained, since dragons as a whole are relegated to the status of myths by the mid-late Third Era and Fourth Era. Only two dragons are known to be extant by the time of Tiber Septim: Paarthurnax, who is cloistered atop the Throat of the World under the Greybeards' protection, and Nafaalilargus, who served Tiber Septim as a mercenary.
- Foreshadowing:
- At the end of Wrothgar's storyline, Alinon the Alchemist mentions several zones that have yet to be announced, and the Prophet appears to warn you about a great danger that will arise when the Clockwork City opens, hinting to the Daedric War arc that would not begin until the next year. In addition, when you are in Wrothgar's library during one of the last main story quests, you can find a letter from Darien Gautier, foreshadowing his appearance in Summerset.
- Dark Brotherhood has a quest that continues hinting toward the Daedric War arc.
- In Fang Lair, the quest-giver will discuss with you how necromancy as a magic art is not inherently evil, and that there are good necromancers. This opens the door for the Necromancer class for players that worry about being evil.
- The fact that shadows are a big element in the prologue quest for Clockwork City foreshadows that there is an antagonist associated with shadows, which turns out to be Nocturnal.
- For Want Of A Nail: At the climax of the Aldmeri Dominion questline, the Vestige and their chosen Mane-to-be are treated to a vision of a very Bad Future, where Javad Tharn's plot in Reaper's March succeeded due to the corruption of Akkhuz-ri, and neither Shazah nor Khali stepped up to replace him as the leader of the Khajiit people as a whole. After the leaderless Khajiit seceded from the Dominion, the balance of power tipped heavily towards the Pact and Covenant, who swiftly took control of Cyrodiil and marched upon Valenwood, forcing the Bosmer to invoke the Wild Hunt to fend for themselves, before devolving into barbaric savages after losing the Silvenar and the Green Lady. Without two of her great allies, an unpopular Queen Ayrenn tries and fails to hold the Dominion together after a second uprising of the Veiled Heritance, led by the disillusioned Battlereeve Urcelmo, took over the Summerset Isles, and dies in a suicidal last stand, bitter and alone.
- Fragile Speedster:
- Generally applies to most damage-dealing builds due to their generally lower health values and less sturdy armor, but both can be remedied somewhat by having a competent tank and healer in the group.
- Wood Elves as a whole are these from a gameplay standpoint. They have no racial bonuses to health and survivability beyond Poison and Disease resistance, instead featuring a suite of passives that promote a fast-moving, hard to hit playstyle revolving around stamina weaponry. Prior to their major Nerf in Update 30, the typical Wood Elf would additionally be dodge rolling all over the place to keep proccing their Hunter's Eye passive, which puts them into Glass Cannon territory.
- The Nightblade class in particular lives and breathes this trope, both in lore and design, due to its over-reliance on evasion to shore up its innately weak defenses. Most of its class skills are themed around dodging damage or cloaking oneself in darkness to avoid being hit, making even Nightblade tanks a bit less sturdy than what their high health would suggest. The trade-off to this is that Nightblades have the best damage mitigation of all six classes in the current meta, but on the off chance that you do take a solid hit, you will feel it.
- Friendly Fireproof: Update 6 gives you the option to murder innocent NPCs, and it adds a menu option to turn that off if you do not wish to do it by accident.
- Fungus Humongous: Morrowind has plenty of gigantic mushrooms.
- Furry Reminder: In the Elsweyr update, Khajiit clean themselves exactly how you would expect the Cat Folk to clean themselves.
- Gameplay and Story Segregation:
- A vampire or werewolf Vestige can join the Fighters Guild perfectly fine, despite their classifications falling under said faction's blacklist and they are the most typical sources of reputation you can find in the game world. Even worse, both the Fighters Guild and main storyline basically have you be acting under Meridia's auspices, who, as the patron of life and energy of all living beings, has a seething hatred for everything undead, vampires included. In fact, as a vampire, you owe your lineage more to Molag Bal of all people, which makes it very odd that Meridia would give you her blessing against him at all.
- On the topic of vampires and werewolves, you can be either of those things and a Templar at the same time. Being adherents of Stendarr, a Templar's very job is to eradicate the undead and heal the living using Aedric and solar magic, which werewolves and vampires are deathly vulnerable to. And nothing bad will happen to you should you play Templar and contract either vampirism or lycanthrope, even if your own magic should have incinerated you instantly for doing so.
- Despite being acknowledged as pirates with no ties to the Covenant, the Ra Gada Pirates in Malabal Tor are capable of using Alliance skills such as the Warhorn or Caltrops.
- PvP zones such as Cyrodiil or the Imperial City are not affected by the current state of the game world regardless of where you are in the main quest. This means that they remain open warzones even if the three factions have entered into an armistice in order to mount an assault on Coldharbour with you during the endgame.
- For that matter, radiant NPCs around alliance zones will not change their attitude towards you regardless of your factions. A Daggerfall Covenant character doing quests in Pact zones will still have to fight and kill their fellow soldiers whereever the quests demand them to, with no way of convincing them to stand down. It gets especially ridiculous if you've completed all three alliance questlines, but the soldiers who are technically allied to you will still be out for your blood if you enter into areas where they're marked as hostile.
- Summonable assistant NPCs such as bankers and merchants cannot be brought out in PvP zones such as Cyrodiil, the Imperial City, or Battlegrounds, seemingly because of the potential collateral damage they may take in those cases if their flavor texts are to be believed. Said assistants will also happily follow you into all manners of hellish environments like Coldharbour, the Deadlands, or other metaphysical planes where dying would be the least of their concerns. Supposedly, this restriction is put in place to prevent players from abusing their services to gain the upper hand in PvP scenarios, but it's nothing that having an actual disclaimed in the assistant descriptions won't do, and doing so has the added benefit of not painting these assistants as having extremely Skewed Priorities.
- Lore-wise, the Templar class should be the diametric opposite to necromancers, the undead, and various daedra, with their light-based powers being granted by the Aedra to smite evil. In gameplay terms, they don't possess any kind of power advantage against these types (one possible ability morph is even named Vampire's Bane, yet does no bonus damage to actual vampire-type enemies and players), whereas the skills and passives of the Fighters Guild line seemed closer to what they should have been able to do instead.
- The climax of the Bangkorai chapter is made meaningless by how the game handles player character deaths. Basically, Septima Tharn's entire plot to cross over to the Far Shores was a plan to separate the Vestige from their soul link to Coldharbour that enabled them to revive every time they die, so that she can kill them there and be done with it. Of course, in a game where Death Is a Slap on the Wrist, you can still revive if you're so inclined and get back into the fight if Septima somehow manages to kill you.
- If you kill another Vestige in PvP with the Soul Trap ability and have an empty soul gem in your inventory, it will still net you a filled gem even though all Vestiges are supposed to be soulless until the completion of the main questline much further in.
- The many town guard NPCs in the game are effectively immortal, can No-Sell basically everything you throw at them, and have a special script that gradually scales up their damage done to the point that they will eventually one-shot you regardless of your own resistances. This raises all kinds of questions, namely why aren't these undying juggernauts being sent to fight in the Three Banners War, or to square up against divine beings capable of wiping out whole groups in a single attack instead of the infinitely more fallible players, who do pitiful damage by comparison and are still vulnerable to being killed.
- Game Mod: Fans can make ones that alter the UI or record data (such as one of the most popular add-ons, "Master Merchant", which tracks guild store sales in all the guilds that you are in so that you can get an idea of the going price for an item.)
- Gendered Outfit: Crafting styles sometimes change depending on the character's gender, like binds or sashes to cover a woman's breast while the male's is bare, or occasionally give the female character a Cleavage Window.
- Averted with dresses and suits from the cash shop; men and women can wear them both.
- The Noble Clan-Chief costume you get from Elsweyr, though only slightly in that female characters show their belly while male characters cover the entire torso.
- Giant Enemy Crab: Mudcrab Beach has a larger-than-normal mudcrab as a boss.
- Shipwreck Strand is host to a giant... blue sandcrab?
- Glass Cannon:
- No class embodies this trope better than Nightblades, especially those specced for Stamina use a.k.a. "Stamblades". Despite wearing medium armor, they possess neither the innate beef of dedicated tank classes, nor the insane amounts of magicka-based protective wards and buffs available to Caster kits, and therefore having startlingly-poor staying power when faced with strong enemies. Their primary means of damage mitigation are blocking and dodge-rolling, both of which require a lot of stamina, which can be difficult to manage in the heat of battle. Even the "cannon" part is arguable, as Nightblades require a lot of skill to even deal meaningful damage, both in the way of skill rotations and resource management, as noted under Difficult, but Awesome.
- In the Mythics category, there's the Thrassian Stranglers item that can stack up an insane level of spell and weapon damage boost (1,150 each) if you can reliably get killing blows, with the caveat of each stack also reducing your max health and shield strength by a considerable amount (6,000 health penalty and 50% shield strength reduction at 50 stacks). A max-stacked Thrassian wearer will be hitting like a freight train, but their health will also be low enough without using HP-boosting food that an enemy looking at them funny may be enough to kill them.
- Global Currency Exception: You gain and use Alliance Points as currency in Player Versus Player areas. You can only use gain and use Tel Var Stones in Imperial City.
- Glory Seeker: Orcs and Nords are like this due to their cultures. The people that participate in the Blessed Crucible, the group dungeon in the Rift zone, also count.
- Godhood Seeker: Mannimarco in the main story, and all the dragons in Elsweyr. Bogdan the Nightflame in Elden Hollow II.
- Godzilla Threshold: The Daggerfall Covenant invasion of the start of the Ebonheart Pact storyline forces them to summon Balreth, one of the two Brothers of Strife, who curb-stomps the invading Daggerfall force. After that event comes the matter of putting him back, however...
- Gossip Evolution: If you have fought the Maormer on Captain Jimila's ship prior to meeting her in Anvil, she will tell you that the stories people tell have become extremely exaggerated: Apparently your party was set upon by a hundred Maormer, but you defeated them with one bare fist while swinging from the rigging, jumped onto the sea serpent, and rode it into the side of the Maormer ship. But that is not all: The ensuing battle allegedly even reshaped the coast - and you turned the serpent into your own personal mount.Vestige: That's.... very dramatic.
- Gotta Catch Them All: Update 28 introduced the Set and Reconstruction systems, where players can collect items belonging to each set and bind them to their account to register them in their Collection tab to gradually fill up each one to completion. As an added bonus, if you've discovered a specific item from a certain set, you can then reconstruct it at a Transmute Station for a certain amount of crystals, with the item trait and quality being entirely left up to your discretion. The more complete a Set is, the cheaper the reconstruction cost will be, leading to players hoarding as many set items as they can to drive the price down to minimum, which is 25 crystals, meaning that with a reasonably filled up set, it would be much cheaper to reconstruct an item to your liking, than transmuting one that's gotten from a drop but in the wrong trait.
- Gravity Barrier: The edge of each region (except for the sea, of course, which has slaughterfish) is bordered by gigantic cliffs that you cannot climb.
- Great Offscreen War: The Akaviri invasion (which led to the formation of the Ebonheart Pact) and King Ranser's uprising against King Emeric (the aftereffects of which are still seen in Rivenspire), to name a few.
- Grief-Induced Split: Valsirenn and Earl Leythen became estranged following the death of their daughter to illness. While Valsirenn doubled down on her research in the aftermath, Leythen became lost his faith in the Psijic Order.
- Grouped for Your Convenience: Players have the opportunity to join any of the three factions warring over the Ruby Throne of the Emperor of Tamriel:[1] the First Aldmeri Dominion (represented by an eagle) led by Queen Ayrenn, composed of the Altmer (High Elf), Bosmer (Wood Elf), and Khajiit races; the Daggerfall Covenant (represented by a lion) led by High King Emeric, composed of the Bretons, Redguard, and Orsimer (Orcs); and the Ebonheart Pact (represented by a dragon) led by Jorunn Skald-King, composed of the Nord, Dunmer (Dark Elf), and Argonian races.
- The Guards Must Be Crazy: The game's AI has a funny way of detecting your presence. As long as you stay out of their (invisible) aggro range, you can literally dance circles around them or steal anything that is not nailed down in plain sight without anybody lifting a finger, but step one toe into that radius and suddenly everybody in their periphery can see you. Learning this invisible range is crucial if you're part of the Dark Brotherhood or Thieves Guild, due to the obviously criminal nature of their missions, and if you've had bounty docked against you, beyond this is the "safe" distance from which city guards will not accost you.
- Due to the game's nature of an MMO with (mostly) respawning [NPCs], guards will never react to seeing a corpse in their vicinity, even in restricted areas.
- Guide Dang It!:
- Wayshrines and their importance are not very well advertised to you as you're getting started. While you will learn their benefits of fast travelling and respawning points very quickly, the game does not tell you that travelling using the wayshrines themselves is instantaneous and best of all, free, until you have dived into the help section, or caught a loading screen tip that says so.
- If you picked up the game a while after it's released, exploring the post-launch content is a nightmare, since there is no clearly-defined order in which you should experience them, especially if you're an ESO Plus subscriber and have access to every DLC. These DLCs are released in arcs throughout their years, but without consulting the release order at the top of the page, it's very easy to play the chapters out of order and be utterly confused when plot points that are already resolved suddenly becoming new topics again (e.g. completing Clockwork City before Morrowind will have the location and Daedric invasion of Sotha Sil's domain be a big deal, despite it already being resolved earlier).
- Homing Boulders: Zigzagged with ranged attacks. While they can miss if the target performs a dodge roll, ranged attacks will hit without fail otherwise, and trying to sidestep out of the way will just result in the arrow or spell bolt clipping through the map geometry or changing trajectory mid-flight to curve into you. Not even killing the enemy who fired that shot will stop it from finding its target, so players low enough on health can very well be finished off by the fireball of the mage they'd just killed mere moments ago if they didn't make an attempt to dodge it. Played a bit less straight with your attacks, in that you have to have a target highlighted for your hits to land, otherwise they will just whiff and do no damage, meaning players cannot perform the aforementioned insane feats of marksmanship available to NPCs most of the time.
- Hard Mode Perks: Dungeon and trial gear drops are generally of higher qualities if you complete a run on veteran, where collected set pieces will be looted in the purple epic quality, rather than the blue rare quality. When it comes to trials, with a few exceptions, after the last boss, you'll receive a Legendary-quality piece of jewelry as well (two if you've increased the difficulty of the final boss, making it a literal "Hard Mode" perk). Additionally, in some veteran arenas and trials, you can receive "perfected" versions of a set, which gives small 5-piece bonuses not found on its regular counterpart, thus presenting endgame players with an incentive to challenge harder content to earn these better gear, however marginally.
- Harping on About Harpies: Harpies make a reappearance for the first time since Daggerfall.
- Have You Come to Gloat?: When you meet Mannimarco in Coldharbour, he asks if you have come to gloat at his torment.
- Heel–Face Brainwashing: In the Wilderking subquest, the player meets a Veiled Heritance agent named Aranias who was forced to join the Heritance in an attempt to assassinate the Wilderking. To foil the attempt, a Spinner in service to the Wilderking will send you into Aranias's story (basically her memories) to change her recollection so that you were her best friend and with her every step of the way. Several times, the Spinner makes it clear that you are not going back in time and changing the past, merely changing what Aranias believes happened so that she will trust you in the present.
- Hellish Horse: The Nightmare Courser, available from the cash shop, has flaming eyes, nostrils, and hooves.
- While not horses, the other Nightmare mounts, the Nightmare Senche, Manelord Nightmare Senche and Packlord Nightmare Wolf, also apply.
- The Dro-m'Athra Senche, or sar-m'Athra, are feline mounts corrupted by the forces of Namiira. There is also the horse version, called the rahd-m'Athra.
- Her Code Name Was "Mary Sue": The main character in the novel being written by the clothier hireling Veesk-Olan:"The Green Hood and the Dres Slavers." That's the title for my first epic featuring the Argonian hero, the Green Hood. In this story, I introduce the mild-mannered Argonian clothier named Kseev-Nalo, who has a bit of an aversion to dealing with reptilian hides. Reminds him of his own skin. And no, this character is not based on anyone we know.
- Hero Antagonist: Okay, "hero" might be a stretch, but the Order of the Hour fills this role in the Dark Brotherhood storyline. While their methods are a bit less than noble, their goals are and always have been, and story-wise, their mission is ultimately to eradicate the local assassin cult that's been going around shanking people on the streets. That the Black Dragon underwent a Heel–Face Turn when she joined them is considered to be a bad thing from your perspective is basically all you need to know about their situation.
- Similarly, the Iron Wheel Mercenaries in Thieves Guild. They genuinely seek to clean up the crime-riddled streets of Hew's Bane, but they are also shown to have problems of their own, such as corruption and a leader whose fanatical obsession with hunting down the Thieves' Guild is tanking the group's funding. Tellingly, at the very end you can sell out the former, traitorous head of the Thieves Guild to them, and they'll reward you with the strongest Pardon Edict in the game.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Too many to count, but most prominently a Companion of your choosing toward the climax of the Five Companions arc.
- Hero of Another Story: You often meet or read about people who are having or had adventures similar to you.
- "Hey, You!" Haymaker: Subverted. One of the possible kill animations using the Blade of Woe has the Vestige tapping on their victim's shoulder to get them to turn around, before stabbing them three times in the chest, stomach, and throat, instead of socking them in the face.
- Hidden Weapons: One of the faction skills of the Fighters Guild, Silver Bolts, has the Vestige producing a miniature Dawnguard crossbow from their wrist to shoot at the enemy with, before swiftly folding back into their sleeve (assuming their apparel has any sleeve to begin with). From the Dual Wielding category, there's the Hidden Blade skill, which operates in a similar manner, but provides for a quick ranged interrupt, as well as a Flash Step when morphed.
- Hide Your Children: Averting the changes made by Skyrim, Online features basically no children at all outside of lore and dialogue mentions.
- High-Dive Hijinks: Stormhaven and Wrothgar have an achievement each for jumping off a high cliff and surviving.
- Highly Visible Landmark: Various zones have major landmarks visible from nearly everywhere in the zone. Just like Oblivion, the Imperial City and Cyrodiil have the White-Gold Tower. Grahtwood has the Elden Tree, Vvardenfell has the volcano Red Mountain, and Summerset has the Crystal Tower.
- Highly-Visible Ninja: However your outfit looks like has absolutely no bearing on your overall sneakiness when it comes to actual gameplay. As sneaking is determined entirely by class skill, armor type, and line of sight, you can strut around wearing the brightest, shiniest suit of platemail you can find, with brightly glowing visual effects, stealing everything that's not nailed down and landing critical sneak attacks like nobody's business, and not a single soul would realize you're right there in front of them if you're still fully stealthed.
- Historical In-Joke: In game, no less. The reason Wuuthrad is shattered? The Worm Cult was using it to empower the ghost of a giant it slaughtered.
- Hit Points: Played straight. The only thing hit points are for is being the barrier that separates you from an armor repair bill and a mildly inconvenient relocation.
- Honor Before Reason: The Redguards hold their ancestors in very high respect, including the corpses of ancestors raised as Undead. Most Redguards would rather run away before dishonoring themselves by fighting them. This becomes quite a problem thanks to a group of necromancers who know that all too well.
- Hopeless Boss Fight: Guards are Nigh-Invulnerable in order to make law-breaking a bit of a risk - even gathering hundreds of your guildmates to fight them will not be enough to kill them.
- Horned Humanoid: A few of the "adornment" options in the character select for Bosmer allows your character to have small horns or antlers.
- Horse of a Different Color: Various unusual mounts can be purchased in the cash shop: Guar, bears, senche, wolves, camels, and even a kagouti, elk, and saber-toothed cat. Some are even more unusual, as they might not be a true animal but rather an atronach or spriggan.
- HUD: As in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, it strives to be as minimalistic as possible, showing mosly your three resources, your equipped skills (which even disappear when not in combat), the compass and current objectives.
- Hunter of His Own Kind: It's entirely possible for a werewolf or vampire Vestige to also be part of the Fighters Guild, a group dedicated mostly to eradicating undead and other freaks of nature.
- Hungry Jungle: The Valenwood zones, as well as Black Marsh. The Murkmire update added more plants that will cut, poison or electrify you if you get too close.
- Hyperactive Metabolism: While healing is usually reserved for skills and potions (and even those heal instantly and give a small regeneration effect for a few seconds), eating food grants buffs to your maximum health, stamina and/or magicka instantly, and can be done as fast as you want with no repercussion whatsoever. Of course, when you actually have a quest involving a drinking contest, expect your character to puke after three drinks and pass out after five.
- I Am Not My Father: The quest-giver of "Legacy of Baelborne Rock" will say something akin to this if you choose to spare him for his father's mistakes.
- I Call It "Vera":
- The bosmer Nistel on Khenarthi's Roost has a blade called "Spleen-shanker".
- Morric Miller of Deleyn's Mill calls the mill's saw blade "Mighty Marie".
- If My Calculations Are Correct: Raynor Vanos does this:
- On Stirk: "According to my calculations, the chances that the leaders of the three alliances can reach any kind of agreement is seven-hundred-and-fifty-six-thousand to one."
- In the Chapel in the Hollow City: "The probability that any of us will survive this adventure, based on every calculation I could reference, is exceedingly infinitesimal. Could be worse, I suppose."
- Implacable Man: The trailers show the dremora as being this. Even in the middle of a pitched battle during the "Siege" trailer, a platoon of them are not even slowed down by a group of Ebonheart soldiers smashing into the front ranks. Pretty much everything they do, they do at a slow, foreboding walk.
- Incredibly Lame Pun: The game is not afraid to make puns based on the texts at hand if the opportunity arrises.
- One of the game's developers is known for his puns, like Argonian schools teaching "Hist-ory".
- Inexplicable Treasure Chests: Much like collectible crafting materials found while trekking through Tamriel, there are several spots in every map where treasure chests can spawn. These are usually well-hidden and offer decent loot and a bit of experience for the leveling adventurer, but are mostly unexplained; a few players might be able to find hints in some dropped letters and such that point towards a chest location (therefore implying that somebody actually put those items there), yet the vast majority of chests have no explanation.
- Notable aversions to this trope exist in the form of lockboxes, which spawn in populated areas and contain items to steal, and so can be explained as being the personal cache of a Non-Player Character nearby, and Undaunted chests, which contain random equipment specifically to reward daring members of the guild.
- Inexplicably Preserved Dungeon Meat: Leveling up the Provisioner skill line means having to be constantly checking the scenery for vegetables, fruit and meat to use in cooking, as it has no real "gatherer nodes" the other crafting lines have. What this means is that some spiderweb-filled, bug-riddled dungeons are basically Provisioner harvesting grounds, as they have a great number of crates and barrels (not hermetically sealed in the least) that somehow always contain perfectly preserved ingredients to make food and drink.
- Informed Deformity: Due to the game's models never really changing from the norm outside of scars, some deformities or lack of limbs might be informed but not shown on the model.
- Insanity Immunity: Sir Cadwell is the only Soul Shriven of Coldharbour who is not a hostile psychopath since he was already mad when he got there. In fact, he quite likes it there.
- Interface Screw: Aside from enemy abilities, quite a lot of your own can also make it harder to see and interact with things, both in and out of combat. Special mention goes to the classes who can summon persistent "pets", such as Warden or Sorcerer, as if those pets get in between you and an interaction or synergy, the prompt will not show up until they move or are unsummoned. This can be very annoying when you're trying to use an item on the ground or talk to an NPC, or dangerous if you have to perform a mechanic or use a synergy in combat to prevent a wipe.
- Interspecies Romance: There are several examples of this: At least two Bosmer-Khajiit couples, and a Redguard-Altmer couple, for instance.
- I Shall Taunt You: This is the primary means for tanks to Draw Aggro towards them, by grabbing the attention of a big, important enemy so that they will not focus on their squishier healers and damage dealers. Many bosses will also taunt you, but not in the gameplay sense. Rather, if you rock up to the scene without actually starting the fight, they will constantly trash talk and heckle at you until you man up and attack them, and should you wipe, they will rub it in even further.
- Interface Spoiler:
- In crypts, you can sometimes spot what bodies will rise as draugr or zombies from a long distance due to the red outline on them if you have that option on.
- Before it was possible to kill innocent non-playable characters, you could notice what figures would later become mobs due to the white outline on them, when normal non-playable characters would not have that at the time.
- If you're specifically dealing with potential werewolves, they will be immune to instant-kill prompts, such as the Blade of Woe or a vampire's Feed. More accurately, the prompts for those abilities will not show if you sneak up on them.
- In crypts, you can sometimes spot what bodies will rise as draugr or zombies from a long distance due to the red outline on them if you have that option on.
- Insistent Terminology: Abnur Tharn will correct anyone who calls Euraxia Tharn his sister, she is his half-sister, thank you very much. And it is very much the same from her side.
- He is also trying really hard to make "rage" the term of venery for dragons.
- When Abnur Tharn calls Khamira Princess, as was her title before Euraxia usurped the throne, she insists that she is Queen and has not been a princess in a long time, as the title was hers the moment her father died. He does not make the same mistake again.
- Is the Answer to This Question "Yes"?: When you ask Faraniel if her clan will kill anyone who "trespasses":Faraniel: Does a fuzzy newt-goat have seven toes? Don't look at me like that! It's a perfectly appropriate analogy.
- Item Farming: You want that legendary equipment? Then prepare to have a stock of legendary crafting items. This is particularly egregious with the jewelry crafting system introduced in the Summerset update, where you must collect ten crafting item parts to make one item, and you need four of them.
- It Has Been an Honor: Several characters say something to this effect before "The Final Assault"; Skordo the Knife says it nearly word-for-word.
- It's Personal: One of the reasons why Queen Ayrenn wants to take over Cyrodiil is to take revenge on Abnur Tharn, who had caused her great suffering several years ago.
- If you complete the storyline in Reaper's March before going to Northern Elsweyr, you have killed Javad Tharn, Euraxia Tharn's son. When you talk to her then, before she goes to the default conversation she will be furious at you for that.
- It's Up to You: Although the game averts making you The Chosen One or the only one who can defeat the zone or arc's villain, often circumstances on your way to the boss make you the only one able to do it. That, or not having a soul that could be taken or corrupted comes in handy where other mortals cannot do anything.
- Jack of All Stats: Without question, the Khajiit race. They have a very balanced spread of bonuses to all three stats along with good recovery, and an appreciable chance to crit at everything, including healing, thus letting them perform well in all roles and playstyles, even if their minor passives tend to lean more towards Stamina DPS.
- Jack of All Trades:
- Averted with the four base game classes (Dragonknight, Sorcerer, Templar, and Nightblade), whose kits were seemingly designed for very specific roles and not much else. While many class buffs have given them skill and passive updates such that they can perform better at other roles, it still doesn't necessarily mean they will do those as well as the dedicated kits can (e.g. Dragonknights struggle at healing and DPS due to weak sustain and clunky skills, Nightblades underperform as tanks and healers due to their innately selfish passives and lack of group buffs, and Templars are very subpar at tanking due to them lacking many vital survivability options like burst healing and sustain). Sorcerer is possibly the most versatile of the four, if only because their kit doesn't have any glaring shortcomings that plague the other three, and the ones that they do have can be easily compensated for with certain skills.
- The post-release classes seem to play this straighter, the trend of which began with the Warden, whose class skills and passives lend well to playing any of the three roles equally amazingly, and the well-rounded Necromancer class which brings its own share of utilities that can't be found anywhere else.
- Jaywalking Will Ruin Your Life: Played with. If you fail a pickpocket once, the guards will come looking for you, and if you happen to have no gold in your inventory, they will kill you for being unable to pay what you are clearly worth in weapons and armor. If you pay the bill, you are in the clear but the guards will confiscate all your stolen goods, even if the total value is in the thousands. If you do manage to get away, you will be unable to stroll through towns for about 30 minutes unless you go through illegal channels or forfeit all your pilfered goods. Compared to the toll for murder, which is a mere three times as much bounty as pickpocketing, there really is little incentive for players to pick pockets if they are the murdering type.
- Jerkass: Way too many to list here, although some races are more prone to shifting into Jerkass terriory than others.
- As an example, the comments made by various guards tend to also be rather scathing, such as "If I want your opinion, I'll give it to you." and "If you want to lose ten pounds of ugly fat, I'll be happy to cut off your head."
- Joke Item: Many of the items that you can steal only serve as two things: loot and humor, either in the form of funny descriptions or through
Fridge Logic. Why would a random commoner have a jar of centipedes in their pocket?
- Karma Houdini:
- Any of the three Disc-One Final Boss characters for each alliance; specifically, High Kinlady Estre, Angof the Undying, or Thallik Wormfather; has the chance to become this in Coldharbour. After being sent to Coldharbour for failing Molag Bal, they are forced to compete in a "game" where they have to use their minions to kill two of the others for a chance to get back into Molag Bal's good graces, and their minions consist of Mage's Guild members you have to rescue. At the end of the quest, you have a chance to either save the Disc-One Final Boss, or the Mages... or both, by threatening to kill the Observer over and over again until he gives in to your demands, which would permanently disrupt the game. The one you chose to save undergoes a Heel–Face Turn of sorts, and joins your army against Molag Bal.
- Lady Clarisse Laurent is a more comical example. While not an evil woman by any means, her single-minded obsession with uncovering ancient relics and artifacts often ends up getting innocent people hurt, killed or worse. And yet any attempt on the player's part to give her some comeuppance invariably fails and ends up affecting her manservant Stibbons instead.
- Ondendil is the only named member of the Veiled Heritance who is not convinced to defect, killed or otherwise brought to justice by the end of the Dominion questlines.
- A Shadow of Rajhin, a Khajiit god, stalked and harassed a married high elf woman in order to sleep with her. After being repeatedly refused, he "stole" her away to hide the shame she brought him, until she would be willing to sleep with him. Then, he "stole" her husband and home, so when she is finally released from her prison by you, she has nowhere to be with her husband gone, her home hidden and her time passed. The Shadow of Rajhin is never made to pay for this.
- Played with in regards to Governor Omellian in Seyda Neen. If you have Marise steal the document proving his involvement with the slavers terrorizing the town instead of doing it yourself, he will escape during the fighting, but his plans are in ruins, his allies are dead, he's been branded a traitor by Morrowind's government and he has a very pissed off Deputy Governor hot on his heels.
- Narsis Dren is a recurring Hate Sink for many players due to his huge ego and incompetence, with a tendency to patronize you, who are doing most of the work for him any time you meet him. Near the end of many of his quests, the player is usually given a sadistic choice to have some kind of tragedy befall him, such as being trapped in a sarcophagus or pushed down a well, which might feel cathartic at first, until you run into him again, and again, and again, with whatever comeuppance you've planned for him never sticking for long.
- In the epilogue of Thieves Guild's main quest, its entirely possible to let Cosh/Nicolas off scot free and allow him to con his new wife for all she's worth, on the condition that he never show his face in Hew's Bane again.
- Karma Houdini Warranty: After knowingly sending his entire research team to their deaths, violating the accord between Archmage Vanus Galerion and the woodland spirit Selene in order to murder her and bind her spirit to his will, and manipulating the Vestige into helping him do it, Warlock Carindon finally gets his comeuppance at the end of the Lair of Maarselok dungeon.
- Kicking Ass in All Her Finery: Due to the huge array of alternative cosmetic options for your female Vestige, you can slaughter your way across Tamriel and beyond wearing the most ridiculously lavish evening dress ever and no amount of slashing or clawing would ever tarnish your fancy costumes. And this does not apply to just female Vestiges, either.
- Kill It with Fire: Magicka-users with the infernal staff as a weapon, of course. Using that staff will change all the Destruction Staff skills to be flame elemental.
- Kill the God: Magistrix Vox attempts to do this to the Tribunal in the Deshaan questline.
- Kleptomaniac Hero: Now possible to be this, after the Justice System was added. Stealing can be quite profitable, and stolen items can fetch surprising prices at fences with the Thieves Guild's Haggling skill, sometimes netting even more gold than one would selling an equivalent item legitimately, thus encouraging players to pickup everything that's not nailed down while trying their best to not accumulate bounty while doing it. The only crimp to this kind of money-making is the hard cap on the amount of things you can fence per day, at 50 if you're just starting, to 140 at level 4 Trafficker.
- Language Equals Thought: In the Sorrow's Kiss quest in Wrothgar, Kharsthun mentions that there is no word in the Orcish language meaning "fragile". This reflects their warlike culture which values strength.
- Large Ham: King Kurog in Wrothgar, and Nocturnal in Summerset.
- Lava Is Boiling Kool-Aid: Though the swimming sounds are different, touching lava is not as fatal as in real life, and you can still swim for a short amount of time. In the past, the damage was set, but now it is doubled for each second spent in lava, averting this trope slightly.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: In the Blackwood tutorial, Norianwe makes a comment about how Skyshards always seem to fall in the most inconvenient locations.
- Leave No Witnesses: Averted. Even if you kill everyone who witnessed the crime, your bounty does not go down like it does in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.
- Legacy Character:
- The Wilderking/-queen is always a mortal who takes up the mantle, losing the memories of who they originally were.
- There is a new Silvenar and Green Lady of the Bosmer once per generation. A portion of the Aldmeri Dominion quests involve helping the new Silvenar and Green Lady rise to power after the death of the current ones.
- It has been a mystery among lore-enthusiasts whether the Mane - the spiritual leader and representative of the Khajiit by birthright - is reborn upon death and thus there is only one Mane, or if there can be multiple Manes, or at least candidates, at a time. The Reaper's March confirms the latter, as you will meet two such candidates, called Lunar Champions, who are candidates to become the next Mane should the current one die or fail his duties in some way. You'll have to choose which of them becomes the next Mane after the current one resigns.
- Morrowind introduces the vigilante Scarlet Judge who fights crime and corruption in Vardenfell, whose mantle is passed to whoever the predecessor sees as worthy.
- Level-Locked Loot: Each armor or weapon has a level on it that you must be at before using it. Also, some crafting materials require you to achieve a certain level in that craft and spend a skill point to be able to use it.
- Life Meter: Three bars graphically show your remaining magicka, stamina and health. Worth noting is that the Life Meter also shows some of your buffs and debuffs through simple graphical effects: the meter cracks if your resistances are reduced, its borders become thicker if they are buffed, it becomes smaller if your maximum health is reduced, glows white if your attack is increased and black if it is reduced, and so on. It also shows if you have any shields, coloring a portion of the bar pink in relation with the strength of the barrier.
- Lightning Bruiser: The racial bonuses of Orcs give them the potential to be this, with a heap of Stamina on top of innately high sprint speed for very little cost, and insane levels of weapon damage buffs, making them very strong in PvE and absolute nightmares to deal with in PvP if they can zone you. There are also quite a lot of abilities and sets that can turn you into unstoppable rampaging damage monsters.
- Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards: Zigzagged trope. Magic builds can push out more damage faster and over a larger area than those relying on stamina by endgame. However, being able to take damage is arguably more important in the metagame than being able to dish it out, and stamina is generally the more efficient option for tanks.
- Living Statue: Many enemies in tombs and temples are statues enchanted to protect the place.
- The Warrior in the Hel-Ra Citadel trial appears in the form of a statue.
- Loading Screen: Plenty of these, containing artwork and a brief bit of information that is usually relevant to where you are. They usually appear when moving into different areas and delves, but they might sometimes suddenly cut your gameplay off if the game cannot load the assets of the current area fast enough.
- Lockpicking Minigame: You are shown five pins on springs and must press down on each one until the right moment (when it starts to shake slightly), and then release. If you push it down too far, the lockpick will break; if it is not far enough, then it simply will return to its normal position (although repeated attempts may still break the lockpick). It is also has a time limit based on the difficulty of the chest: The more difficult the lock, the less amount of time is given to open it.
- It is also worth noting that picking any lock the first time on a character reveals the Legerdemain skill line, which helps you pick locks, pockets, bribe guards, and sneak around a little bit better.
- Loophole Abuse: Soul gems, if stolen from merchants, can only be sold when taken to a Fence, if you're not going to launder them for later use. However, if a stolen soul gem is filled, it automatically becomes a legitimately "clean" item in your inventory, which can then be sold to normal shopkeepers, and will not be confiscated by guards when you're arrested. A player with the Soul Trap skill can literally scoop up every soul gem they can find, fill them with souls, and then selling them right back to the store owner they stole them from in the first place for a pretty penny.
- Loot Boxes: Crown Crates, which are usually only purchaseable through the real-money-only "Crowns" currency, though are also given as a bonus when leveling up characters and occasionally a few are given as a daily login bonus during particular events. They contain four rewards (about a 15-20% of there being a 5th reward) consisting of consumables and cosmetics. If you get a collectible that you already own, or wish to exchange your consumables, you get "crown gems" that can be used to purchase individual items from the crate outright.
- Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: One of the skill types is One-Hand and Shield. Blocking with a shield (as opposed to your own weapon) can absorb more damage and potentially save your life, especially in PvP situations. It is almost a necessity for tanking too, as its skill line contains one of the three ways to Draw Aggro in the game. What is more, merely having a shield equipped increases your armor rating, which further makes you more difficult to take down.
- Mad Scientist:
- Orryn the Black in Fang Lair, experimenting necromancy with animal skeletons.
- Plague Concocter Mortieu in Scalecaller Peak, a follower of Peryite whose experimentation has left him **beautifully disfigured.
- Archivist Ernarde in Moonhunter Keep, who experiments on werewolves to force them to listen to his leader.
- Arkasis the Mad Scientist of Stone Garden is, well, Exactly What It Says on the Tin.
- Magic Knight:
- Most tanks, as they often balance weapon abilities and magical abilities to stay alive. Dragonknights and Templars are quite literal examples of this, boasting a lot of Magicka-based powers that they wield to deal damage and support their teams in equal measure. For additional points and lore accuracy, pick Breton as your race for these classes.
- Also applicable is the surprisingly and curiously powerful Stamina Sorceror build, or "Stamsorc" as it's usually known as, who wield powerful magic that they can imbue into their bladed weapons for devastating effect. The scrapped Battlemage class had a very similar playstyle in theory, with specializations in Two-Handed weaponry, and spells from the Destruction, Alteration, and Mysticism schools of magic.
- Magic Pants: Played with in the cases of the werewolf, vampire, and Necromancer's Goliath transformations. While your clothes do warp and explode when you hulk up into a werewolf, blood scion, or bone goliath, they also rematerialize on your character when you revert back to your usual form no worse for wear, making it so that unlike the system in Skyrim, you're not nudified by the transformation itself.
- Make Them Rot: A plucky Khajiit pirate in Coldharbour finds out the hard way why you should not take ancient loot without first checking to see if it is cursed.First Mate Jalan: What... What's happening? ...My skin! My fur! Aaaaaaaaagh!
- Mana: Magicka, an Elder Scrolls staple.
- Manly Facial Hair: Sai Sahan, one of the prominent characters of the main quest has some.Sai Sahan: "There is an old Redguard proverb: A man is only as great as the beard that wears him. A full and healthy beard carries with it a sense of great honor and wisdom. Also crumbs."Vestige: "Couldn't someone grab onto it in battle, though?"Sai Sahan: "Many have tried. But a fool and his fingers are easily parted."
- Maximum HP Reduction: A debuff mostly enemies can inflict. It is called Minor/Major Mangle, and it is just as easy to dispel as any other debuff.
- Mêlée à Trois: The three playable warring factions in the game consist of the Aldmeri Dominion (Altmer, Bosmer, and Khajiit), the Ebonheart Pact (Dunmer, Nords, and Argonians), and the Daggerfall Covenant (Bretons, Redguards, and Orcs).
- As shown in various previews, this will be very common in PvP. Of particular note are sieges where the defenders may be attacked by forces from the other two factions but the two groups may also start attacking each other.
- At a landmark west of Ebonheart, Vivec's Antlers, there are a few sidequests dealing with one based around an invading Covenant force, the defending Pact soldiers, and Dreugh summoned by the artifact the Covenant is attempting to steal. One of the quests has you convincing the Dreugh that the Pact is defending the artifact too, stacking the battle against the Covenant.
- Medieval European Fantasy: The entire game, but the lands and story arcs of the Daggerfall Covenant are like a love letter to the genre.
- Medieval Stasis: Technology and culture does not change much between this game and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, despite having more than 800 years between them.
- Memetic Badass: Invoked. Captain Fortunata
is the 2nd-Era Gold Coast equivalent of Chuck Norris.
- Menu Time Lockout: Averted for the most part, as combat and other interactions will still play out in real time when you're browsing through your menus. Strangely played straight with the Excavation minigame, though, where nothing can kick you out prematurely by attacking you. If anything, monsters seem to ignore you completely while you're at it.
- Merchant Prince: High King Emeric, leader of the Daggerfall Covenant, was originally a merchant lord from High Rock.
- Microtransactions: The Crown Store. It offers cosmetic items such as pets, and costumes as well as items that can be obtained in-game, such as food/drink/potions, mounts, mount riding skills and crafting books (all of which thankfully do not take huge amounts of Grinding). It also offers the Imperial Edition of the game (adds the ability to be the Imperial race, plus has a few items) and the Adventurer Pack (which adds the ability to play any race in any alliance - something previously only available from preordering the game - and also contains a few items), and DLC.
- Mirror Character: Each of the three alliance leaders have very similar backgrounds. All three traveled across Tamriel before becoming rulers (Ayrenn was an adventurer, Emeric was a caravan guard, and Jorunn was a traveling skald) and something unexpected caused their rise of power and the creation of their faction (Ayrenn returned and claimed her birthright after her father's death and brought her two adventurer companions to help, Emeric married Maraya instead of Rayelle and created a trade alliance with Hammerfell and the Orcs, the death of Jorunn's sister and mother during an Akiviri invasion made him next in line as Skyrim's High King and teamed up with the Dunmer and Argonians to drive them away).
- Mood Whiplash: There is a merchant on Auridon called Elodinar, who, when spoken to, says mournfully, "My heart goes out to the many victims of this foul tragedy that has befallen Greenwater Cove..." before concluding with a cheerful, "... So! Do you need to buy anything!"
- The College of Illumination quest in Summerset is hilarious for most of its rune, what with the innate absurdity of how most of the students and teachers are acting...then, towards the end of the quest, the Monster of the Week gets pissed due to your meddling and the quest suddenly becomes a frantic chase through the academy's library to stop her before she unleashes a horde of literary monsters onto the school.]
- Moral Myopia: Alliances are quickly to blame each other for underhanded or morally bankrupt tactics during the war, despite themselves doing some disgusting things for the sake of the Ruby Throne.
- Mugged for Disguise: Many of the base-game zones have quests where you can attack an enemy NPC and steal their outfit to use as a disguise.
- Multishot: The Arrow Spray bow ability shoots multiple arrows in a row, hitting any enemies within that line of sight.
- My Eyes Are Up Here: Lampshaded with the Seducer Armor costume
◊. The helmet covers the eyes entirely, but it reveals a lot of the rest.
- My Greatest Failure: Many characters have this. Varien's is not stopping Mannimarco in time.
- In Northern Elsweyr, Zamarak has two, one which was the reason for his self-imposed exile and another when he returns. The first was not being in the palace to protect the royal family when Euraxia Tharn usurped the throne, the other was when his mentor was murdered by her army.
- My Species Doth Protest Too Much:
- There is a Dark Seducer in Coldharbour who does not want a mortal to suffer, feeling that he is too noble to deserve such a fate. Considering that Daedra usually do not even care if another of their kind tries to manipulate mortals, it is quite surprising that one will go out of her own way to help a mortal with nothing to gain.
- One quest in Summerset has you helping out both an Altmer/Maormer couple stop the latter’s old crew from taking over a keep. Depending on your choices, both of them will decide to renounce their allegiance to their provinces in order to run away and be together. In case you do not realize, both Altmer and Maormer hate each other.
- Naïve Newcomer: Eveli Sharp-Arrow in Wrothgar. She believes the world is black and white and is not ready for the complexeties of politics or war.
- Quen in Thieves Guild as well.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Many enemies, and some allies, have nicknames that imply some disturbing or dangerous occupations.
- Eludin the Cannibal King in Orcrest, Northern Elsweyr.
- Nature Spirit: The Nords' old religion focused on animals. Bosmer also revere nature to the point of living exclusively on meat.
- Neck Snap: Some of the dying animations have an NPC's chin directly over their shoulder bone while they fly in the direction you hit them in. When you are using a mace or an axe, it looks like you hit them in the head with so much blunt force, that you have snapped their neck. The fact that they simply flop over dead really helps this effect.
- Never Found the Body: At the end of the main quest, you never find Darien Gautier's body, and assume he is dead.
- New Game Plus: Sort of. Once you've completed the main questline and the story missions for the faction you started the game with, Cadwell shows up in the Harborage to offer you a chance to explore the other two routes, one after another. Your character progress is retained, and you play through the other two stories from the beginning as you would with new characters.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Many, but the latest would be you and Abnur Tharn accidentally leading Euraxia Tharn to the dragons' prison and unleashing them, leading to the Season of the Dragon's main arc.
- Non-Combat EXP: You gain experience by unlocking chests, discovering locations, and doing daily crafting quests.
- Non-Elemental: The Magic Damage from restoration staves and various other abilities.
- Non-Indicative Name: Despite their names, none of the three main alliances are headquartered in their namesake areas. The Daggerfall Covenant's capital city is not Daggerfall itself, but rather Wayrest, which is in Stormhaven. Similarly, the leading forces of the Ebonheart Pact are the Nords, who are based out of Windhelm, and their capital is Mournhold, not Ebonheart. Less egregiously, the Aldmeri Dominion really is chiefly commanded by Queen Ayrenn's Altmeri forces, but their base of operations is in Grahtwood, which is Bosmeri land. That being said, based on where Vanus Galerion appears to Pact players during the main quest, it's possible that Ebonheart was at one point considered to be the faction capital, as he wouldn't show up in Mournhold like he would in Wayrest and Elden Root for the other two alliances.
- Non-Mammal Mammaries: The Argonians, who are Lizard Folk but still have breasts like humans.
- Noodle Incident:
- On the Aldmeri Dominion side, Queen Ayrenn and Razum-dar's backstory seems to be full of these, often in reference to the time they adventured together.
- Some crafting skill lines have the Hireling passive, which makes you receive letters every day that contain crafting materials. The letters themselves usually recount the hireling's adventures while retrieving your materials, and can sometimes veer into this trope.
Gavin Gavonne: A word of wisdom from one who learned a thing or two in his travels: no matter how much your drunken companion might encourage it, never, under any circumstances, should you moon a werewolf.- When you ask Lendanor how he got to the prison isle of Amenos, he mentions that he once turned an entire town of Bretons into skeevers. Your astonished character asks "How did you do that? And why?" Lendanor complains that he's tired of talking about it and refuses to elaborate, saying simply, "Breton town. I show up. Skeevers. Then, Amenos. That's all you really need to know."
- No Party Like a Donner Party: During the outbreak of the Llodos plague, a group of Dunmer refugees decided to seek shelter in the Forgotten Crypts. Following the questline, you'll soon discover that the group had resorted to cannibalism to survive, and the quest giver's husband was kicked out and left for dead for finding out the truth. Should you leave her behind while you investigate, she will be butchered as well.
- No-Sell:
- Sometimes when you attack an enemy - usually a boss - you will get a message at the top of the screen saying it is too powerful for effects like knockback or poison.
- Due to their racial lifestyle, certain playable races are resistant or outright immune to many harmful effects.
- One of several benefits to playing as a Bosmer is Acquired Poison Immunity. At level 25, you can unlock the Resist Affliction passive in the Wood Elf racial skill line that grants you complete immunity to the Poisoned status effect. In a similar vein, Argonians are immune to the harmful effects of the Diseased status effect.
- Being born and raised in the Grim Up North that is Skyrim, Nord Vestiges are immune to the Chilled CC effect from frost-based attacks. Similarly, Dark Elven Vestiges are immune to fire-based status effects due to them growing up in the volcanic province of Morrowind, where lava is everywhere and most of the indigenous wildlife also deals flame damage.
- Nostalgia Level: Many of the playable areas of Tamriel would count since the game is largely an even mix of nostalgia locations and new areas. For instance:
- Eastmarch and The Rift in general, to The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. One particular Ebonheart Pact questline will take players back to Skuldafn where they need to access a portal to Sovngarde.
- Stros M'Kai is one for The Elder Scrolls Adventures: Redguard.
- The Dark Brotherhood takes place in the Gold Coast from The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, complete with some areas that were in the previous game.
- The Morrowind expansion's release date was chosen for its closeness to The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind's 15th anniversary, and it features the island of Vvardenfell, with plenty of references to the original game.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Late in Orsinium, sacrificing Talviah to gain the trust of the Vosh Rakh and learn their ultimate plan is clearly meant to be seen as the "evil" choice, but the ending of the main quest you get from sparing him is arguably considerably more depressing than if you kill him, as High Priestess Solgra dies and Eveli is left broken by her death.
- Notice This:
- Lore books and other important documents will have a bright glow to them that will stand out even in well-lit areas, as well as the many Thieves Troves that you can loot from.
- Having the Keen Eye perk on one of the various crafting skill lines will make crafting resources of that type have a noticeable pillar of light effect coming from them, making it easier to spot and harvest them. A similar skill exists for treasure chests and excavation spots, though these highlighted items will glow blue instead of white, and the former will make a low chiming noise when the player is close enough to them.
- Thieves Troves also emit a bright purple glow to invite players to open them.
- The incredible buff of the Imperial City-specific set Imperial Physique is counterbalanced by your character having a bright blue glow about them, especially when you're carrying enough Tel Var stones to make full use of its five-piece effects. In the right hands, Imperial Physique is a scary set to come across, but when used by those less experienced with PvP, all you're doing is putting a huge advertisement over your head that screams "I'm carrying a ton of stones, please kill me!" to every enemy player around you.
- Not the Intended Use: Since you can technically own a lot of houses, which are typically placed near wayshrines or other areas of interests, and traveling to your house is completely free, many players with Crowns to spend tend to scoop up real estate whenever possible, as much as their budget allows for it. Regardless of whether they will actually furnish the places or not, the many houses that dot the world map do provide a very handy alternative method of fast travel that doesn't cost anything to use, with the only crimp being that you can't travel out of the house for free like you could using an actual wayshrine, and the standard cost cooldown also applies.
- Oblivious Guilt Slinging: The player can do this at the end of a major Morrowind questline, though you'll only learn this during Summerset. If they chose to have Naryu kill Veya, their attempts to make Naryu feel better about the deed only angers her, though she is also quick to reassure them she is not really mad at them, just upset at the situation. In Summerset, Veya turns up very much alive and says that Naryu did not have the spine to kill her. Meaning, Naryu was not upset about killing her friend and student, but rather about lying to the Vestige and their attempt to be considerate of her supposed grief only made her feel more guilty about the deception.
- Once Done, Never Forgotten: At the end of the Reaper's March arc. Battlereeve Urcelmo is aghast that at what his Bad Future counterpart did, both because he considers the idea of him betraying his Queen unthinkable, and because Ayrenn now will not stop teasing him over it.
- One-Hit Kill: Many last bosses have this in trials, in particular on veteran. The dragons in Northern Elsweyr, unless you have eaten food that maxes your health and have strong armour, can also do this at times.
- One-Liner, Name... One-Liner: In the Markarth storyline, when Sai Sahan summons his Shehai for the first time, Lyris asks him what he thought of while doing it. Sai responds, "I thought of you, Snow Lily. I thought of you."
- One-Man Army: The Vestige, as is standard. In Murkmire, a dossier talking about the player character, written by the antagonists, recommends sending a force of at least 20 soldiers to take them down, and that even that may not work.
- Only One Name: Few cultures in Tamriel actually have family names; usually they are reserved for nobles or really important families.
- Our Elves Are Different: High Elves (Altmer) are stuck-up fascists, Dark Elves (Dunmer) are religious fanatics and slavers, the Wood Elves (Bosmer) love the forest so much some are cannibals rather than eat flora. The other elf races are Sea Elves (Maormer), who have chameleon-pale skin and are constantly at war with the High Elves; Dwarves (Dwemer), who are not shorter than the other races and were atheist underground-dwellers, as well as eventual slavers of the Snow Elves (Falmer), who have yet to appear in the game, while the Ayleid (also called Wild Elves) are extinct and were slavers of humans.
- Our Fairies Are Different: Though there are fairy-creatures not yet seen in the game, there also are the nixad, small critters that like to cause mischief.
- Our Ghosts Are Different: You can summon ghosts of the deceased back from the afterlife by summoning magic, which in some cultures are more normal than abnormal. They can also be fought and killed (again), sometimes leaving ectoplasm behind.
- Our Gryphons Are Different: Mixes of eagles, horses, felines and more. They are native to Summerset Isles, but were not created in-game until the Summerset chapter. They apparently sometimes do cross the ocean to the mainlands, though, as you can find some of them in Northern Elsweyr. That, or they are (perhaps illegally) imported due to the Aldmeri Dominon alliance.
- Our Orcs Are Different: Originally elves, they were changed to a race of their own due to their patron god Malacath. They are a Proud Warrior Race and experts in blacksmithing, but due to invasions from the Bretons and Redguards, have been unable to keep their own kingdom for long.
- Our Vampires Are Different: Vampirism in Online has several key differences from the strains seen in previous games. Whereas typically, a vampire would burn in sunlight and therefore has to stay indoors until dark or go outside with headwear, vampires in Online can freely go about their business during the day without being hurt. They also do not need to feed, and feeding actually increases your vampirism stage instead of lowering it, like it did in Skyrim.
- Our Werewolves Are Different: In the Alliance trailer
, one part of it features a trio of Ebonheart warriors fighting a group of zombie werewolves.
- Our Zombies Are Different: There are various types of zombies depending on the magic used to bring them back to life. For example, zombies raised by the Bloodthorn Clan will have thorny vines sprouting out of their backs. Zombies of nords in or around tombs are usually called draugr.
- Ouroboros:
- The game's logo has the three animals which represent the factions forming this sort of circle (lion for the Daggerfall Covenant, dragon for the Ebonheart Pact and eagle for the Aldmeri Dominion). This probably should not be taken as an indication of the faction's respective advantages over each other.
- In the Alliance trailer, the Nord, Altmer, and Breton leaders (representing the Warrior, Mage, and Thief respectively) circle each other in the shape of the Ouroboros.
- Out of the Closet, Into the Fire: Regent Cassipia exclaims her love for Little Leaf only after Leaf dies defending Cassipia from the player. Cassipia immediately fights you to her own death as well. A journal can be found in the same room wherein Little Leaf expesses her own feelings for Cassipia, which you'll find only just before or just after killing them.
- Outliving One's Offspring: Depressingly, this happens to several characters in the course of the game, hero and villain alike.
- In the Stonefalls arc, Tanval Indoril's only child Garyn is killed by a Breton general, which causes Tanval's Face–Heel Turn as he seeks an extremely destructive vengeance on the Covenant.
- In Summerset, this is a key piece of Valsirenn's backstory, along with her estranged husband Leythen. They're estranged precisely because they handled their daughter's death in opposite ways, with Valsirenn doubling her commitment to the Psijic Order while Leythen fell away from it completely.
- In Elsweyr, if you've completed the Reaper's March questline beforehand, Euraxia Tharn greets you with absolute rage for killing her son Javad, the Arc Villain of that zone.
- Overly Long Name: The quest "A Duelist's Dilemma" of the Summerset chapter has the Vestige trying to learn the full name of a High Elf at the behest of his announcer and opponent, in order to comply with traditional Altmeri dueling customs. Properly completing the quest requires the player to fully memorize the three incredibly long parts to the Elf's namenote , and then declaring them in three consecutive dialogue checks, to formally announce the challenge.
- Palette-Swapped Alien Food: The food in the Daedric realm of Fargrave is all unusually-colored varations of normal food: pink vegetables, bright purple ham with white speckles, orange bread, and sweetrolls with blue frosting.
- Panthera Awesome: The Khajiit, as well as any feline enemy you encounter in the wild.
- The Paladin: Templar class. According to flavor text and lore, Templars are the Magic Knight champtions of Stendarr, God of Mercy, Justice, Compassion, and wield powers of light and the sun bestowed upon them by the Aedra in their quest to smite evil, heal the sick, and protect the innocent. Books about Stendarr in particular will boost the class experience by one level when read. Additionally, a Templar tank with sword and shield decked in heavy armor fits the typical description to a T.
- Pay Evil unto Evil: During the Forgotten Crypts questline, should you leave Sela behind with the cannibal refugee group while you search for her husband and destroy their food stocks, you'll later come back to find her missing, and their leader, Danus, boasting about having her butchered to feed them, with particularly smug emphasis on her cinnamon perfume being like seasoning for them. If you so choose, you can enact your revenge for Sela and Garil on the spot, as Danus loses his essential status after the conversation ends and dies in one hit.
- Perfectly Arranged Marriage: In a Markarth side-quest, you are tasked to find two run-aways in an arranged marriage to end their clans' feud. Eslyn (the bride) simply doesn't want to marry someone she doesn't know or love while Madearn (the groom) promised his dying friend he would marry his sister Drisene. As you help them try to find a new way to end the feud, they end up bonding and becoming attracted to each other. The quest can end with them deciding to simply go through with the arrangement since Eslyn's concerns are now irrelevant and Madearn can accept that Drisene will be happier without being married out of obligation.
- The Performer King: Jorunn the Skald-King - who is the High King of Skyrim and leader of the Ebonheart Pact - earned his epithet for being a bard (skald) in addition to being king. He is seen singing in a scene of the book that came with the collector's edition of the game.
- Permanently Missable Content: Subverted, as prologue quests remain available after update. The Crown Store has mostly cosmetic sales that go away after a period of time, though they sometimes cycle them back in for themed sales or in Crown Crates.
- Perpetually Static: As zone stories are self-contained, things can get pretty wonky if you play them out of order, especially the DLC chapters, even if they are both part of a larger arc. In many of these cases, characters who canonically died or are otherwise removed from the story will still somehow be alive and well in zones that chronologically precede their "deaths". This is even more of a problem if you decide to skip Coldharbour at the character creation screen, since the game will then prompt you to start your new playthroughs from the most recently-released chapter zone, all of which imply more or less that the Planemeld had already been stopped.
- The Daedric War arc begins with Morrowind and ends in Summerset. Should you decide to play through Summerset first, the events of Morrowind and Clockwork City will still assume that the larger threat is still present, even if you've technically defeated them already.
- Playing through Dragonhold before Elsweyr will still have the characters (and yourself) be utterly surprised that the Dragonguard are still around to some extent near the end of the Anequina arc, even if you've already reformed the order, and mission dialogue will refer to Sai Sahan as some kind of mysterious figure, despite the fact that you already knew him beforehand.
- And speaking of DLC chapters, you can play them immediately after Coldharbour and meet up with important characters from the main questline despite the improbability of it all. Abnur, Lyris and Sai Sahan will accompany you on your quests, and the game will treat it as if you already knew who they are, regardless of whether you've actually met them in the main story proper. One can play through the entirety of the Dragon War arc and then get the mission to rescue Sai from Coldharbour, or meet up with Abnur who's alive and well despite having seemingly perished at the end of Elsweyr, which makes no sense on a continuity level.
- Photographic Memory: The player character can gain the ability to recall any piece of literature they have read, via a magical ritual as a reward from Shalidor after completing the Mages Guild storyline.
- Pillar of Light: Skyshards have one above them, and the Keen Eye crafting passive makes it so a similar effect appears on gathering nodes, making them harder to miss. The Templar skill Backlash also makes a pillar of light appear on top of the target.
- Planimal: The Wild Hunt Crown Crates introduced mounts that were plantbased in the shape of horses, tigers, wolves, guars, bears and camels.
- Player Versus Player:
- Players are able to fight one another in battles for keeps and other such fortifications, with a particularly huge arena being the Imperial City itself, with 100 versus 100 battles. This is not surprising, considering the main creative talent were behind Dark Age of Camelot.
- One of the updates added the ability to challenge another player to a 1-vs-1 duel.
- The Morrowind expansion introduced battlegrounds, which are 4-vs-4-vs-4 arena matches.
- Play Every Day:
- The game has a daily login reward system. Missing a day does not mean you miss the next reward, but it means that it's delayed until the next day you log in, and it means you may miss the last (typically biggest) reward.
- Various zones and questlines have a quest you can complete daily; you can earn achievements which can unlock things like dye colors or crafting stations for completing a certain number.
- Events in the game are relatively frequent, and during them you can earn a number of Event Tickets per day.
- After Bethesda was acquired by Microsoft, the Endeavors system was introduced, which gives players the opportunity to earn a limited number of Seals of Endeavor daily that can be exchanged for Crown Crate items (previously only obtainable by spending real money.)
- Plug the Volcano: In the High Isle expansion, Volcanic Vents are the zone's new world event. When the vent's boss is defeated, a druid closes the main vent by plugging it with a boulder. They claim that they're sealing it for good, so it's not clear whether the event respawning is just a game mechanic or a sign that plugging it failed.
- Poisoned Weapons: Alchemists can make several kinds of poisons to use for any sort of weapon. These work similarly to but distinctly from enchantments, in that they do still confer additional effects to your basic attacks and weapon abilities when slotted, but have only 20% chance to trigger with no cooldown, whereas enchantments are constant but specific ones run on a cooldown in between procs. Amazingly, these poisons even work on magic staves, even restoration ones, even though you don't physically hit your enemies with them. Some weapon and player skills can also involve poison (e.g. the Bow line of skills, for example, has three skills that can be morphed into dealing poison damage on top of the poison you've already applied onto your weapon).
- Police Are Useless: Zig-zagged. This is largely averted for you with the updated Justice system, which made city guards frighteningly good at their job. If they catch you committing a crime, they will immediately attempt to extract a fine out of you, and the only other option is to resist arrest, after which your bounty will be significantly inflated and every single cop in Tamriel will try to kill you on sight. Running away from an angry guard is extremely hard for an inexperienced crook, due to their bevy of CC abilities that constantly snares, roots, stuns, and pulls you into whacking range, where they will wallop you into the ground with their powerful melee weapons. Fighting back also isn't an option, as guards are freaking invincible. For as long as your bounty holds, getting anywhere near a guard without significant investment into the Ledgermain and Thieves Guild skill lines, the latter of which also unlocks the Clemency option when held up, will just be asking for trouble. Unfortunately, they are far less competent when it's the NPCs' turn to commit wrongdoings in their view.
- Polyamory: Each of your characters can be married to up to eight other Vestiges using a Pledge of Mara, and they themselves can have up to eight partners, ad infinitum.
- Position of Literal Power: Upon becoming Emperor, a player receives several passive skills that make them even better in PvP combat.
- Power Incontinence: Aranias, a young Altmer woman who can be found in Valenwood, has a connection with nature. You see some of her past: She has remarkable powers, able to raise land and grow vines right out of the ground, but she also is not able to control it. She destroys an entire ship on accident by raising a rock out of the ocean.
- Precautionary Corpse Disposal: Argonians in Murkmire put a grave-stake through the body of the dead to keep them from rising as a bog blight (essentially a zombie).
- Premium Currency: Besides its regular gold currency, the game offers two special currencies:
- One is "Crowns", the currency used in the cash shop, obtained by spending real money (including subscribing to the game); these let you buy cosmetic items, shortcut items (e.g. merchant assistant that has limited functionality compared to in-game bankers), and DLC.
- The rarer type of premium currency is Crown Gems. These are obtained only by purchasing Crown Crates (a box that gives you 4 random items), and either trading your consumable prizes from them for 1 gem per card, or getting a duplicate costume/pet/etc. (in which case the amount of gems is based on the item's rarity). These gems can then be used to buy an item from the Crown Crates outright, for 16-400 gems depending on which rarity tier it's in.
- Proud Scholar Race: The High Elves put a big emphasis on education. The Bretons are also known to be huge scholars as well.
- Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: When speaking to Kari in the Thieves Guild hideout in Hew's Bane, she will say that if you need to get paid, she will make sure you get what you are owed. "I don't miscount," she says, and then repeats for emphasis: "Never forget: I. Don't. Miscount."
- Purely Aesthetic Gender: In terms of gameplay, there is no functional difference between male and female.
- Putting the Band Back Together: The goal of the main story in the base game is to rescue members of the Five Companions to stop Molag Bal.
- Rare Candy: Transmutation Crystals. They are used to alter the Traits on your gear, or reconstruct previously-obtained set items for a varying cost, which are very important during the late game if you're looking to keep yourself viable. Each transmutation runs you 50 of them, while reconstruction costs vary depending on how many different pieces you've collected for a given set, and you can hold 500 crystals, up to 1,000 with an ESO+ subscription, which are earned at a pretty generous rate if you're diligent at completing daily dungeons and pledges, but will still require some grinding to have enough for a single use. Prior to Update 28, these used to be much more rare, being earned at a rate of 5-7 per day if you're lucky and not already treating PvP like your job.
- Razor Wind: The Set Bonus for wearing five Arms of Relequen gear pieces allows the player to apply a stack of Harmful Winds onto anything they hit, which manifests as a small whirlwind around the target that lacerates them once per second, and hitting them again will add more stacks for increased damage. Many enemy types also wield wind-like powers against the player.
- Rearing Horse: Mounts will perform an animation if you attempt to jump with them while not moving; horses and elks will rear. If you are in combat and take enough hits while on your horse, it will rear, knocking you off.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Unlike previous games, city guards tend to be unaggressive when they approach you if you have a bounty, whereupon they will ask you nicely to pay off your fine (and hand over any stolen items) before letting you go. It is only if you decide to flee that they will turn hostile, lamenting your poor choice and their regret for having to put you down.
- Recurring Character: A lot of downloadable content has characters returning;
- Imperial City: Lyranth the Dremora from the main quest is involved in the Imperial Prison group dungeon.
- Orsinium: Rigurt the Brash from the Ebonheart Pact, as well as Neramo, Lady Clarisse Laurent and Stibbons from the Daggerfall Covenant have roles in each their side-quests. Alinon the Alchemist from Glenumbra reappears as well. At the end of the storyline, the Prophet appears to warn you about Daedric threats to come.
- Dark Brotherhood: Jimila and Mel Adrys from the Aldmeri Dominion and Lerisa from the Daggerfall Covenant each have their own side-quest. Razum-dar and Naryu Virian have one side-quest each before they join forces with you to stop a serial killer. The Vanos siblings from Ebonheart Pact also have their own side-quest.
- Morrowind: Naryu Virian is your teacher in the tutorial and the quest-giver in a city's side-quest. Lady Clarisse and Stibbons makes an appearance in a side quest once again. Narsis Dren from Wrothgar also appears, marking the first time a DLC-character returns in another DLC.
- Clockwork City: The Vanos siblings appear again, both for their own side-quests and having a small role within the story with Neramo, who also returns. The Duke of Crows from the Ebonheart Pact appears as well.
- Summerset: Razum-dar reappears as one of the main characters in this chapter's storyline. Rigurt the Brash returns again, as well. If you completed "Bound by Love" in Vvardenfell, you can meet Tirwin on the shores of Summerset, though with no quests. Sotha Sil himself is also a part of the main quest. Darien Gautier from the Daggerfall Covenant also has a major role in the story. Veya Releth from Morrowind reappears as an antagonist in the story as well.
- Murkmire: Lady Clarisse and Stibbons again makes an appearance. You can also encounter Overseer Shiralas and her wife Varona Beloren from Morrowind as well.
- Wrathstone: Tharayya from the Volenfell dungeon is the quest-giver in both dungeons. In one of them, her ex-husband Quintus Verres also returns.
- Elsweyr: Abnur Tharn from the base-game's main story and Gharesh-ri from the Aldmeri Dominion return to the chapter's main story. Razum-dar is visiting his family and assists you in their side-quest. Rigurt the Brash returns again.
- Scalebreaker: Selene and Warlock Carindon from the Selene's Web group dungeon is involved in the storyline for the Lair of Maarselok.
- Dragonguard: Sai Sahan from the base game's main quest in involved in the main storyline here. You can encounter Skordo the Knife from the Daggerfall Covenant in a quest as well as Zhasim from Orsinium and Ashur from Vvardenfell. Adara’hai from the Maw of Lorkhaj appears, making this the first time a character from a trial makes a reappearance. Abnur Tharn appears late in the story as well.
- Harrowstorm: Lyris Titanborn from the base game's main quest is involved in the storyline for the Icereach group dungeon.
- Greymoor: Fennorian from the Unhallowed Grave group dungeon and Lyris Titanborn returns for the main quest. You can also encounter the Vanos siblings, Rigurt the Brash, Nerano, and Narsis Dren. Gwendis and Adusa-Daro from the Ravenwatch clan from the Daggerfall Covenant makes a reappearance as well as Gabrielle Benele as your tutor for the antiquity skill. The Skald-King himself as well as his son makes a cameo appearance.
- Stonethorn: Gwendis once again returns to help you in the both Castle Thorn and Stone Garden dungeons.
- Markarth: Gwendis and Count Vernandis Ravenwatch reappears for the main quest. Lyris and Sai Sahan can finally reunite in a side quest. Adusa-Daro also makes an appearance. In the epilogue, you can encounter Fennorian, Svana, Morugh, Reddharn, Mjolen, Jorunn, and Irkskar.
- Flames of Ambition: Lyranth the Dremora makes a reappearance to help you out in the Cauldron dungeon while Eveli Sharp-Arrow from Orsinium will assist you in Black Drake Villa.
- Blackwood: Eveli Sharp-Arrow, Elam Drals from the Dark Brotherhood, and Lyranth are a part of the main quest. Lady Clarisse and Stibbons once again appears in a side quest. Your Thieves Guild contacts Seeks-The-Dark and Erilthel, The Duke of Crows, Revus Demnevanni from Vvardenfell, Heem-Jas from the Ruins of Mazzatun Group Dungeon, and Alchemy from Summerset make a reappearance as well.
- Waking Flame: Lyranth is a main character of the Red Petal Bastion group dungeon.
- Deadlands: Once again, Lyranth is involved in the main quest. Divanth Fyr and Valsirenn of the Psijic Order each have a quest of their own. Eveli Sharp-Arrow, Calia, and Sombren return in the epilogue.
- Ascending Tide: Captain Kaleen and Jakarn from the Daggerfall Covenant are part of the Coral Aerie group dungeon while Captain Za'ji and Caska from Dragonguard are a part of Shipwright's Regret.
- High Isle: Captain Kaleen, Jakarn, Captain Za'ji, Caska, Queen Ayrenn, High King Emeric, and Prince Irkskar are all part of the main quest. Jimila, Oblan, Lady Clarisse, Stibbons, and Rigurt the Brash again make an appearance in their respective side quests.
- Firesong: Again, Razum-dar makes an appearance in a side quest as well as another Thieves Guild contact, Quen. Dhulef from the Graven Deep Group Dungeon and Druid Laurel from the Earthen Root Enclave Group Dungeon are a part of the main quest as well as Lord Bacaro who turns out to be the Ascendant Lord in the epilogue. Lady Arabelle, Druid Ryvana, Elea Dufont, Jakarn, Captain Za'ji, Caska, Queen Ayrenn, High King Emeric, and Prince Irkskar appear in the epilogue.
- Necrom: Naryu Virian, Sotha Sil, and Ashur again appear in a side quest. Thaddeus Cosma, the Imperial time traveler from Greymoor makes an appearance as well.
- Red and Black and Evil All Over: The Court of Bedlam in Summerset.
- Refuge in Audacity: In a series of letters from the woodcrafting hireling Margog the Hammer, he details his plans to have Constable Chedric permanently dealt with—by enlisting the Dark Brotherhood. However, he has a last minute of crisis of conscience exactly when the representative of the Dark Brotherhood arrives to take his contract. So how is this solved?
- Relationship Upgrade: Lyris and Sai finally get together during a sidequest in the Markarth DLC. Later dialogue heavily implies they are making the most of their free time before some other crisis kicks off.
- Retcon: The game changes many established elements of the main series, both visually and story-wise, in order to fit the game's vision. The most famous example being Cyrodiil as a Medieval European Fantasy-grassland rather than a jungle. However, this is nothing new in the franchise.
- Retirony: Discussed. In Thieves' Guild, there is one point in the storyline where you break in somewhere and the guard says something akin to, "Hey, I don't want any trouble - only six days until I take my pension!" and offers to down a sleeping potion so that you know he will not go alerting the others.
- The Reveal: The Prophet turns out to be the previous Emperor who got Tamriel into this whole mess.
- Revenue-Enhancing Devices: Surprisingly enough, not the quarterly DLC and occasional Loot Box releases, but rather housing. Online has a surprisingly large selection of homes for the player to acquire and furnish. Generally, houses located in base game areas can be purchased for (exorbitant sums of) gold unfurnished, whereas buying them with preplaced furniture will cost you (similarly-exorbitant sums of) Crowns, and DLC homes are only purchasable with the latter currency. And that's not even going into buying additional furnitures for them, since even pre-furnished ones can be rather scant in terms of decor. To a typical large house, a DLC or stack of loot boxes cost a pittance by comparison. Your homes will be the main resouce and Money Sinks during the late game as you've finalized your gear loadout, leading to many players joking that housing is the "true endgame" in Online. For a lot of players, housing is very Serious Business, and they will be more than happy to shell out whatever absurd amount of Crowns printed on the price tag to acquire virtual real estate, especially time-limited ones.
- Reverse Armfold: This is a stock animation that characters will use in dialogue. Most typically, it is some sort of person of nobility or importance. Queen Ayrenn and Meridia are notable examples. It later became a purchasable personality for the player character.
- Reverse Grip: Dual-wielders do this when heavy-attacking.
- Ridiculously Cute Critter: The Bantam Guar pet is described as such.According to the calculations of the sages of the Cult of the Ancestor Moth, the bantam guar is the cutest creature in all Tamriel.
- Rock Monster:
- The Rock Atronach, a rare type of elemental monster. There is only one in the base game, the Foundation Stone Atronach boss in Aetherian Archives, and they are adds in boss fights in Bloodroot Forge and Falkreath Hold.
- A few other monsters also count. The Air Atronach (found in Craglorn and one location in Vvardenfell) consists of floating rocks (presumably which the actual air elemental picks up and throws around), while the Iron Atronach (Forgotten Wastes, Vvardenfell) looks to be made more of ore than metal.
- Rolling Attack: The Hide of Morihaus Set Bonus makes your dodge deal damage if you roll through an enemy.
- Royal Harem:
- Invoked and exploited. Orc chiefs in clans and strongholds marry several wives to keep bonds between clans, but also so the wives will lead various sections of the clan depending on the order they married him. For example, the first wife is always the hunt-wife, responsible for hunting food and produce for the clan; the second wife is the forge-wife, responsible for overseeing the mining and blacksmithing Orcs are famous for, and the third wife is the hearth-wife, who takes care of the home and cooking. All the wifes are still expected to be able to fight to provide the chief the strongest heirs.
- While most Orc chiefs will have these three wives, they may marry as many as they need, want or can. As King, Kurog has more wives than most, both for tradition and alliance deals. Outside of his three first wives, he also has a set of twins as his shield-wives, meant to protect and fight with him during his campaigns, and immigration-wife who encourages and helps orcs back to Orsinium, and many more that work in the background.
- Subverted in the Alik'r zone. Prince Azah cultivates a reputation as a lothario, but the women in his harem are actually all his personal spy network.
- Rule of Three: Three factions, which mirrors Dark Age of Camelot and its Realm vs. Realm combat.
- Running Gag: The game continues some that have made regular appearances in the Elder Scrolls franchise:
- M'aiq the Liar appears once again
, and you can bake sweetrolls and Fishy Sticks. And yes, The Lusty Argonian Maid also makes its return.
- One running gag has escalated from previous games. Once again, the player character starts as a prisoner. However, the prisoner is essentially killed off in the introduction in order to bring them to Molag Bal's realm of Coldharbor.
- This continues in the Chapters, which each has a new tutorial for new characters: In Morrowind, you are taken by slavers from a shipwreck and must escape; in Summerset, you are in a mind-prison, and in Elsweyr, you are locked in a room for your own comfort, though the key is right by the door.
- Each of the quests involving Narsis Dren give you a choice of screwing him over at the very end. And considering his attitude, you will be sorely tempted to do so each time.
- M'aiq the Liar appears once again
- Sadistic Choice:
- In almost every zone there will be at least one quest where you will have to make such a choice. If you encounter two characters who care deeply for each other and accompany you on some sort of dangerous quest, prepare yourself for the moment when you inevitably have to sacrifice one of them for some reason or another.
- Gloria Fausta's questline in Glenumbra. She orders you to sacrifice her and use her blood to cure Duke Sebastien of lycanthropy, forcing you to choose between killing her (a brave and useful ally) or allowing Camlorn's leader to become a monster. The choice is extra sadistic because if you do not kill her, Duke Sebastien gets cured anyway.
- The sentencing of Princess Lakana's murderer. Either you kill a good man for a crime he did not want to commit or risk the Covenant losing Hammerfell's support.
- In Summerset, "Murder in Lillandril" has an agonizing choice: you can either allow Emile to be imprisoned for Haladan's murder even though his death was a tragic accident, or you can reveal the truth and have Haladan's memory stricken from all records forever, which is almost a Fate Worse than Death.
- Scary Scarecrows: Played for laughs in the Clockwork City DLC. In one of the quests, you team up with some talking crows who charge you with defeating a terrifying creature called "The Motionless Guardian".... which ends up being a not-scary-at-all scarecrow that you simply knock over.
- Secret Test of Character: The Trial of the Heart in Hissmir.
- Self-Deprecation: After you complete a quest to drive off a Covenant attack on Ebonheart, a Nord will jest that they can probably make you the thane of Whiterun, considering that they will make anybody a thane there.
- Sequence Breaking: Typically, certain trial and dungeon bosses will use special abilities once their health has been lowered to specific thresholds, presenting additional mechanics that the players must adapt to or risk a total wipe. Should the team's combined damage output be high enough to rapidly cross these thresholds, however, a given boss can be bursted down in short order without ever transitioning to a mechanic phase. Do note that not all bosses can be dealt with this way, as some will render themselves invulnerable while the mechanic phase is in progress, cause the mechanics to be rushed up way faster than they'd normally be and making things very confusing for the players assigned to handle themnote , or will enrage and/or cause a wipe should they be dealt too much damage in a short amount of time.
- This type of sequence breaking can best be observed in Dragons in particular, who will typically take off at every 25% health loss, during which they will fire special attacks and cannot be hit until they perch or land again, while a large mob of players dealing high enough damage to cross these thresholds can permanently ground a Dragon and wail on it until it dies.
- Series Continuity Error:
- Soul gems are universal in Online and can hold any kind of soul. In prior titles, it had always been exhaustively established that only magically-corrupted black soul gems can hold souls of sentient beings, whereas typical "white" soul gems cannot. This was likely done to give players one less type of item to manage.
- While the Mages Guild did historically have a foothold in Skyrim during the Second Era, before being supplanted by their "official" counterpart, the College of Winterhold, no such excuse exists for why there are also Fighters Guild halls in Eastmarch and The Rift in Online. Per lore, the Fighters Guild never operated within Skyrim due to the existence of the Companions, their regional equivalent, who perform largely the same roles.
- Dwarven metal ore is inexplicably common in the game around the level 35-40 range and is a pretty low-tier material, despite the fact that the prior titles, especially Skyrim, have exhaustively described how the method of creating Dwemer metals have been lost to time, and the only way of getting fresh ingots was by recycling scrap items looted from their ruins.
- Set Bonus: A constant of the games equipment. Regardless of the current patch, the best equipment in the game always offers additional benefits if all parts of its set are worn together. The fact that some of those offer reduced benefits if fewer pieces are equiped, coupled with the fact that you have 12 equipment slots, means that getting the most out of your items involves mixing several sets together.
- Shaped Like Itself: Cadwell at one point says, "I love magic! It's so magical!"
- Shield Bash: The Power Bash skill from the One-hand and Shield line lets you do this. Many tank-type enemies and bosses can also do this to you as well, which can either stun or outright kill you depending on the specific fight if you don't block.
- Shifting Sand Land: The zones Alik'r Desert, Hew's Bane and a part of Northern Elsweyr.
- Ship Tease: Queen Ayrenn and Razum-dar have some history that neither of them go into deep details about, but it's clear in Summerset that Razum-dar is considered part of the family by the more open-minded members of Ayrenn's family.
- Shoot the Medic First: Usually a good strategy in Player Versus Player, as well as a reaction in many veteran trials and dungeons whenever an enemy healer appears.
- Shout-Out:
- A book formerly in the game files (and possibly in the open beta), "Song of the Diamond Sword"
, uses Tobuscus' "I Can Swing My Sword
" essentially word for word.
- There is a acceptance letter for a
Wizarding School that sounds suspiciously similar
to the one that Harry Potter received...
- One of the ships moored in Daggerfall's harbor is called the Lydia.
- When fighting in an arena in Reaper's March, the Player Character is given the stage name The Mysterious Stranger.
- A vampire character's feeding animation, where they rip the blood from a victim's body and make it fly into their mouth, is very similar to how Kain feeds in Blood Omen and Blood Omen 2.
- In Hew's Bane, you can find a Bosmer dressed in green with a large shield on their back sneaking past a guard. The way they're dressed makes them look like Link, and the surrounding scenery is reminiscent of the part of Ocarina of Time where you have to sneak past the palace guards.
- A book formerly in the game files (and possibly in the open beta), "Song of the Diamond Sword"
- Situational Sword:
- Most forms of player stats, passives, and gear traits tend to be useful a lot of the time in either PvP or PvE, but critical damage resistance is purely designed to suit the former, as AI-controlled enemies will simply deal very high flat damage that never crits. As such, most forms of crit resistance or Damage Reduction, such as the Impenetrable trait, are simply worthless if you're not doing PvP to justify their use.
- Although most skills generally have diverse enough uses to avoid becoming niche, there are certain ones that do not confer much meaningful bonus for their point cost, and therefore fit the bill very well.
- The Snakeblood Alchemy skill sounds very handy on paper, due to its hefty reduction to negative effects in potions when consumed. However, it's a fairly high-level skill, and even if you're only remotely diligent at gathering alchemy ingredients, it's perfectly doable to just craft potions with entirely beneficial effects, thus rendering the negative effect reduction redundant. In practice, it's only ever useful when you definitely need to craft some kind of potion, but the only possible combination of ingredients you can come up with has some form of detriment to it, but in such a case, a sensible player would not craft potions at all to even have a negative effect to eliminate. Really, you'd need to go out of your way to deliberately craft something with negative effects for Snakeblood to take effect, which defeats the purpose of high-level Alchemy entirely.
- In most skill lines, the many Keen Eyes skills only serve to highlight important materials and points of interest with a bright glow to help with spotting them. If your actual eyes are keen themselves, combined with just cursory knowledge on where material nodes and treasure chests spawn on the map, you can skip these skills entirely, as they do not confer any other benefits beyond that.
- In keeping with the above point, the Hireling skills have dubious usefulness overall. Even at max level, your hirelings still have a very low chance of giving you something actually useful beyond the standard materials that you can find nearly anywhere. A dedicated harvester can eliminate most of the reasons to even get a hireling in the first place. That being said, there are certain rare materials that can only be gotten from hirelings, which still provide players with an incentive to invest points into these skills.
- Entire classes can become Situational Swords based on the kind of content you're tackling and your group's composition. Due to the way classes give and benefit from Major and Minor buffs, it's a bit more nuanced than just tossing twelve players together and expecting them to work well, since some buffs can only affect Stamina players (Savagery, Brutality, etc...), and others Magicka (Sorcery, Prophecy, etc...). This means that having a Nightblade tank in a group of entirely Magicka damage dealers will be a waste of their Minor Savagery buff which only affects non-magic weapon critical, and a Sorcerer healer will not be able to do their job effectively in a Stamina-heavy setup due to their predominantly Magicka-inclined buffs. Given the dominance of Magicka damage dealers in the late-game, it's a safe bet to say that the vast majority of Stamina-centric support classes will not be seeing as much use.
- The Bosmer race seems to have been engineered more for PvP than PvE, which is reflected in their major passives and stats spread. They boast high resistance to Poison and Disease damage (and prior to Update 30, immunity to both of their relevant status effects), both of which are very rare in PvE, but abundant in PvP. Stealth detection is pointless in most PvE situations as enemies will never sneak up on you like players do, and while the bonus to movement speed is nice, it doesn't make for a huge boon outside of PvP, where rapid relocation that the enemy can't track can be vital in many fights. Pre-Nerf, their playstyle also involved a lot of dodge rolling to proc Hunter's Eye and increase their offensive penetrations, which is a rewarding maneuver in PvP where armor with the Impenetrable trait reduces a lot of your raw damage thus necessitating a means of circumventing this protection, but is of questionable usefulness in PvE where the typical group setup is more than capable of helping you reach penetration cap anyway with just a few buffs. It stands to reason that Bosmers were hit the hardest with the Nerf bat in Update 30, which aimed primarily at balancing content for PvP over PvE.
- Skewed Priorities:
- Played straight with the justice system and how guards treat crimes of any kind. Tamriel may be under threat of a catastrophic Planemeld, but if you would dare use a werewolf, vampire, or necromancer skill while trying to save the city from certain doom, you will earn a big bounty for your troubles and all of the guards in the area will be after your skin instead of actually trying to fight the monsters. This all but forces players of the above three categories to operate at a distance from guards or other potential witnesses, or risk eating a bounty and being chased by every possible cop in sight, though there are many locations in the game where all powers are fair game and you won't be punished for trying to save people.
- Played even straighter with the Three Banner War. In the same vein as the Skyrim Civil War, all three major factions of the game have seemingly decided, with the looming threat of the Planemeld and subjugation of all mortals on Nirn should Molag Bal won, that now of all times would be the right moment to be at each others' throats in a race for the Ruby Throne. While their respective leaders do agree to an armistice during the main questline, that did nothing to stop or even pause the conflict going on in Cyrodiil proper. Even with a gigantic dolmen opening above the Imperial City that can pull all of Nirn into Coldharbour if the White-Gold Tower is captured, seizing the districts would still be higher on the priority totem pole for some reason.
- Skilled, but Naive: The Vestige seems to be this. As with most Bethesda protagonists, they are basically the World's Best Warrior in-story. They also get duped surprisingly often.
- Slowly Slipping Into Evil: The main theme of the Telvanni questline in Morrowind. At first, Sun-In-Shadow genuinely seeks to help her fellow slaves and intends to use her newfound authority in House Telvani to help them. However, as the questline continues she begins to become obessed with the political power she now wields, gradually becoming just as ruthless and egomaniacal as the Telvani Magisters. Depending on your choices, she either falls completely down the other end and forsakes her former slave brethern, or is convinced to hold onto at least some of her original ideals and make good on her promise to free the slave Eoki.
- Snake People: The Lamia.
- Soft Water: As long as the water is deep enough for the player to swim in and are not infested with killer fish, they will survive any fall.
- Sprint Meter: As a staple of The Elder Scrolls games, stamina is used not only to run, but to activate weapon skills, to dodge, to bash to interrupt casting, to absorb damage through blocking and to break free from crowd control effects. Spending points into stamina also makes your stamina-based attacks stronger.
- Square Race, Round Class: Possible, but strongly discouraged in many cases where min-maxing is considered. Although you are free to choose whatever class-role-race combo you feel like, some races are just that much better at certain positions than others due to their racial passives, and selecting a role not suitable for your character can end up handicapping you in the long run, especially for damage-dealers, where every point of magicka or stamina matters (e.g. a Breton Stamina Nightblade will be greatly outperformed by an Orc of the same setup, while a High Elf Sorceror will trump a Nord one). It's less of a concern for healers and tanks, however, where the extra stats are nice to have, but won't make the races that don't have them invalid - you just need to allocate your points differently or use sets and enchantments that make up for any shortages you might run into.
- Squishy Wizard: Soundly averted, ironically enough. Despite their light armor and lesser focus on Health, most Magicka-based classes make up for this squishiness with absurd levels of wards and other protections achieved via spells and other passives. In fact, it's entirely possible to build a Sorcerer or Necromancer to have significantly more raw health than a dedicated Dragon Knight with points invested entirely into Magicka and wearing the correct item sets.
- Stamina Burn: There's a Stamina stat, and corresponding damage effects.
- The Starscream: Mannimarco serves Molag Bal, but wants to obtain greater power than the Prince's.
- Starter Villain: The boss in the tutorials, but also the villains you go against in the starter island and starter zones.
- Stance System: The Destruction Staff skill line will dynamically change its damage type depending on which of the three elemental staves you're currently using. Some skills may also receive different spell effects depending on its elemental type, such as Destructive Touch, where an Inferno staff causes knockback on hit, a Frost staff roots the target, and a Lighting staff inflicts a stun.
- Status Buff: A big part of the game. Since the game's launch, a good part of the available skills could buff the player in a myriad ways, though most were not obvious in some technical aspects (such as what could stack with what instead of being overwritten). A few patches later the buff system was revamped, standarizing most of them with adequate names and inserting them in some unpopular skills to make them more useful, which further emphasized their importance in the system. In terms of their overall usefulness, suffice to say that a clueless player will often put several of their preferred role's most obvious skills on the skill bar and then use two or three, wondering why the game's enemies take too long to kill. A good player will have a mixture of skills to deal damage, mitigate and buff, constantly cycling through them and keeping them up to make the most out of their ten slots.
- Sticks to the Back: Anything larger than a one-handed sword will be worn this way, including staves, shields, bows, and two-handed weapons, some of which can be longer than your character is tall, without any kind of strapping or sheathing, or indeed visible means of actually keeping them in place. A similar deal also applies to one-handed weaponry, which simply float unsheathed around your hip when put away instead of being secured in a scabbard like in Oblivion or Skyrim.
- Straight Gay: There are plenty of non-playable characters who are in a same sex relationship including, but not limited to, an Altmer pirate captain becoming a privateer and her first mate Bosmer wife, a Khajiit trying to get his husband to stop gambling, a Breton werewolf not wanting his husband to get hurt from any possible transformations, and a Dunmer lesbian couple helping out the expansion of Vivec City. One of their gods will even mention the latter couple without making a big deal about their sexuality.
- Stonewall: Naturally, tanks. The Heavy Armor and One-handed and Shield skill lines are hyper-focused on improving your damage resistance and survivability in a fight, which is vital for a role whose job is to Draw Aggro from bosses and dangerous monsters. Certain class skills will further improve your tankiness as well. The trade-off to this is that tanks are naturally very slow, even more so with specific damage-mitigating skills active like Immovable, which grants incredible block mitigation at the cost of basically nailing you in place if you're not wearing lighter armor, and the Bracing Anchor red CP star which grants you even more mitigation at the cost of a 16% movement speed reduction. Using both together turns you into a veritable bulwark that can shrug off insane amounts of damage with your shield, but you might as well be rooted into place while their effects are active, which can be dangerous at times.
- Story Arc: The main game and all its DLCs and Chapters are tied into different overarch stories that can be followed through if you play in the order it came out.
- The Five Companions arc covers the base game and focuses on the main quest where you must recover each of the missing Companions and the Amulet of Kings to stop Molag Bal’s Planemeld.
- The Alliance arc covers the five zones within each alliance in the base game.
- The Daedric War arc covers Morrowind, Clockwork City and Summerset. It has you try to stop an alliance of Clavicus Vile, Mephala and Nocturnal from trying to reshape Nirn. Before Morrowind, the arc was foreshadowed at the end of Orsinium and in a side-quest in Dark Brotherhood.
- Season of the Dragon spans across all the downloadable contents for 2019, consisting of Wrathstone, Elsweyr, Scalebreaker, and Dragonhold. Dragons have escaped from their prison and are terrorizing Elsweyr, and you must partner up with returning characters to stop them.
- Dark Heart of Skyrim, the story arc for 2020, consists of Harrowstorm, Greymoor, Stonethorn, and Markarth. A resurrected vampire lord is plotting to use a magical storm to power up his vampire kin as well as werewolves in order to rule Tamriel and you must stop him before he destroys Skyrim.
- Gates of Oblivion, the story of 2021, consists of Flame of Ambition, Blackwood, Waking Flame, and Deadlands the Daedric Prince Mehrunes Dagon is using four mortals empowered with his essence to destroy the realm of Nirn and with the tenuous alliance of a rogue Daedra, you must stop his plans from happening.
- Legacy of the Breton, the story of 2022, consisting of Ascending Tide, High Isle, Lost Depths, and Firesong. A conspiracy involving ancient drudic magic is being used to destroy the Three Alliance in order to rule Tamriel.
- Shadow Over Morrowind is the storyline for 2023, and will consist of Scribes of Fate, Necrom, plus two other DLC.
- Sufficiently Analyzed Magic: Most of the little technology you see in the game is powered through magic, usually involving a soul gem.
- Super Mode: The Necromancer class has the Bone Goliath Transformation as the ultimate ability for the Bone Tyrant skill-line. You transform into a new type of undead bone creature and gain more health and health recovery, as well as additional morph effects.
- Supporting Leader: The Prophet is technically this in the Five Companions arc, though he declares you the leader.
- High-King Emeric, Queen Ayrenn and Skald-King Jorunn can be considered this in their own Alliance arcs.
- Khamira in Northern Elsweyr.
- Suspiciously Specific Denial:
- The Argonian carpenter in Alinor is most certainly not an Ebonheart Pact spy, but he'll gladly listen to any Dominion gossip you're willing to share.
- In the Blackwood quest involving the Shrine to Nocturnal, the guy you're supposed to find is whispering with someone else, and as you approach he realizes they're being watched and announces, "This is a completely normal stroll through the streets."
- Sword Plant: The Dawnbreaker ultimate from the Fighters Guild skill line is activated by the Vestige slamming the eponymous sword into the ground and unleashing Meridia's punishment onto enemies in front of them.
- Take It to the Bridge: You cannot swim across the Niben River due to slaughterfish killing you; you are forced to cross it at one of three bridges. These create natural chokepoints where many battles occur, particularly at Alessia Bridge.
- Taking the Bullet: In the Elsweyr main questline, Captain Nala-do sacrifices herself by diving in front of a spell meant for Khamira.
- At the climax of Orsinium, If you previously sacrificed Talviah in order to learn the Vosh Rakh's plans, Eveli takes the arrow that would have otherwise killed Solgra in the opposite path. Thankfully, she survives, but is unable to accompany you and Bazrag for the final battle against Kurog and Alga.
- Team Switzerland:
- Both the Fighters and Mages Guilds are technically neutral during the war, supporting none of the three factions while still maintaining operations within their territories.
- Despite being part of greater Skyrim, the confederacy of Western Skyrim is affiliated with neither the Ebonheart Pact nor its opponents, and stayed uninvolved during the Three Banners war.
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: If you've got a Companion tagging along with you and you've done enough things to piss them off, they will not hesitate to let you know how much they hate being with you, and them putting up with your antics up to that point was purely out of obligations and professionalism. Getting their rapport down to rock bottom will make them desert you entirely for a while.
- Temporary Online Content: Some items have been retired from the cash shop and are no longer available.
- Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: Subverted in Elsweyr: Khajiit can be born as small housecats or giant ape-like cats besides the typical bipedal forms, and with the exception of their voices, one cannot see what sex they are.
- That Came Out Wrong: Felande Demarie, the NPC who gives you the quest "Room to Spare" which allows you to purchase property, asks you, "Can I interest you in a room at the local inn?" She immediately states that that came out wrong and that the arrangement she's talking about does not involve having a few drinks.
- Thematic Sequel Logo Change: The Imperial Dragon is instead replaced by an ouroboros with the heads of an eagle (Aldmeri Dominion), dragon (Ebonheart Pact), and lion (Daggerfall Convenant), representing the three warring factions fighting for dominance over Tamriel during the Second Interregnum between the Second and Third Eras and their respective Empires.
- This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman: It is surprising how often having no soul can be useful in quests, especially story arcs that involve your character being killed in some manner. A regular mortal with a soul will most likely die for real, but the Vestige can keep getting resurrected due to their lack of it. And this goes beyond just being a mere gameplay mechanic, as the whole gimmick of the Vestige having no soul is the key to defeating Molag Bal and stopping the Planemeld from happening, since it requires a soulless individual to become the avatar of Akatosh and channel his powers. Had it been anyone else this wouldn't have worked, as Abnur points out in Council of the Five Companions. Outside of the main questline, your lack of a soul is also brought up every now and then as a potential advantage to thwarting the schemes of the evil of the week, such as in Deshaan, where you have to briefly die during the final quest to find a way to weaken Magistrix Vox.
- Three-Point Landing: Your character can occasionally land this way.
- Three-Stat System: Health, Magicka, and Stamina. All other stats are derived from points you invest into each stat.
- Health, as noted above, determines how hard you are to kill.
- Magicka determines not only how many spells you can cast, but how powerful they are (in conjunction with your Spell Power).
- Stamina is a lot like Magicka, in that it determines how many physical abilities you can use, but also their effectiveness. Dodge Rolls, Blocking, Sprinting, and breaking CCs also consume Stamina. Weapon Power also influences the power of Stamina-based abilities.
- Ultimate abiltiies break these rules! Ultimate abilities scale off of whatever your highest resources and power stats are (e.g. Flawless Dawnbreaker, which deals Physical damage, will derive its power based on Magicka, if Max Magicka is bigger than Max Stamina, and Spell Power, if Spell Power is bigger than Weapon Power.)
- Mounts get in on the action too! You can train one skill by one point daily, for 250 gold. You choose between speed, stamina which behaves like a defensive stat as well as increasing your mount's sprint capacity, and carry capacity, which augments your bag space.
- Thrown Down a Well: You have the option to do this to someone during a quest. After helping an Adventurer Archaeologist through two tombs you get to what was supposed to be a Treasure Room but is now empty. Off to one side of it is a well. When you talk with the archeologist to complete the quest you can trick him into thinking that perhaps all of the treasure is down the well. When he walks over and looks down you can then push him in.
- Throwing Your Shield Always Works: An uncommon attack used by certain bosses and elite enemies. The Warrior of Hel Ra Citadel has this as one of his standard moves that can cleave an entire column of players, and the shield also boomerangs back towards him, so unwary group members can be hit twice.
- Thunder Beetle: Thunderbugs, large blue-and-yellow scarab-like beetles with lightning powers.
- Time Loop Trap: The quest for the Rubble Butte delve in Bangkorai concerns one such time loop, where a local witch named Edwyge attempted to emulate a Dragon Break in order to usurp the throne of Evermore from queen Arzhela, but ended up trapping herself and her coven alongside the quest giver in the ruins, doomed to endlessly reliving the final hours of their ritual for an eternity. Based on the note found in the final chamber, it would seem that your arrival has been predestined, as Edwyge mentions being killed by a stranger running into her every time the time loop is reset. Also doubles as Gameplay and Story Integration, since in this remote case it gives a clear reasoning for delve's repeatable nature, and why the boss and lesser mobs would respawn after a while.
- Token Enemy Minority: If you've purchased the corresponding upgrade from the Crown store, you can create a Vestige of any race for any given alliance, including those belonging to a faction that's normally hostile to your own. An Imperial Vestige would be this for any of the banners, given how much of the atrocities they've committed across all three campaigns and even into the DLCs.
- To Hell and Back: Coldharbor
is the starting location and tutorial. Once one character has done it, it can be skipped.
- Too Awesome to Use:
- The Grand Amnesty Edict, awarded once per character by quest, can remove 100,000 gold of bounty on use. But since it cannot be traded, transferred to other characters or stored in any way, many players either have it taking up backpack space forever or find themselves trying to get all the illegal achievements at once before using it.
- Bind On Equip items can sometimes have this effect if they are rare enough to garner large sums of gold on the guild trader market. Use one just once to test it, and it is yours forever.
- Took a Level in Badass:
- Irien starts out as Jakarn's jilted ex who forces herself into Kaleen's crew primarily to keep an eye on Jakarn and keep his womanizing ways in check. By the time you run into the Spearhead crew in Sentinel, she has gone from a prissy noblewoman to a hardened privateer and rogue, complete with a change from her noblewoman's dress to leather armor and a pair of daggers.
- Neramo's pet Dwemer construct, Clanker, starts out as a humble Dwarven Spider. When you encounter Neramo again in Wayrest, its been upgraded into a Dwarven Sphere, and when Neramo is encountered again in Sentinel, Clanker's become a full fledged Centurion.
- Treacherous Quest Giver: Darkshade Cavern I's quest giver tricks your group to pave way for him to take over the kwama mine of his employer, who he killed. The owner's daughter arrives and takes over his role, with the quest now changing to avenge her father.
- Trojan Horse: How the Sea Sload Z'Maja managed to completely overtake the city of Cloudrest. By pretending to be captured by the Welkynars, Z'Maja was brought smack dab into the middle of their base of operations, where she swiftly crippled most of the order by unleashing her magic mist and shadow army.
- Try to Fit That on a Business Card: Subverted. While there is a truly ridiculous amount of titles you can unlock for your Vestige, you can only equip one of them at any given time. Just the most cursory list of the potential epithets you can reasonably get by completing zone quests include, but are definitely not limited to, "Savior of Tamriel, the Hero of Coldharbour, Meridia's Champion, the Moon Hallowed, the Hero of Wrothgar, the Savior of Morrowind, the Hero of the Clockwork City, Savior of Summerset, the Rootmender, Champion of Anequina, Ahkahtuz and the Hero of Dragonhold".
- Turns Red: Certain enemies will do this if they are enraged, whereupon they will start doing significantly more damage and/or take drastically less in turn. Having a few enraged enemies in a fight will considerably ramp up the difficulty, whereas having an enraged boss in a dungeon or trial will usually result in a Total Party Kill. Naturally, you don't want this to happen too often.
- 20 Bear Asses: Averted for the most part, with most of the quests either being a Fetch Quest, a Plot Coupon delivery quest, or taking down a boss.
- The Unfought: Discounting PvP, Ebonheart Pact forces are never encountered as enemies in the Daggerfall Covenant quests aside from a single Dunmer spy you have the option of sparing anyway.
- Unusual Euphemism:
- Bretons are fond of this. In particular there are a women and a man talking about "seeing his collection of antique riding crops, *wink* *wink*"
- Nairume the high elf from "A Lasting Winter" also uses this, telling Rajhin's Shadow that his "arrow looks aquiver". When Rajhin suggests they both have the same tastes, she suggests he feasts upon himself when she refuses him.
- Undressing the Unconscious: Happens several times throughout the many questlines.
- Played with when city guards do this to you, in that you're freaking dead when this happens. If you're wearing contraband and are defeated by city guards, they will literally strip whatever stolen piece of gear they can find off of your body. If all of your slots are filled with stolen gear, have fun reviving in your undies. But hey, at least you'll get an achievement for it, two if your entire loadout was repossessed at once.
- One of your fellow Thieves, Walks-Softly, will do this in Forever Hold Your Peace, in order to obtain an Iron Wheel guard uniform to sneak into No Shira Prison.
- Vampires Are Sex Gods: Several vampires throughout the story, mainly Verandis Ravenwatch in the basegame, but especially in the vampire-themed Dark Heart of Skyrim arc. It is also lampshaded in a costume worn by a Markarth vampire:
- Vestigial Empire: The Akaviri Potentate is weakened following various wars, leaving Cyrodiil in a state of chaos.
- Video Game Caring Potential: There are often choices in the game where you can help or advice non-playable character to speak the truth, escape from abusive situations or otherwise.
- Video Game Cruelty Potential:
- If you have unlocked the Fighters Guild passive "Intimidation", you sometimes get dialogue options that are meant to threaten or scare the non-playable characters to do what you want.
- Sometimes you might meet a stranded merchant, and you can threaten them to give you all their money. There is even an achievement called "Crime Pays" if you do that in every base-game zone.
- You have the option to push someone down a well during a quest. After helping an Adventurer Archaeologist through two tombs you get to what was supposed to be a Treasure Room but is now empty. Off to one side of it is a well. When you talk with the archaeologist to complete the quest you can trick him into thinking that perhaps all of the treasure is down the well. When he walks over and looks down you can then push him in.
- You can choose to help slavers get escaped slaves back, or betray the slavers begging for your help. With Tirwin, she does not let you get away with it, and calls you responsible as a bystander.
- Villainous Friendship: Crosses with Even Evil Has Loved Ones at times.
- Despite their villainous goals, the Gray Host is very protective and caring of one another. When you run into Rada al-Saran and Exarch Ufra in the Undergrowth, the two of them will angrily proclaim their intention to murder you on the spot in order to avenge one of their fellows, Tzinghalis, whom you've slain in the prior quest. Ufra fails and is killed by the Vestige, which only further angers al-Saran the next time your paths cross.
- Violation of Common Sense:
- In a complete reversal of the systems in place in mainline titles like Oblivion or Skyrim, heavy attacks actually restore magicka or stamina instead of draining them. This presents a case of Damn You, Muscle Memory! for those who came to Online from said titles where they were conditioned to not perform heavy attacks when low on resources, as it's one of your most effective means of getting them back in this game outside of potions, which run on a lengthy cooldown so you couldn't just chug them endlessly like you used to be able to.
- Some dungeon mechanics can cause unintentional team wipes due to how they work against what you've been trained to do. In Cloudrest, when fighting Siroria, one of the main mechanics that boss can pull is to hit you with a telegraphed comet AoE from above. Normally, a player with an AoE footprint trained on them should try to move away from the team to prevent it from splashing onto others and causing unplanned deaths. Here, you need to run towards the group, as that damage is spreaded out evenly across everyone in the highlighted area, so the more group members are in that zone, the less damage each member will take, capped at 33% across three players. Having more than three in that blast footprint will not reduce the damage any further. Trying to tank that attack alone will invariably kill you.
- Walking Ossuary: Bone colossi are large necromantic creations of many skeletons' worth of bones; at least three skulls are visible, as well as multiple ribcages, and they generally serve as elite enemies. The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim's Creation Club adds a spell to summon these in the purchasable Creations.
- War Is Hell: Various raids by enemy forces result in the destruction of farms and villages, the deaths of families, and, if the attackers are not careful, the releasing of curses and other monstrosities that the Playercharacter then has to clean up. While the Three Banners War spilling outside of Cyrodil is limited to sidequests and delves for both the Covenant and the Dominion, the Pact deals with this trope full force, as two of its five main questlines involve combatting a massive attempt by the Covenant and the Dominion to invade and conquer Stonefalls and Shadowfen, respectively. The Shadowfen arc is particularly dark due to the Dominion Arc Villain making it clear that his goal is nothing less than genocide of the entire Argonian race.
- Warrior Poet:
- Jorunn the Skald-King, the High-King of Skyrim and one of the leaders of the Ebonheart Pact.
- Vivec, one of the Dunmer's living gods, is also said, in-universe, to be this.
- We ARE Struggling Together: Various warring races have had to come together in order to form the three different Alliances. This is best illustrated in a piece of lore on the game's website, with a note found on the body of a Dunmer slaver. Though apparently the enslavement of Argonians has been made illegal by the Ebonheart Pact, Dunmer keep attempting to find their way around the law in order to continue the trade. The three alliances also form a confederation against Molag Bal later on, but only after a lot of infighting and hostility, and it took a concentrated Daedric assault and the Vestige chewing them all out for them to see reason.
- Wide-Open Sandbox: The game world is at least a dozen times larger than that of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and consists of much (though not all) of Tamriel.
- White Stallion: The Imperial Horse, which comes with the Imperial Edition of the game. Presumably had the "rarity" part of the trope in mind, but ironically was one of the most commonly owned mounts out there until the cash shop introduced more variety in mounts. There has been a white variety of almost every type of mount.
- Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: Lamae Bal, the original Daughter of Coldharbour, qualifies. She is still alive, and is leading a Faustian Rebellion against Molag Bal with the intent of turning the Cyrodiilic Bloodline of vampires against him.
- The World Is Always Doomed: Just how many times have you saved it, now? Lampshaded by Khunzar-ri at the end of the Dragonhold questline.
- World of Badass: Just about every person and every creature can fight.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness:
- Happens to an Altmer in Woodhearth. She plays her part in the Veiled Heritance's plans, and after she is done, she is rewarded with a blade to the gut.
- All the main villains in Elsweyr. Zumog Phoom and Cadwell the Betrayer ally with the dragons after the dragons are done with Euraxia Tharn. Cadwell the Betrayer planned to kill Zumog Phoom as soon as he regained his body, and the dragons only saw Cadwell as useful in opening the Moon Gate.
- You Fool!: In Greymoor, Elle Bitterblade calls her husband Urlvar a fool after he makes a deal with a vampire to "donate" their workers in exchange for protection.
- Your Soul Is Mine!: A Type 1 example done by Molag Bal on the player. It also serves to justify being able to come back to life repeatedly.
- You Wake Up on a Beach: In the early days of the game, once Aldmeri Dominion characters escaped Coldharbour, they would start the game by awakening on the beach of Khenarthi's Roost after a storm.
- You Will Not Evade Me: Many player classes have abilities that can reposition enemies, or themselves towards distant targets. Tank classes typically have these to Draw Aggro towards themselves and pull dangerous enemies away from their fragile DPS players, while others like Nightblades can use Teleporting Strike to move themselves on top of the target provided they're within range. Some enemy types can do this as well, like the Stranglers, as well as the various city guards you'll be running away from when you've got a bounty on your head.
- Zerg Rush: The assassins targeting King Casimir in Daggerfall are not particularly difficult enemies, but they come in wave after wave after wave after wave.