History Skyrim / Tropes0ToC

There are also banishing spells that can be used to banish summoned creatures back to Oblivion.

* AllWebbedUp: Skyrim's native GiantSpider[=s=] do this to their victims. In the first plot-relevant dungeon you explore as part of the main quest, you find a bandit leader still alive and webbed to the wall. He promises to hand over the item you are seeking if you cut him free. [[spoiler:[[ChronicBackstabbingDisorder Of course, the instant you do so, he takes off running and calls you a fool]]. [[DeathByIrony He will likely die a quick death]] to the dungeon's Draugr or death traps if you don't catch up and kill him first]]. One spider-filled cave even has the corpses of ''woolly mammoths'' webbed up this way.

** It even branches off into the main quest. The Blades don't like the Greybeards because they'd rather the Dragonborn focus on learning to control their [[MakeMeWannaShout Thu'um]], and because they refuse to intervene in Tamriel's ongoing crises. Conversely, the Greybeards don't like the Blades because they constantly meddle in affairs they don't understand and wish to use the Dragonborn as a soldier exclusively at their beck and call. Of course, because [[BigBad Alduin]] has emerged, and threatens Tamriel with immediate [[ApocalypseHow destruction]], the Dragonborn doesn't have time to properly meditate on the Voice, but to simply charge in with blades drawn is a fool's venture.

* CatchAndReturn: Theoretically possible, as arrows in flight can be interacted with and ''picked up'', but to do so would require inhuman reflexes. Or you can use the [[TimeMaster slow time]] [[MakeMeWannaShout shout]]. Also both you and your enemies are capable of using arrows that have actually struck (some of the time).

* ChekhovsSkill: At roughly the midpoint of the main quest, you learn the [[MakeMeWannaShout Thu'um]] Clear Skies, which you use to reach [[spoiler:Paarthurnax]] by clearing away the freezing mist on the Throat of the World. [[spoiler:This Shout gets used again in Sovngarde, to clear the MysteriousMist Alduin has shrouded the place with and provoke him to battle.]]

** [[AssholeVictim Grelod the Kind]] from the first Dark Brotherhood literally has a ''single point'' of HP. She can be killed by throwing something at her, [[MakeMeWannaShout shouting]] at her, hitting her with a wooden sword or stabbing her with a fork, or punching her once. Bonus points for killing her because it nearly always results in an unarmed finishing move, resulting in the hilarious potential sight of a tiny Breton mage suddenly killing an old woman (possibly mid-speech) [[WrestlerInAllOfUs with a body slam or a German suplex]].

** Because [[BrownNote Dragonrend]] has such a short cooldown timer even for the full three-word [[MakeMeWannaShout Shout]], using just one word can stunlock dragons. They can't take off, keeping them on the ground and within reach of melee weapons, and every blast sends them reeling in a stagger, disrupting any of their own Shouts that they may be in the midst of bellowing.

* BoobsOfSteel: As the weight slider increments on a female character in character generation, muscle mass and body frame size increase... and so does breast size. Also a literal case with certain armors that add breast cups when used by female characters, such as the Wolf Armor of the Companions.

* ContractOnTheHitman: [[spoiler:Emperor Titus]] gets posthumous revenge, not by having his assassin killed, but by [[spoiler:asking his assassin to kill the man who wanted him dead]]. On a side note, being a member of the Dark Brotherhood doesn't prevent random "Assassin" encounters (complete with a written letter bearing your name and Astrid's signature, [[spoiler:even after Astrid's death near the end of the questline]]) in the wild.

*** The Stormcloaks, [[HornyVikings Nord]] secessionists, (rightfully) criticize the Empire for not understanding [[ProudWarriorRace the people of Skyrim]] or their culture/religion (agreeing to the ban on [[DeityOfHumanOrigin Talos]] worship in the White-Gold Concordant with the Dominion to end the first Great War was [[RealMenLoveJesus the final straw for many Nords]]). They follow Ulfric Stormcloak, a man of great courage and loyalty to his allies (which his enemies acknowledge) and is [[TheParagon a paragon]] of [[RatedMForManly traditional]] [[ProudWarriorRaceGuy Nord]] values. They (justifiably) feel that the Empire caved-in to end the Great War (in which thousands of Nords gave their lives fighting ''for'' the Empire), and that it's become a [[VestigialEmpire decrepit]], [[ObstructiveBureaucrat obstructive]] entity with [[InadequateInheritor weak leadership]] that has given their enemies huge amounts of power in Skyrim without the Nords' consent. Also, a few characters mention that the Empire has been putting high taxes on Skyrim after the war, limiting the citizens' financial well-being.

** The existence of ''Skyrim: Very Special Edition'' for the Amazon Alexa, along with its announcement trailer also claiming that ''Skyrim'' will be released on refrigerators and the Etch A Sketch, is a nod to the meme claiming that Bethesda only exists to rerelease ''Skyrim'' for the rest of time.

* ConvenientWeaknessPlacement: The penultimate boss in the ''Dawnguard'' DLC is fought at the top of a high balcony, and the battle starts with him right up against the railing. Considering this is Skyrim...well, you do the math.

* CoffinContraband: Discussed. Cicero is trying to transport a coffin containing the remains of 'his mother' to a new crypt, but the wagon loses a wheel outside Loreius' farm. Loreius refuses to help Cicero repair the wagon, citing as one of the reasons that he thinks Cicero could be using the coffin to smuggle weapons and skooma.

* BadassBaritone: Ulfric and Alduin

* ArtisticLicenseGeography: Whiterun, Eastmarch, and territories north of these areas are described in-universe as being a tundra environment. However, the presence of trees, high grass, and good farming land in places like Rorikstead indicate the opposite. Permafrost would prevent the growth of trees and most tall plants and severely inhibit farming. In fact, the Pale is largely coniferous forest and Hjaalmarch is a tree-covered swamp, both of which don't occur beyond the tree line that marks where tundra begins.

* CuffsOffRubWrists: If you go to third person mode right as your hands are being untied at the start of the game, you can glimpse the Dragonborn doing this.

** The more vicious Daedric Princes order you to do horrible things for their artifacts (and you need to get all of them for an achievement). They usually involve betraying a companion or leading a good person to a horrible death. The less said about the things [[ImAHumanitarian Namira]], [[TheCorrupter Molag Bal]], [[BloodKnight Boethiah]], and [[YourWorstNightmare Vaermina]] demand of you, the better. That said, all of those are sidequests, and therefore don't have to be completed by the player unless you really want the rewards... although, the in-game rewards for these quests are ''good''. [[InfinityPlusOneSword Really]] ''[[GameBreaker damn]]'' [[ArmorOfInvincibility good]]. Namira and Vaermina's quests, at least, can be intentionally "failed" if you're not quite ready to step over the MoralEventHorizon. In Vaermina's quest in particular, many players have flat out found themselves ''unable to complete it'' and therefore miss out on the "Oblivion Walker" achievement because it involves betraying the very likable Erandur.

* BareYourMidriff: The fur, Forsworn and Falmer armor in the base game and the Creation Club adds the Dark Seducer and Golden Saint armor, which bares the midriffs of female wearers. The Forsworn, hide and Falmer armor also bare the midriffs for males, but the fur armor is shirtless, rather than midriff-baring.

** And speaking of long dead reviled rulers, Wolf Queen Potema. Unlike Olaf, however, there is absolutely zero dispute over how evil and how reviled she was. Apart from some crazy necromancers trying (foolishly) to bind and enslave her, and some vampires living in her catacombs, ''no one'' has anything positive to say about her. At all. [[spoiler: Also unlike Olaf, her ghost is not found in Sovngarde, either before or after the two quests concerning her, so there truly is no silver lining with her. (However, that may be because she's an Imperial.)]]

** It's mentioned when you talk to people in the College of Winterhold that the previous mage group before yours [[ChekhovMIA went missing.]] You can happen upon their bodies by chance, and pick up unique items of theirs, but you can't do anything for them, find out whether the deaths were connected, or bring anyone any closure. This is actually a glitch, as Phinis Gestor was supposed to offer you the quest, but never does.
*** The "Cutting Room Floor" mod, which restores content that was removed from the final game, includes the meadery near Dragon Bridge that two of the missing apprentices were supposed to be running. This obviously conflicts with the unfinished quest in which you were supposed to find all four dead, so the meadery is run by two unrelated people now.

* AbsurdlySpaciousSewer: The Ratway, most definitely. The Thieves Guild has set up their main base down there -- said base covers maybe 10% of the total area. In fact, it's clear that it's too big for them to patrol on their own, as evidenced by the fact that the Thalmor get in there without much trouble during their hunt for Esbern.

* AerithAndBob: The members of Clan Battle-Born: Olfrid, Bergritte, Idolaf, Alfhild... and then Lars and Jon.
** Character names in general run the gamut from the mundane (Lydia the Housecarl, Adrienne Avenicci the blacksmith) to the odd, archaic, or very Scandinavian (Ulfric, Avulstein, Ysolda) to the purely fantastical (Irileth, Belethor, Farengar). For some, it's justified, as each race has different naming conventions. Imperials are Latin/Italian, Bretons are French, elven races lean further towards fantasy etc.

* AirborneMook: Dragons, when they're not attacking you on the ground.

** Astrid, at the end of [[spoiler: the Dark Brotherhood quest. She just wanted her family to be happy. Too bad that family didn't include you.]]

** Miraak in the ''Dragonborn'' DLC, due to [[spoiler: how horrifying his death is]].

* AllThereInTheManual: The official game guide contains a lot of information that isn't present in the game, particularly details about the various {{Non Player Character}}s. For example, Delvin Mallory's description claims that he was raised in Honorhall Orphanage and was later taken in by Gallus, and when he accidentally killed someone during a robbery, Gallus sent him to stay with the Dark Brotherhood for a year (where Delvin became Astrid's lover) until people forgot about it.

* AlwaysIdenticalTwins: Sissel and Britte, the twin daughters of Lemkil in Rorikstead. They're a humorous example, though - since there are only two models (one boy and one girl) for all of the children in Skyrim, they have to be identical twins because ''all'' the children are identical.
** Averted with Farkas and Vilkas, the only other twins in the game, because they're adults and can have different models.

* AndIMustScream: One Dragon Priest is encountered by unlocking his sarcophagus with two keys shaped like skulls. Nothing suggests he was "dead" before the unlocking or even unconscious (Aura Whisper clearly shows him inside before the unlocking). He was most likely trapped in there since the last war against the dragons, which was a couple thousand years ago. Little wonder he is called Otar [[GoMadFromTheIsolation the Mad]]. The backstory found in various in-game sources reveals that [[spoiler: Otar had gone insane before he was imprisoned, and the two draugr you have to kill to get the keys to release him were, in their day, heroes who managed to imprison him and were given the task of guarding his tomb so he wouldn't escape. Of course, they were only "heroes" from the perspective of the Dragon Cult, an unremittingly evil group in the first place.]]

* AndYourRewardIsParenthood: ''Hearthfire'' adds in the option for you to adopt {{Heartwarming Orphan}}s, which you can do whether or not you have a LoveInterest. They live in your home and you can bring them souvenirs of your adventures.

** Really, this trope is so tremendously common in Skyrim, it often seems the largest cause of misfortune and death is "Victim started a diary."

*** This is seen in an amusing meta-example from the developers; the dragon lair of Shearpoint also contains a Dragon Priest tomb, and if you don't watch your step, you'll often have to simultaneously fight off him and several hundred tons of angry lizard in one of the toughest battles of the game. This priest's name? Krosis.

* ArtificialAtmosphericActions: There's still some, but it's ''much'' better than in the previous games. It was mentioned that it's actually quite hard to make the AI act ''completely'' realistic, but they won't talk about nothing but mudcrabs this time. Still, like in ''Oblivion'', you can play the AI for laughs.

** Bryling and Falk Firebeard will often talk to each other about their affair and how they need to keep it a secret from Erikur... often right in front of Erikur (and the entire Blue Palace court).
*** For an added layer, Sybille Stentor will pipe up about how obvious they're being... even while sleeping in the next room.

** While escaping from Helgen with either Hadvar or Ralof, you can murder either the torturers or the Stormcloaks right in front of Hadvar or Ralof respectively, and they won't even care.
*** Subverted with Hadvar; right before going into the torture room, he lets you know that he doesn't have a high opinion of this particular room or its hosts. Sometimes upon killing them, he might even say, ''"These bastards call themselves Imperial Legionnaires..."'' Strangely, that still doesn't stop Hadvar from trying to save them from their impending deaths at the hands of the dragon or the Stormcloaks. Ralof of the Stormcloaks, on the other hand, plays the trope straight.

** If an enemy is being attacked by a foe they cannot reach or attack with ranged weaponry, they will run for cover until said foe can be attacked.
*** Note that the same thing sometimes happens if your sneak skill is so high (and, sometimes, the lighting so dark) that they simply cannot find you, despite being right next to you. A lightly-wounded enemy in this position who simply can't find you sometimes loses their cool completely, screams "I cannot best you!", then runs away and hides for a while. It's particularly amusing when Draugr do it; their "fleeing shuffle" is hilarious yet surprisingly swift.

*** When helping you battle Alduin, Paarthurnax will often fly a little too close to him when you're trying to bring him down with Dragonrend, resulting in him getting hit with it a few times.

** You can steal just about anything by putting a cauldron or bucket on the owner's head. This is an especially effective technique to use on shopkeepers, since they often don't move at all behind the counter. Just put a bucket or cauldron on their head and you can loot everything in the store without the shopkeeper noticing. You can even murder other people in the store without him detecting it.

** When exploring small rooms, followers and summoned creatures/animal companions have a habit of standing right inside a doorway, preventing you from leaving until they back up. Sometimes they do it right away; other times they just stand there looking at you, and probably wondering why you're running into them. It makes shouting "Fus Ro Dah!" at them very tempting when they do this.
*** A patch remedies this problem letting you push [=NPCs=] back a short distance by running into them.

* AsYouKnow: Beautifully averted. The Dragonborn is a foreigner to Skyrim, even if they're a Nord (which is handwaved as them returning to their homeland under the worst possible circumstances after spending an extended period of time away), so they actually learn about the ongoing events (the Civil War, the Thalmor's influence, etc.) at the same pace as the player.
* AscendedFanboy: Erik the Slayer. He's a young farmer's son from a rural town that wants to be an adventurer just like yourself. You have the option to help him live his dream by paying for or talking his father into paying for a weapon and set of armor. You can then hire him one time to make him an adventuring companion.

*** Hern and Hert are vampires, who prey on travelers that visit their mill. (However, it is still possible for the player to feel bad for Hert, as outside of the Dark Brotherhood questline, she is pretty much AffablyEvil.)

** Pretty much everyone in the Markarth questline. You can side with the Forsworn, who are [[spoiler:genocidal racists]], or the Silver-Bloods, who are [[spoiler:using petty criminals and political opposition as slave labor in their mines]].

** The ''Dawnguard'' expansion adds Death Hounds, undead canines that accompany vampires. Joining Clan Volkihar lets you bring one along.
*** Alternately, joining the Dawnguard instead gives you access to a pair of adorable battle hounds which look like huskies, and also ''armored attack trolls''.

** Dragons seem to exhibit this. Due to their lofty view (and general tendency to constantly fly around while fighting), they tend to aggro (or get aggro'd by) pretty much everything, and get distracted from the walking divine intervention attempting to devour their soul to go attack a random mudcrab.

* AutomatonHorses: [[http://i.imgur.com/Xaoka.jpg Well, how's this for starters?]] The only nods to reality are that the horses cannot ''gallop'' non-stop and may die if you ride them off cliffs.

** Smithing. Depending on how fast you can manage to level it, you can get some of the best armor in the game well before it starts turning up as random drops, as well as improve your equipment to outperform standard issue gear that should be superior (and that's not even getting into the enchanting exploits). Unfortunately, the resource cost to level it that high is ''enormous'', and the only alternative is spending a lot of money to train it up. Further, none of the perks affect your combat skills directly. Lastly, with armor in particular, it's fairly easy to reach the hard cap for damage reduction, meaning that all the effort you put into tempering it is largely wasted. [[SubvertedTrope Weapons, however, have no such cap]], so if you're playing on Legendary and at high levels, maxed-out Smithing is pretty much a requirement if you want to be able to so much as '''scratch''' dragons and other powerful foes.

*** Mass Paralysis, a Master Alteration spell, falls into the same trap as Fire Storm. Downplayed a bit with Dragonhide, which can be quite useful if cast before a combat you initiate (provided you have the necessary perks to extend its duration past the base 30 seconds), but just about worthless if the enemy attacks you before you can cast it due to the long cast time. Meanwhile, the Restoration spells are mostly only useful against the undead. Fortunately, the Illusion Master spells have a massive range while the Conjuration-level Master spells summon permanent servants, so the cast time for those is not really a problem at all.

** Being a Werewolf or (with the ''Dawnguard'' DLC) a Vampire Lord can be this outside of combat, since people are instantly hostile to you and you can't pick anything up without mods. The Vampire Lord is slightly better than the Werewolf in this regard, since you can switch in and out of it at will instead of only being able to use it once a day and having to wait out the transformation to change back.
*** Both forms fall into ClippedWingAngel on a high level character. The Vampire Lord's main spell never deals over 150 damage (and cannot be dual-cast), while with smithing, alchemy, weapon skills and enchanting, you can hit for over 1000 damage with a weapon, plus hundreds more with a Chaos enchant and relevant perks for it. But if you want to off someone in plain sight without getting the blame for it...
*** The Vampire Lord, however, has Vampire's Grasp, which lets you repeatedly throw enemies into the air (or off a steep cliff, or into traps...) basically acting like a much more spammable and directable version of the Unrelenting Force shout.

*** Dismay and Disarm don't fare much better. The two shouts only affect enemies that are below a certain level (the exact level depending on how many words are used), and while the stronger versions of the Shouts can be useful at lower levels, they aren't much help after level 30 or so; most enemies at that point are too strong for the Shouts to affect or weak enough that it isn't worth disarming or fearing them. Dismay becomes even more impractical for those who choose to invest in Illusion magic, as the fear spells of that school can end up becoming stronger than the Shout depending on the Dragonborn's perk choices.
** Specialized arrows (Daedric, Dragonbone, etc.) are a huge improvement over generic arrows, doing three times the damage, but this is on the scale of single to double digits. With enough smithing skill, your bows can do three digit damage, rendering that little bit extra completely pointless. If you haven't gotten to that point, however, it can be worth the investment if you know the trick to duplicate them for free. Not to mention that after ''Dawnguard'' is installed, arrows are craftable and can be easily produced in large numbers (except maybe Daedric Arrows, which require a Daedra heart).

** The entire lockpicking perk tree falls victim to this. The mastery perks are useless because lockpicks weigh nothing and cost practically nothing, so it's trivially easy to amass hundreds and brute-force any lock in the game. This also makes having unbreakable picks a novelty at best. The silent lockpicking perk is useless because sneaking has the same effect, and there are very few occasions where you can't get away with sneaking to pick a lock, even if your Sneak skill is abysmal. Wax Key creates a key to a lock if it has one, but if you can pick the lock in the first place then it's irrelevant (not to mention wasteful, if you want to grind the skill on locked doors in a city). Finally, the Golden Touch and Treasure Hunter perks increase the chance of finding gold/rare loot, which is nice, but gold is easily earned through other skills (like alchemy or enchanting) and whatever extra loot you do get is likely going to be inferior to what you're using by the time you've earned enough points to get the perk in the first place.
** Pickpocketing is pretty much just a novelty, as you'll quickly get far superior loot through dungeon exploration than through stealing them off unsuspecting, non-hostile [=NPCs=]. Furthermore, things you get from pickpocketing are marked as stolen while ones looted off slain enemies and containers are not, limiting your possibility for selling them, and quests that specifically require you to pick pockets can be counted on the fingers of one hand (and, like lockpicking, can be brute forced, namely by SaveScumming). While pickpocketing at higher levels does have combat utility by letting you steal armor and weapons off enemies, it specifically only works on ''human'' enemies, and if your Sneak skill is good enough to get you within pickpocketing distance of an enemy, you're probably better off [[BackStab just stabbing them instead]].
* AwesomeMomentOfCrowning: If you complete the main questline and [[spoiler: let Paarthurnax live]], you will return to the top of the Throat of the World to witness [[spoiler: dozens of roaring and Shouting dragons who are acknowledging Paarthurnax as their new leader.]]
** [[spoiler:However, this scene can also be interpreted as those dozens of Dragons acknowledging '''you''' as their new leader. You don't get anything for it, but you did prove that your Voice was stronger than Alduin's.]]

* BackStab: Both thieves and assassins do their best damage from the shadows, and getting the Assassin's Blade perk allows you to do 15x damage with a dagger sneak-attack. Slightly subverted in that you don't actually need to be behind your target - either Invisibility or the Shadow Warrior perk can allow you to "backstab" foes '''right in the face'''.
** Couple that with the shrouded gloves you get, which ''doubles'' that, and you can one-shot most enemies in the game. A vampire wearing muffled boots with either the invisibility spell or the invisibility power can slay almost any enemy in the game in one hit. The lone exception is Alduin, who will always see you when you approach.

* BadassCape: The [[spoiler:Nightingale armour]] from late in the Thieves' Guild questline has one. It's also pretty much the only cape in the game.

** BagOfSpilling: Unfortunately, some of the containers can also be this. Leave certain things in them for too long and they will cease to exist; most notably, the Dragon Priest masks are prone to vanishing if left in a chest for an extended period of time. It's for this reason that most of the houses available in Creation Club include special busts where they can be displayed safely.

** There are also banishing spells that can be used to banish summoned creatures back to Oblivion.

** Of course, there's nothing stopping you from having it in the traditional sense by making your character one of these. In fact, thanks to the aesthetic, it's easy.

* BeatStillMyHeart: In a case of DevelopersForesight, if you pickpocket a briarheart from a Forsworn Briarheart, they instantly die and a gaping hole appears in their chests. This is because Forsworn Briarhearts have had their real hearts replaced with the briarheart you have just ripped from their bodies.

** Likewise, you will miss out on any Daedric artifact that requires you to kill innocents, which is a lot of them. [[spoiler:Vaermina, Namira, Mehrunes Dagon, and Boethiah all require innocent deaths if you want their favor and accompanying artifact. Clavicus Vile does ''not'' - but he'll try to make you think that he does.]]

* BeneathTheEarth: The derelict dwarven city of Blackreach, which houses tribes of Falmer, [[FungusHumongous giant glowing mushrooms,]] [[RagnarokProofing still-functioning lifts to the surface and other contraptions]], a dragon and [[spoiler: an Elder Scroll]]. Not to mention the Crimson Nirnroot is found there.

* BittersweetEnding: Oh, where to begin...

** It's possibly a case of FromACertainPointOfView: Markarth is the only city in the Reach to be almost entirely made out of stone and relatively enclosed - so it ''is'' great for protection from siege by the Stormcloaks or Dragon attacks. Just not so much from Forsworn who manage to sneak in the city with a weapon.

*** However, whether being a werewolf sucks is arguable in actual gameplay, where your lycanthropy is completely controlled; you can change at will, you are immune to all diseases, your carry weight is increased, and you are at no time actually ''required'' to eat anyone (unlike feeding as a vampire). If you avoid transforming in front of witnesses, the only real drawbacks in gameplay are an inability to sleep well, a vulnerability to silver weapons, and being unable to pick locks while in beast form.
* [[BlindWeaponmaster Blind Swordsmith]]: Dexion, in ''Dawnguard,'' can sometimes be found at a blacksmith forge even after he's lost his sight.
** This, however, is a JustifiedTrope. Dexion is a Moth Priest, and they spend their entire lives preparing for their inevitable blindness, including learning how to read and navigate with their fingertips, and he had been to the two locations where he can wind up in-game before then - Castle Volkihar and Fort Dawnguard.
* BloodMagic[=/=]ThePowerOfBlood:

** And of course, you can invoke this trope with the Unrelenting Force shout at full power. So can higher-level draugr.

* BodyHorror: What happens to [[spoiler:Astrid. It seems that having the player's Dark Brotherhood mentor die with a mundane form of this is a series tradition.]]

* BonusBoss:
** In Blackreach, there's a dragon hidden in the artificial sun, which is released by using your '''FUS RO DAH''' on the orb. You can get away with only one word of the shout if you make your way to the platform overlooking the orb, which puts it close enough for the first word to reach it.
** ''Dragonborn'' adds another notable example in the form of the Ebony Warrior, who only appears once the player reaches level 80. He has enchanted equipment which grants him 50% resistance to all elements, LifeDrain, increased melee damage, and increased regeneration. He has Heavy Armor perks which may reflect damage back to you and paralysis perks for both his weapon types. He has both healing magic and potions. He is immune to falling damage outside of a possible glitch. Finally, he has access to the full-powered Disarm and Unrelenting Force shouts. ''[[OneHitKill On top of a mountain.]]'' It says something that even if you have a full set of heavy armor and weapons which you've enhanced to legendary quality and enchanted, he can still easily kill you.
** Karstaag, returning in spirit form from ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIIMorrowind Bloodmoon]]''. This is the ghost of a frost giant, who has [[MagicKnight both powerful destruction spells and sheer physical size]] on his side.
** Only one Dragon Priest is actually required to be killed in order to complete the game's main quest, and that's assuming you don't simply [[SequenceBreaking sprint past him before he closes the path]]. For good reason too - Dragon Priests are easily some of the most deadly enemies in the game, even more than Dragons themselves, but you really have to go out of your way to find them.

*** In that same vein, [[LuckilyMyShieldWillProtectMe blocking]]. With a weapon in one hand, you can choose to put [[DualWielding another weapon]] in the other, or [[MagicKnight a magic spell]]. Or a shield. When your enemies start battering you to death with power attacks, you might come to reconsider that shield. The Block tree even features a perk as low as level 30 that gives you BulletTime when blocking during enemy power attacks, allowing you to ShieldBash them to interrupt said attack or duck out of the way. This even works when blocking with two-handed weapons, so you're not screwed over for using those.

** Become Ethereal. All it does is make you ethereal, and thus render you ''completely untouchable''. Pretty much ''the'' Shout for when you're getting attacked and need to buy a bit of breathing room. Dragons, bandit chiefs, bears, wizards, it doesn't matter. Shout those words and they can't touch you, letting you either escape, wait for backup, run through their companions to the enemy you need to take out, or get ready to chop them with a power attack or ready a powerful spell in peace. With the Blessing of Talos and a Talos Amulet (let alone Fortify Restoration), the basic version of this shout will almost recharge before you're done being ethereal in the first place. [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking And since it nullifies]] FallingDamage, [[MundaneUtility you can also use it to jump off of high places instead of climbing down them.]] (There's a hint of this in the fact that one of the words is found on a wall at the top of a giant waterfall, and another word is found at the base of a different waterfall.)

** There are many Daedric artifacts scattered across Skyrim. Among them are things like a skull staff that eats dreams to power itself up, another staff that can do just about ''anything'' (at random), a ring that lets its wearer devour the dead, a dark katana that steals life and feeds on the blood of your friends, a shield that generates a magical ward when raised, and a mace that would not look out of place in [[Literature/TheLordOfTheRings Sauron]]'s hand and which steals its victims' souls. So, which Daedric artifact is usually considered as the most valuable? The Black Star. [[NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast With a name like that, it must have power of apocalyptic proportions!]] Nope, it's just a reusable Black Soul Gem for enchanting. Black Soul Gems function like normal Grand Soul Gems, but while Grand Soul Gems can only hold animalistic souls (and Grand animalistic souls are only found on bosses and [[BossInMookClothing mammoths]]), Black Soul Gems can hold humanoid souls - which are automatically Grand quality, so any old bandit will do. The thing is, Grand Soul Gems can be purchased easily and are relatively common, while Black Soul Gems are incredibly rare, so having one on hand at all times is extremely valuable. Not helping is the fact that many Daedric weapons are for some reason relatively weak despite their cool-sounding effects, and can be rendered obsolete very fast by better weapons. The Black Star, on the other hand, is here to stay, whether you are level 1 or 100.

* {{Bottomless Quiver}}s: [=NPCs=] get an infinite supply of arrows (although you can only loot a finite number of arrows from corpses). Combine this with the fact that arrows which get stuck in someone will then be usable by that someone, and it means that hitting a bandit with a good arrow and failing to kill him will result in him returning the favor several times over (yet another reason Daedric arrows are TooAwesomeToUse). Fortunately, this also applies to your followers, meaning that you won't have to constantly resupply them with arrows.
* BraggingThemeTune: The ''Skyrim'' theme song is this towards the Dragonborn.

* BrattyHalfPint: A lot of Skyrim's children are obnoxiously rude to you. Special mention goes to Braith of Whiterun, who tries to pick a fight with you even if you're wearing armor made of dragonskin and covered with the blood of your enemies, and Nelkir in Dragonsreach, who sneers that you're likely there to suck up to his father. [[note]] In Nelkir's case, though, it might be due to his [[spoiler: being manipulated by a Daedric artifact]]. [[/note]]
** Braith, with the addition of ''Hearthfire'', can be hit. She will huff and exclaim she never thought you had it in you.

* BreadEggsMilkSquick: Mercer Frey of the Thieves' Guild has a shopping list in his house: milk, goat cheese, turnips, eggs, flour, cheese, and cauterizing agent.

* BulletTime[=/=]SuperReflexes:

* BullyingADragon: It doesn't matter if you're clad in full [[SpikesOfVillainy Daedric armor]] with a bloodstained Daedric war axe in one hand and the gleam of a lethal fire spell in the other and a [[SummonBiggerFish storm atronach]] following you around, Braith will ''still'' petulantly cry that she's not afraid of you.

** At the end of the main questline, you must capture and then release Odahviing in order to reach Skuldafn, the final dungeon. The game forces you to do this because you need to fly in order to get there... except that there is no reason given why Paarthurnax couldn't take you there. This gets even worse if you complete the ''Dragonborn'' DLC questlines before getting to this point in the main game; having learned the appropriate Shout, you can literally command ''any'' dragon you find to land and let you ride it, not to mention being able to summon a dragon anywhere you like who could also fly you there.
*** Odahviing himself lampshades this in dialogue, saying, "It is wise to recognize when you only have one choice." Even though realistically you ''could'' ask Paarthurnax to do it, "But Thou Must" - the game only permits this course of action.

** The Dunmer. The combination of Red Mountain erupting, Vvardenfell's destruction, and Morrowind being sacked by Black Marsh have left the province pretty much in ruins, even years later, leading to a mass exodus of Dunmer away from their home province. The ones who settled in Windhelm are stuck as second-class citizens, and only one supplicant remains at the Shrine of Azura they constructed after their exodus. Hadvar even notes, should you play a Dunmer character at Helgen, that the gods really ''have'' abandoned your people. [[note]] That line is a CallBack to ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIIIMorrowind Morrowind]]'' where the [[PlayerCharacter Nerevarine]] killed one of the Dunmer gods and found another dead by the hand of the first.[[/note]]

* CallARabbitASmeerp: Skeevers are giant rats. The odd thing is... Giant Rats ''did'' exist in all previous ''Franchise/TheElderScrolls'' games (and in fact were part of a running joke involving the Fighters' Guild), and were called such.

** Many monsters in Skyrim are replacements for monsters from the previous games. Skeevers--Giant rats, Falmer--Goblins, Draugr--Zombies, Hagravens--Harpies. It can also be arguably {{Hand Wave}}d as the result of both Skyrim's natives having their own regional names for these animals, and that their names being inconsistently used is the result of cultural bleedover from the other provinces.
*** Its also been two hundred years since ''Oblivion'', so it may just be linguistic drift combined with the above.

** One of the random bard instrumentals is a slower, softer version of ''Daggerfall'''s shop music.
*** With the ''Dragonborn'' DLC installed, seven of the random background songs on Solstheim are tracks taken directly from ''Morrowind''.

** Speaking of the Knights of the Nine, you can find what appears to be their final stand off the coast of Haafingar.

* CareerEndingInjury: The infamous "arrow in the knee" incidents, to the guards.

* ChainMailBikini: Some types of Light Armor act as this, especially the female Forsworn Armor. The skimpiest of the four Fur Armor models would count too -- literally giving women a fur bikini top, but only because women can't go around walking shirtless like the men do in the same piece of armor.
** Slightly subverted in that skimpy armor (especially Forsworn) looks skimpy on ''both'' sexes, and generally [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome has a realistically low armor rating to boot]].

* CharlesAtlasSuperpower: Theoretically, anyone can use the Thu'um; they just need to be trained by the Greybeards, as Ulfric Stormcloak was. What makes the Dragonborn so special is not merely that they can do it, but that they can do it ''instinctively'', without (years of) training.

* ChekhovsGunman: [[spoiler: The first dragon that you see (the one who attacks Helgen) is in fact [[BigBad Alduin]] himself, there to assassinate you before you gain the power to fight him and his minions.]]

* ChillOfUndeath: All undead enemies resist ice magic, some have a weakness to fire, and almost all of them besides the most basic mooks can use ice magic against the player very well. This also extends to the player should they contract vampirism.

* ChurchMilitant[=/=]WarriorMonk: The Vigilants of Stendarr.

* CityNoir: Windhelm has the imagery of the setting down. The city is a maze of streets, FantasticRacism is allegedly official government policy, and there's a SerialKiller on the loose. Banditry is apparently common in the countryside, and unless the victims are Nords, Ulfric allegedly refuses to assist (although banditry is fairly common problem throughout Skyrim, so Eastmarch isn't singled out or anything). [[NiceGuy Brunwulf Free-winter]] is one of the only men around looking for ways to change the city for the better. Also, while commerce is still existent in Windhelm's Merchant Quarter, Free-winter [[spoiler: (upon becoming Jarl if Ulfric is killed)]] states that the coffers are short on funds, implying that, for Ulfric, the war against the Empire previously took precedence over the proper administration of the hold. This, while arguably justifiable, has interfered with the Hold's prosperity.
*** It's also revealed at one point that Skyrim's been under heavy taxation since the war ended. So, a state of disrepair is the norm for many cities aside from Solitude. (Whiterun's crumbling walls are a prime example.) By comparison, Windhelm's structural integrity is doing surprisingly well - probably because, as the capital of the Stormcloak rebellion, it's unlikely the Empire sees any tax from it.
** Markarth is also no slouch in this respect. You walk in and witness a murder (or take action and thwart it), right next to a guy selling dogs for fights, and another guy who is selling very suspicious meat. It is revealed to be a broken society in which an urban underclass is brutally oppressed by a corrupt elite, the architecture is virtual art deco, and there are oh so many dark secrets lurking within its walls.
** Then there's Riften, a perpetually foggy city of canals whose seedy underbelly arguably houses its most thriving industry. You drop even the cheapest of items - a cabbage, for instance - and it causes a riot. Thieves roam the streets, and all of the street merchants can be killed. On top of it all, the person who is tasked with fixing this madness, Maven Black-Briar, is in with the Guild, and has the Jarl (if she herself is not the Jarl, which may happen at the end of the war) wrapped around her finger by pretending she is working on taking down the Thieves' Guild. If you hang around Laila long enough while she is still Jarl, you can see Maven threaten to take her Meadery, Riften's biggest 'legit' business, elsewhere if Riften doesn't pay up.

* CleavageWindow: Female versions of the Vampire Armor.
* ClimaxBoss: Alduin serves as one of these not only for this game, but for the entire ''Elder Scrolls'' Series up to this point. As Alduin's wall in Sky Haven Temple shows, the events of the four chronological games behind it (excluding ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsOnline'' as it hadn't been released yet) were all precursors to the return of the dragons, the Skyrim Civil War, and the coming of the Last Dragonborn. The events detailed on the Wall are:

* ClippedWingAngel: Both the Vampire Lord and Werewolf forms become all but obsolete once you max out your alchemy, smithing and enchanting, as you can make weapons hit for hundreds of damage. Without exploits, you can have a weapon with over 1000 damage, plus from 0 to about 1400 damage from a Chaos enchant.

* TheComputerIsACheatingBastard: Sometimes the enemy can sidestep pretty quickly to dodge your arrow (or spell) when you fire one at them. ''[[http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/615804-the-elder-scrolls-v-skyrim/66610034 Even if they haven't detected you first.]]''
** The pitch darkness in the [[ThatOneLevel Falmer caves]] of ''Dawnguard'' cannot be penetrated by night vision or light spells, even if you have them.

* CrapsackWorld: Two centuries later, Tamriel has still not recovered from [[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion the Oblivion Crisis]]. The Empire is falling apart, the Nords are in civil war, Elsweyr and Black Marsh have seceded, and what parts of Morrowind that weren't destroyed following the eruption of Red Mountain and the fall of the Ministry onto Vivec have been invaded by the Argonians. The Dark Brotherhood and the Thieves' Guild pervade Skyrim to the point of being the de facto government in some cases, and it should be pointed out that ''both'' organizations are suffering from a slow decline. Oh, and the world's about to be eaten by dragons.

* CrueltyIsTheOnlyOption: Many of the Daedric Prince quests are examples of this. In order to get several of the artifacts, you have to: beat a man to death ''twice'' while he begs for his life, sacrifice one of your followers, and murder and cannibalize an innocent priest. Not all of the quests have requirements like these, though, and some which do also have alternate methods of obtaining the artifact. In one case, you get it only by ''not'' killing the person you're asked to kill.

* CuteAndPsycho: Muiri, a Breton living in Markarth and working as an assistant at The Hag's Cure, turns out to be this in an early Dark Brotherhood quest. She asks the Dragonborn to kill a bandit leader who took advantage of her to rob Clan Shatter-Shield in Windhelm, as Muiri was close to the family until Alain used her and they cut off all ties with her and cast her out of Windhelm. In addition to wanting revenge on the bandit leader, she also tasks the Dragonborn with the optional assignment of killing Nilsine Shatter-Shield as well, partly out of revenge for the Shatter-Shields turning their backs on her, and in the hope that maybe this will cause the family matriarch Tova to bring Muiri back after both of her real daughters are dead. [[spoiler: If you kill Nilsine, Tova commits suicide instead, but Muiri doesn't actually seem to have a problem with this, as making Tova suffer is just as good. She also becomes eligible for marriage this way, so she must REALLY appreciate the Dragonborn's efforts.]]

* AsskickingEqualsAuthority:

* AllYourBaseAreBelongToUs: A couple of faction bases are assaulted by their nemeses during the associated questlines.

*** The Destruction spells have it particularly bad. Blizzard deals paltry damage even compared to the Expert-level elemental walls and uses the element resisted by most enemies in the game. Fire Storm is a short-range area-effect, meaning you have to get in melee range to use it, and most armed humanoid enemies are likely to bash you and interrupt your charge while you're trying to cast it, making it mostly just a cool way to blow up some wolves. On top of that, it's likely to kill your follower. Lightning Storm is the most useful of them all, boasting a massive range (which somewhat mitigates the cast time problem) and okay-ish damage, but even then you can deal more damage just by spamming a dual-cast Thunderbolt (which also comes with the ability to endlessly stun-lock opponents if the perk is taken, since each shot staggers the enemy). The problem with Thunderbolt is its heavy Magicka cost, which makes Lightning Storm slightly more practical if only due to the cost factor. When you reach 100% Reduce Magicka Cost on your clothes/armor these is ''no reason'' for you to use Lightning Storm because Thunderbolt does more damage, can be cast faster, and abuses the Impact perk.

* BeastInTheBuilding: Whilst visiting Rona in her living room in "Frenzy", Bill is startled to find two hooded cobras there, having apparently escaped from pizza boxes that Rona had ordered and which have taken up residence in her home. They subsequently spend the episode in fear that the cobras will kill them... until Bill hears what sounds like fire engines coming to her house, at which point she manages to subdue the cobras with ease.

** Tamriel as a whole is in this state as of the game's time-frame, since the continent has been hit by multiple disasters and devastating wars in the last two hundred years, including the [[Videogame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion Oblivion Crisis]], [[ColonyDrop the Red Year]], [[GreatOffscreenWar the Great War]], and [[Literature/TheElderScrolls the Umbriel Crisis]]. Cities that should be glorious and beautiful like Winterhold are husks of their former selves, and even the great trade cities like Whiterun are showing signs of breakdown and disrepair. The weakening of the Empire's power has left many Imperial fortresses as crumbling ruins inhabited by bandits, and the wilds are filled with outlaws and monsters.

** The formal recognition of the Dragonborn by the Greybeards counts. They basically say you now have rights to two {{Awesome McCoolname}}s used by a previous legendary Dragonborn, the illustrious Tiber Septim: "Stormcrown" and "Ysmir, Dragon of The North". And they do it by blasting you with the ritual words of recognition in the dragon tongue, making the ground quake as they do it.

* AwesomeMcCoolname: All the Dragon names translated are intimidating and scary.
** Many Nords have badass clan names or sobriquets, like Ulfric Stormcloak, Aela the Huntress, Mjoll the Lioness, Galmar Stone-Fist, Ulfberth War-Bear, Oengul War-Anvil...

** With ''Dragonborn'', Miraak may show up and steal the soul of the dragon that you just killed, followed by a taunt. One of the taunts questions the morality of killing countless dragons just to get more power. ''"[[YouBastard Do you ever wonder if it hurts? To have one's soul ripped out like that?]]"''

** When going after the Eldergleam Sap, Maurice Jondrelle is smart enough to ask to go with you for protection to see the Eldergleam Sanctuary. He is not smart enough to avoid running up to any bear, bandit or dragon you stumble across on the way and flailing at it with his bare, unarmored hands. Worse, if you fast-travel, ''you can't bring him with you'' and you have to wait for him at the sanctuary... and hope nothing kills him along the way. The ''only'' way to get him there safely is to walk with him, the entire trek, saving frequently and reloading as necessary. Fortunately you ''can'' hire a cart to take you to Windhelm at least, which shortens the trek a bit, but the hardest part is still to come (in particular, the dragon nesting near the Sanctuary requires a ''wide'' detour to get around, unless you're doing a non-dragon run).

* AbsoluteCleavage:
** The Daedric Lords Azura and Nocturnal both wear robes split from shoulders to navel. While Azura is only depicted through statues, Nocturnal appears in person (if you complete the Thieves' Guild questline). Her robes are unobtainable barring console commands.
** Ancient Nord Armor, when worn on females (Aela the Huntress has a set as her default), is comprised of a deep-V halter-top and [[SexyBacklessOutfit no back]] ([[{{Sideboob}} or sides for that matter]]). For FanDisservice, [[OurZombiesAreDifferent Draugr]] who were female in life wear this armor.
** The female version of Hide Armor also has cleavage that extends to their stomach.

** The armor that's most played straight with the trope is Ancient Nord Armor. The armor for men consists of heavy steel or iron plates around the torso with a fur under layer. The gauntlets, helmet and boots look similar for women, but the chest piece consists mostly [[HellBentForLeather tight leather]], with a few much smaller steel plates protecting the shoulders and crotch. There is [[SexyBacklessOutfit no back of the armor, either]], and you can tell that their [[VaporWear bra must have been removed]] when they put the armor on. It also includes AbsoluteCleavage, SideBoob, and [[MinidressOfPower a miniskirt]].

* ((Antepiece}}: You're sent to [[NoobCave Bleak Falls Barrow]] to recover an item early in the main quest (and may have completed it even earlier as a sidequest in the FirstTown sends you there). It has less-threatening, less-complex examples of the enemies (bandits, draugr that appear to be dead but then start to move when you get close, {{Giant Spider}}s dropping from the ceiling, etc.) and puzzles (traps, a Dragon Claw lock, a boss draugr who comes out of a stone sarcophagus, etc.) that you'll face in similar barrows throughout the rest of the game which are frequent quest destinations. (Every [[SidequestSidestory faction questline]] will send you into at least one, plus several more in the main quest, and countless more in sidequests.)