Weird Elder Scrolls Retcons and Inconsistencies

[@Fr.O.G.]

Found an inconsistency? A dragon break did it!

[@spartanq7781]

Ah yes the Elder Scrolls equivalent of "he did it." Todd and Patio are not the people who should be touching this series. They are creativity bankrupt and greedy with their marketing.

[@noahsylvester1754]

@@spartanq7781 creatively bankrupt doesn't even begin to explain what bethesda did to cyrodiil and skyrim a land of jungles and plains filled with the ruins of an old elven regime, turned into flatlands and run-of-the-mill forests, not so bad compared to skyrim, which ended up being a surface-level offshoot of what game of thrones looked like in season 1

[@Raven_Bones]

​@@noahsylvester1754Tbh Skyrim felt a lot more unique than Cyrodiil

[@joshalmightyblades]

Gg

[@BigMan-mb6hc]

People say this a lot but I have yet to see an actual example of a retcon being explained away by a dragon break. Almost as if that doesn’t actually happen and you’re just talking out your ass

[@Gabranicus]

Umbra is a daedric artifact. Daedric artifacts are notorious for making their way back to the Princes that made them and are able to reform eventually if destroyed. Also, what Akatosh did to end the Oblivion crisis doesn't prevent portals from being opened from Mundus. It stops daedra from invading on their own.

[@bozthekiller]

If I recall Umbra is special as it is so powerful that it broke free of its deadric princes influence and basically does what it wants

[@marco0445]

​@@bozthekillerNot only that it had a whole city formed/warped named Umbriel which floated around Tamriel. Umbra was destroyed in the story abt the ingenium. Its whole shtick was that it would bring ruin to Clavicus Vile if he keeped trying to get it. The creation Club story is just weak, it infantalizes the original novel that expanded upon Umbra.

[@xiriusthesoulwatcher3955]

thats also a retcon. Umbra was just a sword of a powerful orc warrior in morrowind who wanted to die because he had already seen it all. And he called himself "Umbra" to you, because you may as well know him by his sword's name for all the difference that would make. The whole bullshit about daedric artifacts and clavicus vile and umbriel and whatever was made up later

[@pirate4460]

I know a retcon that very few are aware of. In Arena, East and West are swapped in a few situations. If you take a quest from the ruler of a city, if they tell you to go east, you must go west- and if you look at the official strategy guide, one of the pages has a large statue with east and west swapped. If you look at the sunset, it sets in the east. I've asked Julian Lefay and he doesn't remember this.

[@ceedott]

@@pirate4460 I’ve heard about this one but wasn’t certain if it was true. Thank you for sharing!

[@CorviustheCollector]

Is that a retcon or a typo

[@KahavaveCAPIPI]

That's not a retcon.

[@ImperialKnowledge]

Glad my man found his password back (jk jk). Looking forward to watching this on the train soon, im sure its going to be a banger. Welcome back!

[@ceedott]

Good to be back :)

[@Loganjlr]

Omg it’s a crossover

[@bobSeigar]

When you base your lore off of Philosophical Wiritngs, Medieval Propaganda, and the Monomyth, things tend to be inconsistent. Almost nothing is original, but it is woven together beautifully.

[@Cranberrie123]

My theory with Rorik is that he just renamed the town, probably expanding and or rebuilding it in the process. So perhaps the town did really exist in some form much longer, but only as Rorikstead for a short time. Perhaps the town was destroyed or near abandoned at some point, then Rorik buys it for cheap because the land wasn't fertile. Which might be why it was abandoned. So Rorik ends up taking credit for founding the town, because most of the people who live there now either work for him, bought their land from him, or are his progeny.

[@owenkachirisky326]

the tongues didn’t really get retconned, the world has just changed a lot since they were described in Varieties of Faith in the Empire. The province of skyrim has undergone massive imperialization by the time the game takes place, and the old ways have largely died out. where there once were many tongues and wielders of the voice, there are now just the graybeards, a lone group of select few practitioners of the old ways. even them having to go gagged is still canon, the reason the graybeards aren’t physically gagged is because they’re far secluded from civilization. arngier is the only one you ever see speak, and he never shouts as he’s more of a speaker for the group, whereas the ones that shout are never seen speaking. the rare exceptions are when one will whisper to you “dohvakiin”, but even this whisper is accompanied by the mountain itself shaking.

[@xiriusthesoulwatcher3955]

Yes they have. Thu'um was nordic wind magic, not dragon language. The entire underpinning of the concept and the order has been replaced altogether

[@facelessnameless]

Would be cool to see a couple of mods providing lore and explanations for retcons in the respective games. Well researched mate

[@JonCrs10]

Im more curious what Skyrim would've looked like with Morrowind's "lets be weird and original" ethos. As it stands the game is pretty generic in what creatures are in the wilderness as far as fantasy goes. No weird two-limbed reptile mounts living around giant mushrooms, you know what I mean?

[@jimforehand7571]

I don't know how old of a song "Ragnar the red" is supposed to be but it does mention old Rorikstead

[@tengu2D]

first video ive seen by you, was expecting tens of thousands of subscribers, but saw only 2k??? you need more attention

[@mpg272727]

To this day I'm convinced the only reason Oblivion and Cyoriil was generic fantasty rather than the Tropical rainforest it had been spoken as in past games was down to Todd Howard really being into Lord of the rings and just being all "Make it like the films"

[@federicoricca2512]

It was literally that. They wanted to appeal to a broad audience and they preferred to sell their soul instead of keeping their identity until they reached the top (kinda like from software)

[@reviewbridge3400]

Yet the only person to say this is butthurt Kirkbride. And the only, 'lore' about Cyrodiil being a jungle came from a game no one's played, Redguard. Yet every Youchoob cultist tells you it's fact, (like it even matters). People just rinse and repeat. Oblivion looks like the more Imperial areas of Morrowind, that's it, and the story was set up in it to. The More You Know, eh.

[@federicoricca2512]

@@reviewbridge3400 false, it was a jungle ever since Daggerfall, in the "pocket guide to the empire", I believe. Kirkbride just gave some artwork to the company for a fourth game set on Somerset isles and then on Cyrodiil, until the project became Oblivion. I don't understand why you criticise Kirkbride over absolutely nothing

[@anonymousanon6913]

Erm the Elder Scrolls has magic and Talos or Reman did a magic thing and made it temperate instead of tropical.

[@federicoricca2512]

@@anonymousanon6913 pffffff not only it was never stated that such magic exists, there is also no reference to this in the games. Plus, it's an overall dumb and pointless retcon

[@vitriolicAmaranth]

For the worse: Any time they change something that has to do with dragons Also Kirkbride HATES Ebonarm for some reason. Of course it's well known that he feels a more intimate connection to some of his characters than an author ordinarily would; He based Tiber Septim's appearamce in the PGE on himself, for example, and we all know how he feels about Vivec. Both are supposed to have been mortals who attained godhood through CHIM, and Ebonarm, possibly the early lore basis of Reman (another favourite of Kirkbride's), was supposed to be a mortal ascended to godhood. One has to wonder what he thinks about the lore as it stands on Ar'kay and Mannimarco, with Mannimarco literally becoming a tenth Divine (cosmologically speaking) orbiting Arkay.

[@chemputer]

You don't _have_ to wear Wraithguard, you just need enough HP to not die immediately. Fortify Health and Recover Health potions work fine for this. And, powers of enchanted items have consistently changed (or mostly lessened) over the years and between games, both in and out of universe, so I guess diminishing power of the items could justify it.

[@trainershade1937]

It's also worth noting that Arniel is surprised that the player is alive whilst handling the improperly stored Keening, it even still gives you a "mortal wound" when you equip it prior to completing the quest. Though the debuff is rather mundane. So unless it has simply been weakened (perhaps a consequence to it being used on the Heart), it could otherwise be assumed that the Dragonborn simply resists its effects at a natural level (for some reason).

[@vsprodctions]

Great video, I really don't mind ESO's inconsistencies. I hope ES6 brings back some of the more mythic qualities of the lore

[@skylordthe1st]

Thank god our history isn't like that

[@TheR6R6R]

🤔🤔🤔

[@it2spooky4me79]

Or is it????????

[@AntonVShokolov]

"We don't need to use any design documents! What could possibly go wrong?"

[@st.anselmsfire3547]

Here's one: what race was Tiber Septim? Lore is back and forth about him being a Nord or a Breton, but Oblivion and Morrowind have his avatars as imperials. And Skyrim hammers it hard that he was a Nord. Which was he?

[@normanfury8259]

Almost everything says Nord (including the new Castles game), the Breton thing comes from an out of lore book that calls him a manmer. Unless you're referring to the possiblity he's from Alcaire, which still refers to him as "Hjalti", a Nordic name.

[@arinwendeeriadorskaya6917]

He was a Nord by ethnicity, a Breton by citizenship and an Imperial by choice.

[@pliskin101]

Maaan, I missed you! Always good to see another certified TES banger.

[@tahershah2965]

Great video! You're about to blow up soon. Really surprised you dont have more subs

[@mrswan7745]

PELINAL FANS ASSEMBLE (The best Cyrodiil Retcon Explanation Theory)

[@albertwesker6153]

One hundred six hundred and ten, two hundred six hundred and ten, three hundred six hundred and ten

[@theelderscrolls6vi]

Good video. I've always wanted to make TES lore videos but You, Imperial Knowledge, Master Neloth ( and Recently Boreal Knight) already make such good videos that I don't see the need for me to do it. listening to this while I cook my fried rice.

[@阳明子]

Great video! I wish Cyrodiil matched its original description

[@saalok]

Coming from WoW; I can definitely say that TES' retcons are not nearly as bad as they could be.

[@KrutchesRDH]

So, books aren't supposed to be 100% correct. They're perspectives and theories from authors living in the world. Not histories written by the developers.

[@icefarrow7959]

Yep, this dude completely missed the point of Elder Scrolls lore. This video is plain stupid and dead wrong.

[@mcbeaty3971]

This doesn’t apply to a quarter of the retcons he mentioned.

[@mcbeaty3971]

⁠​⁠​⁠​⁠@@icefarrow7959The point of Elder Scrolls lore is to posit that someone made up random terms for the elves in Daggerfall? Or that the Nine Isles of the Imperial City were One this whole time? I think you misunderstand the point of the lore, are dead wrong, and plain of mind.

[@Copperkaiju]

@@icefarrow7959 The ESO bits are clear inconsistencies. Developers make mistakes and sometimes parts of lore need to be sacrificed to make expansions to the worldbuilding.

[@KrutchesRDH]

It doesn't apply to all, but there's more. The names of the elves could have been regional for the time, the 9 islands could have been a misunderstanding for the districts of the city. Then there's more like how he calls the dragon break a retcon, when it's clear there's a God of Timelines and it makes perfect sense. Or when he references Cyrodil being a jungle, yet the lore reason for deforestation makes sense and has ties to the previous game i.e. Chim.

[@Nuniixo]

Starfall Bay is the smaller bay that branches off of the Illiac Bay and is where Sentinel sits.

[@jonleonard1555]

29:25 Fun fact, if you want to see the real "true" story of the Lusty Argonian Maid, you should watch Josh Strife Hayes playthrough of Morrowind, where he recreates the character, and does everything she would have canonically done.

[@yuron8210]

lore is an afterthought for todd

[@Whootzie]

Great video. I know people in the Elder Scrolls community like to overuse the unreliable narrator for inconsistencies. "The Warp in the West" did some weird 'Timey Whimey" Things which may explain The disappearance of the lesser deities from Elder Scrolls 2. It's kind of a shame they don't rework "The Lessers" into different champions of divinity representing the 9 Devine.

[@ChungaI]

Thanks for the upload

[@ceedott]

Thank you for watching!

[@NerevarOfficialReal]

Seyda Neen in ESO is 1:1 the exact same as Morrowind's not because of some deep, complex lore reason, but because Zenimax is creatively bankrupt and is utterly incapable of creating good, original content so they just rip off previous games in a desperate and pathetic attempt at fan service. The same can be applied to everything else in ESO.

[@emotea9485]

Love this type of content for the series!

[@reffa2858]

I just want to point out that people have been calling foul on ESO because of its retcons but the developers have been retconning the games since Daggerfall.

[@BargainShopp3r]

its wild this fit into 30 minutes

[@AlvaTheWayfaringKnight]

The dragon break can account for the religion change. That's lazy tho

[@xandervampire195]

I find it funny how they only got dragons right in Arena and never again. Western dragons in real world mythology always have four legs, naturally. The two legged creatures shown in games like Skyrim are not dragons, they're wyverns. It's a common mistake amongst people who don't know the mythology. I just find it amusing that they accidentally portrayed them correctly the first time then got them wrong every time afterwards.

[@sautethecrableg]

new ceedot video? insane W

[@Drexus88]

Daggerfall got changed hard due to budget and technology, there was supposed to be an active war and dragons. it's still good af though. It's def the most ambitious one.

[@lordedmundblackadder9321]

Ah but you see, Dragon Break

[@younghegelian1]

tru

[@DBeskar6605]

Okay, this is going to be good.

[@gobbo1917]

Man I wish they would just release daggerfall on modern consoles, it's my favorite one. I think there's lots of people that would actually give it a go if they could just lay down and veg out while they try to figure out how to play the damn thing. 😅

[@Vienershmaken]

All of my gang are Tsaeci

[@NolenGYT]

Thanks Akatosh 😵‍💫

[@zachariah1688]

I have checked my settings, and I am unsure if it is an editing choice or error, but is anyone else hearing the narrator speeding up in random spots? Feels like I am listening at x1.0 or even x0.85 to suddenly burst into x1.25 or x1.5 at times? Giving this whole video a weird up and down a hilly road feel.

[@ceedott]

Very honestly I just kinda suck at reading off a script, it’s like my mind reads it faster than my mouth can and I end up speaking too quickly sometimes. Sorry if it makes it weird to listen to!

[@liatrisblossomheart4013]

every retcon and lore inconsistency is actually very easily explained: It's just Sheogorath just fucking with the loremasters of our real world

[@ico1]

Or that someone grabbed an Elder Scroll and used it as their personal wikipedia by making small edits all over the place that no one ever noticed

[@liatrisblossomheart4013]

@@ico1 or both: sheogorath encouraged a person to take a sharpie to an elder scroll for funsies

[@ProjectRedfoot]

But, in 50 years I'll be (mumbles) years old!

[@BigMan-mb6hc]

Dude they literally acknowledge that the Dragonborn being able to hold keening is strange in the damn quest. Did you even pay attention? Your video has more errors than tes lore does

[@Hero_Of_Old]

I miss TES. But sadly, TES 6 will never be like the good old days due to, well the modern era.

[@Patch2112]

“The modern era”? Sorry, not sure what you mean by this. Are you saying you think we need to skip to the 5th Era? I think that’s a bit premature since Skyrim was the only game set in 4E , and that was already a 200 year time jump. We don’t need to jump again and leave the “modern era” .

[@younghegelian1]

only tes releases i care about are tamriel rebuilt and project tamriel

[@TheR6R6R]

​@@Patch2112I think OP meant more of how and who games are developed for these days, judging from most AAA flops recently. But yeah, TES VI will probably take place after or even during the 'second great war' with the Thalmor, not too far from TES V.

[@LudvigJosvason]

I'll answer your question from the thumbnail What changed? The Elder Scrolls went from a shitty generic Fantasy RPG to a Fantasy RPG with an interesting world, distinguishable human cultures, and an actually good soundtrack. It was off to a rough start gameplay wise with Morrowind, but ironed out it's kinks almost completely by Oblivion and felt truly cohesive by Skyrim.

[@wokenpancake]

Black Briar mead appears in ESO

[@BigMan-mb6hc]

No it doesn’t

[@rougenarwhal8378]

is your voice ai generated? the randomly speeding up and down mid dictation is incredibly jarring

[@Firestar-TV]

lol they should've just set The Elder Scrolls Online in the late third Era

[@ArturoPladeado]

That would've made too much sense because then they couldn't fuck up their lore which they seemingly love to do.

[@it2spooky4me79]

Idk, I like it being in the 2nd Era, it's one of the Eras along with the 1st where we basically know nothing about, only a few things here and there.

[@snookiewozo]

Can't tell if its a voice of a weird person or simply AI generated.

[@memegalodon4522]

Yeah ESO is definitely not to be considered canon and shouldn't have any effect on the lore, it's basically fanfiction.

[@JayBMods]

I blame Peter Jackson for all this

[@ceedott]

He really took jungle cyrodiil from us 😔

[@JayBMods]

@@ceedott least we’ve got another province: cyrodiil release dropping later this year

[@Hero_Of_Old]

Well the European esque fantasy setting is great, but it shouldn't have been in TES.

[@JayBMods]

@@Hero_Of_Old belongs in high rock where it belongs (though even then the Bretons should be less boring)

[@Hero_Of_Old]

​@@JayBMods true, I forgot about High Rock. It gives me ASOIAF vibes.

[@HaxAras]

I find the series lore to be far more enjoyable when you treat each games lore as its own little world. And not just for the Elder Scrolls, I do that for Mystery Dungeon, and other wikis I maintain. It's much less annoying than trying to cram all of these conflicting lore tendrils into some sort of coherent narrative. If the writers can't be bothered, why should I?

[@DAGGERBLIVION]

You are inncorect about cyrodiil. Cyrodiil is described in daggerfall and shown in the arena as being a temperate forrest. PGE1 descripion is the real retcon.

[@SpiralDownward]

That ESO section should be longer. ESO HATERZ RISE UP!

[@it2spooky4me79]

Honestly, we don't know much about the 2nd Era, only a few things here and there, but even then those stuff could be wrong too, since information within Elder Scrolls could be from a bias, sure there's some retcons that are definitely there, but overall, I think it's cool being able to see what the 2nd Era was like.

[@NerevarOfficialReal]

Yeah, ESO fucking sucks.

[@Azuris190]

Algorithm Comment

[@azraelwolfsblood2902]

It’s almost like elder scrolls has always been a series about contradictions and formulating your own opinions on what’s real and what isn’t. Crazy I know, maybe in the future they should just spoon feed you what the truth is like other boring and forgettable fantasy lores

[@mcbeaty3971]

This doesn’t even apply to a tenth of the retcons mentioned here, or perhaps even any.

[@azraelwolfsblood2902]

This is why I’ll never understand the interest of lore in games and movies. Seems all it does is piss people off and make them wanna argue about fake shit. Like why does it matter? You’re playing a game that involves yelling at dragons, who cares about the race of some guy that’s never even been seen in game or whether or not a country you don’t visit is a jungle continent or not

[@mcbeaty3971]

Reductive and pathetic argument. The „there‘s magic so why have anything make sense or be internally consistent?!“ “““Argument“““ has been made and crushed into the dirt countless times, embarrassing that you even bothered to comment it, yet again.

[@younghegelian1]

@@mcbeaty3971 they've got a point though. excessive lore delving is counterproductive to the appreciation and critical examination of art

[@ThommyofThenn]

It seems the TES lore is woefully under-documented by gamer channels. I think its always been that way somewhat. There is a distinct lack of identifiable characters which makes it hard for a proper fan community to form

[@BizarreM]

Yet to watch the video but I heard the first sentence and had to disagree and share my own opinion. I personally do not think that TES universe is as "in-depth and complex" as many present it to be. I think it's quite mid in its scale and depth, something like a 6/10. I think it mainly stems from the lack of sources (~10 games across 30 years, really?), because imagine if TES had guidebooks as in-depth as Forgotten Realms or as many novels as Warhammer fantasy; and also the lack of grey areas, which are skimmed over but still properly touched upon instead of simple inexistence or a single sentence, as with Elsweyr, Valenwood and quite a few other places. You can't tell the difference between cities of Rivenhold and Alabaster because there's just not enough information, but you can pinpoint how people's lives differ in the towns of Kemperbad and Stormdorf (not much but the difference is still there). In what TES prevails however is the SOUL of it all and the chaotic lore rate, e.g. something happens for 20 years which is then followed by 100 years of nothingness (I think that's a benefit or at least an initially harmless quirk (which Bethesda mishandles)), and the absurd mix of different sci-fi and unhinged moments in a pretty grounded medieval fantasy setting; all the time-travelling cyborgs, atomic turbo katanas of 2E, dragonbreak events, Vivec going all freaky with Satan lite, it's fascinating! I only wish all of that interacted or had an affect on recent events too and wasn't all in a vacuum of 1st and 2nd eras. I'd place the setting above One Piece and Final Fantasy XIV but below Dark Sun in terms of how deep and vast it is. Sorry for rambling, had to get it off my chest. No malice intended and may the gods be with thee.

[@uriel7395]

Yeah, saying TES is one of the deepest is a very video game brained moment. All the big epic fantasy books like, Malazan book of the Fallen, Wheel of Time, Cosmere, A Song of Ice and Fire, and then countless tabletop settings as you mentioned as well as others like World of Darkness all have much more in depth worlds and stories than TES ever has

[@Cynic3018]

The only elder scrolls lore I consider Canon is elder scrolls online. Everything else is shit

[@Beastlango]

One thing to note is that names change over time in real life. So the river and bay examples could be that way. That said in most fantasy they don’t usually care about this so probably still a retcon

[@puertoricanpapi1356]

You are clearly a casual. Nothing was retconned or inconsistent. Everything is completely perfect and makes sense. In case you didn’t know the ohmes were human looking khajiit. And khajiit come from azura who is a human looking daedric princess. Also argonian were slaves to the empire at the time of the first game which is why they had imperial names. And imperials have always existed but they were just called men before the empire were formed.

[@azraelwolfsblood2902]

27:23 is this dude really trying to say a mod is somehow breaking the lore? Guess Dunkey should be shunned by the community after having Master Chief as a follower in his video