So, I like to roleplay in games like the Elder Scrolls or Fallout. I mean, they are RPGs after all. I've been getting into skyrim again so I wanted to share my character and hear about any of yours.



Numerius Titian is a true wizard. Not a mage or sorcerer, using his hands to cast spells. While Numerius concedes that this is a valid form of magic and uses hand casting to keep his skill in Destruction and Restoration up, he believes it is inferior to the use of a Staff. Numerius believes magic users are too rigid in their practice. No armor, no weapons, spells only! Magic isn't rigid, Numerius knows it is fluid and when channeled through the magic wood of a Staff, it's more powerful than any measly spell. He also believes that relying solely on magic and letting your body go to ruin is foolish because even spells and staves can fail one where a weapon will not.

So he carries a blade with him as well as a staff, using only hand casting for healing and training in the schools of magic. Numerius is not concerned with magical power for power's sake, like other magic users. A True Wizard uses magic to unlock the mysteries of the world and the universe, not as a petty tool for the domination of other beings. Numerius traveled to Skyrim to study the many ruins there, the Dwemer and The Ancient Nords. To observe the unique societies of the Forsworn and Falmer.

And possibly even try to converse with a giant. A True Wizard pursues knowledge for knowledge's sake, this is Numerius' philosophy. But he wasn't always like this, no, see Numerius isn't a young Imperial (At least not by Tamriel's standards). He was a battlemage in The Great War for the Empire. Seeking magical power and glory. Using his physical prowess and arcane intellect to dominate both warriors and mages alike. But after the war was over and the dust settled, Numerius saw it as a massive waste of life and potential, a misuse of the wonders of magic. So he left the Legion and joined the mages guild, spending years studying with them. While he was there, Numerius became fascinated with Staves. No other object could channel the kind of power a Staff could and contain it as safely as a Staff, not even enchanted weapons. Numerius began to learn the craftsmanship and knowledge behind staves and soon they became one of his specialties.

But not even a True Wizard can focus on knowledge all of the time. Such was fate, Numerius laid eyes on a lovely dunmer woman, a fellow magic user and member of the mages guild. Evitha was her name. By this time, Numerius was 30 years old and a respected wizard at the Arcane University. People around the university knew his name and reputation, so it was almost too easy for Numerius to arrange a date with her. She was funny, beautiful, brilliant, and Numerius fell completely in love with her. 7 months after they had their first dinner together, they were married. 9 months after that, their daughter was born. Arvianne Titian. For sometime, magic and research took a backseat to Numerius' family but after a year or so he returned to the university to teach and research as he had done before. Evitha had always been a savvy woman, savvy to people and politics in a way Numerius couldn't even fathom. As the years went by and little Arvianne grew into childhood, Numerius was disconcerted by the amount of politics that had entered the mages guild and how well Evitha played that field. They began to have arguements about her involvement in the political spectrum, especially in regards to the omnipresent Thalmor, who Numerius' despised with a passion.

Despite these arguments they were still a happy couple with a beautiful child. Until...they weren't. It was a week after Arvianne's 7th birthday, 4E 191. Numerius was returning home late after a hard day of research. He was so tired he didn't notice that his bedroom door was completely closed. It never was completely closed. When he opened the door he saw his darling Evitha in bed with a high elf aristocrat. Then he saw red. Numerius grabbed the bastard and yanked him out of the bed flinging him across the room and tackling him into the wall. He hadn't been this angry in years, not since the war. Numerius beat that elf senseless, coming just short of killing him. He didn't listen to anything Evitha said, if she said anything at all. He just left the room and went to see his daughter. Numerius knew he had to leave after that rampage on a noble's face. He wasn't concerned, he had been wanting to travel tamriel and expand his research for years. He desperately wanted to take Arvianne with him, but he knew he couldn't. That was no life for a young girl, venturing into dangerous territory in the pursuit of knowledge. Away from her mother.

So Numerius left Cyrodil and became a traveling scholar, venturing all around the continent in pursuit of knowledge. He wandered for 10 years, eventually making his way towards Skyrim to study the ancient civilizations and unique cultures that Skyrim was known for. He was captured by the Empire while trying to cross the border. I'm sure you all know the rest...

(What are your characters? I would love to see some development as long as mine :D)

I have too many characters myself over the years from video games to even put one down here. I'm actually on the verge of posting my own roleplay from a story I want to write out and publish. I'm thinking along the lines of receiving ideas from other people for the story then implementing them into the story itself. I've been working on it for years now and still haven't started it, because I just don't feel it's the right time to start it.

I did do a Skyrim RP on the old site years back that took off, but ended up dying out, because not too many people at the time were in to The Elder Scrolls. I agree on the whole notion that a mage should carry a weapon as well as his/her magic. Even wear armor. Sometimes, magic will fail or the character will run out of magicka, so you have to be prepared for these events.

I have too many characters myself over the years from video games to even put one down here. I'm actually on the verge of posting my own roleplay from a story I want to write out and publish. I'm thinking along the lines of receiving ideas from other people for the story then implementing them into the story itself. I've been working on it for years now and still haven't started it, because I just don't feel it's the right time to start it.

I did do a Skyrim RP on the old site years back that took off, but ended up dying out, because not too many people at the time were in to The Elder Scrolls. I agree on the whole notion that a mage should carry a weapon as well as his/her magic. Even wear armor. Sometimes, magic will fail or the character will run out of magicka, so you have to be prepared for these events.

Slight sidebar: I'd strongly encourage you to start, regardless of whether you feel it is the right time. I did that for years and lost a lot of time where I could have had the novel completed. Very rarely will writing it ever feel like the write time, but you have to make it the right time by just doing it.

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As for RP in games, I don't go to the extent the OP does, but I do tend to enjoy games where I can make my characters exist in those universe through lots of customization or talents.

Creating a character in a videogame as completely as I do in an RP? Nah, doesn't happen for me. With an RP, the OOC usually has all the tools I need to really understand the world and create a character for it. Most of the videogames I play like to hold back on those kinds of details, so I can't really envision things like where they were born, or even the type of environment they might have grown up in. It can also be quite jarring when you have a story figured out for your character, and the game throws one of those "but you are the chosen one!" things at you.

When it comes to dialog choices and getting skills, I do tend to think about things like what my character would say/do/have in that particular situation. but even here, some games will punish you for not making "smart" choices. So I find myself overriding choices my character would make just so that I can get the stuff/side quest/complete the game.

Of course, it wouldn't be hard for me to add more detail to these characters. it just never really works in game.

Ohh I have so many Elder Scrolls characters. I often make ones that don't really go anywhere, but the ones that did even made it into some RP's.
My most notable ones are;

Corin Darbon, a Breton Battlemage who's family had been quite corrupt, resulting in them getting themselves the wrong enemies and being attacked one night. Corin survived and ended up as a member of a group of hunters. A lot of traveling, fighting with bandit groups and adapting to his new life later he ended up in Skyrim where he managed to rebuild both fame and fortune.
Just don't mention his height.

Adrian Brunfaire, a Breton mage. A pretty friendly and pacifistic guy. Skyrim's attitude towards wizard has resulted in him being a bit secretive, but once he notices he can safely talk about magic around someone, the young scholar and researcher won't shut up.
Really just a big nerd.

Eriseya, my Altmer Dragonborn. Oddly insecure for an Altmer and fairly down to earth. She's very close to Lydia, isn't too loved by the Thalmor and is a close childhood friend of my other Altmer character.
She's a onehanded warrior, since I also love playing against type.

Serion, the other Altmer. Unsurprisingly, much like his friend he's not a big friend of the Thalmor. He is also a member of the Dawnguard, close friends with Serana and a tank, since the height of Altmer characters makes them really imposing looking in heavy armor : D

Faras Greendale, a Bosmer thief and former assassin. Suave, not necessarily unfriendly but definitely not loyal. Also, hypocritically enough, he's pretty fed up with being betrayed all the bloody time.
Good archer, also pretty good at nicking things and stabbing people.

@Piddle Totally know what you mean about RP characters not going far :p

I've put Numerius on hold for Dulza, my female Orc Warlock. She's a fan of raising the dead, summoning creatures from oblivion, and cracking skulls with a skyforge steel war axe. She's also a werewolf. She's the closest to an evil character I've ever gotten (RP wise) though I would describe her more as a power hungry anti-hero than a villain.

@TheMusketMan Dulza sounds pretty badass!
I have to admit I'm godawful at playing evil characters; they turn around eventually :')

@Piddle Yeah, plus its sort of hard to make an all out evil character. There aren't many 'evil' dialogue options in the elder scrolls outside of The Dark Brotherhood and Daedric Quests. Maybe the vampire side of dawnguard as well.

@TheMusketMan That's true, yeah. And a lot of that also leans quite heavily on a specific type of evil, I feel so it also doesn't always fit the type one might want to try out.
Having said that, there's definitely some fun in having a character do decent things but just kind of 'roleplay' them as just doing it for money, fame and attention, while everyone still treats them like a hero.

@Piddle Even now I'm thinking of another character. I have this problem where I can't stick with one character past like, level 12. I put them on hold or scrap them altogether. The idea for this new character is actually based on Jim Morrison and The Doors' song 'People are Strange'.



James is a Nord bard that favors one-handed swords, illusion magic, light armor, and chaos. He would arrive in Skyrim, unsurprisingly, in chains. He probably hooked up with a noble's wife or burned down a temple or something. Regardless, he escapes certain death with the help of a scaled friend and sets out into Skyrim to gain the reputation of the best bard in all the land. Thing is, he's a bit crazy. Not like evil crazy (though maybe sometimes that when he's angry) but he just thrives on chaos and weirdness. The mundane world of Nirn perpetually bores him, which is why he would be constantly throwing himself into life or death situations (unusual for a bard) just to get a little variety. When faced with Sheogorath, you would bet they'd be thick as thieves and James would happily accept the wabbajack.

Hell, even when faced with stopping the resurrection of the wolf queen Potema, James would probably stop to consider it. How much more interesting would Skyrim be if there was an undead Queen causing havoc? He favors Illusion because of the influence he has over people. As a bard, he has a very high speech skill but one could hardly convince someone to murder their best friend with just their voice. So a little magic and bam, instant head to axe action. Oh, and forget about James discovering he's the last of a legendary line of warriors that can use their voice to rule the world. He would be beside himself and it would only give him more reason to jump into nordic ruins to find words of power.

Despite all this madness, James is still a bard. He loves literature and music, and is actually a very talented singer and songwriter himself. He finds companionship with bards and maniacs alike and although Nirn as a whole is very uninteresting to him, Skyrim, it seems, will be a whole lot more interesting than he anticipated.

@TheMusketMan I've the same problem with characters. I won't stick with them past level 5 or around there. I think what the cause is there is so many options and possibilities that you want to do them all but at the same time you don't want to. It's quiet the conundrum.

Yeah, relatable. For me the issue is that at some point I have characters for almost every questline and having too many questlines done by too many characters just makes it feel a wee bit less like that one character's accomplishment to me, so new characters often strand because I'm just dicking around with them.

The majority of the time I do actively roleplay these characters out in the same settings and games, in that I try to find a mode of operation for them and things they will simply do or not do. Many of the choices I make, as less than optimal as they tend to be with these games because there's no remote semblance of balance, favors just trying to be clever or different with them. What I mean is, purposefully trying to stick to a single character above all else is not only difficult, but quite rewarding if you can manage to get it to work.

I have a single khajiit mage in Skyrim who is well into level 40 or so with the long, and I do mean long, journey of Skyrim being a huge backing force as to how I managed to focus on such a character. To date, I have managed to avoid stealing anything and getting involved with the greater conflict, so it feels much more like a game of a lone adventurer just going about hunting bandits, solving ancient puzzles and doing quests - a more traditional roleplaying experience. No less, being a mage that focuses extensively on alteration and destruction spells, it leaves a fairly pure experience as to what one can or cannot do. It feels very earned and sincere, at times frustrating beyond all reason, but as though this character actually has a story; mostly ignoring the dragonborn elements except for the obvious times.

I think I managed to find myself at the point where the character is just the archetypal adventuring mage who has somehow made way by himself and as a race not too beloved by the nords of Skyrim. It helped some that my motivation was to make him as least a khajiit as possible, but I would by lying if I did not mention how useful claws are when you are out of magicka.