Main quest

[Zarkis]

I read through parts of the proposed main quest and I like the basic setup very much. One thing I would change however is the Telvanni part. I would kick them out as a major faction. They may have played a role in the history of St but they really have no base of followers in ST. I think four major powers are more then enough. To dramatize things we could split up the city between those powers:

Valderon/ST guardians: military district around the tower + slums
Hlaalu: merchant area
Redoran: a new Redoran quarter
Temple: Temple quarter

Valderon/Hlaalu would be more imperial friendly then Redoran/Temple, since Hlaalu profits from the trade with the Empire and doesn't want the trade routes to be closed, and Valderon wants to keep peace with the Empire (and maybe the ST guardians are in part imperial mercenaries).

[KuKulzA]

sounds good...
I don't know too much about Silgrad Tower but I believe it is mostly Redoran but a lot of Hlaalu and Imperial. The factions want to gain control and influence of the politics, etc. I don't think Telvannui would be too interested, or if they did, they'd send agents... not a real faction to act politically...

maybe the Silgrad Tower guards are a specially trained corps. of Dunmer, trained by military trainers and advisors of the Empire... and paid for defending Silgrad Tower...

[Zarkis]

Note to myself: Just browse the webpage and you find anything you need to know.

Silgrad Guardians

Silgrad History

[Harikari]

I wouldn't suggest kicking out the telvanni, they've always been the underdog and you could do some interesting things with their connections with the daedra. I'm talking overthrow of goverment here

[Razorwing]

I moved some posts to the Vvardenfell board, so we can get back to discussing the main quest for Silgrad Tower.

[Zarkis]

The populance in ST consists of Hlaalu, Redoran, some foreigners (mainly imperials and Nords) and many former slaves. How could the Telvanni play a big role here? And why should they have an interest in ST politics at all? Bethesda described them as individualistic and excentric mages. Not the type of people who want to rule a big city.
Also four factions mean less work. Each player can only play one of the main quest lines. With five independent quest lines, he will never see the other four. Too much work wasted if you ask me.

[raggidman]

My understanding of the Telvanni in Morrowind was that they are always going off to open up new outposts, or reopen previously disused locations - it seem to be the way they operate.

A band goes out, they set up the new outpost, and then as often as not, either because they are young so that none of them is truly dominant, or because they start experimenting with the darker side of magic, they start an internal war. This may continue until there is only one left, or perhaps the odd servant will survive - but then 'accidents' can still happen to odd servants...

When they arrive in an occupied town or city that is too formidable to challenge directly they try to set up in the grandest unoccupied building available, and remain to trade or whatever it si that they are most interested in.

There were numerous quests to confirm this or if you just travel around Vvardenfell you will see examples of all of these things.

Having just restarted to play Morrowind (after a gap of several years) it will be a while before I can give you the locations where there are examples, but I think that there are plenty of runthroughs on the fansites if you ask, and they will tell exactly where to go to find 'rogue Telvanni.

Also I find it likely that the Telvanni would eventually wish to challenge the mage guild wherever they set up shop.

[KuKulzA]

the Telvanni live in a very individualistic society... it is a society comfortable with death and crime
they believe the strongest should rule, since wisdom confers power which confers right
they spread in small bands... not always working well together... but the Telvanni tradition of purging or fighting off the weak, makes the strong stronger and those who would want to compete have to be strong...

that way although Telvanni expansion is informal... it is very hard to pinpoint and stop...
and if you look... in TES3, there were lots of Telvanni bases...


I doubt they'd have a BIG role in Silgrad... maybe just a small band of them who seek to kill the Mages Guild...

[Razorwing]

Many of the points raised against the Telvanni presence are in fact part of the reason they're there in the main quest draft in the first place - to give high-level characters a meaty challenge. Haplo used to be in charge of those quests and I think one of the ideas he thought about was to show how the Telvanni presence in Silgrad grew as the player completed quests for them. I.e. that they would bring over or recruit more followers as the player caused developments to go in favor of the underdog.

The limited Telvanni presence near our main city (and on the Council of Elders) goes back a long way in the annals of our history, and we even have a custom-made podhouse courtesy of Hoss that we can use for the Councillor's residence if we want. My impression is that one of the early ideas was that House Telvanni was invited to Silgrad, to take one of the chairs on the Council of Elders... and it would seem to me to go against their nature to pass up a chance to gain power in any part of Morrowind. Besides all those points, in my humble opinion I think there's a lot of player Telvanni fans out there who'd like to work for that faction again, as well as modders who appreciate the opportunities for comic relief those folk provide.

I don't see a reason why we couldn't discuss alternatives to the main quest draft. If someone wants that, draw up a draft, and then the core can vote on the matter. Regardless of what one thinks of the current draft, an alternative would hopefully be equally extensive. Looking forward to reading the suggestions.

[raggidman]

I think that I will wait until I can find 'something special' (probably highly controversial) that no one can agree on and that everyone enjoys speculating and theorising about and then suggest including that.

Because that way we will get the best kinda basis for different outcomes and eveyone will want to work hard to create and include their favorite = successful representation of 'race relations' atmosphere in-game!

When something like (whatever) that (is) is accurately portrayed with due weight, balance leeway and emotional commitment given to each faction, then I think we will be able to say we have achieved the real thing!

But right now I am happy to discuss all, because that is where some of the best ideas come from. Umm, course I am aware that to put good ideas into practice involves more work - but what the heck, I am enjoying this. Hope you are too.