STOP RIGHT THERE, TROPER! Take a look at these
The Elder Scrolls memes and see if any are familiar to you.
Please add entries in the following format:
- The name of the video game or company.
- The meme. [[labelnote:Explanation]]The explanation behind the meme, if necessary.[[/labelnote]] ExplanationLike this.
- Further mutations and successor memes, if any.
Recurring:
- [remain silent]ExplanationThe Dark Brotherhood quests in Oblivion and Skyrim often give you the option to not say anything in response to an NPC's dialogue. The NPC will react accordingly.
- "Khajiit has wares, if you have coin."ExplanationStandard stock line of Khajiit salespeople. Usually paired with pictures of actual felines.
- "Khajiit stole nothing... Khajiit is innocent of this crime."ExplanationAnother stock line, typically paired with pictures of actual felines in cages or being dragged away.
- Fishy Sticks ExplanationA forum in-joke that's referenced Once per Episode. Basically, it's tradition to give newcomers to the official forum a "fishy stick" in the form of this image
◊, an altered version of Captain Morgan Rum, but the Captain is instead saying "Have a fishy stick!" Bethesda was amused by it and has thrown in various in-game references. - "C0DA makes it canon." ExplanationC0DA, a comic written by Michael Kirkbride, was about, among other things, the nature of Elder Scrolls canon, in that it is deliberately contradictory and open to the interpretation of the community, particularly in the matter of fanfiction. The absurdity of the comic leads many to use this phrase as a response to shitposts and memes.
- It just works. Explanation Todd Howard used this phrase during the gameplay reveal of Fallout 4. Fans have begun to use this phrase to refer to how buggy the recent Bethesda games have been.
- Jokes about the lore being written by a guy high off his mind on shroom. explanationDue to the esoteric nature of the series' lore, it's a very common joke within the community that its former main writer, Michael Kirkbride, was tripping balls on LSD the whole time while writing it. The joke is so prevalent that Cracked even does a whole article debunking it.
- HALTHALTHALTHALTHALTHALTHALTHALTHALTHALTHALT! ExplanationCity guards cry "Halt!" while chasing you. Committing a crime will result in a lot of city guards chasing you; if you keep running around long enough eventually the endlessly spawning guards will clog up the memory and cause the program, fittingly enough, to halt.
- Game of the Year. All Years.ExplanationThe Game of the Year edition of the game was still being sold in stores some 10-12 years after it came out, so people ran with it. As of 2018, it has been made a backwards compatible title on the various virtual stores, so it will always be available.
- YOU N'WAH! FILTHY S'WIT! DIE, FETCHER! ExplanationInsults the native Dunmer use in battle. They stick out due to the frequency you'll hear them along with the fact that they're made up racial slurs. Carried over into later games.
- We're watching you, scum.ExplanationA classic "greeting" used by Ordinators.
- The Morrowind Strut. ExplanationThe odd walking animation, which spawned several youtube videos. There is even a mod for "Shoes of Extravagant Swag" which will play 'Stayin' Alive' when the player character walks in them.
- The Lusty Argonian Maid ExplanationOne of the in-game books is a So Bad, It's Good excerpt from a cheesy pornographic play by resident Chivalrous Pervert Crassius Curio. It was so popular with fans that it's been included in every game since, then got sequels in Skyrim.
- "With this character's death, the thread of prophecy is severed. Restore a saved game to restore the weave of fate, or persist in the doomed world you have created." ExplanationA message you get if you kill a character who's essential to the plot. Morrowind doesn't have "essential" NPC protection, so you can very easily kill someone you weren't meant to and get this message a lot.
- "Why walk when you can ride?" ExplanationA common catchphrase from the NPCs that offer Silt Strider Transport.
- "Mournhold. City of Light. City of Magic" ExplanationA common catchphrase from the NPCs in Mournhold.
- The 36 Lessons of Vivec debuted in Morrowind and features the especially memorable line "Reach heaven by violence" repeated in several of the sermons; after being popularized as a reference as a recurring line in Kill Six Billion Demons, "Reach heaven through violence" has shown up in a lot of varied places since.
- Where's your uniform?ExplanationTo the frustration of many players, joining the Imperial Legion requires the player to wear a very selective range of armor when speaking to Legion officers. Approaching them without the right armor equipped will prompt them to ask why the player is out of uniform.
- STOP! YOU VIOLATED THE LAW! Pay the court a fine or serve your sentence! Your stolen goods are now forfeit!
- STOP RIGHT THERE, CRIMINAL SCUM! No one breaks the law on my watch! I'm confiscating your stolen goods, now pay your fine or it's off to jail! ExplanationBoth lines said by the Imperial Guardsmen when they catch you after you've committed a crime.
- Goddamn telepathic guards. ExplanationWhen you're caught commiting a crime, somehow every guard in the region immediately knows you're a criminal upon seeing you, even if you flee all the way across the map.
- BY THE NINE DIVINES! THERE'S BEEN A MURDER! ExplanationOften said directly after you kill someone and take about two steps away from the corpse.
- BY THE NINE DIVINES! ASSAULT! ASSAULT! ExplanationUsually shouted if the player attacks a friendly NPC.
- "The body is still warm. There is a killer about." ExplanationAnother line that the guards say upon finding a dead body, which they will often say just after they kill someone themselves.
- BY AZURA! BY AZURA! BY AZURA!! IT'S THE GRAND CHAMPION! ExplanationThe line comes from a particularly annoying NPC called the Adoring Fan who follows you around sometimes and can't be killed.
- I heard the Fighters' Guild is recruiting again. Explanation Basically a Welcome to Corneria. Players can expect to hear it a lot.
- I saw a mud crab the other day.
- Loathsome things, I hate them.
- Did you steer well clear of it?
- Goodbye.ExplanationThe system that generates chatter for the NPCs is a bit eccentric; it often repeats itself and throws together odd conversations, and seems to be weirdly obsessed with mud crabs.
- "CHEESE! FOR EVERYONE!" ExplanationOne of Sheogorath's lines when you successfully complete a quest for him. He's a fairly Mad God ("Wait, scratch that! Cheese fer no one! That can be just as much as a celebration if you don't like cheese, true?!").
- Powdered deer penis. ExplanationWeebam-Na lists off the menu of a failed restaurant, ending the list with "Rat ragu with powdered deer penis." Fans were quick to make the "penis" part of the line a meme.
- "Oblivion NPC dialogue in a nutshell" ExplanationComedic YouTube videos making fun of the aforementioned Artificial Atmospheric Actions by setting awkward dialogue from movies, tv shows and other sources to Oblivion music.
- "Have you heard of the high elves?" Explanation LaFave Bros, a Youtube channel, have made short videos with absolutely dead-on imitations of Oblivion characters' physics, behaviours, and voices. The line "Have you heard of the high elves" has become particularly attached to Oblivion, despite the fact that it is never actually said in the game.
- "Wait a minute let me do that one again-" Explanation Some outtakes were left in the dialogue, with the line said by female elves in the Imperial City after completing "Misdirection" being the most notorious.
- NI-NI-NI-NI-NI-NI-NI-NI ExplanationIn the Shivering Isles DLC you meet a bizarre Argonian who shouts this while running around in circles (appropriately enough, the Argonian is named "Runs-In-Circles").
- I don't know you and I don't care to know you! ExplanationIn Cheydinhal, you meet a corrupt guard who will say this to you. Due to a Good Bad Bug, he will continue to say this phrase when he is in a conversation with an NPC.
- Horse armor. ExplanationThe horse armor DLC was widely regarded as an especially blatant example of Revenue-Enhancing Devices, partly because it was released before microtransactions became a common practice.
- "...then I took an arrow in the knee." ExplanationThe guards of major settlements tend to say "I used to be an adventurer like you, then I took an arrow in the knee." quite a lot. The strangeness of the phrase at face value and its prolific nature in-game led to it being widely parodied. It got so popular online that it eventually spawned a massive backlash by the second half of the 2010s, with many netizens viewing it as the archetypal example of a Discredited Meme.
- This piece of concept art◊ was mistaken by many people to be depicting the player facing a bear with tentacles coming out of its lower half (due to mammoths having four tusks in-universe). Tentacle bears are bound to come up in early discussion about the game. It's a bear eating a mammoth, in case you're wondering.
- FUS RO DAH! ExplanationThe words for the "Unrelenting Force" shout, which can be used to send just about anything flying with a Super-Scream that generates Gale-Force Sound. Literally means "force balance push". Often used in videos that show someone or something getting knocked over. For example, this video.
- In particular, the first glimpse of "FUS RO DAH!" from the trailer, always preceded by the "But there's one they fear..." narration and followed by the game's theme song, quickly became a YouTube Poop trend.
- Weightless Carrots. This has become the rallying cry of those who decry the constant "ruined" mentality over the most inane things... because someone actually did complain about them at one point on the Bethesda forums.
- "Unfortunately, I am the High King of Skyrim." Came about after a Game Mod was released that let the player actually become the High King of Skyrim, giving them the power to order anyone killed, make anyone a follower, enslave or imprison anyone, etc., with the aforementioned gallery focusing on the various Scrappies of the game (and the Ebony Warrior).
- KA... ME... HA... ME... HA!!! ExplanationThe master-level shock spell in the destruction tree, Lightning Storm, looks like an electrical variant on the (semi) trope-naming Kamehameha from Dragon Ball.
- Let me guess, someone stole your sweetroll. ExplanationAnother quote from the guards. This is actually a reference to previous Elder Scrolls games, where the multiple-choice character creation option would ask you what you would do if someone stole your sweetroll. It's nodded at in Fallout 3, another Bethesda game, in which at the start, a bully attempts to steal your sweetroll.
- Did you see those warriors from Hammerfell? They've got curved swords. Curved. Swords. ExplanationThose guards are at it again. The ones in Whiterun will sometimes comment on the Alik'r warriors in the city who do indeed carry curved swords, which the guards find fascinating for some reason. Inexplicably, you can also hear it from guards in the other cities where there aren't any Alik'r warriors at all.
- Don't let yourself be fooled by a pretty face. You're better than that. Explanation A quote by Kematu, the leader of said Alik'r warriors, if you side with him over Saadia. Lobbed at players that are accused of being Distracted by the Sexy.
- "Something you need, you miserable wretch?" ExplanationA common greeting from NPC's that you've managed to royally piss off, usually by stealing something from them or killing a friend of theirs. Most famously used by the merchant Elrindir if you murder his brother Anoriath for the Dark Brotherhood.
- People don't want to be sword.
- "Do you get to the Cloud District very often? Oh, what am I saying? Of course, you don't." ExplanationA common quote from Nazeem. Considered particularly grating since the 'Cloud District' is just the area around Dragonsreach, which you can not only get to very easily and have to go to several times in the main quest including the first time you visit Whiterun, but may be exactly where you're standing when he says this.
- "We are but maggots, WRITHING in the filth of OUR OWN CORRUPTION!" and "Praise Talos!" ExplanationOne Nord priest named Heimskr has a very loud way of appreciation of the god Talos. This makes him, along with Nazeem, one of the most favoured characters to kill for being annoying.
- And "LET ME SHOOOOOOOOOW YOU THE POWER OF TALOS STORMCROWN!"
- "These Skyrim mods are getting out of hand." ExplanationOn image-sharing sites like Imgur, this is a typical comment on Scenery Porn photos.
- Horses not giving a crap about physics◊ due to the wonky behavior of mountains.
- Skyrim now on EVERYTHING! ExplanationSkyrim's repeated appearances at E3 2017 (six years after it came out) caused a bit of a reaction, with comparisons to Resident Evil 4. Notably, this was acknowledged by Bethesda at E3 2018, with them jokingly announcing Skyrim Very Special Edition for the Amazon Alexa, Etch-a-Sketch, Motorola pager, and Samsung smart refrigerator.
- Goddamit Todd, you did it again. Explanation Todd Howard, executive producer on Oblivion, Skyrim, and several Fallout games, is stereotyped as an endearing-but-odd boss along the lines of a Michael Scott who desperately wants you to buy multiple copies of Skyrim / Fallout 4 / Fallout 76 / whatever else at any cost, up to and including threatening you at gunpoint, putting you inside the game, or disguising a Bethesda game as another game.
- After the announcement of Skyrim Special Edition and Skyrim for the Nintendo Switch, Skyrim rerelease jokes tend to be accompanied by photoshops of Todd Howard's face to vaguely resemble someone else to hype up the Skyrim rerelease. Has become somewhat of an Ascended Meme with the joke reveal trailer for Skyrim: Very Special Edition at E3 2018, which promised the game would be coming to Amazon Alexa, an electronic refrigerator, and the Etch A Sketch. This meme has been extended to the point of Bethesda sneaking Skyrim into completely unrelated properties, usually in the form of other games unexpectedly transitioning into the Skyrim intro (the "Hey you, you're finally awake" meme below). Up to eleven with the announcement of Bethesda being bought by Microsoft and added to Xbox Game Studios and that all Bethesda games will be added to the Xbox Game Pass, with the joke being that Todd Howard successfully sold and will continue to sell Skyrim every month for the rest of time.
- You are carrying too much to be able to run. ExplanationYou will see this message a lot in the early part of the game, especially while trudging toward the nearest town with a general store.
- I'll just create a new character with a fresh playstyle... And I'm a Stealth Archer again. ExplanationSkyrim overhauled the Stealth system which has been in place since the series' inception, taking it from near Useless Useful Stealth levels and buffing it to damn near Game-Breaker levels. At high skill levels and with the right perks, it becomes difficult for NPCs to detect you at all, which added to the stealth combat enhancements the game brings, makes it a devastating Critical Hit Class. As such, players attempting to create new characters with different playstyles often find themselves drawn back into being Stealth Archers. Meme examples: here◊ and here◊.
- You cannot fast travel when enemies are nearby. ExplanationA great source of aggravation for players attempting to travel to another location, especially as, more often than not, it's caused by a Slaughterfish in a nearby brook that the player can't even see to kill. That, or they've randomly encountered a dragon, again.
- "Then I stripped the corpse naked and threw it in the river." ExplanationThe standard ending to any story involving bandits, Thalmor agents, or anyone else a player fights. In some cases, it's actually become custom for dealing with dead NPC characters who don't disappear after being murdered, as for many, it essentially becomes a funeral.
- "A NEW HAND TOUCHES THE BEACON" ExplanationPicking up Meridia's Beacon automatically triggers both her quest and a loud, sudden voiceover from her, ordering you to go to her temple. The beacon is spawned in a randomly chosen boss chest, making it near inevitable that you'll unwittingly pick it up in the middle of a different, far more important quest. This has made it a popular Interrupting Meme.
- Skyrim Intro Copypasta/"Rorikroll"/"Hey, you. You're finally awake. You were trying to cross the border, right? Walked right into that Imperial ambush, same as us, and that thief over there." ExplanationA series of infamous◊ series◊ of greentext referencing the opening of the game, usually starts off as the poster is heading somewhere on a carrier or simply closing their eyes, resulting the aforementioned opening once the poster wakes up/opened his/her eyes. Naturally, it spawns parodies and variations◊.
- The Frost Troll.ExplanationThe path to High Hrothgar has a Beef Gate Frost Troll on it which can very easily kill a low-level character. You have to go to High Hrothgar to advance the main quest, and are told to go there very early in the main questline, so this can lead to a Cycle of Hurting where the Troll kills you over and over, causing it to become a bit of a Memetic Badass amongst the fandom.
- [Insert Skill] 100.Explanation It’s popular to make screenshots of real life news stories accompanied by the appropriate in-game skill, insinuating that the people involved leveled those skills to the max.
- Illusion 100, Sneak 100. Explanation Similar to the above, except this is used sarcastically, in situations where With Cat Like Tread would apply (a cat hiding amongst towels, or a trail claiming to be a train).
- We Know. ExplantionThe Dark Brotherhood questline begins when you kill one of their targets and promptly get an anonymous letter saying "We Know" along with a black handprint. Letters in other works of fiction are frequently edited into the same message.
- Quicksaving... ExplanationIt’s common practice for players to quicksave their game upon meeting annoying or rude NPCs so they can kill them without getting a bounty or derailing a playthrough.
- Skyrim belongs to the Nords! ExplanationA common battle cry among the Nordic NPCs. Since most characters in the game are Nords, expect to hear this a lot.
- You'll make a fine rug, cat! Explanation A race-specific taunt that Khajiit will hear a lot.
- You've committed crimes against Skyrim and her people, what say you in your defense? ExplanationWhat the guards say when arresting you. Snowcloned for a variety of scenarios, usually to show disapproval of something.
- Wait, I know you...ExplanationIf you try to speak to a guard if you have an active bounty at the hold, they will recognize you and say this before trying to arrest.
- The Sacred Chicken ExplanationOne of the many quirks of the game’s AI is that, if you kill any of the chickens or other livestock in villages, every single citizen in the town will turn hostile and attack you with intent to kill. The bounty you get for it is pretty minuscule, making their reactions even more inexplicable. One particular chicken in Riverwood near the front gate tends to be casually attacked by new players, leading to them learning this the hard way.
- Must've been my imagination...ExplanationThe Sneak skill was revamped in Skyrim to basically become "Artificial Stupidity: the Skill"; at high Sneak levels, it's exceedingly common for enemies to not detect you even as you're peppering them with arrows, leading to bandits brushing off the arrows sticking out the back of their heads as a figment of their imagination.
- Never should have come here!ExplanationSaid by every bandit that attacks you ever. And most other NPCs in combat, for that matter. It's also strongly associated with the Suicidal Overconfidence of enemies, who will charge fearlessly at a daedric armor-clad Dragonborn with their flimsy iron sword.
- Cuckolding Faendal/SvenExplanationOne of the earliest quests you can do is resolving a Love Triangle between Faendal, Sven, and Camilla in Riverwood. Whichever of the men you help becomes a recruitable companion. The issue? Camilla is a marriage option, meaning you can help Faendal or Sven get a chance at the woman they love, only to swoop in and steal her from them, all while making them follow you around and serve you.
- "I like your ass"/"You're lying, Morgan." ExplanationPopular parody YouTuber Mans1ay3r's outro starts with a section of his L.A Noire's parody video, which contains this memetic exchange. Since Mans1ay3r's Skyrim and Oblivion Gamer Poop series are extremely popular among the TES fandom, this meme quickly became associated with Skyrim. Make any joke that originates from Mans1ay3r and someone is guaranteed to quote this exchange in response.
- Restoration is a perfectly valid school of magic, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise!ExplanationAs Colette Marence, the Restoration master at the College of Winterhold, will tell you every time you come within earshot. The question of Restoration's validity is often jokingly taken with a disproportionate amount of seriousness by fans as a result.
- What in Oblivion is THAT?ExplanationGeneral Tullius's uncharacteristically hammy response to Alduin's appearance in the game's intro is relatively popular as a way to express surprise.
- Kleptomaniac with a cheese addictionExplanationThe best descriptor for the Dragonborn
- Pogodi! Pogodi!Explanation Extreme case of Russian Mondegreen for the main theme, turning it into hilarious, but strangerly coherent lyrics. ("Dovahkiin, Dovahkiin, naal ok zin los vahriin" - "Pogodi, pogodi, na chasy posmotry", which translates as "Wait a bit, wait a bit, look at your watch"). The rest of the song similary turned into quite insane, but pretty coherent Russian citizen sad tale, lamenting about his dog being fat and flea-ridden, Moscow losing its head (again), and peoples being tired of victories, but still ready to brew a coffee, while enemies are advancing unnoticed without the ring.
- "By Talos, this can't be happening!"ExplanationOriginating on tumblr◊, the phrase is frequently used as a stock response to negative (but usually harmless or just strange) information. The actual phrase does not appear in the game, though several NPCs say the similar "By the gods, this can't be happening".
- THE SKELETON APPEARSExplanationA sort of "joint" meme with Kirby, where an otherwise unrelated scene is abruptly cut short by a Skull (an item from Skyrim) suddenly appearing from a wall of flames, complete with the Skull Gang's theme song from Kirby Mass Attack blasting in the background.
- PUNCHCATExplanationA silly but popular build revolving around abusing the Khajiit race's inherent bonus for barehanded combat to reflect their claws. The PUNCHCAT is often portrayed as a sort of Hot-Blooded Testosterone Poisoning Blood Knight and Idiot Hero, somewhat akin to Team Fortress 2's Soldier.
- "You fool. You don't stand a chance!"ExplanationA line said by Estormo, a Thalmor assassin sent by Ancano after the Dragonborn during the Winterhold questline. For someone with so much confidence, he is not all that strong, especially in the context of the Dragonborn having defeated a Dragon Priest just before this. All this makes it incredibly satisfying to tear him apart. There is a profusion of Youtube videos (almost always titled simply "You fool, you don't stand a chance") all dedicated to annihilating Estormo in the most flashy or humiliating ways possible.
- "Transcription Error" ExplanationDespite earlier games describing Cyrodiil, the heartland of the Empire and home province of the Imperials, as a tropical jungle, Oblivion showed it to be much more temperate. As described in the "Obscure Text" The Many Headed Talos (which Heimskr, see above, quotes from in Skyrim), the Deity of Human Origin Talos is said to have changed Cyrodiil to its current climate as a way of thanking the Imperial Legions who served him so well in life. The lore community largely accepted this explanation. However, when Online came out and showed Cyrodiil with the same temperate climate it has in Oblivion, fans scoffed. The in-game book The Heartland of Cyrodiil added fuel to the fire when it dismissed previous descriptions of Cyrodiil being a jungle as a "Transcription Error". Lore buffs largely settled on the Fanon explanation that Talos's changes were retroactive, making it so that Cyrodiil had always had a temperate climate. Since then, "Transcription Error" has been used by the fanbase to mock any changes Online (which was written and developed by a Bethesda subsidiary instead of the usual Elder Scrolls team) has made to the lore which they do not like. Example Reddit discussion here.
Do you get to the trope district very often? Oh what am I saying, of course you don't!
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