What should happen in the Elder Scrolls 6?

What should happen in the Elder Scrolls 6?

 

It’s been five whole years since Skyrim. There have been many ups and downs in video game land during that time but soon you would expect it to be time for the huge up in in the form of a new Elder Scrolls game. What should The Elder Scrolls 6 be like? This is my spin on the topic.

 

First point of discussion would be where the game takes place? Many people want to return to Morrowind, many want to go somewhere new and I’m part of that second group. More to the point I’d like to see the game take place in both Valenwood and Elsweyr. Looking at this realistically Skyrim is a similar size to the combined Valenwood and Elsweyr meaning it should be do able for Bethesda. On top of this the two provinces would supply a lot of new and interesting environments to explore. Valenwood is primarily forest land. This would be a good environment and the lush wildlife could supply a plethora of new wildlife and plant life. I would also like to see the Wood Elf civilisation in the treetops. Elsweyr meanwhile being home to the beast race of Khajit consists mainly of jungle and desert, however being home to a race of feline people there could also be a large plethora of strange and never seen before features. Similar to Morrowind your first visit to Elsweyr could be a completely new experience unlike anything you had seen before. On top of this having to provinces would supply a hug variety in landscapes and civilisations. It would also be interesting to see a smaller amount of human characters as well as seeing how they survive and fit in in these lands that are in no way catered to them.

 

I liked the skills in Skyrim however I think a few more should be added for the next game. I would like to see acrobatics return but I would like to see it incorporate dodging and movement skills. This way a nimble archer or assassin could manoeuvre around a battle quickly and precisely rather than just getting smacked in the face by a big burly orc with a Warhammer. This would add more diversity in different character builds, a warrior with heavy armour and a two handed weapon would not be as agile as a thief with light armour. I also would like unarmed combat to become its own skill once again to make it a more viable playstyle.

 

Of all Skyrim’s existing skills I think speech needs the most change. It would be great to see speech have a bigger impact with other characters with more options for persuasion and intimidate. Rather than just affect the prices in shops it would be good to see your speech skill have a greater impact on your relationships with npc’s without having to do the boring conversation mini game from Oblivion.

 

The other skills that I think should be changed slightly are the magic skills. I really liked Skyim’s magic system, particularly the dual wielding system, I would just like to see an increase in the number of different types of spells. More types of destruction, more conjurable creatures, really all the magic skill tree could do with an increase in types of spells. The conjuration tree for example has a small number of summoned creatures and while Dragonborn was a good addition with ash creatures even more should be added for the next game. Perhaps you could learn unique conjuration spells from different areas to reflect the landscape and inhabitants. I would also like to see spell crafting see a return to really personalize your arsenal of magic. Skyrim had a very good magic system, I feel the next game just needs to add more spells rather than change the system.

 

Finally I would like smithing to be more than making the same things over and over again. I would like to see you be able to make customizations to your armour in smithing for each race or just to your taste. This could be something like choosing what shape to form your sword in when you make an iron sword at the start of the game (From a basic sword to a katana to a scimitar) or simply changing the groves on a pair of gauntlets.

 

Items and gear are of course very important in Elder Scrolls games and should be a big focus for the Elder Scrolls 6. I’ll start with armour and weapons. First a nit-pick, it bothers me than Orcish armour is better than Dwarvern armour so I would like to see that change. With that out of the way I don’t just want to see more types or armour but rather unique armours from the different provinces and for different races. Armours should look different when worn by each race and it would be fun to be able to make small customizations to your armour, whether that be when you make it or just add some small trinkets.

 

For more weapons I’d like weapons to cater to hand to hand characters such as knuckle braces as well as throwing weapons such throwing knives or shurikens. However the biggest change I would like to see is a change in staves. While I would like you to be able to create your own with a far bigger variety of effects than the Dragonborn staff maker provides I also want them to be wielded differently depending on the character preference. If you were playing as an older wiser mage it could act like a walking stick and not used in battle as you fire you powerful magic through your hands. However staff could also be wielded like a bow staff, for some agile combat to protect yourself when your enemies get close to you. Spheres could also be added and used to a similar effect, except they’re thrown instead of being used to cast a spell.

 

Some smaller things could also be tweaked to good effect. A wider range of jewellery to choose from and craft would be appreciated as would an added importance to food and eating. Maybe a hunger and survival mechanic could be implemented into higher difficulties. However the biggest change needs to be to unique items as in they should actually be unique. Some are such as Deadric artefacts but how often do you do a quest for a unique item and it’s just a normal item you could find yourself with an average enchantment. All unique items should be unique and thus worth finding. Powerful items such as Deadric artefacts should not only look unique but be unique to other items and actually worth using and not outclassed by a random thing you craft and enchant yourself. Make them powerful but hard to obtain, that way it’s worth the effort.

 

I’d like to see bigger cities where appropriate in the Elder Scrolls 6. Oblivion did cities very well, it had big cities when it needed and smaller towns when they were more appropriate. In Skyrim outside of Solitude I found some cities to be way too small. Whindhelm and Whiterun in particular seemed more like towns than grnad cities and while there obviously should be smaller towns, large settlements should actually feel large and full of people and activity, like the Imperial city did.

 

Having a follower was great in Skyrim and for the next game I’d like to see followers have more personality. Serena and Teldryn Sero were a good start but for the next game I’d like to see full conversations with followers and to develop a real relationship with the person you’re trekking the land with. They could have set ideals such as religion but traits you could change such as morality and racist prejudice through talking with them and travelling with them. A lot of games do this well such as Mass Effect and it’d be great to really care about your follower. Ideally it would get to a point where you would do something you wouldn’t normally do because your follower wanted you to, it could be like you genuinely care. Perhaps if you disagree with a follower too much or do things they don’t like they could get annoyed or even leave you while if you earn their respect and do good things for them they could really care for you. This could lead into marriage which was extremely shallow in Skyrim. In the next game you could have to earn that trust from your character and actually form a connection in the game rather than finding just them a sword then slapping on a necklace. Hopefully this would make interactions with npc’s more interesting and be more like talking to a real person as appose to most of them just spouting random trivia at you.

 

Elder Scrolls games always have great quests and to expand I’d like more guilds to join. However you shouldn’t just to be able to join them all, there could be multiple warrior type guilds that rival each other and each have unique quest lines that impact the other guilds opinions of you. The same could apply to other guilds and they could appear in different places, for example a grand magic college in a large city but a cult of necromancers would be hidden away. A pack of werewolves would live away from society while a guild full of honourable warriors would be welcomed in the cities. It would be cool to see rivalling factions such as different bloodlines of vampires or fighting warrior factions, for the thieves’ guild to have a larger reach and influence and to not have the entire Dark Brotherhood die at the end of the quest line. I’ve only scratched the surface with guilds here but an increased number where your actions impact the others would be a perfect evolution of what we have in Skyrim.

 

This leads onto you actions having more consequence. Maybe with entire guilds or maybe just followers, this would make the world seem much more like a real living world that will continue to exist after you leave. Maybe your actions would eventually catch up with you or maybe you’d be pleasantly surprised later on when you were rewarded for that good thing you did. Either way it would be s superb addition.

 

The last thing I want to mention is the main quest line. The obvious thing is the Thalmor and this would suit the locations I have chosen ideally. We could see more into their ambitions and intentions as well as discover more about the Aldmeri Dominian as not the whole Dominian are supporters of the Thalmor’s extreme ideals. There is so much possibility with using the Thalmor as the primary antagonists with possible rebellion from Khajit and Wood Elves as well as an internal conflict amongst the high elves or conflicting ideals or different families and groups.

 

More addition to the vast numbers of books to expand the lore would be great and I’m sure we will get this but I hope they don’t reveal too much about mysterious Dwemner, Black Marsh or Elder Scrolls. It may have sounded like I bashed Skyrim a lot in this post but I really do think Skyrim is a great game and it’s a fantastic game to build on to bring us all a spectacular game. What do you think Bethesda should do with the Elder Scrolls 6? Leave a comment and of course remember the most important thing … make sure Mai’q the Liar returns.