The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Alternative Character Interpretation:
    • The Empire of Tamriel ranges from the last bastion of goodness against the Aldmeri Dominion, to an oppressive foreign power that doesn't belong in Skyrim, to a fractured shell that deserves to collapse until someone worthy can reunite the continent.
    • Is the Emperor a craven appeaser who doesn't care what happens to his people as long as he can hold some power for himself? Is he a good man and a political realist, who signed the White-Gold Concordat to buy time for the Legion to recover? Is he simply an unremarkable person in an age that demands heroes? His behavior during the final mission of the Dark Brotherhood plotline shows that, whatever else he may be, he is definitely not a coward.
    • Is Ulfric Stormcloak a revolutionary hero who wants to restore Skyrim to its former glory, a power-hungry tyrant interested only in taking the throne, or a Stupid Good rebel who doesn't realize the long-term consequences of his actions? Just how controlled was he by the Dominion? Is he the kind of guy who thinks that, for anyone who died fighting the Thalmor, it was their own fault for being too weak and un-Nord-like to survive?
    • Amaund Motierre. Is he, as Astrid suggests, trying to get the Emperor assassinated to better his own position within the Elder Council or could it be a more collective feeling calling for desperate measures in desperate times? The Emperor seems to be aware of harsh opposition amongst his political elite. Is he really ruling that badly? Not to mention how, after the deed is done, Motierre seems to genuinely believe that the Emperor's death has "saved" the Empire.
    • Paarthurnax. Is he a genuine atoner who will (attempt to) lead the dragons to a peaceful future, or a very patient and manipulative Starscream with a Meaningful Name? Is this a case of Blue and Orange Morality, or perhaps of a forsaken namesake?
    • This trope also counts for Paarthurnax's arch enemies, the Blades. Are they indeed the heroic order they used to be, or are they just an embittered remnant of an age long gone? Is their hate for Paarthurnax reasonable or are they just too narrow minded to see beings can change?
    • The Graybeards. Indecisive wishy-washys who sit out every conflict, or guardians of a power that's too dangerous to let be abused? Or overly cautious guardians of a power that is too dangerous to let be abused but too useful to not use at all?
    • Astrid. Was she genuinely trying to protect the Brotherhood by selling you out to Maro, or was she trying to eliminate a threat to her leadership? A bit of both? Similarly, her disdain for the Night Mother and her control freak tendencies can be read as a simple refusal to give up her authority as leader... or her being a cynical realist who genuinely views her as an active liability to the Brotherhood given how by the time she joined the organization, it was already a shell of its former self and on the verge of collapse despite her comrades' fanatical worship of their unholy matron.
      • Likewise, was Maro tracking the sanctuary’s location and burning it down due to an unforgivably stupid mistake on her part, or was the Dark Brotherhood doomed long before the Dragonborn came into the picture, thus removing the burden of guilt from her since Maro would have attacked it anyway? It should be noted that Maro already knows exactly where the Sanctuary is and how to get in if you choose to destroy the Dark Brotherhood, but whether the Brotherhood was doomed from the start or if this is a case of "Schroedinger's Plot Convenience" is anyone's guess.
    • While Vasha is definitely an Asshole Victim, how much of an asshole is he? While it's easy to jump to conclusions and assume he's a rapist when he proudly brags about being a "defiler of daughters", he's just as likely to be a sleazy "bad boy" womanizer with a fetish for young virgin girls.
    • It takes surprisingly little effort to read Karliah as a manipulative, two-faced Daedra cultist as opposed to the tragic Woobie that she's presented as. Even though Mercer Frey may as well be a bandit who can turn himself invisible, she hypes him up as this invincible superhuman that even a Dragonborn doesn't stand a chance against, and pressures you and Brynjolf into selling your souls to Nocturnal because you just have to have her actively on your side to even stand a chance, apparently. She's also prone to lying or withholding information about the nastier aspects of her plans until it's too late to back out, and despite constantly claiming that Nocturnal doesn't want to be worshiped and even disparaging priests who've dedicated themselves to her, venerates her with the awe of a true believer singing praises of their god.
    • Erandur: a former Daedra worshiper who underwent a genuine Heel Faith Turn and is The Atoner trying to make up for the evil things he did as a Vaermina cultist? Or is he a Dirty Coward Fair-Weather Friend trying to sweep evidence of his past crimes under the rug?
  • And the Fandom Rejoiced:
    • DLC was announced on May first, 2012.
    • The announcement of the new engine, and its features, caused plenty of praise. For starters, talking with NPCs no longer freezes the world, and the person you're talking with still goes around their business and walks around, in addition to more detailed talking animations with full motion and better facial expressions.
    • Holy Shit! What is this? Forged in God's very flames!
    • The Oblivion-style level scaling isn't going to be used.
    • Played for laughs on the InsideXbox show SentUAMessage. After getting lots of questions about Elder Scrolls V, the two hosts are glad the questions about it are gonna be over when the game comes out... Then one of them brings up the fact that people will be asking about Elder Scrolls VI right from the get go.
    • M'aiq the Liar is still alive after two hundred years, and will serenade you with his sonorous falsehoods all you like should you find him.
    • After completing a few Dark Brotherhood quests, you gain the ability to summon a spectral assassin to help you. Guess who that assassin is? Lucien Lachance, still voiced by Wes Johnson!
    • The much larger pool of random lines and voice actors (and the fact that said voice actors are not keyed to a particular race and gender, mostly) severely reduces the incidence of Talking to Himself and Welcome to Corneria.
    • Beards. They're baaaaaack!
      • Predictably, M'aiq snarks about the fanbase being happy they can give their characters beards.
    • With the 1.5 update, Lydia can now be married.
    • A patch for the 1.6 update has been released, featuring the ability to fight on horseback. Players have been wanting to do that since Oblivion!
    • The Dawnguard announcement trailer and other material. Frost Giants, dragons that can dive under ice, master vampires, crossbows, spears and a fascinating slew of new locations (including Oblivion!). In addition, there are also new perk trees, including ones for both werewolves and vampires, as well as options to change character appearance, new Thu'um shouts and dragonbone weaponry.
    • With the announcement of Hearthfire came the joy of players absolutely itching to build their own homes. Ditto for when it was announced that you could adopt children as well.
    • The final story DLC, Dragonborn, is when the hype truly hit critical mass. Morrowind fans get to return to Solstheim, while the promise of a showdown against a fellow Dragonborn as well as an entirely new "world" to explore is tantalizing to fans of the vanilla game. Add in scores of new enemies, yet another plane of Oblivion to explore, the ability to ride dragons, and two monstrously powerful superbosses to fight, and you've got one hell of a way to end a beloved game.
    • Guess what game ended up being a launch title for the Nintendo Switch? This game, that's what! Not only is it the first time Skyrim can be played on the go, but it comes bundled with cute Zelda-themed bonuses... as well as removing the hated random vampire attacks on cities added with Dawnguard.
  • Anticlimax Boss:
    • Bethesda Boss Syndrome hits twice in during the main quest. The only plot relevant Dragon Priest (extremely powerful undead sorcerer) is easily the weakest of them all, and Alduin only appears to differ from the elite Ancient Dragons by having a few more hitpoints. Its even worse during the final battle in the afterlife, since you are assisted by the souls of three legendary Nord warriors.
    • At the end of the Thieves' Guild questline, a big deal is made about how powerful Mercer Frey is and why you won't be able to fight him alone. But the final battle ironically ends up as a one-on-one fight against someone who's no different than any regular old mook aside from the ability to briefly turn invisible. Even better, the room he's in is huge, spacious, and the perfect height to score an instant kill by Fus-Ro-Dah'ing him to his death.
    • Ulfric arguably. By the time you face him at the end of the Legion quest line, he's been hyped up as extremely dangerous and skilled in the Way of the Voice, but he goes down with a solid hit or two from a battle axe. His Dragon is the real threat, though if Ulfric can hit you with his Thu'um, things get real complicated, real fast... or they would, if you didn't have Tullius and Rikke bum-rushing him, already doing the meat of the work against him and Galmar (or even outright defeating them) by the time you get off the ground. Arguably from him only having an armour value in the single-digits... despite his clothing looking like it incorporates a breastplate and a coat of chainmail, only the bracers actually have an armour value, the rest is just normal clothing. Also, the way the game is set up all levelable NPCs (which includes Followers and most major characters) are locked at the level at which they first spawn, unlike in Oblivion or Fallout 3 where they dynamically level up as the player does. Since Ulfric shows up during the introductory cutscene, he's locked at level 1 for the entire game. Galmar, in contrast, puts up more of fight because he doesn't show up until later, and thus is generated at a higher level.
    • General Tullius. Not quite as pronounced as Ulfric though, as his abilities in combat aren't hyped up in the Stormcloak campaign at all since he's more of a tactician than a fighter.
    • Forsworn Briarhearts are the most dangerous Forsworn you'll fight thanks to their ridiculous attack power, tendency to dual-wield in combat, and powerful ice spells that will melt your health, stamina, and speed down to nothing. However, sneaky players can turn them into the easiest boss-level enemy by far if they forgo fighting and simply pickpocket the Briar Heart that's keeping them alive. Since you're basically ripping their artificial hearts out, you instantly kill them the second it leaves their body. While this can go for any dangerous boss level enemy you can kill via stealth, pick-pocketing is much safer since it pauses the game and puts you in a menu.
    • Nahkriin isn't the only anticlimactic Dragon Priest. Morokei, who is the second to last boss of the College of Winterhold's questline gets a ton of build up as a major threat while you explore Labyrinthian. Flashbacks show that he was too powerful to be killed conventionally, forcing Savos Aren to seal him away by sacrificing his friends so that he wouldn't escape into the outside world. He also regularly taunts you in his creepy-ass voice, completely draining your magicka as you approach his chamber. But once you actually fight him, you'll quickly realize that his fighting style is incredibly gimmicky and flawed thanks to his reliance on the Staff of Magnus. He can't actually hurt you at first since the staff drains your magicka, and then health. Players who invested plenty of perks into physical combat can simply bum rush him and stomp him flat before he empties your magicka bar, and even dedicated mages tend to have huge pools of magic to eat through, and can regenerate it faster than he can drain it (or at least stall it considerably) with the right gear and potions.
    • The Dawnguard DLC has the two-fer that is Durnehviir and Arch-Curate Vyrthur. While he's known and feared as the scourge of the Soul Cairn, Durnehviir is roughly about as powerful as a non-threatening Blood Dragon and only gets one unique trick in the form of summoning easily-disposed of skeleton goons. Vyrthur, on the other hand, at least gets a fun and challenging first phase that has him unleash hordes of frozen Chaurus and Falmer minions while bringing down the cathedral's roof on you... but the second phase? It starts with him backed up against a balcony. A very, very, VERY high balcony looking over the edge of a mountain. All it takes is one Fus Ro Dah to send him falling to his death.
    • While not hard, Lord Harkon at least puts up a fairly good fight once you confront him. However, stealth players will quickly realize that he spends a long time monologuing when you and Serana confront him... and you aren't locked into place until he specifically confronts you. You can sneak up behind him and instantly kill him via backstab while he's busy taunting Serana!
  • Awesome Music:
    • The main theme, Dragonborn. Yes, they're singing in the Dragon language. Lyrics here.
    • Try to listen to this theme without imagining yourself standing in a Norse lord's hall.
    • All hail the glorious dead.
    • Let's just say the whole damn soundtrack and be done with it. They've even gone and lifted some Crowning Musics Of Awesome from the previous games without so much as a remix.
    • Hell, even the 40-minute plus piece titled "Skyrim Atmosphere" is really, really good.
    • Under your voice they will cower!
    • It's got the usual remixes of varying quality, but this one stands out, combining one of the tavern songs with the main theme... and the singer's voice is about as beautiful as the graphics in the game.
    • Another, by the same singer.
    • When it comes to remixes, this takes the cake.
    • Another cover of the main theme...with an electric violin.
    • "Far Horizons" is just gorgeous.
    • This singer portraying an entire Draugr choir and actually singing in Dragon language, complete with acoustic effects and drums to fit the dark chilling atmosphere, is just beyond words.
    • Here's a gorgeous vocal and guitar cover of Tale of the Tongues.
    • One They Fear is a song that has got many a player killed, simply because they got so pumped while it was playing that they attacked the dragon in question head-on.
    • The music they play when you learn a Word of Power or slay a Dragon and absorb it's soul. They gave you your own Theme Music Power-Up for this game.
  • Base Breaker:
    • The Civil War campaign is the catalyst for a few of these. Jump in any forum topic about it and expect to see a Flame War. Are the Empire the last, best hope for ensuring humanity's prosperity and survival against the genocidal Thalmor, or brutal oppressors holding on to a shadow of their former glory and crossed the line trying to appease the Thalmor? Are the Stormcloaks a bunch of heroic freedom fighters pushing a brutal empire out of their land and the Only Sane Men who know the only real way to deal with the Thalmor, or are they a bunch of bull-headed, racist idiots that are unwittingly giving the Thalmor exactly what they want and ultimately are just as bad as the Thalmor?
    • Cicero. He's a fangirl darling for being so damned adorable, tragic, hilarious, and truly loyal to the Dark Brotherhood's virtues and beliefs, but many people find him grating thanks to his screechy voice, hysterical behavior, creepy obsession with the Night Mother, and lack of an indoor voice.
    • Fellow Dark Brotherhood member Astrid catches a lot of hate (to the point that she's labeled as an outright Scrappy on TV Tropes) thanks to her selfish Control Freak tendencies and betrayal of the player to Commander Maro, which not only ruins a perfect assassination plot, but gets most of the Brotherhood (herself included) killed. Not following the Dark Brotherhood's tenants is another mark against her. However, her loud hatedom is accompanied by a much quieter fanbase that feel her final moments and genuine love for her "family" redeem her when all is said and done, and is the subject of quite a few mods that allow you to romance her, summon her has as a Spectral Assassin, or otherwise flesh out her role in the story.
    • While the Thalmor are definitely meant to be hated, there's a fairly big divide between those who Love to Hate them for being so deliciously evil and satisfying to kill, and those who just plain hate them due to feeling one-dimensional and undercooked as a major faction.
    • The Thieves Guild attracts some seriously strong opinions from both sides. It's not uncommon to hear people decry them as the worst guild in the game thanks to the sheer amount of unlikable Jerkass characters you're forced to buddy up with, the lack of story missions actually focused on stealing things, the overarching plot falling apart when you think about it for more than five seconds, and it being one of several instances where you're railroaded into helping a Daedric Prince with no say in the matter. However, it's also one of the better-received guilds overall since while you're forced to become a Nightingale, you aren't made the Guildmaster proper until you've put in enough legwork with sidequests that actually do revolve around thievery and building criminal connections, which helps it feel more in line with guild progression in older games. Likewise, while you do work with plenty of assholes, the Guild is also home to its fair share of Ensemble Darkhorses such as Brynjolf, Karliah, and Delvin Mallory. And while stealth isn't necessary to beat the Guild's missions, they end up actually being rather fun if you commit to it anyway (with the the Goldenglow Estate and Dwemer Museum jobs being standouts).
    • The mere fact that he wants Paarthurnax dead and won't help you unless you murder him means that Esbern ends up on many players' bad side. Yet unlike fellow Blade Delphine, he manages to avoid Scrappy status and instead settles into this trope's territory. The fact that he's much less of a domineering Jerkass means that players are more willing to hear him out, and he genuinely seems remorseful yet honorbound as opposed to spiteful. There's also the matter that years of isolation have taken a visible mental toll on him, meaning that he gets further sympathy points from players who still refuse to kill Paarthurnax.
    • While he started off as a Scrappy, Nazeem has developed into more of a Base Breaker thanks to the passage of time. While his condescending remarks and arrogant behavior still mean that plenty of players still can't stand him, many players have come around to liking him in the sense that they Love to Hate him as opposed to just generally hating him. While definitely not nice, he's still fairly benign as far as Skyrim's Jerkass characters go, and his unique brand of Upper Class Twit behavior does add flavor to Whiterun's otherwise (mostly) friendly atmosphere.
    • Funnily enough, the above has come to apply to Heimskr. While his loud, incessant bellowing about Talos still makes him a target of all sorts of abuse, he's still ultimately a rather inoffensive NPC who adds flavor to Whiterun. It's not uncommon for players that killed him to find themselves missing his hammy sermons.
    • Isran from the Dawnguard DLC. You'll either hate him for being a rabid vampire-hating Jerkass who dehumanizes Serana when he talks to her, or like him for his surprisingly tender-hearted moments that culminate in him becoming nicer to Serana and his Reasonable Authority Figure tendencies when dealing with the player. Most players can agree, however, that he wasn't given anywhere near the amount of focus that he deserved.
  • Best Level Ever:
    • Blackreach. An absolutely huge underground cavern (approx. four square miles) home to an abandoned Dwarven city and some of the most unique and breathtaking environmental design in the entire game. It even comes with it's own Bonus Boss! You'd have to spend several hours exploring the vast compound to find everything, but you'll love every bit of it.
    • While the College of Winterhold might just be the least popular of the four main guilds, very few people have anything bad to say about Labyrinthian, the questline's final dungeon. It's a terrifying deep dive into a crypt filled with a surprisingly diverse array of enemies such as spectral Draugr, spectral hounds, a Wispmother, trolls, a skeleton dragon, and of course, the Dragon Priest boss at the end. And as you make your descent deeper and deeper into the crypt, you watch the ghostly echoes reenacting the doomed expedition a younger Savos Aren led that ended in the deaths of all his friends and destroyed his optimistic worldview, all while Morokei, the aforementioned Dragon Priest, keeps taunting you due to believing that you're Aren, returning to finish what he started all those years ago.
    • Dawnguard has the Forgotten Vale, which is a vast, mountainous valley that rivals Blackreach in size, and boasts a truly beautiful landscape with wonders such as frozen waterfalls, a misty clearing, an above-ground Falmer village built into a mountainside, and culminates in a trek through a seemingly abandoned chapel full of creepy frozen Falmer. You've got unique sidequests that task you with hunting down Frost Giants and ancient books written by the Falmer, memorable boss fights against a pair of dragons that dive in and out of an icy lake and a Snow Elf vampire who tears his arena apart in a bid to kill you, and your prize for defeating said Snow Elf vampire is a special bow that can either blot out the sun, or turn it into a laser-spewing Kill Sat.
  • Broken Base: Winning the Game & Developer of The Year awards at the Spike VGAs: you either thought they were deserved, or absolutely dumbfounded that the team which released a game that was borderline unplayable on one of the formats it was released on won these awards over other deserving titles and developers.
  • Common Knowledge:
    • Khajiit aren’t banned from entering Skyrim's cities, Khajiit caravans are, something the game draws attention to when a Khajiit assassin is tailing you in Riften when you're looking for Esbern. The reason for this misconception is due to the game admittedly not doing the best job at communicating this, since NPC's talking about the supposed "Khajiit ban" always do so in the context of the caravans being forced to camp outside of the cities that they visit.
    • While the jury’s out on whether Saadia is the good guy or bad guy of her sidequest, killing her does not cause Thalmor assassins to come after you. There are a few things you can do that causes Elenwen to send out her hit squads, and none of them are associated with her sidequest in any way.
  • Creepy Awesome: Cicero. The guy is like a male Harley Quinn. Really, the Dark Brotherhood in general is this.
  • Crowning Level Of Awesome: Blackreach. It's an abandoned Dwemer City stuffed to the gills with beautiful scenery, tons of buildings, interesting enemies such as brainwashed humans who serve the Falmer, a unique dragon summoned by Fus Ro Dah-ing the giant orb on the ceiling, and even a stray random giant wandering around down there. There's also the fact that the game has a nice little callback to Oblivion, as not only can you find Sinderion's corpse, but you get to go on another Nirnroot gathering quest only with the objective being to find Blackreach-native Red Nirnroot.
  • Demonic Spiders:
    • Chaurus. They take forever to kill, spit poison, and will kill you pretty much instantly if they get close enough to melee. Oh, and aside from the individual Chaurus that spawn in the swamps of Hjaalmarch, they're often fought in the company of several other members of their brethren, as well as the equally annoying Falmer that raise them.
      • Dawnguard decided that garden-variety Chaurus aren't dangerous enough, so they introduced a variant that can fly. Chaurus Hunters are basically Tamriel's answer to the Cazador, buzzing around as quick as a whistle while dealing horrifying damage with their poison and melee attacks. They're every bit as durable as their baby forms, but are harder to hit thanks to their newfound speed and much more slender frames.
    • Giant Sabrecats. 900 pounds of pure muscle and feline fury coupled with a nasty disposition and a tendency to creep up on you from behind, and even later in the game they can do tremendous amounts of damage (early on they pretty much kill you in a couple swipes). And they are insanely fast for something the size of a bear too. Given how they are basically sabretooth tigers, it makes sense, but it gets a little ridiculous when Sabrecats are scarier than dragons.
    • Most of the enemies you find inside Dwemer ruins are this. The spiders aren't too bad, but the Sphere Guardians are very hard to outrun and dangerous to fight head-on, and the Centurions are daunting Mighty Glaciers packing a very powerful steam blast attack that hits even harder than an Ancient Dragon's fire/frost breath. And those are just the constructs: Falmer and their Chaurus buddies are also a common sight in these places.
    • Bears. Huge aggro radius that's hard to avoid, runs nearly fast enough to keep up with a sprinting horse, takes as much hurt as it can dole out (i.e. a lot) and always ends up in the middle of the damn road you want to travel down. Unlike wolves, which howl pretty much as soon as they're aware of you, the bear silently gets up from its nap, by which time you've probably already wandered into its aggro radius. And they're freakin' everywhere. After Unrelenting Force, your most used shout will be Kyne's Peace because of them. Or Animal Allegiance.
    • Higher leveled enemy mages can be a real pain in the ass thanks to them not suffering any of the same drawbacks that mage players do. They throw out powerful spells with reckless abandon, yet thanks to their massive magicka pools, quick magicka regen, and 50% magicka discount when casting spells, they're in no real danger of running out of magic and can cast tons of these spells in quick succession. Their spells are further empowered by all three "augmented (x) element" perks, and when you fight them you'll quickly realize that they’ve got aimbot-level accuracy with their spells, and have an annoying tendency to strafe you when you get in close in hopes of killing them in melee. The Adept and Expert-level spells fired off by the strongest mages will also cause a ton of Sensory Abuse thanks to the exploding flames and lightning bolts making it hard to see what's going on, and just to add insult to injury? Trying to use Unrelenting Force to bowl over a bunch of Mages or send them falling to their deaths often results in them firing up a Ward and No Selling it.
    • Elder and Ancient dragons. Just when you're powerful enough to be convinced that Blood and Frost dragons aren't any more of a threat, these bastards show up and start two-shotting you. Hitting them with Dragonrend just puts them on the ground, where they can more easily kill you (it helps to bring a shield along, especially enchanted ones like the Spellbreaker, to defend against their breath blasts and bites, if you don't mind giving up the use of two-handed weapons). Dawnguard takes it even further by introducing Revered and Legendary Dragons, who hit even harder and have a new Shout added to their arsenal: Drain Vitality, which saps your health, stamina, and magic. Because clearly, Elders and Ancients weren't frustrating enough.
    • Spriggans are ridiculous. They can appear seemingly out of nowhere in forested areas, and they're more than capable of killing you fast by either quickly draining your health with insects or tearing huge chunks out of your hide with their claws. And once you get them down to low health, they're able to quickly fully restore their health making you have to wear them down all over again. Oh, and did we mention that they can call animals to help them out? Or that their call radius is huge, and they're often fought smack in the middle of bear territory? On the bright side, they're a lot easier to handle the more you level up... with the caveat that Dawnguard introduced Spriggan Earth Mothers, which are still dangerous even to high-leveled players.
    • Forsworn Briarhearts must be fought with extreme caution. They're able to quickly rip huge amounts of health from you with their powerful dual-wielding attacks, and they're more than happy to leave you as a sitting duck with the aforementioned Ice Storm spell. And they rarely appear alone, so even if you're able to defeat the Briarheart, his weaker but still formidable lackeys are more than capable of picking you off.
    • Giants and their Mammoth livestock. Thankfully, they're usually passive and won’t attack unless you provoke them. But if you're given a quest to hunt one down, want the items that they drop upon dying, or otherwise accidentally provoke them? You'll be pounded into a pancake (or launched into orbit) by these guys thanks to their sky-high strength and meaty health pools. They can also move deceptively quick once they're angry, meaning that you're not as safe as you might believe when you hang back and pepper them with spells and arrows from a distance.
    • Falmer are some of the most dangerous humanoid enemies you can face. Like with the Forsworn, their warriors often deal massive damage through dual-wielding while their mages are incredibly powerful and favor Ice spells that slow you down. However, their archers will whittle you down with poisoned arrows, and can be hard to track down in the darkness of their subterranean lairs. They're also frequently encountered alongside the venomous, tanky, hard-hitting Chaurus pets for extra frustration points. While stealth works even better on them than with most other enemies since they're blind, you'll need to invest a lot of experience and perks into the related skill tree (as well as pack footwear that muffles your movement or a Quiet-Casted Muffle spell) since they make up for their lack of eyesight with uncanny, damn-near superhuman hearing.
    • The Dawnguard DLC has the infamous vampire squads that will show up in walled cities at night. They don't qualify for this trope because of the threat they pose to the player, however (though you still don't want to take them lightly). It's because of how dangerous they are to the townsfolk. The very, very squishy and suicidally moronic townsfolk who will die en masse as they rush these foul creatures of the night with wimpy Iron Daggers dressed in nothing but their plainclothes. Vampire gangs are infamous for reducing cities to ghost towns and slaughtering quest-giving NPC's en masse, which is why the Switch rerelease, and later the Special Edition disabled them outright.
    • The Werebears encountered in Dragonborn are thankfully rare, because when they do show up, you'll quickly realize that the only thing worse than a bear is a manbear. They're bigger, meaner, faster, and much stronger than what you're used to, and often attack in groups of three. If a trio of shirtless men run up and start punching you, rush them down and kill them fast, or get ready to burn through your supply of healing potions as you try to patch up the insane damage they deal to you.
    • Mounted Rieklings/Riekling Chargers. Rieklings in general are very dangerous to low level players because of how deceptively powerful they are, but they're at least frail to compensate. Turns out that somehow, just riding a boar makes your garden variety Riekling a hell of a lot more durable and even harder-hitting than usual. They also can't be flung off of cliffs with Unrelenting Force or tossed around with Cyclone, meaning the even high level players are going to be in for a rough time once one bum-rushes you at full tilt.
  • Disappointing Last Level: The penultimate dungeon consists of the same Draugr enemies you've seen in every ruin and tomb up to that point, the only catch is this time you have no follower and the dungeon is a lot longer. Depending on how much you've leveled, this can mean either a swarm of standard Draugr, or Scourges who may have shouts (and will destroy your stamina with frost spells) and Deathlords who do have shouts and, on top of that, take lots of abuse before going down. Given that dungeons aren't even that long, and the Disappointing Last Level of Morrowind... it's an improvement.
  • Discredited Meme:
    • Youtube commentors got absolutely sick of the "Arrow in the Knee" jokes as early as a month after this game came out!
    • Readers on the Skyrim board at GameFAQs have also become sick of the Toeh meme spawned there.
  • Draco in Leather Pants:
    • Despite all that the quest/story designers did to make you want to hate the Thalmor (see A Nazi by Any Other Name in the main page)... some people still inexplicably like the Thalmor, and not in a "love to hate" way.
      • Ondolemar in particular attracts a lot of this thanks to being the only Thalmor member that can potentially treat the player civilly. This does not, however, make him the Token Good Teammate: to make him friendly towards you, you have to rat out a Talos worshipper to him. The fact that he doesn't take any action against him has led to speculation that he's merely a Punch Clock Villain doing the bare minimum to keep his job... but analysis of the game's coding reveals that this is only because of a bug: he's supposed to arrest him, which is an interaction restored by the Unofficial Patch.
    • Many players feel that the Forsworn are misunderstood freedom fighters working for a just cause to overthrow a government that demonizes them, and wish that they could join them in the Civil War. Hmm... perhaps it's the raiding, genocide, and implicit rape, cannibalism, and Cruelty Rich Leather they practice that explains why it's not an option.
    • Speaking of the Civil War, expect around half of the player base to do this for the side they support while invoking Ron the Death Eater on the other. While either side could objectively be viewed as the "right side", they do not come without their flaws either.
  • Ensemble Darkhorse:
    • Lydia, again. Most were very disappointed when a minor (and fixable) bug prevented players from marrying her (fixed in the 1.5 patch, or by mods on the PC before that). Bethesda seemed to pick up on this, and ended up fleshing out Lydia's personality more with the Dawnguard and Dragonborn to where she's not only more of a smart-ass than she was in the vanilla game (which was only present in one line of dialogue), but to where she warms up to you the more you travel with her.
    • The Spectral Assassin, in other words, Lucien Lachance rides again.
    • Paarthurnax, due to him being The Mentor and one of the two (and later, three) friendly dragons. Several players have tried to slaughter the Blades for even suggesting killing him.
    • Brynjolf of the Thieves' Guild. With his accent, friendliness and tendency to affectionately call your PC lass/lad, so many players were disappointed to find him unmarriable.
    • Vilkas and Farkas of the Companions, but especially Farkas for being good-looking and a total sweetheart of a man. Happily, you can marry them. Aela is also pretty popular, can't imagine why. And like with Vilkas and Farkas, she's also a marriage candidate.
    • If the kink memes are anything to go by, Ondolemar, Ancano, Nelacar... really, almost any named male High Elf, likely because of their height, attractiveness, fashion sense and Bastard Boyfriend-ish attitudes.
    • Cicero, thanks to his hilarious dialogue, surprisingly sad backstory, and his voice actor's deliciously hammy performance.
    • Among the Jarls, Balgruuf the Greater is quite the fandom darling. That tends to happen whenever you're a Reasonable Authority Figure of a Jarl who takes threats to your hold seriously and treats the player with respect. It's not uncommon for players to side with the Empire during the Civil War simply because they don't want to betray him and kick him out of Whiterun.
    • An interesting example of this trope would be none other than Emperor Titus Mede himself. While he's the leader of one of the Civil War's Base Breaker factions and is often criticized as an ineffective ruler', many people nonetheless respect him on a personal level for showing no fear in the face of certain death when you confront him at the end of the Dark Brotherhood questline. That takes serious balls.
  • Evil Is Sexy:
    • Astrid, Matron of the Dark Brotherhood.
    • Alva, scantily-clad vampiric seductress extraordinaire.
    • Not a perfect example due to being a Daedric Prince (their morality is vastly different from Tamriel's sentient species), but Nocturnal is certainly this due to being the patron of the Thieves' Guild and boasting one hell of a plunging neckline.
      • A lot more conventionally evil are Molag Bal and Mephala, who don't make physical appearances, yet manage to step into this territory purely due to their seductive, attractive voices. And no, the former being the King of Rape does not, in any way, deter horny fangirls, as the comments' section of this video can attest.

Commenter: You guys need Akatosh.

    • Even among those that absolutely hate them, a lot of people find the Thalmor in general to embody this due to just about every member being a sharply dressed and inhumanly attractive Altmer. Ondolemar and Ancano in particular have rabid fangirl followings, and plenty of fanboys wish it was possible to romance Elenwen as well.
    • And there's the female Forsworn for their choice of clothing: incredibly skimpy Fur Bikinis.
    • Eola, the psycho cannibal cultist who kicks off Namira's Daedric Quest. Repulsive eating habits aside, she's quite the Unkempt Beauty and speaks in the same seductive voice Susan Eisenberg gives to other "FemaleSultry" characters.
  • Fountain of Memes: The entire game.
  • Game Breaker:
    • The Windshear, a unique sword found aboard The Katariah causes unfailing stagger to EVERY enemy. Even Alduin. This effectively makes melee fighting anyone or anything with one on one combat a guaranteed win.
    • You can create some ridiculously overpowered equipment if you have maxed out the enchanting and smithing skills with the skills' respective perks.
    • According to the Skyrim wiki, your follower is able to pick up a giant's club (as you can't do it yourself). They will be able equip it and and thus be able to inflict over 200 points of damage... The trick is actually finding one, however. This is likely to be patched out, if it hasn't been already.
    • Max Enchanting plus the relevant perks lets you craft a set of equipment that reduce the mana costs of two magic schools to zero, letting you cast spells from those two schools for free.
    • Max Conjuration plus perks lets you summon two Dremora Lords at once. For reference, ONE Dremora Lord can kill a Giant in around three hits. This would not be a Game Breaker if it weren't for the fact that there is a trivially easy way to level Conjuration: cast Soul Trap repeatedly on a dead body. Or merely hold a bound weapon in your hands with some hostiles in the area.
    • Max Smithing and its perks lets you build and upgrade the strongest possible weapons. You can even upgrade some of the unique artifacts like the Mace of Molag Bal and Spellbreaker. Meshes well with Max Enchanting too.
    • Add in Alchemy, and you can boost your Enchanting and Smithing skills past the 100 limit. Make a potion that boosts the effectiveness of Enchantments, then enchant a few armor pieces with Fortify Alchemy to boost the effectiveness of your brewed potions. Repeat ad infinitum, then make a few Fortify Smithing potions, add the enchantment of the same to some armor pieces, then upgrade your equipment for weapons that do over 100 damage a hit, without any bonuses, and armor pieces with the same in defense, body armor maxing over 200. Then you can add on to them your choice of enchantments, two for each armor piece plus a ring and necklace. Make yourself immune to magic, immune to Frost, Flame and Shock, double the regen rate of your stats or more, etc.
      • You can speed the process along by making Fortify Restoration potions, which, likely due to a glitch, enhance the capabilities of your other enchanted equipment after taking it off and putting it back on again. Making a full set of Fortify Alchemy equipment and then performing this loop can lead to potions so strong they loop around into negative numbers after a few iterations. Make some Fortify Enchantment and Smithing potions once you're at the apex and even your pathetic starting equipment and a few petty soul gems can be made to one-shot anything in the game. And the ingredients for Fortify Restoration aren't even rare.
    • Once again, the Skeleton Key makes Lockpicking a joke. It just requires a lot of patience. You have to give up the very next quest after getting it, and it's only acquired near the end of the Thieves Guild questline, but there's nothing stopping you from taking your sweet time getting around to it. There's a Lockpicking perk with the same effect, so once you've had your fun with the Skeleton Key and leveled up enough, you can finish the quest and not lose a stitch.
    • The Oghma Infinium. It adds 5 skill points to all six branches of a relevant skill tree (Thief, Mage, Warrior), for a total of 30 points overall. However, there's also a glitch that allows players to level all the way up to 81, and you can acquire the Infinium at any point after achieving Level 15.
    • The Shadow Warrior perk, combined with the damage-boosting sneak attack perks makes you capable of literally walking up to an enemy's face, crouching for a second, and immediately attacking. Shadow Warrior not only makes the player invisible for a second, but completely erases the "Detected" status, making the sneak attack multipliers work even against an enemy standing right in front of you. This means you can one-shot every single enemy in the game if your weapon damage is high enough. If you're using a dagger (and why wouldn't you be, with the 15x sneak damage buff from the Assassin's Blade perk), you'll also usually get the hilarious effect of you teleporting behind your enemy to slit their throat before they can finish saying "Where are you?".
    • Max Illusion perks and vampirism. Vampires gain an extra 25% effectiveness to Illusion (even if the stat is already maxed) and the Vampire Seduction ability (with Stage 3 vampirism). With this combination, your character can offset every Illusion resistance in the game, and according to the UESP wiki, there is no character capable of defending against it.
      • Hell, Illusion in general is just plain busted. Granted, it isn't immediately amazing and you can be a bit underpowered for a while if you commit to leveling it up, but the results are definitely worth it. You can turn group battles into chaotic free-for-alls by Furying enemies and turning them against each other while cleaning up the survivors of the little civil war you started. Likewise, you can turn hostile enemies calm and get a big, meaty hit in on them, or use Courage so they won't run away from you. Also, Stealth players get a HUGE benefit from investing in Illusion because of how well these skills synergize with each other. Leveling it up enough will give you access to Silent casting, meaning that you can pelt people with fireballs, heal yourself, muffle your footsteps, cause Fury-induced brawls, and summon Daedra without blowing your cover. Muffle, likewise, makes you completely silent when you move, making it a godsend for sneaky backstabbing types. Invisibility, while tied to a high-level spell with a bit of a long windup, will also help you sneak past annoyingly tough enemies or make it much easier to move around undetected so you can get into the ideal position to sneak-kill your enemies.
    • The Impact perk, which allows you to stun any opponent if you double cast a projectile spell, makes it impossible to lose any sort of one-on-one battle as long as you have enough Magicka potions on hand to keep the infinite stunlock going.
    • Combining all the needed Smithing perks and the appropriate skills of an Assassin (e.g. the Assassin's perk and the Back Stab enchantment, which further boost a weapon's damage while sneaking), you can One-Hit Kill any enemy, even Dragons! And if your Sneak skills are at maximum with all the needed perks, you can possibly sneak up to any enemy even in broad daylight, and right in clear view of them, and strike them dead in on swipe, and no one will notice.
    • Most players' bread-and-butter Dragon Shout is Fus Ro Dah/Unrelenting Force, and it's not just because it's hilarious and satisfying to send NPC's flying across a room or off a mountainside. It's also one of the game's best dueling tools: depending on your positioning, it guarantees you an instant kill against any enemy that isn't a dragon, a mammoth, the Ebony Warrior, or Kaarstag thanks to the power of gravity and the way fall damage is calculated. Even if there isn't a high enough drop nearby, the time the enemy spends getting back on their feet is time you can spend hacking them apart unopposed, and the recharge time isn't super unreasonable should you be wearing an Amulet of Talos, have an active Blessing of Talos, or both.
    • Marked For Death. Had enough of Demonic Spiders and That One Boss tanking everything you throw at them? This handy-dandy low-cost shout will lower their armor and defense values. And the debuffs STACK, meaning that tougher Damage Sponge Bosses will find themselves as easily ripped apart as toilet paper the longer a fight goes on.
    • While Skyrim may belong to the Nords, an Orc Dragonborn classed as a warrior will break the game over his/her knee. The Orc racial trait, Berserk, is a free massive damage AND defense boost that will let you splatter even the toughest enemies across the walls while their attacks do little more than tickle you. While the effect only lasts for 60 seconds, that's all the time you need to take down a problematic horde of enemies or a particularly tough boss-level opponent.
  • Germans Love David Hasselhoff:
    • Whether it's getting a 40/40 from Weekly Famitsu (the very first western game to get it) or being one of the first games to be released for the Nintendo Switch, Skyrim seems to be surprisingly popular in Japan.
    • Conversely, quite a number of western gamers like the Japanese dubbed voices of the game (which for the PC can easily be had by a simple language change), particularly that of Paarthurnax.
  • Goddamned Bats:
    • Necromancers. It isn't that they toss frost spells or summon skeletons, that's easy. It isn't that they come in packs, though that is more worrisome. No, the frustrating thing about necromancers is that they can revive each other. And you always seem to miss one.
    • Not to mention, low level Draugr. They're easy to kill but they tend to appear in large numbers making them annoying to fight, and the loot they drop isn't really anything special.
    • Wolves are fairly weak, even at the start, and even if they ambush you (which happens a lot) they don't do much damage. What puts them in this category, however, is that they transmit Rockjoint, which will cut down your melee damage by 25%. And it's almost impossible to stop them from getting at least one hit in, so you'll be traveling back to town a lot to get it cured (unless you stock up on "Cure Disease" potions).
  • Good Bad Bug: Wouldn't be a Bethesda game without them. From ragdoll hilarity to physics gaffes to invisible hats that you can wear with other hats, the game has it all!
  • Hell Is That Noise: Wait.... that sounded like wind... rushing past a giant pair of wings? By Akatosh, that's a dragon!
    • Was that a roar? Oh fuck there's a red dot BY AZURA, TO ARMS! A DRAGON!
    • Are those bees? SWEET TALOS THOSE ARE BEES!
    • Did I hear a clicking sound... CHAURUS BY MARA THAT'S A CHAURUS GET IT AWAY!
      • Hmm, was that another clicking sou- BLESSED KYNARETH, IT'S A FROSTBITE SPIDER! KILL IT KILL IT!
    • Hmm... Was that a growl I just heard o- BY YSMIR IT'S A DRAUGR!
    • Was that a "whoosh" soun- SWEET STENDARR IT WAS! FIREBALL!
    • What was that clattering noi– GREAT BOETHIAH, A FALMER ARCHER! RUN!
  • Hilarious in Hindsight: An in-game book describing the events of Oblivion takes special care to mention that it was the Mythic Dawn, and not the Dark Brotherhood, who assassinated Uriel Septim. The author even points out that it would have been suicidal for the Brotherhood to have taken out a contract on the Emperor, since it would have brought the whole of the Empire's forces down on them and destroyed them. Guess what you get to do after joining the Dark Brotherhood in Skyrim?
  • Hype Backlash: Arguably gaming's ultimate example of this.
  • Internet Backdraft: The Civil War storyline. Debates regarding how and why one side is better than the other can quickly get rather flame-hot and passionate. Fridge Brilliance kicks in when you realize that this is how people often react with one another when discussing similarly broad Real Life disputes.
  • It's Short, So It Sucks:
    • Some of the games' major subplots could be finished in an afternoon, and the main quest will take about 20-30 hours. Given that only one or two of these hours is Disappointing Last Level compared to others in the series... it's probably a bit better that they didn't decide to lengthen the story. Once you finish, however, there's a ton of sidequests quests, ranging from questlines like the College and Companions to just retrieving an item for someone, and there's also finding all the Words of Power. Even if you don't have a quest to do, the game world is just so deep that you can pick a compass direction and head off into the unknown, you're bound to come across a new tomb or cave you haven't explored yet. Thus, if you're planning to plumb the game for all it has to offer outside the two main story quests, you're going to be spending a lot of time in Skyrim.
    • Because of the new random quest system, there are fewer scripted storyline quests for all the questlines compared to previous Elder Scrolls games, thus it can feel a bit jarring to be proclaimed a trusted and veteran member of your guild and their Chosen One just shortly after joining. These sorts of Pacing Problems are particularly obvious with the Companions questline, where one gets to join their Circle of most trusted veteran warriors literally after the initiation and then doing one more quest.
  • Magnificent Bastard:
    • Sanguine, that lovable Prince of hedonism. Posing as a friendly bar-goer, he tricks you into competing in a drinking contest that leaves you frantically running all over Skyrim as you try to piece together what happened between your crazy night of debauchery. What follows is a medieval flavored version of The Hangover, culminating in a confrontation with him in his Plane of Oblivion where he greets you as a friend and gives you his staff, the Sanguine Rose, as a reward for enduring all the bullshit you had to deal with.
    • Hermaeus Mora really comes into his own during Dragonborn. He's the master of Miraak, the DLC's Big Bad, and is responsible for his rise to power and all the weird phenomena plaguing Solstheim as a result. Since Miraak is looking to betray him, he sets him up for failure by helping out the player... but not before making you offer up the shaman of the Skaal to him so he can finally get his slimy claws and tentacles on their ancient, well-guarded secrets. Ultimately, you do all of old Mora's dirty work for him, and he gets to slither away after getting exactly what he wants, making him the one storyline villain who wins in the end.
  • Memetic Badass:
    • Lydia quickly became one. Though housecarls in general are pretty tough, Lydia is the one almost every player has. She can survive being hurled off a mountain.
    • Giants too, due to a Good Bad Bug that lets them knock players into space with their clubs.
    • Ysgramor, in-universe. He can eat soup with a fork.
    • Horses.
    • For most people, slaying a dragon is the most awesome thing you can do in your life. For the Dovahkiin, it's all in a day's work.
  • Memetic Mutation:
  • Moe: Vaermina of all characters ends up qualifying as this. While past games had her look like a shriveled old crone (and she never makes a physical appearance in this one), her high-pitched, girlish voice makes her sound downright adorable.
  • Moral Event Horizon: Whether or not various members of the various factions cross it and if so, when, is probably a subject of huge debate... but one thing is for sure: if the player is out for One Hundred Percent Completion (and sometimes even if they aren't), the Dragonborn is GOING to cross this. It's only a matter of which completely irredeemable act is performed first, to catapult the Dovahkiin into Complete Monster territory: the Namira, Boethiah, Molag Bal, Mehrunes Dagon, Mephala and a smattering of Dark Brotherhood quests are all good candidates.
    • And of course the Thalmor started the game on the wrong side of this. But if you want a specific moment, them delivering the severed heads of every Blade in their territory to Emperor Mede on his birthday certainly counts.
    • Delphine crosses it when she orders you to murder Paarthurnax. Esbern at least has the excuse of being paranoid and isolated for a big portion of his life, but being of sound mind makes Delphine's decision come off as little more than an act of spiteful cruelty.
    • Erikur can potentially cross this by getting a Bosmer slave girl sent to Elenwen's torture chambers for not returning his affections during Diplomatic Immunity. Thankfully, this can easily be avoided by having someone else cause a distraction so you can slip away from the party.
    • Mercer Frey crossed this back when he killed his trusted ally Gallus and pinned the blame on his friend's lover Karliah, destroying her life as a way to cover his ass for Gallus' murder.
    • For Jaree-Ra and Deeja, there's them slaughtering the entire crew of the Icerunner despite promising the Dragonborn that they would help get them to safety. Hell, them trying to dupe naïve, unsuspecting people into committing atrocities like this also arguably counts.
    • Alain Dufont, one of your targets during the Dark Brotherhood questline, definitely crossed this. What kind of man seduces a woman so he can rob her surrogate family and frame her for it? A soulless, irredeemable piece of filth, that’s what. Not only did this awful act of betrayal convince Muiri that she needed to contact the Dark Brotherhood, but Windhelm's guards will know you killed him, and won't care because the man was, in their own words, "bandit trash".
      • Unfortunately, Muiri herself crosses this not by hiring you to kill him, but by putting a hit out on Nilsine Shatter-Shield as well. Nilsine had nothing to do with her life being ruined, and the act itself is little more than a spiteful, nasty way to hurt her mother.
  • Most Annoying Sound:
    • Get used to hearing enemy NPCs tell you that YOU NEVER SHOULD HAVE COME HERE!.
    • Heimskr, who might be considered something of an Expy of Cromwell, the preacher from Megaton in Fallout 3. Even the wiki has a list of ways to stealth kill him to shut him up.
    • Cicero in general can be absolutely OBNOXIOUS to some, thanks to lacking any kind of indoor voice and always screeching at the top of his lungs when talking about the Night Mother.
    • When you summon the Spectral Assassin, he blabbers on and on and on and on and ON and ON about topics relating to the Dark Brotherhood, rather unbecoming for someone who was an expert assassin in life and thus would know when to put a lid on it.
    • "Do you get to the Cloud District very often? Oh, what am I saying, of course you don't." If you like to spend a lot of time in Whiterun, be prepared to have Nazeem say this every time you pass him by. Every. Time.
  • Most Wonderful Sound: When the barbarian choir starts singing, something awesome is always going to happen.
    • When you kill them (and it's easy to do, they go down in about one shot), skeletons make a delightful clattering sound when their bones hit the floor.
  • Narm:
    • The marriage dialogue.

Player: "Interested in me, are you?"
NPC: "Well, yes. Why wouldn't I be? Are you... interested in me?"
Player: "Yes. Yes I am."
*Wedding*

    • The werewolf ritual's Special Effects Failure. The arm is lifted, a dagger runs across it, and SPLAT! The basin is instantly half-filled with blood.
    • All NPCs have combat lines that relate to their position and race. Normally this isn't a problem, but hearing Lydia yelling "Skyrim belongs to the Nords!" while fighting mud crabs is a bit narmy.
    • Among the things guards can say to you is "You're like me, eh? Don't fancy those clunky two-handed weapons." They can say this while they are holding two-handed weapons. They can say this when YOU are holding two-handed weapons. This goes for any skill with high levels, no matter how non-obvious it may be ("Best offense is a good defense, right?" (the message for a high skill in heavy armor) when you are not wearing any heavy armor at all, etc). Also, guards' Mood Whiplash towards you, such as first of all greeting you as the Dovahkiin/a Companion, then going straight to being suspicious of you, such as "Go fiddling with any locks around here, and we're going to have a real problem."
      • Though the commentary on skills when you don't have the equipment to match could be justified by your reputation.
    • There is a lot of overlap between helping out an NPC via a favor or misc quest, and possibly going against them in another sidequest. For example, after completing both Taking Care of Business and his misc quest, the waiter at the Riften inn will be admonishing you for defeating in a brawl/intimidating the innkeeper one moment, and singing your praises for helping him make his wedding ring the next.
    • Babette is a preteen girl who is Really Seven Hundred Years Old. Taking this into account, Bethesda wrote her (appropriately creepy) lines like those of an adult woman. However, since they had to get an actual 10-year-old for the voice acting, a lot of them just sound like... well, a ten-year-old girl reading lines written for an adult woman. This is noticeable especially when she struggles with the pronunciation of "alchemy reagents".
    • During "No One Escapes Cidhna Mine", the conversation with Braig where he reveals his tragic backstory runs afoul of this in two major ways. First, the voice acting: while Stephen Russell's performance is actually quite good and genuinely heartfelt, the fact that he also voices Madanach, the guy who sent you to talk to Braig to begin with, is seriously distracting since it's clear that there was no voice direction given to make them sound different from one another. And second, at the peak of his tearful speech, Braig calls Madanach "Manadanach", a jarring error given that he pronounces his name correctly otherwise, making it either a distracting case of a blooper that somehow made it past the voice director, or Mr. Russell being given a script with a blatant typo that the voice director didn't catch.
  • Nausea Fuel:
    • Peryite's quest "The Only Cure". You can meet a passive Afflicted early on, which indicates to you that The Virus in this example rots your skin somewhat. In the quest itself, you encounter aggressive Afflicted who can attack you Linda Blair-style with streams of vomit. Oh, and the condition is a "blessing" according to Peryite.
    • Namira's Daedric quest, where you slaughter a man in cold blood on a rather disturbing-looking altar and then shovel gobs of his raw flesh into your mouth with your bare hands. Then Namira speaks to you and congratulates you for your actions. Notable in that, if you want One Hundred Percent Completion, doing this is mandatory. If, on the other hand, you're not out for 100% completion, you can kill every last one of the cannibals and get a nice reward from Brother Verulus.
  • One-Scene Wonder: Roggvir only gets a few minutes in one scene to Chew The Scenery, and he makes a meal of it.
  • Paranoia Fuel:
    • Dragons can attack you anywhere where the sky is visible. Even inside cities. Half the time, your only warning that a dragon is about to attack is when it suddenly roars and drops down on you. The other half of the time, they don't even do that. Even in the courtyard of the mage college, in the middle of a thick snowstorm.
    • A specific plot instance is Alduin's soul-snaring mist in Sovngarde. You can't see him, and it is quite possible to come up to a random anonymous soldier who barely has time to tell you to run before he gets snatched away and his very soul devoured.
    • When you kill Grelod the Kind, the kid gives you the reward, all's well and good, right? Wrong. A courier shows up with a message from someone. I wonder who it is? Whoever it is was pretty eager to get it to you, apparently. So you read the note. Wanna know what it says? WE KNOW below a black handprint. Sleep tight. Um... You may want to rethink the sleeping part...
    • In barrows, the mummified corpses that rise up to attack you and the ones that just sit in their tombs and sarcophagi look very similar. In an early playthrough, it's almost impossible to be sure which ones are undead and which aren't. It gets better as become more savvy and level up, but then you run into the problem of enemies and sarcophagi that don't "trigger" because your Sneak is too high, and suddenly find yourself surrounded because you made just a tiny bit of noise...
    • During the quest "A Cornered Rat", you might notice an oddity in Riften: there's a Khajiit named Shavari wandering around the city proper, something you won't find anywhere else. Other than that, she doesn't seem very noteworthy, doesn't have much to say, and isn't particularly friendly. But if you pay special attention to her, you'll notice she's both watching and following you from a safe distance. When you escape the Ratways with Esbern, you'll find out she's working with the Thalmor. You can also pickpocket her and find a note that specifically says that the Thalmor are tracking you and that you'll lead them to Esbern.
    • Spriggans appear literally out of nowhere, right next to you, and hit hard when they do. As a result, you'll never feel safe in wooded grottoes.
  • Porting Disaster:
    • While the Xbox and PC versions are relatively stable for a Bethesda game, the Play Station 3 version of Skyrim is plagued with massive slow-downs, almost to the point of being unplayable. This is especially frustrating for gamers who utilize larger saving files, since they will have to wait for Bethesda to release a patch, although it is unclear how effective the patch will be.
    • While the PC version does not suffer many technical problems (well, no more than the Xbox version... this is an Elder Scrolls game, after all), the UI is very console-adapted, to the point that it has caused problems with using a mouse for many users (as in, the game doesn't properly register that you clicked on something). Bethesda has said they have no intention of modifying the UI themselves, but luckily, this is one porting problem that can be (and already has been) fixed by modders.
  • Ruined FOREVER:
    • Skyrim will no longer have attributes. This has caused some fans to completely forsake the game due to the "dumbing down". Historically, they've said that for every Elder Scrolls game, so make of it what you will.
      • As it turned out, it might've been a good thing. Eliminating attributes also largely eliminated Empty Levels.
    • The addition of relationships and marriage has also caused some to cry foul, declaring it unnecessary fanservice and a waste of resources that should have been used to bring back all of those Morrowind features that Oblivion didn't have...
    • The removal of classes, which hardly anybody used anyway.
      • The removal of class creation appears to be what bugged most fans, as now players have almost no amount of character customization beyond physical appearance and minor skill buffs/powers. In addition, the removal of major/minor skills makes very little sense when the community presented the idea that both major and minor skills could simply contribute equally to leveling, while major skills would start higher and level faster (much in the way of the standing stones).
    • People are still complaining about the lack of polearms. For reference, out of the five games in the series, only Morrowind had polearms, which were extremely unpopular due to them being horrendous weapons (two handed weapons that did less damage than most one handed weapons).
    • The fact that you're pretty much required to play the game on Steam. Although this a much less common issue now, since Steam's been well established and doesn't have any of the bugs it once did (not to mention the automatic patching being a godsend for a series and genre known for being full of glitches on launch). Strike that, there was an update released on Nov 21st that now makes the Launcher-bypass execution that didn't require Steam running to now require it.
    • You can now only equip one ring at a time. While admittedly fairly minor, it is pretty hard to justify.
  • The Scrappy:
    • Delphine. Being a stubborn, bossy Jerkass who regularly talks down to you, forces you to act as her errand boy, and forcing the ultimatum of killing Paarthurnax on threat of the Blades withholding all further aid did not endear her to the fandom, to put it lightly. Fellow Blade Esbern was hated just as violently early in the game's lifespan, though in his case, tempers cooled to the point that he's now just a Base Breaker.
    • Heimskr due to his endless preaching about Talos. Makes it even worse when he loses his house and thus preaches more. He is one of the two things both Imperial and Stormcloak sympathizers agree to hate.
    • The Thalmor. They're generally hated by everyone. As one fan put it, people hate the Nazi elves more than the world-eating dragon. If the general NPC attitude towards them is any indication, this was likely intentional.
    • Maven Black-Briar is another big one. She's a ruthless crime lord who's got Riften by the balls, and a total Jerkass who goes out of her way to belittle its residents and make their lives miserable. While that all comes with the territory when you're The Don, that's not the only reason why she's hated. She's obnoxiously untouchable on top of that. You can't kill her because she's essential. You can't run her out of town, or disrupt her criminal enterprises in any sort of meaningful way. Hell, if you join the Thieves' Guild you're forced to work for her, and while you get a few opportunities to be a burden to her, you ultimately don't do much other than mildly annoy her. Not only is she a Karma Houdini, but she's practically a borderline Villain Sue as well. The only thing keeping her from being a proper example is her empty threats to the player, and the fact that the Dark Brotherhood actively ignores her much to her annoyance.
      • While not to the extent of Maven, her sons Hemming and Sibbi qualify by proxy since they're just as cruel as their mother and arguably even more obnoxious in some ways. Hemming, much like dear old mom, is completely untouchable since he's supposed to become her steward if Riften falls under Imperial control. And while you can kill Sibbi, it isn't immediately obvious that you can do so in the first place, and he otherwise gets to live it up in a Luxury Prison Suite despite spending time in jail for murder.
    • Lots of Jerkass characters in general for their insufferable attitudes fall into this. Including such lovely specimens like the infamous Nazeem and his over-inflated ego, Mercer Frey for his unabashed Jerkass behavior even for a guild full of thieves though his unlikability is intentional due to him being the guild quest's true villain, and child abusing old crone Grelod the Kind.
    • This trope is the reason why Killable Children mods not only exist, but are incredibly popular: many of Skyrim's kids are horrible little brats and invincible pests that you can only indirectly put in their place. One standout example is Braith, a mean-spirited bully who regularly torments a boy who's too scared of her to fight back and arrogantly smack-talks you even after you intimidate her on his behalf. Likewise, two of Jarl Balgruuf's children openly mock and order you around every time you talk to them.
    • Jaree-Ra, thanks to multiple factors. His quest railroads you into helping him with a ridiculously evil scheme involving mass-murder, and unless you're playing as a total bastard, there's no justification for helping him if you're a good-aligned player aside from wanting to see absolutely everything the game has to offer, or you just wanting to get him out of Solitude. For some reason you can't report him to the city watch or Jarl, and you can't kill him until after you’ve crashed the ship he wanted to loot and thus gotten everyone onboard killed. If you don't want to compromise your morals, you'll probably go insane hearing "You should see me when you get bored, stranger" every single time you pass him by.
    • Aerin, Mjoll the Lioness' little hanger-on that follows her everywhere she goes. Everywhere. To the point that he'll invite himself into any house you and her move to should you marry her. While a friendly character who doesn't have a single mean bone in his body, he is viciously hated for his unintentionally creepy, stalkerish behavior, to the point that many players find themselves trying to find a way to kill him that won't result in Mjoll hating you for it.
    • Malborn, Delphine's guy who helps you infiltrate the Thalmor Embassy. He is incredibly whiny and pissy when talking with you, and should you save him from the Thalmor agents that capture and try to kill him, he'll angrily blame you for ruining his life despite the fact that A. he made an active choice to risk it all by going against the Thalmor and B. you had nothing to do with his life being ruined since it was Delphine who contacted and arranged everything with him. Many players aren't even aware that there's an extra sidequest where you can help him flee to Morrowind since they often opt to let him get munched on by a Frost Troll or kill him themselves for his behavior.
  • Scrappy Mechanic:
    • The broken-as-hell yielding system. In Oblivion, all you needed to do to yield was block and press a button, which the enemy would recognize and guards always accepted. In Skyrim, you need to put your weapon away and just stand there like an idiot. Most of the time it doesn't work, meaning guards will keep trying to kill you for a forty-gold bounty, no matter how many times you try to surrender.
    • Marriage. Despite being an interesting new aspect of the game with great potential, many people have taken issue with it. Courtship is easy and short. The dialogue with your spouse is rather boring and often buggy, and you can't have any meaningful interaction with them apart from setting them as a follower, talking about various banal topics, or buying items. The only benefits it offers are certain status buffs, a source of income, and a free follower. It's become enough of a problem that there are numerous mods to improve marriage, including ones that allow you to marry more characters.
  • Self-Imposed Challenge: Skipping the very first quest of the game that, among other things, unbinds your hands and allows you to pick up objects and interact with people. Link.
  • Sidetracked By the Golden Saucer:
    • As before with Elder Scrolls games, you can spend so long reading books.
    • And as with a lot of freeform exploration games, it is absurdly easy to get sidetracked while en route to a quest. Something as simple as stopping to investigate a curious landmark while en route to another quest site can result in the player ending up on the far side of Skyrim engaging in another quest-line entirely unrelated tot he first one.
  • Squick:
    • Awesome yet totally horrid is a werewolf's double-swipe power finisher, where they grab their foe, lift them off the ground and pop their head off like they're crushing a grapefruit.
    • Wear the Ring of Namira around, and guards will comment on how rotten your breath smells and ask what you've been eating. The answer, if you have the ring, is of course human flesh.
  • Take That, Scrappy!:
  • That One Boss:
    • The Ghost of Sigdis Gauldurson at the end of the Forbidden Legend quest. He's a Doppelgänger boss where you have to play whack-a-draugr to find the real deal, they're all archers (and hurt a LOT when they hit), and each one, doppelgängers and all, pack an Unrelenting Force shout powerful enough to send you flying. Even if you whack a few of the doppelgängers, the remainder will shout you onto your ass and you take forever to get back up, meaning he resets his doppelgängers all over, and you probably didn't land a single hit. By which time you'll be frantically restoring whatever health was lost when you were a sitting duck getting pin-cushioned by arrows after being shouted over. Still, you can own him easily by hiding behind a pillar and shooting him with a bow. Additionally, the real Sigdis can be spotted by the fact he's the only one wearing a helmet whose horns point down. The decoys all have helmets with horns pointing up. Once you've learned to look for that cue, the fight goes way way faster. You even have to fight Sigdis twice during the quest. And the second time he is part of a Boss Rush along with his brothers.
    • Those Eight Dragon Priests! They make Alduin look like a pushover (except for Nahkriin)! One of them even ambushes when you when you're trying to learn a new word of power after killing a dragon. May Talos have mercy on your soul when you wake said Dragon Priest while still fighting the actual dragon. Aside from leveling up, some good ways to deal with them include sniping (for stealth types), shield bashing (for melee types) and ganging up on them (for those who like using summons and followers).
    • Malyn Varen can be pretty nasty. He sics three Daedra enemies on you before fleeing to his chamber, and they're fond of powerful fire spells. If you're unlucky, all three of them will gang up on you at once. Hope you brought some fire resistance and healing potions. The single fastest way to beat him is to not let him flee. Pull a Shut UP, Hannibal and shoot him with a poisoned arrow.
    • Malkoran is considered this not because of his shades, it is because of his extremely powerful frost spell that can potentially kill in one hit (Confirmed at Level 26) even in the lowest difficulty. If you have the Ice Form shout, it's an excellent counter against him. Put him on ice, and before he has a chance to recover, beat the crap out of him.
    • Morvarth has several vampire servants that can cast powerful ice spells and heal themselves as well. Combined with Morvath's own powerful spells and tendecy to decapitate in melee, many players will be seeing the same loading screen over and over again.
    • The Thieves Guild has a nasty surprise for players who didn't expect to see much in the way of combat. Lurking underneath the Honningbrew Meadery during one of the earliest quests is Hamelyn, an insane mage who will blast you with powerful spells, throw up protective wards to reduce the damage dealt to him, and has a bunch of pet Skeevers on hand who will ruin your stealthy approach and alert him to your presence. You can try to rush the door he's guarding since killing him is optional, but considering how powerful and dangerous he is, your best bet is to rush him instead and try beating him down in melee combat before he or his pets get you.
    • Draugr Deathlords and Draugr Death Overlords are the highest leveled "Boss" varieties of Draugr, and they're about as unfun to fight as you can possibly imagine. In keeping with Bethesda's traditional level-scaling, they're Damage Sponge Bosses who take forever to wear down and hit ridiculously hard thanks to their Ebony weaponry. They're also among the few non-Dragon enemies with access to Dragon Shouts, and oh BOY. Do you laugh when you send enemies flying ass-over-teakettle with Unrelenting Force? You're in for some karmic payback once these guys do it to you, and either rush up and hack you to pieces or turn you into a human/elf/beastman pincushion while you're helpless on the ground. They also know the obnoxious Disarm shout, which will knock your weapon out of your hands and can quite possibly cause it to clip into the floor and lay forever beyond your reach. And if you think they're annoying enough as bossesThey became garden-variety enemies once you're at a high enough level!
    • If you side with Saadia during her questline, the fight with Kematu at the end can be a tough one. Mainly due to the fact that you’re not just fighting Kematu: you’re fighting him and his Alik'r thugs. Who all dual-wield. In a small, crowded room. While you've got a better chance of beating him if you escape the literal meat-grinder, it's still an uphill battle unless you've planned ahead.
    • Choosing to kill Madanach instead of escaping Cidhna Mine with him leads to all sorts of problems if you're playing as a warrior Dragonborn. Sneaky players can simply backstab him for massive damage (with the right perk) and Mage players have an arsenal of spells to attack him with, but warrior players have to directly fight what may as well be a Forsworn Briarheart with only the wimpy shivs and pickaxes that are lying around the mine, which is especially bad if you primarily fight with two-handed weapons and haven’t invested in the One-Handed skill tree. Even worse is that Madanach has access to all kinds of powerful Frost spells, including the dreaded Ice Storm used by Malkoran, as well as one that will let him summon Frost Atronachs.
    • Dawnguard has the fights against the Keepers in the Soul Cairn. No real tricks or gimmicks to these guys, they simply have the durability of a Draugr Death Overlord, and hit even harder thanks to their Dragonbone Weapons. On the bright side, they don't have Dragon Shouts, so you don't have to worry about being thrown around like a ragdoll or your weapon flying right out of your hands.
  • That One Level:
    • Shimmermist Cave. Falmer infested areas are pretty tough in general, but Shimmermist Cave stands out because it's a Falmer lair that you're likely to visit at a very early level. There's a decent chance that The Companions will send you there as part of an early radiant quest, and since the game nudges you into joining them since they're based in the very first major city you're pointed towards, you're likely to be under-equipped and underleveled while struggling to survive against Falmer with their poisoned weapons and stamina-draining, speed-cutting ice magic, Chaurus with their venom spit and horrifying Lightning Bruiser stats, and a Dwemer Centurion ambushing you at the very end. While the Centurion isn't counted as the dungeon boss and won't need to be killed for a potential early-game Companion's quest, it still lives in the same room as the Falmer boss and is very easy to aggro on accident.
    • As far as general Holds go, The Reach is a miserable place to explore. You’ve got a lot of rough, craggy terrain and sweeping rivers that can make it annoying to get from place to place, but the place is also infested with Forsworn and Hagravens who are a lot more dangerous than your garden-variety bandits, as well as very frequent encounters with Bears and Saber Cats. Coming here as a low-level player is a very very bad idea, but its close proximity to Whiterun means that it’s easy for new players to find themselves wandering towards the most dangerous Hold in Skyrim without having any idea of what they’re in for.
    • The Soul Cairn isn't too bad when you're exploring it as part of Dawnguard's main questline since you're pointed towards very obvious landmarks. But if you're tackling its sidequests, you're in for a miserable experience. While you probably won't die that often, it's mind-numbingly, frustratingly hard to find items needed for certain sidequests thanks to everything looking the same in this dull, purple hellscape, and the lack of a map or quest markers for things like Arvak's skull, Jiub's papers, and the Reaper Gem fragments mean that you'll often find yourself endlessly walking circles around the same stretch of land.
    • Skuldafn, the Definitely Final Dungeon, is this if you're at a high level when you visit it. Why? Because it's absolutely infested with annoying Draugr enemies by default. And at a high enough level, most of those Draugr will be Deathlords. It's either a desperate struggle to survive as you're trying to avoid having them two/three-shot you or just a tedious slog as you hack away at their mammoth health pools, but by the time you finally make your way to Sovngarde, you'll probably never want to visit another Ancient Nord ruin ever again.
  • They Changed It, Now It Sucks: While it's unofficial (it's all in the name!), the Unofficial Skyrim Patch fixes so many annoying and outright game-breaking glitches that many consider it to be essential to playing the game to the point that UESP recommends it, and many mods won't even function if you don't have it installed. But despite all the good it does, many of the less essential changes it makes have proven very unpopular with the fans (something not helped by the creator’s attitude towards criticism). To name a few...
    • Patching out the Necromage effect that makes all spells used by a Vampire Dovahkiin 25% more powerful is a big one. Since vampires and mages are a bit outclassed by other character builds in the endgame, it's a nice way for those players to keep their heads above water. Considering that Bethesda has never nerfed it in any way, it’s widely viewed as Arthmoor changing things for the sake of being Anti-Fun.
    • Lynly Star-Sung having blonde hair instead of black, as described by Sibbi Black-Briar. While it could be an oversight on Bethesda's part, it's just as likely to be intentional since she is in hiding from her murderous, sociopathic ex-boyfriend. Most players feel that, oversight or not, it actually works better from a lore standpoint and think this change misses the point entirely.
    • J'zargo, easily the most popular College of Winterhold-alligned follower and one of the most popular as a whole, owes his popularity to the fact that he has no level cap and gets as strong as the player. The Unofficial Patch doesn't nerf him so much as it neuters him completely by giving him a wimpy little level cap on par with the other College students that can follow you. And he's not simply AS weak as the others, he's outclassed since Onmund uses the same sort of magic as him, but with stronger spells.
    • All food and salt barrels/sacks laying around in various towns and cities are now owned by some nebuluous force, meaning that taking anything from them counts as stealing. Considering that NPC's react to you taking things from them as if you're snooping through the trash, it's clear that the "stolen" items weren't meant to have any sort of owner, and that the locals consider them disposable.
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
    • To some, the Civil War plotline was underutilized. The in-game story clues and documentation reveal a long and complex backstory involving war and political intrigue between many nations and factions leading to the start of the civil war. The war itself has distinctive factions with heaps of Gray and Grey Morality associated with them, many ways to interpret all sides, and an overarching conflict with the Thalmor. However, the civil war itself takes a backseat to the main quest centering around Alduin, and while the civil war questline is one of the largest in the game, it generally involves similar missions across Skyrim, just in different locations depending on faction. You can actually discuss this with the head of the Bard's College in Solitude, who comments that the war in Skyrim is just another war in history, and that kings and empires rise and fall regularly, but that the conflict between the Dragonborn and Alduin is something much more unique and noteworthy.
    • While the DLC is named after them, the titular Dawnguard are given surprisingly little to do. Even if you side with them, Volkihar vampire Serana and her family drama take up the lion's share of the spotlight anyway, and aside from the raid on Castle Volkihar at the very end, vampire hunting isn't really a major focus outside of sidequests (most of which tend to be radiant in nature).
    • Much like the Dark Brotherhood, there easily could have been a sidequest dedicated to wiping out the Thieves Guild (and indeed, there was, but it was left on the cutting room floor). The citizens of Riften make no bones about how miserable life is thanks to crime and corruption running rampant, Mjoll the Lioness is dedicated to fighting the Guild and opposing Maven Black-Briar, and the Guild is on its last legs as it is. But while the stage is set for a heroic Dragonborn to descend upon the Guild and wipe it out, it just isn't an option without downloading certain mods.
    • And speaking of destroying the Dark Brotherhood, there's also a common sentiment that simply wiping out the group in one fell swoop isn't that satisfying or fulfilling, with some fans feeling that you could easily have missions dedicated to taking each member out as sort of a Good Counterpart to the Brotherhood's assassination quests (and indeed, there are mods for this sort of thing as well).
  • Ugly Cute:
    • As grotesque as they are, one particular Hagraven manages to slip into this thanks to her amusing personality and voice. Melka, a friendly Hagraven you can team up with in one Forsworn dungeon, is adorably enthusiastic about boiling eyeballs and eating them. Even more adorable is her dedication to getting revenge on her sister in what amounts to a particularly violent yet petty and childish property dispute. She's also genuinely grateful for your help, never even thinks about betraying you (making her a rarity among many dungeon "allies"), and overall gives the impression of an intimidating, yet sweet old grandma.
    • The Rieklings of Solstheim are Adorable Evil Minions of the Ugly Cute persuasion. While dangerous, murderous little pot-bellied goblins that often attack in packs and like catching the player offguard with surprise ambushes, the funny noises they make and their tendency to form Cargo Cults centered around the weirdest items makes them more endearing than scary. Even moreso are the Thirsk Mead Hall Rieklings, who you can team up with and even recruit as followers if you take their side during the mead hall's questline.
  • Uncanny Valley:
    • The new engine attempts to solve this issue, with the faces be a vast improvement over previous games.
    • The new characters also attempt to carry on their daily duties while glancing at the player if you speak to them, while this is normally fine sometimes it can break in crowded areas such as a tavern when multiple NPCs think the character is about to start a conversation, as a result, everyone stares at the player every time they look up from what they're doing.
    • Someone made a mod that makes the horses in-game look like they came from My Little Pony. The results look like someone tried to render a My Little Pony realistically. And what happens when you try to render a cartoon realistically? Yep. You'd be right...
    • Speaking of mods, witness Miku Hatsune methodically slaughtering enemy mooks, with a straight face, in Bullet Time. Even being hit by an arrow doesn't stop her.
    • And now Luka Megurine has joined in the fun as well, with even more frightening efficiency.
    • Adults have very distinct appearances. Children, clothing aside, look like clones.
      • Worse, many of the animations for children weren't properly rigged. When a child NPC does something like sit down on a chair, or uses an Alchemy station, their dimensions will stretch out and make them the same size as the adults.
    • Clothing especially, with the children. They only seem to have one outfit, based on their gender. Even Babette, who you think would look more like she belongs in the Dark Brotherhood.
    • If you (for some reason) strip a character naked, you'll notice their feet look like mittens with lines engraved for their toes.
  • Unfortunate Implications: Once you get married, no matter what type of life your spouse was living and what type of person they are, at your request they'll move into your home halfway across Skyrim and spend the rest of the game being a homemaker who runs what could only be described as a junk shop and dotes on you when you come home. Though it's not an issue if you marry a follower since your husband or wife will still follow you and help in combat despite being married.
  • Unintentionally Sympathetic: Downplayed since it's clear that Paarthurnax and the Graybeards are definitely meant to be sympathetic characters. But they're perhaps a little too sympathetic for the "Paarthurnax" sidequest to be as morally gray as intended. Paarthurnax used to be Alduin's literal and figurative Dragon, and committed all kinds of atrocities before pulling a Heel Face Turn. While he's a steadfast good guy in the present, as far as Delphine and Esbern are concerned, it doesn't erase his past crimes, and he'll even vouch for them by admitting that as a Dragon, the urge to kill and dominate is hard-coded into his very being. And thus, you're given the following choice: kill Paarthurnax in order to make him pay for his past crimes and stop him from potentially turning evil again in the future, alienating the Graybeards in the process, or spare him for proving his worth as a trusted ally and friend, thus alienating the Blades instead. A tough choice to make on paper, but the playerbase overwhelmingly sides with Paarthurnax and the Graybeards for the following reasons:
    • Paarthurnax is nothing but friendly and helpful to the player, repeatedly helping you on your quest to stop Alduin without expecting anything in return. While there are times where the Graybeards aren't exactly thrilled to help you with things that go against their philosophy, they nontheless check their pride at the door and help you anyway for the sake of the greater good, and only stop helping entirely once you've murdered their leader. Compare that to Delphine, who repeatedly bosses you around and forces you to prove yourself to her without giving any sort of justification, talks down to you, and will throw a hissy fit and refuse to help you if you don't mindlessly obey her. Even Esbern, who's a lot less of a Jerkass, proves to be just as unwilling to compromise on the Paarthurnax issue as her.
    • While Paarthurnax has an innate urge to dominate and admits that supressing it has been incredibly difficult, he has supressed it all the same, proving that he has an incredible amount of self-control and a strong moral compass. Ignoring him, other dragons like Odahviing, Durnehviir, and the random friendly dragons you can occassionally encounter harmlessly flying in the sky are just as capable of acting benevolently. Hell, you have the soul of a dragon and canonically have the very same urges to do evil, but can easily go against them and not even think of doing anything bad. With that in mind, Paarthurnax comes across as the furthest thing from a ticking time bomb despite what the Blades and even he himself will say.
    • While he undoubtedly did awful things long ago, it's honestly hard to care about Paarthurnax's crimes since they're so far in the past that they're literally ancient history. Ditto for nobody really elaborating on just what those crimes even were to begin with, or even caring aside from just Delphine and Esbern.
  • Unintentionally Unsympathetic:
    • A major reason why Delphine is so hated: while she's supposed to be a traumatized Jerk With a Heart of Gold, her condescending behavior towards the Dragonborn, rudeness towards everyone she interacts with, and refusal to lift a finger if you don't do as she says and kill Paarthurnax despite claiming to be honor-bound to serve you make it very hard to sympathize with her.
    • Related to her entry under Alternate Character Interpretation, Karliah runs afoul of this trope for some. While being framed for the murder of her boyfriend and having to spend over twenty years on the run is genuinely horrible, the same can be said with the way she manipulates you and Brynjolf into selling your souls to Nocturnal because apparently, Mercer Frey is just THAT dangerous. Selling your soul doesn't actually make you any stronger and it doesn't give you, Brynjolf, or Karliah your Nightingale powers yet because as Karliah reveals if you point this out, Nocturnal can't actually empower you thanks to the theft of the Skeleton Key, her artifact. Because Mercer Frey still dies very, very easily, you sell your soul for nothing and have what Tsun suggests is an inescapable afterlife of servitude to look forward to all because Karliah was desperate to get back into Nocturnal’s good graces and did so in the most cowardly and underhanded manner possible.
  • Visual Effects of Awesome:
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