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ImpeREAL Empire - Falkreath


torminater

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Hey guys,

 

this mod has been in the nexus TOP 5 for some days now and I've looked more deeply into it. It only uses an .esp file which changes what kind of textures are used for the walls and roads of Falkreath. The author says his changes, which do contradict Bethesda's art style for this city a lot, is lore-friendly at it's outmost, since Bethesda's design for Falkreath wasn't. When first visiting Falkreath the city looks a lot more majestic now, but not overwhelmingly like for example Windhelm or Solitude. It's still a minor city compared to the other two but now is closer to the appearance of Whiterun, while still remaining very unique. Yes, I know STEP wants to stick as much to vanilla as possible, but I think this mod is great, especially because no HiRes Texture replacers or other things are needed but still are 100%ly compatible.

Also the author states, that he always cleans his mod with the most recent TES5Edit and he is a veteran modder from Oblivion.

 

I like the idea and feel of this mod and can recommend it.

 

What do you think?

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I had a quick look, and I like it. Makes it seem like a more distinct and significant place. I wouldn't personally be concerned about it deviating too far from vanilla - it seems quite appropriate. Some of the smaller towns do feel like they were slapped togther without too much care.

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I can say that I'm all in - that is one of those moments we don't have to treat Vanilla as a Holy Grail - my and my friends made two tenets(?):

1. Beth was too lazy to do that.

2. There is a mod for that.

and that is one of those situations where design (not only technical ones) should be fixed ;)

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I can honestly say that I don't like it. Falkreath is in the middle of a heavily wooded area and it would only be natural to use the resources that are easily and abundantly available. Using "natural stone" rather then "milled stone" and wood instead of stone for most structures seems to be what you'd naturally expect to find in Falkreath (vanilla style). This mod just changes too much and running up on Falkreath in the middle of a forest with this mod make the town seem out of place.

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I can honestly say that I don't like it. Falkreath is in the middle of a heavily wooded area and it would only be natural to use the resources that are easily and abundantly available. Using "natural stone" rather then "milled stone" and wood instead of stone for most structures seems to be what you'd naturally expect to find in Falkreath (vanilla style). This mod just changes too much and running up on Falkreath in the middle of a forest with this mod make the town seem out of place.

This is fair criticism and I think many overhauls are guilty of altering the towns and villages against the likelihood of them actually being built this way.
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The guy gives his reasons for why he considers it lore friendly. Sounds fair enough to me. If the Cyrodillic empire was anything like the Roman one, shifting stones around would not have given them pause for a moment! I still quite like it, but hardly essential, and possibly a little too much of a change for STEP.

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The guy gives his reasons for why he considers it lore friendly. Sounds fair enough to me. If the Cyrodillic empire was anything like the Roman one' date=' shifting stones around would not have given them pause for a moment! I still quite like it, but hardly essential, and possibly a little too much of a change for STEP.[/quote']

I don't know anything about the lore he refers to so I can only make my judgments based off what I see and it just looks completely out of place for the region. Have you watched the video? There's some clipping going on in some places (most noticeable is a tree and tower appear to be sharing some of the same space).

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Yes, I had a look around.  His suggestion is that because it was originally an outpost city of Cyrodil, it would and should look somewhat different, and I quite enjoyed that.  I'm not a lore nut by any means, but if we're talking realism, both the Roman and Greek empires would absolutely have gone to the trouble of building in their own imposing style, to make a statement to the conquered.  They were also making concrete bricks to build stronger structures, and the Romans would hack through solid rock just to keep their roads nice and straight, rather than going around an obstacle!

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Well, how likely is it that in a Hold close to Cyrodill the hold capital looks like a woodcutter's settlement in the middle of nowhere like Riverwood?

I only remember this one guard in Whiterun saying to me: "Be glad you are here in Whiterun and not out in Riverwood. Those poor fellows don't even have a wall to protect them."

Falkreath doesn't even have a Gate to protect it from invaders. By any means, I think that Falkreath is as unlikely to look as it does as is e.g. Morthal!

Nords are not Vikings living on islands or hard to reach on foot regions who therefore don't need any city fortifications. If Skyrim was somewhat like Europe then in the early middle ages the Jarls were their own bosses and did what they wanted to. They fight another to death for better or worse reasons. Why should a Jarl live in a city/town/village without any protection from a bandit group?

All of this doesn't make any sense to me.

And: Falkreath Vanilla style might fit well artistically in the region it's located because everything is created from the most obvious ressources which can be found at most 10 yards away from the houses, but why shouldn't they be able to get some craftsmen over from solitude or windhelm to shapen some rocks to get stone walls for their houses? Falkreath has a pretty wet climate (at least Frostfall states this) and therefore it might be better to have walls made of stone than wood, which only soaks up all the rain. Also the straw roofs don't make very much sense, since they would probably start to grow fungus after a couple of seasons.

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I think there really is a place for discussion of what we, and the general community of Elder Scrolls fans, consider as lore-friendly, and based our overall judgements and goals on that.

 

I agree with torminater, if we start looking at the big picture, Skyrim really needs an overhaul in a few places to make it lore friendly (e.g. fitting in the worlds we're supposed to believe and live in), as it isn't such in many places.

 

Acknowledging that the Empire resembles most of that of the late Roman Empire, I think it's safe to assume that Falkreath, as a northern outpust, would be much better protected and "modernised", than we'd believe judging from the vanilla game.

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