Maormer NPCs and new info

So today the twitter feed confirmed that the Maormer of Pyandonea(sp?) will be present in the game as npcs.

   

This says several things to me: chiefly that there will almost definitely be a couple other non-playable races present, likely reachmen and imga, perhaps a few scattered akaviri, possibly kothringi, etc. It also satisfies me that ZOS has a decent grasp of some of the less recognized lore, and are willing to acknowledge it.

But the most immediately relevant thing I get from this is that whoever is overseeing the twitter feed is willing to answer some questions about the game. This is the only piece of new info we've had since E3 (or earlier if you don't count the 'gameplay' videos), and it was given out pretty casually in answer to a direct question.
The twitter feed has been the only stream of regular community interaction from the devs, with a clear goal of keeping people's attention on ESO. It seems to me that if we were to pose small, specific questions like this on twitter, we might be able to get a few tidbits here and there on minor things we are curious about. Obviously we aren't going to get anwsers to any big things with far-reaching implications, but as it stands this looks like our only potential source of info until ZOS decides to make their next reveal.

Good news! It would be nice to know some more races that will appear, hopefully we will see the imga in the game.

seriously? AWSOME. But, seriously?
we just got the *spoiler* falmer. And now we gotta see another "lost" elven race.

I wonder how big their role might be. Well wasnt the Maomer / Altmer sea war going on? Probably they appear as enemies in the Elven areas. Man thats great news. That means they actually do digg into the lore. BRRHWAZAWZWHWAAWWZ

As we know so far from MER (Elves) group in TES:

Aldmer (a.k.a. Elder Folk)
Altmer (a.k.a. High Elves)
Ayleid (a.k.a. Wild Elves, or Heartland High Elves)
Bosmer (a.k.a. Wood Elves)
Chimer (a.k.a. Changed Folk)
Dunmer (a.k.a. Dark Elves)
Dwemer (a.k.a. Dwarves, or Deep Folk)
Falmer (a.k.a. Snow Elves, or Ice Elves)
Lefthanded Elves (a.k.a. a race of elves from Yokuda)
Maormer (a.k.a. Sea Elves, or Tropical Elves)
Orcs (a.k.a. Orsimer, or Pariah Folk)

This may be stating the obvious, but we are going to see a much broader expanse of the lore being incorporated into ESO than any single TES SRPG.

One has to keep in mind that this game has been in development for the past five years (BGS generally has a development cycle of three years). With that understood, ZOS has had plenty of time to fully flesh out the world and incorporate as much lore, culture, and civilizations into the game as possible.

This is why lore buffs should be excited for ESO. While it will certainly create and establish new lore, it should also have a plethora of references to already established lore that BGS has never fully incorporated into their games. This game (at least from a lore perspective) has the potential to be the most organic and extensive TES game to date.

The thing is.

It is either "excited" or "concerned" so far ive been on the "concerned" side see, games tend to take a long time to make, especialy MMOs, especialy games that had their engine build from ground up like (TESO) not to mention Skyrim had a simmilar development time. With a Team that was at this time already in touch with the lore. Matt Firors team, not so much. In other words alot of the time was spend doing the Engine, getting the game to work and actually familirizing themselves with the material.
Further elaborating on it (Wich is needet) is not includet in this as of yet.

So the words "broader expanse" is not so much a thing as "broader strokes" is. It means there is less time and money for detail in each province than there is for a healthy dose of lore in general. For example many MMORPGs have realy great Zones. Using the envirements to tell a story of its own.
However these zones usually do not have much lore content inside them. At least not alot obvious ones.
While it is true that one cannot compare TESO to any other MMORPG (well something they can,right?)

Still the problem is there, even with the ammount of money and manpower they have at their disposal, qutie a few others have too.

Still the recent announcement that the Maomer will make an appearance in TESO gives me hopes of a bright future. However this just leads me to more worriyng, hoping they wont just use Altmer player models for them.
Or cast them as boring villains.

(September 19th 2012, 11:08 AM)Sordak Wrote: With a Team that was at this time already in touch with the lore. Matt Firors team, not so much. In other words alot of the time was spend doing the Engine, getting the game to work and actually familirizing themselves with the material.

Several of the key devs on the ZOS team have stated that they are big fans of TES from way back, Paul Sage having been playing since Arena. I would be surprised if most of the current Bethesda team had played Arena at all, let alone worked on it.

The basics of the lore are easy enough to pick up, but for the more esoteric stuff that I think most hardcore fans are interested in, much of the time it seems like the current Bethesda doesn't have a clue when compared to the knowledge of the fans. Certainly they are more interested in appealing to a wide audience with stuff like dragons and vikings rather than getting into the metaphysics and history lessons that are admittedly a niche market.

Not to say that skyrim didn't make good use of existing lore, it was one of the better core games in that respect. Oblivion on the other hand...basically what I am trying to say is that while Bethesda may have been the source of all lore, in their current state they are not necessarily the best choice to put it to use, and ZOS may be as well acquainted with it (or better), not to mention being in a better position to use it, given the type of game they are making.

thats just a dumb statement.

Skyrim has alot of hints to the metaphysics, they are just hidden. And they were NEVER that obvious, not even in Morrowind. Even if Vivec was there.
Saying Bethesda doesnt have a clue is a rediculous statement.

(September 19th 2012, 02:34 PM)Sordak Wrote: thats just a dumb statement.

Skyrim has alot of hints to the metaphysics, they are just hidden. And they were NEVER that obvious, not even in Morrowind. Even if Vivec was there.
Saying Bethesda doesnt have a clue is a rediculous statement.

That's not really said at all actually.

What he did say is that people need to get it out of their thick skulls that only BGS can make TES games and that perhaps ZOS can bring a new enlightening perspective to the lore.

Given that they are making the first TES MMO, this will be a great opportunity for ZOS to go much more in-depth into the world of Tamriel than BGS ever has. We'll obviously have to wait to see the results of this, but I think it's ridiculous to claim just because ZOS is a new studio that they can't decide what's the "best" way to incorporate lore.

I would argue lore will actually be much more important for a MMORPG than the single player games, so I expect it will play a role in almost every aspect of the game in some way, shape, or form.

(September 19th 2012, 01:04 PM)confusion Wrote:

(September 19th 2012, 11:08 AM)Sordak Wrote: With a Team that was at this time already in touch with the lore. Matt Firors team, not so much. In other words alot of the time was spend doing the Engine, getting the game to work and actually familirizing themselves with the material.

Several of the key devs on the ZOS team have stated that they are big fans of TES from way back, Paul Sage having been playing since Arena. I would be surprised if most of the current Bethesda team had played Arena at all, let alone worked on it.

The basics of the lore are easy enough to pick up, but for the more esoteric stuff that I think most hardcore fans are interested in, much of the time it seems like the current Bethesda doesn't have a clue when compared to the knowledge of the fans.

Most of the 'esoteric stuff' never showed up directly in any of the games anyway. It was all parsed and speculated out from very sketchy hints and the occasional 'pseudo-canon' of BSG members posting to the lore boards themselves; only bits of it were ever actually 'confirmed' and the whole of it is wrapped in the concept of monkey-truth aesthetics - which is, from the Temple Zero society's definition, an aesthetic that puts 'marvel' ahead of 'internal consistency.'

Thus we get things like "Akatosh is Auri-El, but Akatosh is Lorkhan*, but Lorkhan is decidedly not Auri-El."
*confirmed by Kirkbride himself.

(September 19th 2012, 01:04 PM)confusion Wrote: Certainly they are more interested in appealing to a wide audience with stuff like dragons and vikings rather than getting into the metaphysics and history lessons that are admittedly a niche market.

And ZOS isn't?

However, they are employing Bethesda's lore team for the making of this game. And they've deliberately chosen a period of Tamriel's history that is almost entirely unrecorded, as this allows for a fair bit of freedom on what happens in-game. Though, there are already concerns about the faction breakdowns; I find them at least plausible, but there's quite a few who don't.

I am not saying that they cant deliver the lore (i just suspect it, but i will go into that in a moment) but i said it WILL have to be spread thinner. Even if there is alot of established lore. Alot of the stuff for each individual province is done by extensive research on the subject matter. Bethesda showed in their dev diaries that they did quite a bit of research on viking culture. I just doubt that ZOS has the manpower to do the same for each province (like the flora of an actual jungle for black marsh, one would be suprised how different it actually is from how you precieve it through the media) in the same time Bethesda put into making ONE province.
Its also noteworthy that in an MMORPG most things kinda have to be content oriented. Alot of the lore snippets in Skyrim are just there, they dont realy do anything.

Or they are part of the main Quest. But for the most part they are just there. While the books are certainly coming back for the MMO. I doubt that they will deliver alot of content that has no kinda quest in it. On the good side this could mean ALOT lore friendly content. On the bad side it could mean not much else beeing implemented when it comes to lore.


So why do i think that they may not be able to deliver the lore. Basically just one thing: black marsh. Ive seen the Video. And if you honestly think this is how Black Marsh looks like from the lore we got about it you probably had your head somewhere else while doing so. Its flat, its open it is too focused on the ground layer, it hardly has any plants on the ground that hinder your movement, it shows no sign of decay and has these weird maya ruins that havent been mentioned before.

(September 20th 2012, 02:01 AM)Sordak Wrote: Or they are part of the main Quest. But for the most part they are just there. While the books are certainly coming back for the MMO. I doubt that they will deliver alot of content that has no kinda quest in it. On the good side this could mean ALOT lore friendly content. On the bad side it could mean not much else beeing implemented when it comes to lore.

Watch for anachronism, as well. I'm sure at least some of the books we're familiar with wouldn't have been penned quite yet, but I wouldn't be surprised to see a couple slip through. (Also watch for it among the RP lore buffs... it's the most likely point where the community will slip.)

as i am not a fan of the lore community of TES..

Intresting. I wonder if we will see Imga as well.

(September 25th 2012, 12:33 PM)Stordrage Wrote: Intresting. I wonder if we will see Imga as well.

As long as it isn't an element of the lore that isn't too far out there and was maybe mentioned in one sentence in a random book in Morrowind, chances are lore buffs will love this game.

I don't exactly know how ZOS has crafted each individual province. However, we do know they have taken great pains into making three distinctly different experiences for the three factions in their respective provinces.

I expect all the provinces to be relatively fleshed out, especially since ZOS left areas of some of the provinces for later expansions. Hopefully they are massive and packed with loads of lore references, content, beautiful environments, and plenty of memories and adventures to be had in the world.