World Building- Glaciers, Northern Lands, and Skyrim

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Glaciers? Skyrim? Shawty got cake? The answer to all... is yes.
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timestabs
00:00- A Cold One with the Boys
1:28- Fjords
2:10- Glacial Lakes
2:49- Upland Swamps
3:12- Erratic Boulder Boys
3:30- Moraines
5:38- Skyrim is rightfully an Imperial Province
Glaciers are a huge part of what shapes the landscape of the northern and southern lands. This video goes over some of the aspects that you should add to your map in order to make them feel like they could house a genuine Canadian, or a Finn, or a confused Bolivian. This also goes over whether Skyrim follows these geomorphological features (hint it pretty much doesn't), as well as how world building suits it as a popular video game!
Similar channels to check out- James Tullos, Hello Future Me, World Building Notes, Artifexian, How to be a Great Game Master, Runesmith, Tale Foundry
Descriptive tags- Worldbuilding, world building, writing, history, DM, D&D, Dungeons and Dragons, culture, society, city, characters, empires, states, countries, borders, map, geography, how to, names, Rome, China, language, novel, writer, GM, art, migrate, character, land, help, creative, stoneworks, plot, story, structure, religion, archaeology, artifact, item, magic, quest, tv, movie, world anvil, campaign, glaciers, skyrim, elder scrolls
This content is made for teens and adults

[@Stoneworks]

Ulfric Stormcloak. Some here in Helgen call you a hero. But a hero doesn't use a power like the Voice to murder his King and usurp his throne. You started this war, plunged Skyrim into chaos, and now the Empire is going to put you down, and restore the peace! Discord- discord.gg/f4dEzqv Patreon- www.patreon.com/stoneworks Okay edits- Yes Glaciers are not rocks. They're ice. That's what happens when you don't write a script for a video and you're sick of your own voice.

[@beazles5684]

I want to be cold And i want it to snow so bad I hope your flames don't grow I want to be buried in snow I hope your flames don't grow I just want to be cold I don't want you to know

[@Stoneworks]

@@beazles5684 I'm literally crying right now

[@gabfar4328]

THE EMPIRE I KNEW NEVER SURRENDERED

[@beazles5684]

@@Stoneworks Cry, Child, Cry. Your tears will be the seeds of a transcendentally tender generation.

[@eyesack6845]

even the loading screen tips say that skyrim is home to the nords. i may be a khajiit sellsword but the stormcloaks are where it's at.

[@barkasz6066]

That bit in Eastmarch is not a swamp. It's a geothermal fissure with thermal lakes.

[@The-Okami-Project]

Worse its an active, or close to active super volcano. The whole valley is the result of a previous eruption. And the hill in the centre is a caldera. A place where the pressure of building magma is pushing up the surface. Judging by the rumbles that can be heard there. Its very much active. Also consider how much smaller the game maps are to their cannonical sizes. That baby goes off, were looking a yellowstone level kaboom. Nirn is fucked. Red mountain is baby puke in comparison.

[@diablo.the.cheater]

@@The-Okami-Project I mean, lorewise, the island you visit in the dlc was actually ripped from the continent by a shout of a Dragonborn, chances are the Dragonborn just shout the lava away, also there is a super big cavern under skyrim that would be very convenient to store the excess lava.

[@The-Okami-Project]

@@diablo.the.cheater we know for sure though our dragonborn is 2 things. 1: Not nearly that powerful 2: the last dragonborn. Its incredibly unlikely our db could do anything at that size and scale. If their even alive in that time frame. Though do consider the atherium forge and the large amount of lava there. Its very likely skyrim is part of a volcanic ring. Eastmarch goes, all of them go. Including red mountain.

[@roojackaroo8517]

@@The-Okami-Project no,the dragonborn could definetely do something to that size or scale,its just in game that you don't realise how canonically powerful you are. The fight between Miraak and another Dragon Priest CUT OFF solstheim from skyrim's mainland. The last dragonborn BEATS Miraak. They are a ridiculously powerful force and could easily do things to the same scale as Miraak and even far above him.

[@Zaire82]

@@The-Okami-Project Remember that the dragonborn can manage killing the destroyer of worlds within a single week of finding out their heritage. Give them a decade and I'd beg to differ. Give them 50 years, and I'd laugh at you for saying that. Let them live as long as Miraak, and they're no different from one of the divines.

[@aaronhamric7679]

Skyrim belongs to the fjords!

[@magmat0585]

this is an underrated comment

[@RedSheep-dz8hb]

@@magmat0585 make a perception check please

[@hisholiness4537]

@@RedSheep-dz8hb SPECIAL stat checks are only a thing in New Vegas. Also likes under 1000 are considered underrated.

[@mog-myownbestfriend]

"I always enjoyed doing the little fiddly bits around the fjords"

[@beewulf4234]

God I love those books. you are a great being for reminding me of them, thx :p

[@Stoneworks]

I don't get this reference, what is it? curious

[@mog-myownbestfriend]

@@Stoneworks It's from "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy". The character who said it, Slartibartfast, is a member of a race of contractors that construct whole planets

[@Stoneworks]

@@mog-myownbestfriend Oh! I read the first half of that book and never finished it. Thank you, because you reminded me to do so!

[@destraw6221]

My old Scottish boss told me the name Kyle is the word for fjords in Scotland

[@mrfancypanzer549]

As a Norwegian i feel like they did a decent job for the map size they had.

[@ballguy1527]

Helt enig Bender

[@vitorpressendo4335]

As a non Norwegian I lmao when mod comunity made a mod adding stave churches

[@newtype0083]

Glaciers also break up rock and release minerals into the soil. It is part of why temperate regions have rich farming soil and tropical regions are worse.

[@benrex7775]

Nice to know.

[@benrex7775]

@@wilhelmseleorningcniht9410 Do I understand that correctly? Increased rainfall makes the dirt layer thinker? Because I've learned that in rain forests the dirt layer is surprisingly thin. I learned that in context with Madagascar. Perhaps the region also plays a role.

[@benrex7775]

​@@wilhelmseleorningcniht9410 Interesting. There is one thing I'm not sure how it should work out. Basically there are a few layers. Topmost is a thin layer of humus with most of the nutrients. That is the part I already knew. And below that is a think layer. If I understood you correctly this one is out of clay. And below that is the bedrock. The warm water goes beneath the clay layer and breaks down the bedrock to make the clay layer thicker. My question is that an accurate simplification and if so isn't clay waterproof? The clay in Switzerland prevents water from going through it. At least to my understanding.

[@benrex7775]

@@wilhelmseleorningcniht9410 Thanks. Why do you know all that? Is is a hobby, do you know it because of your job or is it just something you learned at school?

[@benrex7775]

​@@wilhelmseleorningcniht9410 Cool. I was wondering where your name comes from. I have an electrical engineering background and my geology education is not even high school level. Do you have anything that you can recommend concerning geology literature or KZbin channel? I'm one of those guy that is interested in worldbuilding and who is interested in any kind of science. But I feel like my knowledge in geology is lacking. Best would be someone like "anton petrov" or "two minutes paper" just with the topic of geology. I once read half a geology book from someone that studied geology. But that felt like it was only theory with little connection to the world. But then I had to return it and I lost connection with her. The book is called "Press/Siever - Allgemeine Geologie (Sav Geowissenschaften) (Deutsch)" in case you are interested. That book should be quite solid. I learned a bit but I still don't really feel geology like some of the other sciences.

[@youtubepeace]

so what ur tellin me is that moraines are basically when ur sweeping and a theres that shitty bit of dirt that didnt make it into the dustpan

[@houndofculann1793]

No, they're the line of dust that forms when you just sweep once and leave it on the floor

[@jkotarsky]

Both of your descriptions are very helpful for a visual mind.

[@chuckjones7092]

I’m about late but the second description would best match the primary stopping point (southern moraine of Long Island) and the first the secondary ones (northern moraine/Connecticut coast) as the primary stopping point is the main “pile of debris” and the secondary is what is left after the glacier “moves on”

[@spartanchief1785]

Wait I thought a moraine was a sorceress from The Wheel of Time? 😂

[@ChazCharlie1]

The second swamp isn't a swamp at all! Those are geothermal hot pools and there are cracks everywhere spewing hot steam.

[@haroldthetalkingtree7509]

Probably one of the most satisfying aswell. You can see the orange birch forests just below that geological feature, representing the massive effect both the mountains and Red Mountain have on the unique climate of Skyrim. You can even see the prismatic bacteria flaunting their hues and hunters that use the hot springs as a natural hot tub. Even Morthal, isn't even a swamp. It's a frozen salt marsh. When marshes freeze they turn grey and it's the epicenter for harmful magic use like omens and witchcraft.

[@tristanjames6304]

Its an active super volcano. The mountains surrounding it is a caldera left behind from a previous eruption

[@kunaljanvalkar2850]

Yeah. It's pretty obvious because of sulfur pools and permanent mist over the swamp. It's strange how there is no other reference of volcanic activity under skyrim...

[@spartanchief1785]

@@kunaljanvalkar2850 idk maybe the whole underground dwemmer area (the one with the crimson nirnroot) is a hollowed our magma chamber that could refill?

[@LazyBuddyBan]

such an interesting and unique region concept, a shame its barely different from boring fields that surround Whiterun

[@hopin8krzys]

It feels so weird hearing about glaciers with mostly North America as an example, when we in school never even mentioned this continent around topics of glaciers. It was always Europe and Asia

[@benrex7775]

I'm from Switzerland and we had a lot of focus on Swiss geology. Of course there was also world geology. But concerning glaciers we mostly only talked about the alps.

[@BonaparteBardithion]

In the Pacific Northwest they mostly use local examples. Glaciers are in the mountains, they carved valleys and fjords, left erratics everywhere... Lot to be learned about volcanism and glaciers around here. A fun game while traveling is guessing which processes made the surrounding land.

[@WizoIstGott]

@@BonaparteBardithion Depends on where you are. My last trip was to indonesia and it would just be "volcanism, volcanism, volcanism" and "plate tectonics, plate tectonics, plate tectonics" To add to OP´s Point: In northern Germany we don´t learn nearly enough about glaciers, but I could tell you a lot about bogs, swamps and loess.

[@florbengorben7651]

Oh man I'm from Minnesota in the northern United States and I learned (or at least heard) about glaciers a lot especially in elementary school because glaciers are one of the reasons why Minnesota has 11,000~ lakes, as well as being the reason why the great lakes exist. I guess it matters where you live because you're more likely to be taught it if it actually affected the geography of the place you live.

[@marycae]

@@WizoIstGott As a fellow northern german: You are absolutely right, all we did in geography for the first few years was just talking about bogs and peat!

[@seraaron]

Here in Wales, we have stories about those erratic glacial boulders being thrown by Giants down the valleys from Mt. Snowden

[@artexfyne8122]

WHERE IS SNOWDEN!!!

[@Notmyname1593]

Funny, we have similar stories in Estonia

[@roundpaddy]

I've walked up Snowden many times and had hot food and pints afterwards. Nice views from the summit and great.laughs from the drink. 👍👍👍👍👍👍👍

[@criticalbil1]

Sorry, sorry. That was me.

[@sirreginaldfishingtonxvii6149]

@@Notmyname1593 Scandinavia, too. Might be something to that rumour, hmm...

[@joevines3428]

Skyrim is too small to make it geologically accurate.

[@MrMarinus18]

In games gameplay usually takes priority to realism. Bethesda could have made it bigger by adding a lot more empty space but all that would accomplish is make the game more tedious.

[@vrinnmetagen]

Let's be honest. It's bethesda. They arnt known for quality or attention to detail. And any Bethesda game that is known for that is normally to the credit of the dev team. Like obsidian and ID

[@ZunaZurugi]

@@vrinnmetagen Bethesdas Skyrim world is quite nice and one of the best feeling virtual worlds i would say.

[@zacharycollins1547]

@@ZunaZurugi yes but I wouldn't say it has much attention to detail

[@ZunaZurugi]

@@zacharycollins1547 Depends on the details i guess. For me the world is very detailed especialy for 2011. The game has many problem but the world was just nice. Could you tell me a world which you think has a bigger attention to detail? There are SOME probably but i would say skyrim plays in the higher league here.

[@coopersmith1634]

Another thing! I live in one of the shallow lake areas and it’s true but more complex. The lakes are shallow in the sense that the shore is shallow for a lot longer were you can walk very far out. But! The middle is deep and usually has a underwater reservoir that sucks stuff down! I think this could be used very well in some world building stuff. Also lakes sometimes disappear because they get sucked down lol

[@CritLoren]

that sounds terrifying.

[@n.m.dimmick194]

Me, worldbuilding a D&D campaign: INTERESTING.

[@dasik84]

@@CritLoren It depends what is under the lake. If it's CaCO3 (limestone, former coral reef from age of dinosaurs or older), the water will dissolve it and create underground caves in which it will then disappear.

[@rileyyoung4762]

One thing is Skyrim doesn't actually have a long history of being cold enough for glaciers to exist and carve out the land, it used to be significantly warmer just a few thousand years ago

[@CommanderM117]

incorrect if you look at older Arena picture of skyrim you can see it largely mountainous ice sheets with Markarth being the only green spot

[@rileyyoung4762]

@@CommanderM117 Arena isnt cannon any longer. The lore is that the the men of Atmora traveled to Skyrim fleeing an ice age, when they arrived in Skyrim it was much warmer than it is today. You can see this yourself when you wear the Wooden Mask in labyrithian and travel into the past, the lighting is much warmer, theres no snow and the ambience changes.

[@CommanderM117]

@@rileyyoung4762 you do realize the dragon war took place long before the First Era and that the climate might of bean warmer then got cold again as for Arena not being Cannon that bulshit conisdering it take place 3E 389 during the Third era with Uriel Septim VII from Obilvion

[@bradleymchugh6952]

@@CommanderM117 A lot of lore was retconned after morrowind, i think that is what they meant.

[@CommanderM117]

@@bradleymchugh6952 witch is stupid bethesda are simply dumming down the game then rather then making it awsome what would you rather have sun taned Nords or Naked Nord in a Snow storm riped as F

[@twist.mp3]

The Forgotten Vale is actually made realy beautifully and really well

[@sonobitches]

9:00 is bs. The regions look very different (with exception of snowy mountains in those regions). Haafingar has big Mountains next to the sea, The reach is a pointy rocky borderline mordor looking hell, Hjaalmarch is super swampy, Falkreath has lush forests, Whuterun hold has green plains, the Pale snowy planes, Winterhold has a lot of Ice and a rocky coastline, Windhelm has snowy mountains, Eastmarch has hot springs and the Rift Sits on a plateau full of orange and white birch trees above Eastmarch. They're all pretty unique and easy to tell apart

[@christopheralvarado4544]

The only places that make specific holds difficult to make out are peaks of mountains because they're shrouded in fog.

[@honest_cake]

Agreed. Sure certain forests and mountain sections look similar, but every hold is easily recognizable. I would say the Pale is maybe the most unremarkable but it's still obvious which hold you are in.

[@kiraoshiro6157]

I thought the same thing. When I play Skyrim, I usually don't use the map so it's more challenging and that has made me more familiar with the differences in each region. "You don't really get a good feel of where you are based on the stuff around you." Then how come I know exactly where I am based on the stuff around me?

[@kunaljanvalkar2850]

Lots of this are odd when it comes to geography of Skyrim. Mostly because its difficult to gauge the lore scale of map by looking at in game scale. In game, the map is like 2-3 counties combined. In real life that will never have a grassland and a glacier within that small of an area. If we consider Skyrim to be of size of Scotland, its hard to explain the lack of villages. Also it lacks a natural gradient observed in real maps. Like why does it have mountain on East, West, North and South? Real life mountain dont work that way. And if it is a basin why there is no great lake at its centre? Oh yes, because there is a huge ass mountain in the centre... Honestly the geography of entire tamriel is fucked up. Especially Cyrodil. Although Daggerfall map is pretty close to real landforms.

[@dashiellgillingham4579]

@@kiraoshiro6157 I did something similar but also almost the opposite. I disabled fast travel, then I got out a very real, physical map, and navigated primarily on roads based on that. Eventually I stopped needing the map.

[@pastlife960]

The word ‘schloop’ needs to be in more people’s vocabulary.

[@svartirbjorn197]

Im Canadian and that's what my friends and I call the mix of gravy and cheese left over from poutine

[@pastlife960]

Svartir Bjorn Cool, cool. But what the hell is poutine?!

[@svartirbjorn197]

@@pastlife960 It's basically the only food Canada is famous for, fries with cheese curds and gravy. It comes from Quebec but is popular all over Canada now

[@yukowolfang8645]

"Like, watch that glacier swooce right in"

[@NyuuMikuru1]

Shcloop John B.

[@branditz613]

I think the video on the really bizarre and alien geography of Morrowind would be cool. What is the closest thing to Morrowind that could actually exist?

[@celticogre8360]

your mom

[@gerdforster883]

The whole of Morrowind, or just Vvardenfell, as seen in the vanilla game? Vvardenfell is basically a volcano in the sea. Since there seems to be no subduction zone, it's probably a hot spot (like Hawaii). For the most part, it doesn't look to weird.

[@Fr3k3]

who cares. do whatever you want man. ignore this minority of world building youtubers who do nothing but bitch about the geography of other worlds, while having done absolutely nothing of note themselves.

[@kawabatayuri]

@Crow well in Eso morrowind still looks pretty Alien

[@akbas58]

australia

[@FortressLordJP193]

As a big Skyrim fan: I feel it was too small to convey good Scandinavian geography. That's not a defence but my issue with it. Sure it feels huge on foot, but could stand to be more realistically sized. Countries aren't meant to be walkable. Maybe future games would be. A single fjord would be like 1/2 the map, just for starters, like the video says. However, in defense of Skyrim and TES, it's 100% worth noting that in The Elder Scrolls, the cold is a slow mysterious presence that started North of Skyrim and trickled down across the globe. With Nords running South *away* from the cold not merely moving North to live there like IRL. It's safe to say there was no ancient glacier millions of years back to cause our real world's features. You could say Skyrim isn't a true Scandinavian/polar region but one slowly invaded by dropping temperatures. The northern islets and random boulders are likely frankly placed there to make the map more interesting which is whatever I guess. Unrealistic given the lore but looks nice.

[@johanrosenberg6342]

Those are some good points, especially the ones about Skyrim not being as cold as some might think. What I'd like to add is that in folklore, many big rocks and islands were "created" by giants. I doubt the giants in-game could produce those effects, but there are also dragons, dwemer, magic and volcanoes not too far off.

[@lhumanoideerrantdesinterne8598]

I really don't think Skyrim should have been larger than it is. Even if we assume Bethesda had enough manpower and budget to fill these new areas with interesting content, there is a point where games become too big and bloated and trying to finish them becomes a chore. Sure, an actual country is rarely crossable by foot, but I don't want to spend days crossing the map to hand over a quest. Also, you can totally give the impression of something big while keeping it actually small. It's a matter of creating the right atmosphere, not being realistic. For instance, if you want a depiction of a fjord in a videogame, you can look at the Howling Fjord in WoW. It is absolutely tiny compared to any actual fjord, but it feels huge and imposing when you explore it and totally like a fjord. Or, to get back to Skyrim, look at cities. Winterhelm and Solitude are ridiculously small, they would barely be able to hold 200 people each, but they feel like actual, large towns both because they are sold to us as such and 'cause the atmosphere of what we see isn't that of a small village. Size is meaningless when conveying an experience, something that theme parks understand very well BTW.

[@fomalhaut_the_great]

Implying TES will have future games at all lmao

[@peelsreklaw]

and ES6 is already announced...

[@millerrepin4452]

Bigger doesn't mean better in game design true if it was realistic it shouldn't be a walking distance but that being said what makes skyrim so successful is that walking in a random direction leads to something interesting like an npc, bandits, wild animals and well something. No offense but no one plays games just for sight seeing.

[@Punished_Rustles]

Things like glacial tearing only occur if a location was previously covered in a glacier that them receded. In real life, this is common because of the ice ages, but in a fantasy setting like TES this was not the case

[@user-tp5yb4hr4w]

in the atmora part of the map above skyrim is where the real glacial stuff would be seen. at least according to the lore. but i don't know what that might translate to in a game tbh. maybe there's villages living in between the glacial walls with tunnels and rivers found on the vast landscape, the nords left that land probably because it was way to hard to live there and some war i think. idk if i could play a game that was within a land mass that was just glaciers lol.

[@insaincaldo]

@@user-tp5yb4hr4w If we are to believe some statements about Atmora, it's all iced so hard time might have been frozen. Possible? Don't worry, fantasy.

[@VertietRyper]

@@user-tp5yb4hr4w The Atmorans fled south because harsh environment, it was the Akviri that fled south because of a war. A race of semi-immortal snake-people akin to Dragons had humanity on the run so everyone went south. The Atmoran snake people would actually invade Tamriel but would get utterly crushed.

[@VertietRyper]

@@insaincaldo well, time itself doesn't work normally in TES. It's held linear by Akatosh but sometimes he drops the ball or gets messed up and time-space gets all willy-nilly and nonsensical. The Dawn Era in TES isn't well known because some racists decided to separate elven depictions of Akatosh from Akatosh, which pretty much self-destructed all of time space to the point that they had to start a new timeline because nothing before it made sense

[@insaincaldo]

@@VertietRyper Got your locations which you were correcting, mixed up there in the end.

[@reisen9235]

'Skyrim has no fjords' I don't know, those pictures of irl fjords look a LOT like the Reach in Skyrim (the western part where Markarth is. Also the part that a hundred thousand guys in masks will tell you 'belongs to the forsworn!')

[@sirreginaldfishingtonxvii6149]

Eh I don't really know. Fjords look more grand and complex... In a way? They don't really look or feel like Fjords to me, I mean. Then again, size problems.

[@soljordal5218]

The fjords are actually the ocean part of the glacier valleys. So no, the Reach does not have any fjords since there's no grand ocean waters.

[@ulfjohnsen6203]

To me the sea south of Solitude looks like a fjord. Might be the reason for the stone formation Solitude sits on too.

[@soljordal5218]

@@ulfjohnsen6203 nah that's more like a bay, it's way too small to even be considered a fjord. I'm from western Norway, I know my fjords.

[@ulfjohnsen6203]

@@soljordal5218 the scale of the entire map is too small. So based on that it is impossible to have a fjord on the map w/o it taking up half the map.

[@Shatterverse]

We've got big-ass glacial field stones in the Midwest too. The Great Lakes are less about scraping and more about the weight of the ice and the compression if the landmass - land which is slowly rebounding like a giant sqished sponge.

[@fomalhaut_the_great]

Aren't the Great Lakes just remnants of the Laurentide ice sheet's meltwater lake(s) like Great Bear Lake, Great Slave Lake, Llake Athabasca, & Lake Winnipeg are? Thought that was self evident since they form such a neat line when you look at them from space - because they were all along the border of the ice sheet.

[@ninny65]

WHEN AN ICE SHEET HITS THE OCEAN AND DEPOSITS ROCKY MATERIAL, THAT'S A MORAINE

[@dasik84]

We have moraine here in Central Europe too, and no ocean. You just need the material brought by the iceberg, ocean is irrelevant.

[@TKnightcrawler]

"Glaciers are big giant sheets of rock." I'm gonna have to stop you right there, lad. :-P

[@user-tp5yb4hr4w]

the east march area wasn't really intended to be a swamp as it was more like a hot springs type of area and they believe it's related to the red mountain in morrowind.

[@tomoffel1963]

Nobody: Stoneworks: so wanna know why skyrims glaciers suck? And surprisingly i wanted to know and i really did learn something. Great work!

[@Spacefrisian]

Was it because no ice age has been mentioned in the lore?

[@TheRyuSword]

11:30 Speak for yourself, I can usually tell where I am by how the area looks, believe it or not, but Skyrim is genuinely small enough to recognize the differences in all 9 holds. If you are in Rift, the World's Throat is to the West and the border of the game is East, if you weren't near any of the lakes, Eastmarch has the Hot Springs and its distinctive River as well as the Eastern mountains, Winterhold is a blasted hellscape with Azura's statue which is visible from quite a range of locations, The Pale is a blasted Hellscape which is far away from that statue, Whiterun is mostly plains with a mountain in the middle, Falkreath is a Forest, Morthal has swamps, Markarth is what it is like to live in Norway with the sheer level of mountainous terrain, and Solitude has mountainous terrain which is more covered in snow.

[@Merecir]

Also, like the lake scarring, the opposite occurs along the coastline in the form of archipelagos. Where smooth scored rock rise up out of the sea many thousands of years after the ice melted away due to the uplift. As an example of this see the archipelago that is between the Stockholm area and Finland.

[@Rynewulf]

Grassland = whiterun, rocky mountains= the reach, forest = falkreath, swamp = morthal, rivers and hots springs (they are steamy, and seem volcanic like Iceland) = Windhelm, lakeside forest hills = the Rift, bright white icebergs and snow mountains and revines means Dawnstar and Winterhold. There: easy, mostly distinct areas. It's more a low fantasy design tbh, but not every next village with just cabbage collection quests needs to be the most dramatic thing you've ever scene in the last 5 mins

[@KorbentMarksman]

I know you also mentioned southern lands briefly but smh Antarctica deserves more than this 😤

[@LewisStockton125]

0:22 "Glaciers are giant sheets of Rock." 0- You mean Ice

[@Stoneworks]

oh lol whoops

[@LewisStockton125]

@@Stoneworks Hehe :) Happens to us all! I actually had to do a triple take to make sure I got it :D

[@jarskil8862]

Hol up. I bet he said Ice when I first time saw this vid.

[@carbonmonoxide5052]

A rock is a combination of minerals. A mineral is inorganic, naturally occurring, solid, has a defined crystalline structure, and has a defined chemical formula. So... ice is a mineral, and sheets of ice are rocks. No error was made.

[@Great_Olaf5]

Oddly enough, ice does *technically* qualify as a mineral, so calling glaciers giant sheets of rock isn't entirely inaccurate. EDIT: There's also a really big thing you missed, it's not something that gets talked wacky much anywhere: isostatic rebound. Glaciers are gigantic and heavy, they're actually heavy enough to dent the earth's crust, pushing the ground underneath them down, and that.. Never mind, hit to the end, you covered it. EDIT 2: I do have one thing, I can usually tell what hold I'm in based on the landscape. Falkreath is dense forests, the Rift is thinner forests and with a lot more water moving around in the south, with hot springs in the north. The Reach is all mountains and cliffs and you can see the Karth River practically anywhere in the hold. Whiterun is all mild tundra, with dead grass and moss and lichen, Hjaalmarch is arctic swamp. The Pale is frozen lowlands mostly, with hills and mountains continuing east into Winterhold. Eastmarch is similar to the Pale, but also dominated by a large river as well as hills in the south and west. Haafingar is similar to the Reach, but with more frozen mountains, less presence of the river, and less verticality.

[@tharwab]

I think the flora works the best. In Winterhold you’ll see snowberries dotting the ice covered mountains. The pale has the occasional tree, but mainly still snowberries. Whiterun has brown grassy land. The Rift has thinner and redder trees. Falkreath they grow thicker. In the Reach the grass actually turns green as the terrain becomes more densely mountainous. Et c. et c. Grass color is the big thing for me

[@Great_Olaf5]

@@tharwab Good point, I tend to look more at the geography because of my poor eyesight, but I see what you mean. I do have to say that I'm pretty sure that the brown ground covering on the plains of Whiterun isn't supposed to be grass, but lichen, though I'm not going to swear to it.

[@colonelchair2737]

Yeah I was a little confused that he thought you can't tell where you are because I have a fairly easy time with that personally I look at land shapes and the flora, though I suppose knowing where the main biomes are would help out a bit; and if you still aren't sure, just check out the road signs :p

[@StephanusTavilrond]

Loving the Daggerfall music

[@ub3rfr3nzy94]

I'm pretty sure that was Arena music, becuase I've played Arena and not DAggerfall and I recognised it. Skyrim music.

[@StephanusTavilrond]

@@ub3rfr3nzy94 Ackchually, that music was used in both Daggerfall and Arena. At least, the MIDI files were in for both games.

[@editorrbr2107]

The most unique feeling area is the Rift. It’s like perpetual autumn.

[@namepar7496]

man, writing a book or making moovies is scary. cause you are exposing your work to experts in all sorts of fields.

[@ryancolberg1486]

There’s actually a place more north of Skyrim - Atmora. Maybe that map would be closer to your standards

[@VertietRyper]

There isn't an Atmoran map

[@lucasistrom]

I actually really liked the Morthal swamp and the Eastmarch volcanic hot springs. Not sure how realistic they are but definitely some of my favorite environments in the game.

[@thesafetycalzone4920]

I'm abouy 8 months late here, but just had to compliment the satisfying "Shloop" at 01:37

[@Madhijz]

Love hearing the snow theme from Daggerfall in there

[@amzilla]

ohhh now I know why the previous map of my fantasy world looks so off. all this information on gleciers is gonna make the next map look way more whole thank u

[@faerylnhiikira1053]

When the ice starts to melt and it leaves a big welt That's a Moraine~

[@jadenthrasher4154]

TES Arena Snow theme in the background, nice. :)

[@aeriswf]

Great video, as always! If possible, I think a video on the map of BOTW would be nice. It has such a diverse and beautiful landscape and I'd love to see you talk about it.

[@henryfleischer404]

I love how each area feels visually distinctive. I can tell roughly where I am by the feel of the terrain, notwithstanding the specifics.

[@thesunwillneverset]

Fjords also tend to be very very good natural harbours, hence why many norse settlements were seafaring - either traders or raiders.

[@Pikminarecool]

why do people always look at the weird paper map, it barely shows the mountain ridge damn i actually thought they did the swamps pretty well, just a lil small. maybe I've played too much skyrim but I've found that the whole map has very distinct areas, contrary to what you said. from a screenshot I can usually tell what hold it's in, like the screenshot you used to accompany you saying it all looks the same I would say is very clearly the reach with its barren and rocky mountains. even the pale and winterhold can be distinguished despite the snow where the pale has snow planes and winterhold is in the mountains, though theyre both pretty dreary. glaciers are cool nice video

[@typhoidtyphoon]

Agreed!

[@ayylmao8375]

Skyrim definitely has distinct regions. Every hold has its own feel, with some holds having multiple regions, like the snow and hot springs of east march.

[@joemamajoastar8708]

Yea every region feels pretty distinct don't know what he is talking about

[@Gogglesofkrome]

@@joemamajoastar8708 the half baked theme park that is skyrim is about as distinct as separate sides of the same sheet of paper. I enjoyed skyrim, but it's often times very clear that the game was not developed with anything in mind other than seemingly checking off lists of details that needed to be fulfilled, and placing these details randomly about the map, beyond of course the ones that were already established prior to the game's release. My biggest gripes mostly come down to the serious lack of details or care in regards to society in the setting (several gardens supposedly feed all of skyrim's capital, whiterun for example), and how seriously underwhelming the location as a whole is, with again some exceptions, like markarth and solitude. This however is kind of out of the scope of the topic at hand, so I guess I'll take my leave.

[@joemamajoastar8708]

@@Gogglesofkrome it is pretty distinct every area is clearly defined when you are in them but I do agree the game does often feel like half baked features stitched together and the "cities" are very disappointing (morthal, falkreath, dawnstar, and winterhold are just towns lmao) I have been playing oblivion lately and having a good time with it I wish skyrims magic system was more like oblivions although a return to it's routes with a huge jaw dropping map like daggerfall would be nice even though it would be very hard to do that I do think for all of it's shit fallout 76 had a pretty decent map it felt pretty big to me and felt nice just should have had more

[@blackmask9669]

i think i saw this video before i was meant to

[@Stoneworks]

thanks for watching the playlists

[@naltlan7651]

there is no wrong time for stoneworks

[@travishunt2083]

Could you teach me this power

[@mme.veronica735]

I actually think they did a pretty decent job of the showing where you are with the environment. In a thick green forest without a lot of work rivers? Falkreath. In a jagged mountainy land, Markarth. The trees are red? Riften. Glacier is WinterHold. Snowy forest is Windhelm. Snowy coast is Dawnstar. Regular coast is Solitude. Swamp is Morthal. And of course, if you can see plains you're in Whiterun

[@vitriolicAmaranth]

The trees are yellow in the vanilla Rift. And I say that but I mean the texture is yellow. Everything is grey in vanilla Skyrim.

[@vitriolicAmaranth]

@Manek Iridius I'm talking about the vanilla game. If you are also, I hope you're just "trolling" or "shitposting" or something and haven't actually convinced yourself that a practically monochrome game that literally has shaders that are always active to desaturate the textures of all models in the game is "plenty colourful."

[@dasik84]

@@vitriolicAmaranth Don't use ENB and the game will start not to be blurry and desaturated. My vanilla game is super colorful.

[@MB-sq7yn]

I think it's definitely important to highlight the fact that Tamriel hasn't exactly had an Ice Age, so there wasn't the conditions to create massive glaciers. Now if we ever got to see Atmora, then that would be a different story. Also, "Skyrim is rightfully an Imperial Province", nice~

[@RighBread]

I had no idea this channel existed, but it's so damn helpful. I know next to nothing about geology and so I have a hard time creating realistic lands in my worldbuilding. Thank you for taking the time to condense a lot of this into easily digestible chunks. Excellent channel.

[@NamelessKing1597]

0:22 Ah yes giant sheets of rock that carve ice formations.

[@orionl7406]

I remember seeing a bunch of glaciers back in the day in Australia. Oh wait, I've never seen snow

[@sirreginaldfishingtonxvii6149]

Basically: It a lot of white.

[@tobiashagstrom4168]

A thing that's kind of worth noting is that I don't know that Skyrim has ever had an ice age. In fact, to my understanding, this part of Tampriel used to be much warmer, referred to by Kodlak as "the days of the distant green summers", when Atmora (the landmass north of Skyrim) used to be habitable, from which the ancestors of the nords came. Now Atmora is just a big block of ice.

[@yousifosama4414]

The area in the Reach, the one around the Karth river, looks pretty much like a Fjord to me. I'm not sure if the water originates in the Reach and descends down into the sea near solitude, or if it's the opposite, and the river is coming from the sea, but either way, the area around the Karth River at least has the appearance of being a fjord. People don't remember it as much because that area is so goddamn mountainy and difficult to navigate, entering it from the rest of Skyrim is like Nepal being a neighbor of Finland

[@dasik84]

The river comes from mountains in the south and has multiple waterfalls, so that tells its direction. It's a canyon. The area around Solitude could be a fjord though. There's a march right next to it too.

[@sadgiraffe6669]

Honestly you could just do geography content and I would still watch, this was really good.

[@InternetLaser]

There's more to be said for moraines. I live in Illinois, and though they're a much smaller scale, here a few moraines exist where you can see how individual years of glacial melt led to small geographic features, and a place where a glacier stayed for a few years has led to hills here, all of these leading to places where east-west rivers now flow. Similarly in Nebraska, The flow of the Nebraska river and the Platte sur river were decided by moraines. The white river could've been a good example of how a Moraine directs river flows, if the mountain range that holds shearpoint and butt the northern edge of the river had been designed better, but skyrim messes up here. All of skyrim's mountains look like they've been created by geological uplift, which sucks as worldbuilding.

[@mareksicinski3726]

11:18 Morthal definitely has another feel, it is like geothermal, it is really cool and one of my favourite places

[@Perceptionreflection]

So, Skyrim is actually getting colder. It was a much warmer and greener place in the eras prior. The Atmorans came to Skyrim fleeing an advancing ice sheet and frozen climate that had taken over their entire continent. It's super key to the lore. Your crit is valid for sure, but keep in mind it's a newer glacial zone.

[@spiritronin]

Maybe skyrim is too southern on nirn to have had many glaciers? There's a whole continent north of tamriel where the nords originally came from, that's prob where you'll find some big ol' glaciers.

[@agamemnonofmycenae5258]

A map designer who worked on Skyrim looking at this video:"Damn,I didn't know my design choice could be scientifically explained.Guess you learn something new from yourself everyday!" And from the youtuber!Cheers!

[@jeroen92]

The forgotten vale is super amazing you should definitely get dawnguard to visit that place alone, loved the underground rivers, ice caves etc.

[@vikiv.1352]

The daggerfall music on background is awesome

[@lloydturquoise2457]

The segment called “Skyrim is rightfully an imperial province” is grammatically incorrect. It should be spelt like this “Ulfric stormcloak is the rightful High King of Skyrim and Talos is one of the Nine”

[@lloydturquoise2457]

@Mr. Obunga • 20 years ago You know, you should join the rebellion and help free Skyrim.

[@JamesTullos]

Second.

[@JaggerRyan]

First

[@pastlife960]

Hey it’s that other guy

[@Nightweaver1]

I will say that the Hjaalmarch swamp does feel like enough of a swamp to me so I know where I am if I'm there and look around. There's tons of shallow ponds, fog, swamp pods and other gross vegetation, and reeds and broken trees sticking out. It's not a bad job at all I'd say.

[@2013Arcturus]

As somone who grew up on Cape Cod, this is a "Do not cite the deep magic witch" video for me, lol.

[@aeugchad]

As a Long Islander, same.

[@KAPTAINmORGANnWo4eva]

Elder Scrolls has a built-in excuse for terrain that doesn't conform to or fully exploit real geographical mechanics, that being the world explicitly being a result of divine creation rather than natural processes. Although, it's not like most of Bethesda cares about their own IPs' worldbuilding anymore anyways.

[@peelsreklaw]

It does still have natural processes though, like Vvardenfell island is the result of volcanic activity. It's also not clear how much the myths of the world reflect reality.

[@KAPTAINmORGANnWo4eva]

@@peelsreklaw Yeah, I'm just saying they can handwave impossible/inaccurate geography with literal divine will. In fact, Red Mountain is pretty deeply involved with the world's mythology, to the point where even the eruption they talk about in Skyrim has a magical element to it with the Heart Stones and other weird stuff.

[@FoxgirlEriana]

and if you *really* want to get into the speculative, it's also entirely possible that the entire Elder Scrolls universe exists in the dream state of some sort of "great being" type deal

[@thomasrial4444]

KaptainMorganWo - when it erupted the Dwemer disappeared while battling high elves in that area and all those high elves became dark elves creating their race. So either it was Devine or it was the dwemers disappearing event that they could’ve caused.

[@roojackaroo8517]

That's bullshit lmao. The elder scrolls has some of the deepest worldbuilding of any IP I have ever seen and a HUGE amount of that also comes from skyrim

[@lucasrh6910]

Oh, did you say norwegian fjords? *slartibartfast joke*

[@ChrissieBear]

Fun fact, Nirn, the world of Elder Scrolls, is currently at the START of an ice age, with Atmora, north of Skyrim, recently being rendered too cold to inhabit. ~5000 years ago it started transforming from a verdant (if cold) land to a frozen hell. By the early Third Era it was hardly inhabited, and by the end of the Third Era it was no longer inhabited. So the glaciers in the north are likely a new development (on a geological scale). This is further suggested by the fact that these glaciers have cut into and destroyed dwemer and falmer cities, that would've likely been on solid land thousands of years ago.

[@AlgaeNymph]

2:42 - Oo! Lake Geneva! : D

[@thegreatskinkpriest8104]

Damn right Skyrim is rightfully an Imperial province. The game is also completely grey.

[@sean668]

Lmao, I've been living on a geological turd my whole life

[@edcliffe2988]

As someone interested in world-building, I really liked this video. Excellent source of knowledge coupled with a sense of humour.

[@Aabergm]

@Stoneworks Bit of lore will explain that no Skyrim will not have glaciers. Cyrodil is now temperate but going back was once tropical and Atmora (Nord original homeland north of Skyrim) was temperate and is now buried under ice. So the world in which Tamriel exists is currently undergoing an ice-age where Skyrim is likely too close to the equator to be seeing any real glaciation due to climate. Only hope is altitude and the mountains are not really accessible to check. Interesting vid though, learned some cool things about glaciers.

[@gloriaevelis8840]

Eh high fantasy worlds have the luxury of magic/demigods/gods sculpting stuff not nature.

[@VertietRyper]

Actually, TES is effected by climate change. Global cooling has been occurring since 1st Era and is the main reason Nords escaped to Tamriel. There is magic events that change world geography but they're not very common in lore and most of them occured at the dawn of recorded time when literal gods were having a throwdown. The only other major incident was The Red Mountain eruption which may or may not be part of the global cooling

[@Aipe97]

Eh I'd say that the map diversity isn't that bad, at least for me I can easily tell when I'm near Markarth, Whiterun, or Falkreath. Though yeah places like Dawnstar and Winterhold are pretty similar, and a full on swamp for Morthal would've been even better. But compared to how some lore fans imagined Skyrim to be a full on frozen wasteland before the announcement of the game I think it's decently good.

[@icrangirl]

I'm working on a project that involves a setting in a cold northern environment, so this helps ALOT! Thank you for making this. I'm saving this for my notes.

[@angelmarques3124]

I like that in the end you just say, “but hey, it’s a game, none of this really matters”

[@darken2417]

Funfact: According to the lore Skyrim should have been far far far more of a frozen hellhole.

[@CommanderM117]

indeed you can even see how it ment to look in Arena

[@wizstorm172]

Bethesda is really bad when it comes to world-building.

[@Rynewulf]

Just try bring up the worlds of series like Gothic, Dragon Age or The Witcher and you'll suddenly find out how many people love dragon Scandinavia, drunk Europe and mushroom volcano land over grey low fantasy totally not Europe number 87 EDIT: Apparently people need to be told dragon Scandinavia and mushroom land are more fun than medieval europe #431

[@Rynewulf]

@Manek Iridius I was actually talking them down

[@the_dropbear4392]

Not really, Nirn isn't old enough to have glaciers. It's only around 10,000 years old at max. It's also relies on strange metaphysics

[@diamondmason2759]

Another good example of some amazing fjords is Kenai Fjords National Park in Alaska

[@PandaSE_]

Already disliked and out of your house.

[@brendansherry8737]

East March isn't a swamp, it's a hot springs. Possibly skyrim has a batholith raising up under it. That kind of uplift could erase glacial features. Look at Idaho and not Minnesota. Not many glacial features left after the batholith raised up.

[@TheGrunaldi]

One thing that's worth remembering when going on about fantasy maps /geography is ... ... that magic exists in those worlds and may or may not have been used to create those lands . You can say that's just a lazy bs excuse to do maps easier ... but sometimes good writing can make geography more inserting . Anyway awesome video , keep up the good work!

[@VertietRyper]

Tamriel was actually part of a mega continent in Dawn era but was split into several smaller continents upon a great war between the gods. The Red Mountain is the most major area where mythos impacted the land because the heart of a God landed there. Global cooling began in the 1st era and humans came to Tamriel to escape persecution and the cold. Miraak the Dragonborn, split Solstheim from mainland Tamriel around then. Other stuff happened but became forgotten because time-space warps that pretty much disrupted all forms of record keeping.

[@PowerThrash]

Really interesting video, and excellent music choice! The Arena soundtrack is underrated.

[@glanni]

Loved this a lot! I love to learn about how land was formed!

[@matthiasrauert8397]

Man this channel is unique! Earned a new sub great work!

[@Hercules_the_Great]

Never anticipated a video about Skyrim would be so edifying!

[@AegixDrakan]

Some decent information here, and THE most unique sign-off I have ever heard. I love it. XD

[@carson3964]

In New Hampshire mt.Washington was formed by bubbles of granite in the ground, when the glacier came by it moved all of the softer rocks and revealed the bubbles of granite, causing our tall mountains and deep ravines.

[@melaniabladeofmiquella]

I love how you've suddenly made Geography an interesting and absorbing subject for me

[@baconaterlover5399]

Can’t believe I watched a 12 minute video about glacier but this shit had my attention the whole time. Cool stuff about the natural world and it’s application in video games is always something neat to see.

[@Moonlightatnight2]

Hey man, my Argonian hunter built a lovely den full of trophies and herbs right next to that Morthal swamp. That swamp was where he went to unwind by killing shit with a crossbow. I can still picture the misty mornings and the scuttling of the mudcrabs

[@bellicosepariah6609]

This background music was my favorite tract from Daggerfall. I think it was called "over snow".

[@ethandonnachie]

amazing video

[@GhostofSkyrim]

I feel like TES land masses can't be judged too harshly by real world logic due to how Nirn is pretty much just the body of a god as opposed to how our world went through millions of cycles just to end up where we are today.

[@neoqwerty]

Holy crap I love this channel and I'm mad it took this long for youtube to recommend it.

[@thewarriorofboros]

oh I grew up with one of those big rocks in my backyard, they're really cool. One of my favorite family pictures are of me and my cousins all up on top of it when we were little

[@Scrogan]

Good video. Got a sub. Look forward for more.

[@dasik84]

You absolutely can recognize where you are in Skyrim. Whiterun is nothing but brown grass, tundra. Falkreath is a pine forest, basically tajga. Rift is an autumn forest and on a huge mountain plateau. Winterhold has permanent snow storms. Eastmarch is basically Iceland - volcanic tundra with sulfur, thermal ponds and steam everywhere. Pale is the purest permafrost with good weather and whitiest snow of whole game. Haafingar is a mountain range with ocean view on one side and swamps on the other one. And Hjaalmarch is a swamp with view on Solitude.

[@darrenparis8314]

I was not expecting to find a geologic survey of Skyrim today, but this has been very educational.

[@baardi2]

Nice Runescape Ice Giant