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I have at various points defended the Storyteller as a being that deserves a presumption of good faith. I am recanting that defense. By word and deed, the Storyteller has demonstrated that it is capricious, untrustworthy, and ultimately unconcerned with our survival.

Fact: The Storyteller does not provide useful information. It may be bound by an immense number of rules and restrictions that forbid it from doing so... but in every interaction it has been explicitly unhelpful and unforthcoming.

Fact: Although the Storyteller professes to regret our suffering and travails, it has explicitly forbidden us from setting up any defenses around the mana pool in its temple -- despite enemies having demonstrably penetrated through to the islets and assaulted and captured us in our sleep.

Fact: The Storyteller has openly encouraged me to abandon my principles and beliefs, while pretending it is not doing so. (It has also gone to some effort to mock those principles and beliefs.)

Pretty sure this is a fact: the Storyteller is taking petty revenge on me for calling out its behavior as capricious and untrustworthy.

I want to be absolutely clear that regardless of the Storyteller's intentions, we can only judge it by its actions. While it may mean the best by its own perspective, its perspective of what is 'best' for us clearly does not resemble our own. We must, unfortunately, consider it an enemy by that standard. Furthermore, gods are still fallible.

I am not advocating direct action against it, nor am I saying we have any other alternative at present than to accept we are, unavoidably, its playthings. But we need to know that's what we are, and view our interactions accordingly. We cannot trust it.

And incidentally, if anything suspicious should happen to me after writing this, take that as what evidence you should.

~Roy Greenhilt

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

How's that got anything to do with using "it?"

Don't know about your backwater homeworld, but over in Tamriel, we've got words for civilized communication. You use he or she or they when you need to talk about thinking, feeling folks instead of dustbin or livestock. You familiar with these revolutionary concepts, or am I going too fast?

There is not a set usage. We would likely refer to a dragon as 'it' if we didn't know its gender, for example, and dragons are sentient and sapient beings.

If the point you're trying to make, however, is that the established and preferred usage for the Storyteller is 'they', than I apologize and will use that in the future.

Would we? Funny. I've never known Paarthurnax, Durnehviir, or even Alduin as anything but "he."

Know what sort of people I've seen use "it" for sapients? The sort of folks who call me "lizard." Who say an Argonian isn't fit to live in their city or that a Khajiit can't be allowed to trade within their walls, because we're nothing but talking animals. This cute little "we have to use it" thing, strangely enough, only ever seems to apply to things that look different from you races of men. How you talk when you aren't thinking gives away a lot about the assumptions you hold, land-strider. Try to avoid not thinking.

Anyway, your obvious disdain for nonhumans aside, I think you maybe expect too much, dryskin. Jarl, Daedric Prince, divine, mortal... no matter what someone is, nobody lives purely and completely for someone else. There's no such thing as a strictly altruistic existence. The Storyteller is not our keeper or our egg-tender. What they have with us is a business relationship.

I am extremely baffled by both your projection of your issues on me based on a divergent linguistic experience I have already apologized for, and your rejection of the notion of Good as a concept in its entirety. That being said, if you are prepared to enter into a business relationship with an entity that is prepared to willingly sacrifice us without cause given, I'm not here to stop you.

You're starting down a pretty insufferable road, hero. I've already had my share of encounters with do-gooders who care more about being right than not doing harm.

I'm just saying, you're being downright naive if you expect everyone around you to abide by your moral code. If you deal with the Storyteller knowing they're a person with their own agenda and you're negotiating an exchange, not making a demand, then you won't have any problems. I mean, we're all getting the stuff we ask them to bring in for us, no? You wouldn't be writing on this board now if the Storyteller couldn't be bargained with reasonably.

Except their actions are capricious and arbitrary, or at least give all appearance of being so, making the difference a nonentity.

They literally insist we remain open to attack for no reason given. You remember the apes kidnapping us from our homes in the night, right? We are being forced to permit that possibility at all times. How is this okay?

And how have they done that? Forbid you to patrol the islets? Threaten anyone giving self-defense lessons with tarring and feathering? Ban the very concept of banding together to schedule a night sentry? Stop giving us supplies to fix up and fortify our homes? You're making a pretty big claim, but I'm not actually in the know about what the Storyteller did, here.

In this specific case, prepare fortifications around the temple mana pool to guard against intruders and better defend against assault.

Which I would be fine with if there was a reason given. Or even if we were told there is a reason and that cannot be told to us. That there was not one says that either there is no reason, that the reason will not be communicated to us, or that the reason cannot be communicated to all of us. However you break that down, the end result is that the Storyteller insists we maintain a weakness in our defenses that has already been breached once.

Well... it's their temple. People tend to not be okay with desecrating holy ground. I got into some trouble once because I poked the roots of a sacred tree with a knife, and that's nowhere near permanent changes.

Anyway, whatever the reason, you're not approaching this like a negotiator. Why should they have to justify what goes in their temple grounds to you? You're only using their mana pool because they let you. You're a tenant, not a landlord, and you're not gonna get what you want by making demands when you're not the one in a position of power. You've got to be able to think flexibly, dryskin, if you want to bargain well.

Why not fortify the islet mana pools instead? I mean, can't you realistically use any mana pool to reach the islets? Walling the Storyteller's pool off would be completely and utterly useless.

We need to fortify all of them. Fortifying the islet only could subject us to an overwhelming rush as enemies pour through multiple pools and out the one, and could also lead us to be cut off from the island if we lose control of the exterior ones.

I wanted to negotiate. I was not given a chance. I am entirely prepared to be respectful of holy ground or make any other reasonable accommodation, but it's our lives on the line. Just because we can come back doesn't make our pain and suffering okay. I would have accepted a reason, too, and I was given none. It isn't the decision itself, it's the manner in which it was made and enforced.

Edited (good lord that underline got out of control) 2017-11-23 05:14 (UTC)

So, wait, wait. You want to hand-build walls around every single mana pool except the ones on the islets? That's the most efficient course of action you've decided on, here? You're convinced that's the easiest route to guaranteed safety, not any of the other, much easier stuff I mentioned earlier?

Hero, I think we're done here. You're not only convinced your way is the only way, you're an abject fool, too.

I never said your proposed solutions have no value, and I never said that we shouldn't fortify the islet mana pool. If you actually wish to debate this I would appreciate not being misconstrued in that manner... though as you came into this communication hostile to begin with, I'd be lying if I said that I thought it was unintentional.

I'm trying to save and preserve lives. If you're not opposed to that, we're on the same side. (If the only life you care about is your own, then yes, we have nothing further to talk about.)