The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion/YMMV

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• Alternate Character Interpretation - Plenty of people, even some in-game characters, just plain don't like the "good guy" Archmage Traven. Your interpretation of him and his apparent grudge against necromancy colors the Mages Guild quest line; from what it seems, while the necromancers are truly a threat, at least part of the Guild's fervent opposition to them is due to Traven's personal agenda.
  • There's also the fact that he closed the Imperial University and eliminated freedom of research, which is antithetical to the reasons the Guild was founded in the first place. Any more than a cursory glance has Traven as a man with a grudge against necromancy and is willing to do anything to destroy it, rather than an archmage doing what's best for the guild. It certainly doesn't help that most of the smaller guildhalls are run incompetently by Know-Nothing Know-It-Alls or people who were Kicked Upstairs.
  • It's mentioned several times that he severely weakened the Mages Guild. By the time of Skyrim it no longer exists, likely collapsing during the ensuing chaos resulting from the Septim bloodline ending
  • Also, an Alternate Empire Interpretation: What sort of empire hosts Gladiator Games, using criminals as combatants, in the capital city? The Evil Empire, that's what kind.
  • Mankor Camoran has a few odd things about him that makes him suspect to many players. Most notably, the historical Mankor Camoran was not an altmer, while the one in-game is. He confuses several daedric princes and their realms. He is wearing the amulet of kings despite not being related to the imperial family (though events in skyrim could explain this). Many players suspect he is a false front for the mythic dawn.
• Anticlimax Boss: Agronak Gro-Malog, the Grand Champion of the Arena. Agronak's level isn't scaled to the character level so at mid level and above he is easier the mooks you just fought in the Arena. Of course, all the NPCs still react to the fight as if beating him was a huge accomplishment. You can even beat him at low level if you do his quest.
  • Erandur-Vangaril, a lich with a backstory that has a bug that causes it to always have only 15 Health, and you can only fight it if you're at least level 23, at which point you can almost certainly kill it in one hit.
  • Mannimarco too. His mooks are slow and avoidable, he has no game in melee combat, and if you have a decent weapon, then he can be killed with a dozen or so attacks at the most.
    • He becomes even more of one for a player of Daggerfall, who likely would have expected Mannimarco, the King of Worms to look like the King of Worms (imposing, clad in a red robe covering his face in shadow, eyes glowing brightly). Oblivion's incarnation... is a fairly ordinary-looking Altmer.
• Complete Monster: Many.
  • Countess Alessia Carol, who tortures people for no better reason than being of the beast races.
  • Kurdan gro-Dragol, who uses a brutal loanshark persona as a front for his murder tournaments, kills Aleron Loche after you've been trying to save him, then laughs in your face.
  • Francois Motierre, who allows his own mother to be killed in order to get the Dark Brotherhood to fake his death for him.
  • Mathieu Bellamont, the villain of the Dark Brotherhood quest. The only reasonable argument for him not being this is due to the Evil Versus Evil nature of the story here – if he did the same things to any other faction in the game, he would 'definitely be a Complete Monster.
  • The residents of Hackdirt. With the exception of Jiv Hiriel, they all are creepy, vile and malevolent.
  • Your fellow Dark Brothers and Sisters in the Sanctuary may also count; if you actually take time to talk to them at the start of each Dark Brotherhood quest they have some interesting things to say. Most notably, the Orc brags to you about killing a 6 year old girl, and Antoinetta Marie cheerfully tells you about how she murdered her own aunt in cold blood by putting poison in her soup...
    • The protagonist of s\he completes the entire Dark Brotherhood quest chain (hell, the Night Mother even points this out, claiming you have a soul as black as midnight)
      • This is confirmed as canon in Skyrim when you meet him/her as Sheogoath, who alludes to having been Listener and the Grey Fox.
    • The entire Dark Brotherhood is made up of Complete Monsters, if you're familiar with the backstory. They are a gleefully murderous cult who know exactly that what they are doing is wrong, but do it anyway to impress their facetious godhead who, given his status as the absence of being, wouldn't give a damn either way.
  • Mannimarco, Tamriel's first lich and greatest necromancer, and leader of the Order of the Blackworm, who murders and tortures countless people, including all but one of the Bruma mages, and reportedly knows a spell that turns people into undead while they're still alive.
  • Umaril the Unfeathered, originally a brutal Ayleid tyrant, now a half Ayleid, half Daedra Omnicidal Maniac.
• Crazy Awesome - Sheogorath is, almost literally, practically the embodiment of this trope. For example, if you attack him, he executes you by teleporting you hundreds of feet above the Isles, just to fall to your death!
• Demonic Spiders - If you're playing vanilla Oblivion and you've leveled up too high, every single enemy becomes a demonic spider due to the game's leveled enemies system.
  • To be more specific: Will-o-Wisps, who are, count 'em: magic resistant, fast, turn invisible, can only be hurt with silver/magic weapons, drain stats and can make your weapons/armor rot off your body. And Spider Daedra are literally giant deadly demonic spider-women. Who spawn miniature versions of themselves that paralyze you, so they fit the trope too.
• Draco in Leather Pants - Mannimarco, and by extension, his Necromancer followers.
• Game Breaker - So much that it takes up half the page.
• Goddamn Bats - Goddamn scamps. Goddamn rats. Goddamn wolves. Goddamn silly bandits.
• Good Bad Bugs: Once Mythic Dawn agents start openly attacking people, it's possible for one such agent, Cingor, to be rendered not just peaceful, but friendly with a high enough influence in the Fighter's Guild.
  • One of the rather hilarious ones involves Shadowmere, the horse you can get during the Dark Brotherhood questline. Unlike all other horses she's marked as essential and cannot be killed, only briefly knocked unconscious. It is still possible to access her as if she was a corpse, though, and as with all other bodies it is possible to place items into her inventory, essentially turning her into a portable storage chest. Furthermore, placing potions into her inventory will cause her to actually drink them during battle, enhancing her already considerable combat effectiveness.
  • Although not useful quite hilarious. At the Arcane University Casting a frenzy spell on a mage scholar or apprentice will cause them to attack each other and the intervening guards. After the spell has worn out the hostilities between the scholars and the apprentices still exist and the will fight til the last side standing. Because all parties are respawnable they will all come back after leaving the university for a while. The end result is a scholar vs apprentice rumble every time you return from your quest.
  • When the avatar of Mehrunes Dagon appears in the middle of the Imperial City in the finale of the main storyline, you aren't supposed to fight him, and he has the stats to make sure that you won't. However, the Wabbajack works on him, and if you get lucky with it, you can turn him into something harmless and easily killed, like a sheep. And when you do kill him, he melts.
  • After the Fighter's Guild mission "Trolls of Forsaken Mine", upon asking for your next mission, you're demoted because the Guild Master blames you and Modryn Oreyn for the death of her son. So you're forced to do an extra mission to regain your rank. However, this only happens if you go to Anvil's Guild Hall to ask for your next mission. You still have to do the extra mission, but you don't lose your rank (so it's really more like extra credit).
• Hilarious in Hindsight - Xedilian is a dungeon designed by a mad god to lure adventurers to their doom. And if you read some of the lore you'll learn that is was constructed "under pain of fun"
  • Kalthar, of the Bravil Mages' Guild, is an ugly guy with pale skin, a giant forehead, and long black receding hair. He's a dead ringer for Tommy Wiseau.
  • The Madness Cuirass in Shivering Isles has a picture of a grinning face carved into the front of it. Wearing it makes your character look like the Gurren Lagann.
• Holy Shit Quotient - Your first sighting of a Land Dreugh. Sighting the unicorn in the wilderness. Looking back down from the first mountain you climb.
• Ho Yay: From Knights of the Nine, Sir Berich and Sir Caius. Despite having been killed by the former, Sir Caius seems oddly eager to clear Sir Berich's name and enter Afterlife with him. Sir Berich seems equally excited about it.
  • Since Martin seems to develop a crush on the player, this happens if you're playing a male character.
  • The blacksmith in Mania will hit on the player if you're a male character. Did I mention this blacksmith is a gay Orc?
• It's Popular, Now It Sucks: Oblivion received this reaction from the rest of The Elder Scrolls fanbase upon it's success.
• Memetic Mutation - The game spawned memes: Rufio from Dark Brotherhood. Throwing the Adoring Fan off of Dive Rock. "I saw a mudcrab the other day." And, of course...

"STOP RIGHT THERE, CRIMINAL SCUM! You violated the law! Pay the court a fine or serve your sentence. Your stolen goods are now forfeit!"

• • To forget the Dark Brotherhood's five tenets... is to invoke the Wrath of Sithis.
  • Powdered deer penis
  • From Shivering Isles, CHEESE FOR EVERYONE!
• Misaimed Fandom - Mannimarco and his Order of the Black Worm are only a small niche of Necromancers, and yet some fans believe they represent Necromancy as a whole...
• Moral Event Horizon - Mannimarco destroying the Bruma guildhall in the Mages Guild questline, The Blackwood Company killing the guildmaster's youngest son in the Fighters Guild questline, and Umaril slaughtering multiple Chapels in Knights of the Nine.
  • The protagonist can cross this in multiple ways, the most obvious choice being any quest offered by the Dark Brotherhood [the arguably best choice is the one where you kill all of your guildmates, even the guy who initiated you is disgusted by it (though mostly because of your idiocy for helping the antagonist of the guild chain)]
  • Fixing Xedilian normally doesn't sound bad... but consider this: It's standard MO is to either a)kill off greedy adventurers, or b)render them irreversibly insane.. Points for the creativity of said Mind Rapes. Hallucinating into believing that the rat you just taunted is now going to murder you, searching a hundred duplicate keys to see which one works, and worst of all, a forced temporary and literal out-of-body experience. But hey, the Shivering Isles always needs residents...
• Most Annoying Sound - including random villagers talking about mud crabs, and shopkeepers telling you how great you are at haggling.
• Paranoia Fuel: Some may be uncomfortable if you don't know what the "Your killing has been observed by forces unknown" means.
  • By the time you're done with the Shivering Isles questline, you will have become very wary of corpses in case they're not quite dead.
• Player Punch: The Dark Brotherhood questline contains a very, very nasty example of this. By the end of the quest line, every single member that you knew at the beginning is dead.
  • Martin in the main quest.
  • Viranus Dalton and Biene Amelion in the Fighters Guild.
  • Sheogorath in the Shivering Isles.
  • the Bruma guildhall, and everyone in it, getting blown up by Mannimarco during the Mages Guild questline.
• Scrappy Mechanic - The previously mentioned level-scaling mechanic.
• Squick - One alchemist asks you about the punishment for necrophilia in Cyrodiil. "No reason, just curious." She'll be very happy if you tell her it's just a fine, even for repeated offenses. What makes it even worse, however, is that she makes the comment that the punishment is "much lighter than Morrowind," leaving the impression that she may be in Cyrodiil because of her... habits. There's even a line from an NPC about seeing a Dark Elf walking out of the graveyard at night with "a silly smile on their face." Pass the Brain Bleach.
  • Also worth noting that the Player Character knows what the punishment is. Perhaps one step on the trail of discovering why you start out in a dungeon at the beginning of the game.
  • Ah yes, practising law without a license. Stop right there, criminal scum!
• That One Sidequest - Collecting 100 Nirnroot plants. "You must have turned every stone in all of Cyrodill". Yes, yes, we did. Though it's not quite as hard as it sounds- there are over 300 nirnroot plants in the game(they can be used in alchemy) so finding 100 isn't too straining. Three of the DLC add-ons include extra nirnroots too- and the one in Deepscorn Hollow respawns every 3 days as it's a "collected" food object on a desk, rather than a plant.
  • Shadowbanish wine. All you're told is that it is found in abandoned forts around Cyrodil. There are over fifty forts, only about a dozen of which have the wine in them. Good luck.
    • And one of those, Fort Grief, isn't even accessible unless you're doing the associated quest.
  • In a similar fashion, especially if you're not into random dungeon searching, the Museum of Oddities in the Shivering Isles expansion.
• The Scrappy
  • The Adoring Fan. Even the in-house strategy guide agreed that he was annoying. The worst part is that he, unlike most other NPCs, respawns. Or you could think that's hilarious. YMMV.
  • Maglir, the biggest coward in the fighter's guild. Getting to splat him is satisfying.
  • Jeanne Frasoric.
  • Farwil Indarys. His irritating gameplay-related "qualities" are even lampshaded by the Count of Cheydinhal, Andel Indarys... his own father.
• Uncanny Valley - Some of the NPCs look and act like they have Down Syndrome, staring at you bug-eyed throughout every conversation. Without mods, almost every human face looks blotchy and blurry, like they paired high-poly models with Voodoo-era textures. Zooming in for conversation with any non-Argonian (especially Redguards!) immediately reminds you that you're playing a videogame. They really should have spent a few more megabytes on face textures.
  • The Brethren of Hackdirt invoke this deliberately with their unusually large eyes. At first, it's very unnerving. But once you find out who they are (and their goal), they're fucking terrifying.
• Villain Decay - It hits Mannimarco rather hard. Throughout the Mages Guild questline, he is set up as the Big Bad of that story, having characters become unnerved or outright terrified by knowing that he has reappeared, there's a pretty good poem-style book about his history to find which sets him up as a powerful evil, at one point, he deals a scarily effective, unexpected blow to the Mages Guild and the only survivor of the attack is terrified and tells you how he, concealed by magic, watched Mannimarco rip out his friend's soul and how he believes the guy actually could see through his magical disguise and pretty much just spared him for fun. Then Mannimarco effectively manages to corrupt and disrupt the Mages Council. By the end of the questline, you seriously get the feeling that everything's going to hell for the Mages Guild if you don't stop him quickly. So, after finding his hideout and slaughtering your way through his minions, he's a moderately powerful Altmer wizard whose spells might be slightly threatening at the very worst, and silencing him will reduce him to waving a dagger at you.Yep, this is the guy who Hannibal Traven thought was such a threat that he voluntarily soul-trapped himself to give you some sort of advantage.
  • Makes for quite an Anticlimax Boss.
  • It also hits him, arguably, in relation to Daggerfall, in a more visual way. Compare the King of Worms there with the Altmer of Oblivion: http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:King_of_Worms.
• Woobie - Antoinette Marie of the Dark Brotherhood