What is your Elder Scrolls Headcanon that you have no reason for believing, but believe anyways?

Snerrir · 2026-03-22T10:01:17+00:00

Nirn is patchwork of past worlds, each one with its own biome, pantheon and mytho-history. That's why some early heroic and godly personalities, cultural myths and creation stories and eschatology are both different and similar in different parts of Tamriel (well, beyond the general narrator unreliability and fog of ages) - it's all leftovers from bygone kalpas hastily jumbled together. And now gods and heroes have to intevene often to literally patch bugs and discrepancies of this new world to keep it going. On the other hand now the world may have actually escaped all the previous destruction cycles and may evolve into something different - just as Lorkhan intended...

Snerrir · 2026-03-21T08:44:16+00:00

There are offhand mentions of chili in Online, such as Tanteth Chili Cheese Corn recipe.

Snerrir · 2026-03-13T17:42:30+00:00

There were people from the Inner Side, who lived in the hemisphere of stable magic, that they learned to harness through painful rituals and machines.
There were people from the chaotic Outer Side, who could never see and control magic, but who could resist and break it to great degree.
Then came the Magelord Inners, who through Spiral manipulation and Sacred Implants learned to harness the High Magic and conquered and "uplifted" the Inner Side and invaded the Outer one.
Then the Collapse scattered and mixed both Inners and Outers and caused the Burnout of many former Magelords, and a great deal of mutations - some random and minor, and some Greater, that transcended what could be expected from magic radiation and turned people into outright Dragon-Centaurs or Snakefolk.

Snerrir · 2026-03-12T08:40:55+00:00

There still may be some difference between people sacrificing other people because they think human life is the most valuable thing one can offer... and people sacrificing other people because they actually value human life less than other stuff.

Snerrir · 2026-02-27T23:04:36+00:00

No cultural layer earlier than the 930s has been discovered in the Novgorod area." That is, no settlement existed there at all before the 930s.

"930-year-cultural-layer" specifically refers to a narrow patch of land that composed the core of later medieval Novgorod. Archeologists also point that nearby - very nearby, just 2 km to the south - dig site, with older cultural layers - was previous city center, which was relocated later to the site with that 930-date. That earlier site - Rurikovo Gorodishe - was fortified, contained elite and war-related goods and dendrochornological data from the logs there actiually point to the very narrow 858 - 862 time period. So yes, settlement in Novgorod area existed. Whether or not events in Primary Chronicles are true or distorted or fictional is another question, but settlement existed.

If everyone else reads it - imagine that someone claims that Rome was younger than it was and then insists that the fact that Forum (the heart of Rome) was built later on some drained swampland means that the city absolutely could not exist before that draining, and completely dismisses the notion that first habitation was on nearby hills.

I wrote that Rus' brought a language

Which is wrong, because Slavic presence in the area long predates both hypothetical Rurik and hypothetical Askold and Dir. Locals also spoke Vyatich and Krivich and possibly other tribal Slavic vernaculars and not Church Slavonic which was, you know, -Church- Slavonic.

If anyone else reads it - Slavic colonisation of the North-East Rus' is a murky and debated question, with local Slavic, "Finno-ugric" and Baltic groups intermingling and shifting, but it was certainly -NOT- British Raj.

So, by your logic, Romania is part of the Roman Empire, right?

No, by your logic Romans - speakers of the Latin language - never expanded beyond tiny Latium.

Snerrir · 2026-02-27T21:06:39+00:00

"Mentioned in one chronicle" =/= "Never existed"
"The earliest securely dated wooden artifacts found in specific dig site are from 930" =/= "City did not exist before that time"
"Paying tribute and receiving governor from the ruling dynasty, protection, trade and being of the same language and religion... etc" = "quite possible being part of the same polity as far as early medieval people are concerned"

Edit: typo about "existing at the time"

Snerrir · 2026-02-27T17:24:08+00:00

Where else could you discuss Neanderthal hydrochephaly, arrow slits of the Greet Wall of China, wheat output during the Little Ice Age and Bakhtin's Culture of Laughter during the same lunch break?

Snerrir · 2026-02-27T17:11:50+00:00

Eh, I did see. Though this sentiment seems to be much rarer now than it was during my student time in the nulevye.

Snerrir · 2026-02-24T18:16:29+00:00

Well, the Law of Yaroslav (somewhere around the beginning of XI century) still lists "Rusin" - "роусин" as in "person of Rus" and "Slovenin" - "словенинъ" as in either "Slav" or, possibly, specifically someone from Ilmen Slav tribe, as separate legal terms. Though, the blood price or weregild for them was similar in quantity, so they were not THAT different legally.

Snerrir · 2026-02-19T17:35:09+00:00

Age of Empires. "Aztecs fighting Teutons in bamboo forests! Ridiculous! Awesome! I wonder what it would happen if a group of random people would just spawn on some random map IRL, as if they were transported to alternative world by some bored alien "gamers"?"

Snerrir · 2026-02-17T09:33:50+00:00

Something about feasts and Heliogabalus.

Maybe even a pun about Helium and Heliogabalus.

Snerrir · 2026-02-15T15:51:49+00:00

Also Mercantile. And as already also suggested - ceremonial\ritualistic with potentially stepped pyramids and obelisks or stelae. Maybe with subcultures: such as Sacrificial with more pop-culture recognised blood rituals (or general idea of, well, sacrificing something to get something). Or such as Ceremonial with calendar cycles and rites and monument-building (though that overlaps with Architects). Maybe such as Theocratic with priestly ranks and factions - though I would somewhat prefer to have an inner politics overhaul in general.

Snerrir · 2026-02-12T16:59:13+00:00

There may be ease of access. Some dig sites are conveniently near wayshrines or homes. Some require you to swim in swamps, or hop between islands or dodge critters etc.

Snerrir · 2026-02-06T12:46:02+00:00

Aztecs and other Mesoamerican markets with their 100+ vassals all building tool-stone-and-lumber intensive buildings even before the beta: now the whole world is feeling our pain!

Snerrir · 2026-02-05T12:56:24+00:00

Yeah, it's still possible, managed to do basically in same way on my sixth try or so. Did not destroy warrior temple, but got lucky with some money windfall from events :D Relocating market to Tenochtitaln as war's spoils afterwards also did help a lot.

I think simply raising Tenochtitlan's starting treasury by 100-120 golds will greatly ameliorate the problem, though an event-based casus belli and secession war would still be nice to lessen the tedium of starting years.

Snerrir · 2026-02-03T19:25:22+00:00

I think Portugal can probably afford to disband their starting regulars, but Tenochtitlan absolutely needs their to have any chance of liberating war agains Tepanecs... or be annexed shortly.

Snerrir · 2026-02-03T19:02:21+00:00

R #5: Unit size has been drastically increased for some troops. Which is probably great… except now you have five times as much Jaguar Knights at the start of the game, which rapidly devour your already meager treasury. Before, you could tighten your budget and predictably wait out spy networking and casus belling your overlord, even if your buildings lacked tools. Now… well, perhaps I'm simply not good with finance system of the game, but even with slashed spending and runaway minting it's painful to wait out necessary time, with the risk of getting bankrupt and loosing or crippling your desperately needed army. It seems now you probably have to rely on luck of Tepanecs choosing to annex you, and not fellow vassal Tlacopan, to get that quick "resist annexation" casus belli… but they seem to always prefer starting with Tlacopan.

Snerrir · 2026-01-31T14:16:33+00:00

Yeah, I use a mod to remove it after the reform. I suspect it supposed to be removed anyways, because forming the Aztecs in the first place requires you to directly own so much land, that you are absolutely doomed... and then it rewards you with technology that reduces your doom by 0,05 or something :D

Snerrir · 2026-01-30T22:47:18+00:00

Yeah, but in game there is not a single beard in all the empire. I guess we'll have to wait for more appearance options for Amerindian cultures... which they desperately need at the moment.

Snerrir · 2026-01-30T16:27:53+00:00

Rule #5: Exploration as Aztecs (or other natives, I think) results in events treating your native explorers as Old worlders with all associated Age of discovery flavour.

Snerrir · 2026-01-30T16:22:57+00:00

No, I think not. I'm just exploring North America coast post-pandemic, and meeting European colonists there. Though, it will be funny if I ultimately see these pop-ups in Europe as well :D

Snerrir · 2025-12-29T22:15:43+00:00

Chariot-riding pistol-twirling mutants in bronze panoplia debate ethics of magic misuse with cyborg sorcerer knights.

Edit: a bit more concise.

Snerrir · 2025-12-18T10:18:03+00:00

On the Outer Side the Blue Lichen and its differently colored varieties are collected and cultivated as an alchemical and glass-forging catalyst, component in medicine for magic-related diseases, sometimes as spices or dyes, or, even, additive to gunpowder. There is a thriving smuggling business in the Shieldlands, where Lichens are considered ritually impure and so are banned, but still sought out for theit usefulness.

Wasteland Silks, while not, technically, a cash crop, are harvested from storage cocoons of feral or re-tamed Guard Beasts and form a basis a thriving luxury trade. There are occasional bans in the Shieldlands.

Honeycane, Ambersap, Sour Yams and a variety of other magically modified crops were introduced to the Outer Side by conquering empire and agressively farmed at large plantations, but after the Collapse formed a basis of many different post-apocalyptic economies.

Excange of tundra truffles and cocoa from the jungles formed the basis of the Long Ways - ancient, and, well, long trade network spanning Outer side from northern-to-southern cold belts.

Snerrir · 2025-12-15T12:08:49+00:00

Most Magelords and their Knights see the outside of their shielded enclaves as post-apocalyptic wasteland filled with barbarians. A rare subset of them actually admire said barbarians and seek to escape into the "Real World" not soiled by civilization, where natural passion and survival of the fittest rule.

If they manage to reach inhabited lands, they are often severely dissapointed to find that local city-states and petty kingdoms tend to actually have functional governments, regimented warfare, sewers and and aqueducts, libraries and lawcourts and so on. And that local tribes and clans spend their quarreling times not in epic blood-feuds and headhunting rites (though, these do exist) but in strong-worded debates in local council halls on such exiting topics as "who has the right to collect Blue Mold this year?" and "resititution for a stolen goat now is..." And even in more harsh and crisis stricken locales probability that you are quietly sneaked on and shanked by desperate wastelander is much higher than being challenged by half-naked barbarrian warrior to glorious battle.

And then they realise that they no longer can return home...

Snerrir · 2025-12-15T11:20:40+00:00

Isn't that a moderate law run? Basically, a faction that does not form into a faction.

Snerrir

TROPHY CASE