Bloodmoon is the better DLC. I can recall very little of Tribunal despite having played through it several times, but Bloodmoon sticks in the memory more, and positively so.
Exact same here. It's been almost 20 years but I still remember most of Bloodmoon, while the only thing I remember about Tribunal are the stupid goblins/sewers.
It's weird how you essentially are just a messenger for Raven Rock and you feel so accomplished at the end, whereas Hearthfire homes feel hollow and almost useless even on a character who's rping as a homesteader.
Those sewers are AWFUL. There's multiple interconnected areas of them and they ALL look the same, and only ONE leads to the damn Dark Brotherhood base. So bad, and this is coming from a MW vet with thousands of hours in it.
My understanding is that she wants you to wield Trueflame to show her people that you're Nerevar reborn, and get the whole "I'm re-united with my husband" thing, and intends to make you a martyr by killing you and blaming Sotha Sil and Vivec, so she can ascend the Tribunal as a solo act
Interesting. I must say I was a little shocked when I found out "I was her husband". I'm sure that's mentioned in the base-game but I thought that was funny
@@FrostbreakYT While Almalexia mentions it in her Tribunal dialogue specifically, it is mentioned a couple of times in the base game. In the book "The Battle of Red Mountain, and the Rise and Fall of the Tribunal" is the line 'Nerevar's queen, Almalexia'. The book is found in the base game in the Palace of Vivec and the Hall of Justice Secret Library. Additionally, she's referred to as 'the Lover' (whereas Sotha Sil is 'the Teacher', in reference to their roles vis-à-vis Nerevar) in "The Cantatas of Vivec", a book of poems/gospels by Vivec that is found in a few locations in the base game.
Yeah, your opinion on Tribunal is pretty much the consensus in the community. The big issue to keep in mind is that it was designed to be "end game" content. From a purely story perspective it requires Dagoth Ur's defeat to make sense. But as a result of this, the game expects you to be near an end game character and have a lot of meta knowledge on the game. This is especially an issue with magic because Bethesda's idea for dealing with the power of magic characters was to give a lot of enemies magic immunity and even magic reflection to stop you. Melee doesn't fair much better because they give a bunch of enemies high ability and luck scores and even passive sanctuary (Dodge spell) effects to drop your hit rate to stupid low numbers. It's interesting that you disliked Tribunal because it is often cited as the turning point from Morrowind's open quest structure with actual player choices so the more linear, guided structure seen in Oblivion and Skyrim where they frequently try to trick you with false choices that both lead to the same end (in tribunal if you with for Helseth you're told to do Almalexia's quests "as a spy" but there's no payoff or differences between the questlines minus a couple bonus quests for Helseth where you need to root out some dissidents). Ultimately, Bloodmoon is a MUCH better expansion that utilizes what makes Morrowind great and there are two major questlines (main quest and a colony side quest) that have actual, meaningful branching paths that take the quests in pretty different directions. Especially the main quest where you participate in the same events, but on opposite sides. I absolutely believe you will enjoy Bloodmoon as much as base game. Just be prepared for, uhhh, some very challenging fights because you can't back out at the end. Plus, as a Skyrim fan who most likely did Dragonborn, Bloodmoon sets the stage and informs much of the lore you find in Solstheim and it would be an interesting second look for you. Regardless of whether you decide to do bloodmoon or not, thanks for this video and I look forward to what's next.
LOL as soon as I saw that thumbnail I knew exactly what this vid was about. dw ur 100% not alone tribunal is widely regarded as rushed/subpar. prob a new r/morrowind post on it every few weeks about people being disappointed/upset. bloodmoon is 100% worth it tho don't give up just yet!
wow yeah I just searched in google "morrowind tribunal reddit" and most of the results are people complaining about it (after trying it for the first time). Glad I'm not insane
Main issue with Bloodmoon is, that it's not connected to the base game at all. Tribunal gives some closure to main theme, while Bloodmoon is completely separate Skyrim adventure on small island oversaturated with lvl 40 mobs.
Ah Yes, Tribunal. I remember it well. 10 Hours of Fetch Quests in the Sewers followed by one of the best, yet unearned conclusions in a game. What is this a... 5 / 10 too much sewers?
Bloodmoon is absolutely a worthwhile DLC! So many unique interactions and quests, one of my favorites things is helping to develop the newly established Raven Rock colony!
Throwing my recommendation behind Tamriel Rebuilt. There is no 'main quest' but wow for fan made, its enthralling to explore it all and as much content as the main game.
You should give Bloodmoon a try, it's way better than Tribunal. Also I can recommend the Tamriel Rebuilt Mod if you want to visit Deshaan and the rest of mainland Morrowind. That mod alone is bigger than the base game + the DLC and it's been in development for many years with more updates to come.
As I recall, the best thing about the Tribunal DLC was the improvements to the journal. When TES III: Morrowind was published, the Player's Journal was only accessible on a chronological basis, ie. it was like reading a diary with entries following one another in the order the information was obtained by the Player. The Journal entries could not be sorted by source or subject matter, it was simply available in the order which the player obtained the information.. If you used those features in your earlier playthroughs, you failed to experience the "True 2002 Experience" upon which you take so much pride. I also noticed that your game failed to crash as much as it did in 2002. Tribunal was a real gamechanger, not for the DLC quests, lore, etc. Instead it was a gamechanger due to the Quality of Life improvements that came with it.
Your 100% right. I just discovered that addition at the start of this video and I should've mentioned it. being able to actually sort by quest is revolutionary for MW xD
Someone's probably said it already but a major problem of tribunal is it was rushed/subpar with likely a small budget but it also has the issue of expecting players to have beaten the large majority of content in the base game before starting tribunal; it ends up leading newer players to morrowind to learning that to get the DB to stop jumping them they gotta do some of the DLC early on which utterly floors them in difficulty
That's still a frost spell! At least with openMW all "blast" spells (regardless of damage type) have that explosion effect. It's called "frost blast" which you can see at 0:37. Very expensive but good for AOE
I had played Morrowind for many years before tackling Tribunal and feeling the same way you did about approaching Bloodmoon. Took a break and came back and glad I followed through on it! Bloodmoon offers way more diversity and is far FAR more memorable. Although, I went the whole DLC without knowing that cutscenes were supposed to be playing at certain story beats (classic Bethesda bug) 😅
Yes I remember those feelings. It's somewhat of a sugar coating, but if you consider Almalexia, who has gone mad from losing the ability to renew her beloved divinity, to be the one pulling the strings from the start, the fetch quests start to make a sense. She's trying to kill off the Nerevarine and simply uses them as a means to an end. To the player, however, Mournhold is still just a place that has everything jacked up to end-game levels. The clerks have big speechcraft skills, there's Gaenor the max luck guy and everything just works with bigger numbers in general. I think the biggest area of effect I saw in vanilla Morrowind was the fireball from a dremora. Here you can't outrun the blast that fills 90% of the room :D
Played this only a couple years ago, and I agree with almost everything said in this video. However I love it still specifically for the writing. Even the way characters ask you to do fetch quests makes it sounds more exciting and interesting that it had any right to be. Almalexia is a very tragic character because she was the best of the Tribunal. The fear of losing her power after a millennium drove her mad, but you could still see a glimmer of who she once was and why the people followed her. Even the former Hand she sends you to assassinate legitimately loves her, but his faith has waned. I like it because I felt like it could've happened to anyone in her position. She and Mankar Camoran are my two favorite TES characters. But yeah it's crazy Tribunal has the worst escort mission in Morrowind after the numerous terrible escort missions in base game (without OpenMW). That acolyte got stuck on everything and the quest was nearly unbeatable. As for difficult, it's wild that goblins are stronger than the entire 6th house pretty much. I played a spellsword and found Almalexia much harder than the Imperfect, but the Imperfect was the more fun boss. Clockwork is probably my favorite dungeon in the game and I like both it and ESO's depiction. I think they can coexist. I like the dangerous aspect of it because Sotha Sil was trying "anything" to build a better world, so we should expect "anything", and I feel the exact opposite about steampunk. Anytime I hear that I think of very crude but functional technology, nothing sleek. Also, Dwemer C4. Edit: Oh I almost forgot my fun fact: Barenziah is famous for more than just the books named after her. She played a major role in the defeat of TES' first villain from Arena, Jagar Tharn (last name sound familiar?). She and her son Helseth were also prominent characters in the sequel Daggerfall. While she's mentioned in later games, Morrowind you could say is the end of her journey.
Adding mods and Tamriel Rebuilt would definitely spice up your experience. That mod is amazing. Also, I am a diehard Morrowind fan, but I have never finished the Tribunal DLC. I have used console commands to skip to the final quest to experience it, but I was bored to death after the very first sewer dungeon and did not want to go back. You are definitely not alone in wanting to put the game down after that.
Idunno if I mind the sewers in Tribunal, a lot of the caves on the mainland kind of blur together to me. Not in a bad way, I do actually remember a lot of the memorable ones, but physically they also look very samey sometimes.
I’m on my sick leave and I’ve binge-watched all your videos, and I must say - I love your content. It is amazing how much your channel developed in such a short time, please keep up the good work! Thank you for the videos!
the most exciting thing for me in tribunal are the dwemer ghosts you find under mournhould. Everyone says they all disappeared out of existence but i guess the ghosts are spared.
The lore, atmsophere and sense of freedom and replayability especially with mods is where the game shines for me. The combat system is something you get used to and it's not a big deal after the inital couple of levels once your stats are better. As to the main quests and dlcs, I never bothered to much with that, I prefer to make my own adventures. But it's interesting to see others go through that aspect of the game and see what they think.
1:13 Bro did you skill up by practise? Make Potions, kill ordinators, sell that stuff and go to the trainer, youre not limited to 5 skillpoints per lvl like in the other titles. and turn the fog back on :(
Try Tamriel Rebuilt, and Skyrim: Home of the Nords. Excellent expansion mods for Morrowind, especially if you're wanting more open land to explore. Another sister project, Province Cyrodiil, is about to drop a major expansion aswell.
P..S. Vivec does talk about you killing the mad Amalexia. He basically says that he knew that would happen after the Heart of Lorkhan was destroyed and that the Dunmer will go back to worshiping the Good Daedra and he leaves Morrowind.
I had a similar experience, I tried getting into Morrowind many times. But finally made a good run and finished the main story with some sidequests along the way, really enjoyed it. Got to Tribunal, played for an hour or two and I just deflated and got bored, haven't played since.
Tamriel Rebuilt is absolutely FANTASTIC. also maybe try the mod "skyrim home of the nords" there's also an entire fan GAME on the same version of gamebryo, called Anthirin or something? it's a prequel to Enderal. i'm certain you heard of it.
Since the ESO format sadly, sadly wasn't doing so well lately, how about you do a sort of laid-back review of the alliance's zone as one vid for each alliance, just giving your general impressions and some thoughts about exploration and story? I want to get into ESO in the future and your videos are helping to inform me where to spend time and most importantly, where to start.
Thanks for that. That was awesome. I played Morrowind and the DLC’s as they came out and felt exactly the same about Tribunal. I’m a sicko but I enjoyed remembering how frustrating it was and seeing you do it to. You should definitely do blood moon!
I understand this is against the spirit of the review, but I feel like your experience could’ve been improved by following a guide. I realize that’s not the goal but I genuinely feel with some older games unfortunately that should be the intended first time experience. However, you hopefully go onto tri blood moon because it is commonly regarded as the best expansion tomorrow whereas I believe this one is the least favored.😅
Bloodmoon, the next DLC, is definitely a much better experience. It is set on Solstheim, the same place you go in Skyrim's Dargonborn DLC. It also gives you an opportunity to turn into a werewolf. Imagine being a lizard doggo. wouldn't that be cool?
It took me years to figure this out since i mostly played Melee Warriors. But projectiles (spells, arrows, bolts, and thrown weapons) can intercept spells cast at you if you hit them midair
When I was a kid I played the game out of order and finished Tribunal before the main quest. No guides and an under level character didn’t make for a fun time but I did it and it’s still my proudest elderscrolls achievement. I couldn’t do something like that today, I’d lose my mind.
I liked Bloodmoon more than Tribunal myself. If you do play Bloodmoon, go a bit easier on the pure frost magic build. Being a snow-bound heavily Nord-focused region, frost may not be the best offensive choice.
I never even finished Tribunal, and I didn’t even play Bloodmoon. I just made a new character and installed Tamriel Rebuilt. It’s the size of several DLCs, the quests are well-written, the world design is beautiful.
once you are done with your "first playthrough without help" of the game and dlcs, you should use the list of all quests in the uesp wiki to experience how much content actually is in this world. after that probably give the various mods that exist for this game a chance. stuff like postprocessing shaders and high detail texture packs make this game look almost like vanilla skyrim. tamriel rebuilt adds some portions of the mainland with new quests (needs a new playthrough). if you are still up for more. sureai (the makers of enderal and nehrim) also had total conversions for morrowind called Arktwend and Myar Aranath. and who knows what else slumbers out there. also im surprised you enjoyed the magic system. most enemies have a chance to resist or reflect magic, at least in the basegame. so using magic mostly results in your own death due to getting a drain health 100pts for 1 sec spell being reflected back at you. also do yourself a favor and never start abusing the alchemy system. i basically ruined an entire run because when you have 17000 personality, and the potion wears off, everyone who you have encountered so far hates your guts cause of the perceived loss of personality. so i was forced to rely on those potions for the rest of the run.
I think you're basically correct in your assesment. One very minor thing for me, at least, is that I think of the Clockwork City less as ordinary "steampunk", and more as "weird technomagic reality-altering weirdness", which sorta explains the tons of circuit-like patterns on the walls. The chunkiness? Eh, maybe not so much.
I think the insane excitement my little Daggerfall heart had in seeing Helseth and Barenziah again blinded me to the fact that Tribunal was really... not great. I think you gave a really solid assessment of the DLC, the end is really the only interesting part. It was kind of cool seeing them try to realise Old Mournhold as it was described the The Real Barenziah, though. I wish they'd put in a little easter egg about the Staff of Chaos.
@@FrostbreakYT Take those suggestions with a grain of salt lol, I'm not so rose-tinted I don't know that my love for Daggerfall is heavily steeped in nostalgia. But if you do give it a try, I'll be here to watch!
I heard DLC, and I kinda knew where it was going. I like some of the things they did in Tribunal, but it wasn't great. And as much as other people seem to like Bloodmoon, it just didn't feel quite the same as the base game. I will recommend the mod Tamriel Rebuilt though...that's a really good mod, and probably a few videos worth of content lol.
@Frostbreak, I sure hope you choose to continue. I've never completely finished Morrowind, but I absolutely love seeing you play through both the good and the bad. I have to admit that seeing you "suffer" makes me want to restart the game again, haha. Great video as always! Thank you!
I remember Bloodmoon as a proper DLC, this is pretty much just some endgame fights for people that have done everything else. I think the museum also points to that.
I felt the same way when I first played Tribunal. I had to take like a month break. But when I finally played Bloodmoon, it made me love Morrowind again. Now I playthrough it at least twice a year.
Do Bloodmoon. You're not going to be disappointed. Tribunal (from the lens of teenage me) was definitely the inferior DLC / story in all of Morrowind. The theme was cool, though.
Ive come back to Morrowind probably once every other year since 2002. In that time, I think Ive done Tribunal once, maybe twice. Ive come back for Bloodmoon alone multiple times. I think especially if you've played Skyrim before coming to Morrowind, Bloodmoon is particularly cool as a proto-Skyrim.
Ive considered Morrowind my favorite game since 2002, and Tribunal is the only main quest content I've seen to the end. That said, you're 100% right about it all being fetch quests. The redeeming parts though is that many of the enemies are actually challenging, where I found it absurdly easy to overlevel in base Morrowind. It was nice having a challenge, as well as that artifact museum, as well as a vendor that had enough cash to sell valuable things to. Then there also was the addition of adamantine armor, which gave a top tier material to accompany glass and daedric. All in all, I would still rate it a 4 or a 5, but still lower than the rest of the game.
I am completely into Morrowind nostalgia 😅 If you know how it works, you can rush through the fetch quests (boots of blinding speed - yay!) and have some fun speaking to all these well written NPCs and the great lore behind the two big powers of the city. Also enemies are quite challenging even if you are experienced (damn Gaenor and Salas Volar have killed me so many times). Almalexia is one of my favourite villains at all. Also the side quests are much stronger than in base game Morrowind for me. Does it deserve a better score than base game MW? Depends on you - I am used to the repetitive dungeons of this over 20 year old game and play the main story once a year before christmas. So nostalgia seems to be very helpful if you want to enjoy outdated games. But your video was great - I really like people giving Morrowind a chance! :) Keep on the great work.
I gotta say this about the clockwork city design - even playing this in 2004 as a teenager, it fell flat for me. It wasn't what it was hyped up to be. I get the sense that because they couldn't actually DO curved lines (low poly count) and gleaming brass (no material textures) they decided to just cram it with spinning gears and intricately-detailed textures, but the textures are still that rust-brown shade that makes everything look dingy and old, which makes sense for dwemer ruins but not so much for Sotha Sil's city which isn't supposed to have been neglected for so long.
You're not wrong. Tribunal was never any good. The bugs prevented me from actually finishing it twenty years ago, so I never even saw the Clockwork City, and the only reason I ever visited Mournhold on subsequent play throughs was to get the fortify skill spell. Oh, and the high ordinator armour set. Bloodmoon is well worth it, though. I hope you play it. :)
Still awesome of you to tough out this Sewer/10 dlc regardless, it's always a slog to get through. Also the appraisal of RPGs where your actions directly influence the story at the players discretion- had me realizing that you'd *really* enjoy Baldur's Gate 3 if you haven't considered it already. Another out of comfort zone game that did that same 'Morrowind when it hits' moment imo
I saw your videos, I have a lot of things to share!!! First I don’t know if you got the fists of rangulf? I don’t know how to spell it, in the sixth house base when you get corprus The guy in the haunted mansion is one of the only ways to get the daedric bow Daedric quest and items in this game are awesome, my favorite is the the one were they give you a bear skull helmet There is a dragon bone armor in the game is you are a Skyrim fan The morag tong is a great guild to join, at least for me and one is the only ways to get the fortify skill spell If you like enchanted equipment you need to get the azura star You can build armor in mournhold There is also another special vendor in caldera Blood moon have a set of arrows that are just fun to use Use the original plugins for the game (kind of mini dlc) they make the game a little more immersive and also get you area effect arrows Medium armor rocks in this game, adamantine is awesome And so much more
Played Bloodmoon 20 years ago and i don't remember ANYTHING about the story - BUT I had a ton of fun and that DLC was amazing and I remember that still to this day
You gotta do Solstheim! You have to get the Daedric Pauldron from the top of the waterfall in the cave! It's the only way to get a full Daedric set in Morrowind without slaying NPC's
I really enjoy the story of Tribunal and a lot of the new gear you can get and the unique items - I always run Hopesfire on a longblade character after killing Almalexia. But it is exscuted poorly and I agree with how tedious the fetch quests are. Bloodmoon is much better but it's a much different beast that will probably take you longer to do and longer to write a script up for. It's also much more difficult and you won't want to be using frost spells there.
I'm an old player that got to play them when they were released. And tbh, I don't really even remember doing the tribunal content at all but bloodmoon I really do remember fondly
The writer and developer who created the world and setting and lore of Morrowind (Michael Kirkbride) left shortly after the completion of the base game which is why there is such a sudden drop in quality. Though he doesn't work for Bethesda anymore his contributions still forms the basis of elder scrolls lore even up to Skyrim which is based off of his writings: "from the many headed Talos" (heimskrs speech in game) and "the seven fights of the Aldudagga"(Alduin the world eater)
I think it's wrong to blame every bad decision Beth made on Kirkbride leaving. It's way to simple. The biggest problem with Tribunal is that they rushed it and had to develop it in 5 months.
Kirkbride was never a level or quest designer though, which is where the DLC struggles most. The basis for the story, look, and most of the worldbuilding for the base game came from him (and Kuhlmann), but the only development work he actually did for the game was writing in-game books.
Unfortunate that you didn't enjoy Tribunal but I really enjoyed seeing a fresh reaction from someone who played ESO first. Bloodmoon is a lot better I think and the other DLCs are of mixed quality. As a Skyrim player I think you'll find 2003's version of Nords interesting. Tamriel Rebuilt and Project Tamriel content is higher quality than vanilla these days.
Bloodmoon is similar to the main game in exploration, bouncing back and forth between SEVERAL places Tribunal is mostly bouncing back and forth between two places ✌🏻
Tribunal genuinely pisses me off lol, so my first time playing this dlc, I kept getting stuck in Almalexia's temple because guards kept blocking the hallway, even when I waited they still wont budge, and eventually I just decided to kill that guard, and now its a tradition that if I ever enter the cursed city ever again, I start by killing guards that patrol the narrow hallways. And then during the quest where u have to bring a priest down there to cleanse the tomb, he got stuck in a rock and I had to restart, but because I overwritten my save files, I had to restart the DLC from the start again. I mentioned this already but this DLC is genuinely the Anti-Morrowind, where Morrowind is big, expansive, and gives you the freedom to explore, then Tribunal is narrow, cramped, repetitive, and restrictive. On a side note, Im glad you like the magic system, its what keeps me gmcoming back to Morrowind as a mage. Its something I'm GREATLY disappointed in when it came to Oblivion and Skyrim. Being a mage in Morrowind makes you feel like a god. Flying around, nuking everything from a far, the moment I could fly, I would never touch the ground ever again. In Oblivion it was alright, uncan still be powerful but it just doesn't feel right, but man, did Skyrim destroyed the magic system, being a mage feels good but god do you feel like a filthy commoner.
I do hope Bloodmoon gets a chance, I remember playing this game, not when it came out because I'm broke all the time even as a kid, but when I was able to snag the game of the year edition, used and for cheap, I was all in. And thankfully, all the DLC was included but Tribunals doesn't stand out to me much at all. I do think I remember the DLC's being a bit higher leveled, though. So it might be a double edged sword starting a new, informed character reroll but the low level is likely to pose an issue. But it's hard to say if a new build that doesn't miss quite as much or can use magic would be easier or if John Fortnite could handle himself
Tribunal was indeed way too much into sewer delving. May have something to do with the fact that it‘s all interior cells, even the city. But at least it gave us the improved journal. Bloodmoon is much better as other posters already pointed out. It‘s a real worldspace extension instead of what was essentially a large, populated dungeon in Tribunal.
I remember booting up Morrowind for the fist time since 2010 last year. My last savegame was inside the sewers. Loaded it and was instantly reminded why I quit the last time.
Almalexia states the reason for helping you reforge trueflame. It was to test if you really are the nerevarine Bloodmoon is a lot more open than Tribunal and the main story is a lot more enjoyable.
I really try my best to not take for granted my ultra modded install of morrowind, because there's a way to fix everything. But tribunal is almost not even worth fixing with mods although it's fun to do so. Bloodmoon is 100% better, though its also a little bit contrived. Other people have suggested Tamriel Rebuilt, and I completely agree. It's an extension of vanilla but with even more polish. Eventually the project will restructure tribunal so the environments will be better, even if the story stays the same. Lol sorry for the eall of text
Yeah, Tribunal is not the best experience. You are 100% right on "Too Much Sewers". There is some stuff in the deeper dungeons that's kinda neat to explore and find neat loot. It basically is a direct continuation of the events of you being the Nerevarine in the base game. Bloodmoon is a much more solid experience overall with a lot more stuff to just randomly explore, but it isn't necessarily as connected to the main story events around being Nerevar reborn. -someone who first played morrowind in high school when it was brand new
Tribunal is like closure on the Tribunal age of Morrowind, along with a gameplay challenge for high level characters. Everything in Mournhold hits like a truck, so it's quite a lot harder than most content in vanilla Morrowind. Almalexia is really designed to whip your ass, and well, go to Bloodmoon, you'll get a few more high level enemies to fight. I enjoy them both, but I 100% understand the frustration and monotony of Tribunal, as the mob diversity is basically 0. That part is dramatically improved in Bloodmoon.
Tribunal was so thin that the only thing I ever used it for was the museum. lol It should be a standard in each game to have a museum or to be able to return the artifacts to their rightful place. I hate having all these epic artifacts just laying around my one-bedroom cabin. lol
I never finished Tribunal, but I remember liking the new mobs and locations. The other DLC is fun just on the premise, but again I have no cluie if the story or quest structure is good - just that becoming werefolf was amazing and I had tons of fun with that.
yeah there's definitely some cool stuff in Mournhold but I'm not going to defend the progression of Tribunal being mostly sewer romps and fetch quests. Bloodmoon has a much more interesting area to explore and as a Skyrim player you'll possibly recognise some things from the Dragonborn expansion as it's the same landmass it takes place on :)
Tribunal really needed to communicate better that its supposed to be an extension of the main quest, and probably should only be accessible after defeating Dagoth Ur. Its literally the only large area with proper difficulty for an at least somewhat optimized late game character, base game (and bloodmoon to a lesser extent) are just too easy if you know what you are doing and dont hold yourself back, even on the highest difficulty. And the expansions main quest is a better end than the last third of the base game mq, storywise. Bloodmoon is kinda like oblivion and skyrim dlc, its better than the average of the base game, but completly seperate from the mq and the narrative of the base game. Like one giant side quest.
I'm so glad you mentioned Tamriel Rebuilt so I don't have to! Bloodmoon is seriously fun and completely different, and despite being a Morrowboomer myself I still haven't tried it. Would love to see Bloodmoon and then TR, the latter I'm very interested in but know nothing about. Also, congratulations on wrinkling up your brain, Skyzoomer, it's been great watching the Morrowind episodes and following your journey. As a side note, reading is good and fun and just in general I recommend making it a part of your daily life. Wealth beyond measure, outlander.
Bloodmoon is the best DLC for Morrowwind. Hell I think it's one of the best TES DLC's period. Not gonna lie I remember starting Tribunal back in the day and I don't think I ever finished it.
They were bad 20 years ago. Tribunal was fetch quest simulator but at least you actually learnt more about the figures of the Tribunal and their reason for being and cements the fact they are ALL assholes (at least base game Hortator quests gave decent lore dumps) and while Bloodmoon had some cool ideas, it kinda flubs it big time. That said, if you do another Bloodmoon playthrough use Tomb of the Snow Prince. It's a lovely mod that really gives you the actual vision for Bloodmoon. I got mega excited back in the day because "oooh werewolves".
My mom got me the game for Xmas when it came out back in the day, then I picked up the GotY addition as soon as it dropped thinking 'ok, 2 more xpacks, more content? what could go wrong?' I played through bloodmoon first and was so happy with it that getting to Tribunal was a shock I wasn't ready for. I hate this dlc so much
Bloodmoon is the better DLC. I can recall very little of Tribunal despite having played through it several times, but Bloodmoon sticks in the memory more, and positively so.
The story is implemented so much better then Tribunal.
Thanks for letting me know, and I'm glad i'm not alone. I'm not uninstalling MW just yet... I think I might make the return after some other videos.
@@FrostbreakYT bloodmoon is well worth it, very fun area with fun nords and stuff
Exact same here. It's been almost 20 years but I still remember most of Bloodmoon, while the only thing I remember about Tribunal are the stupid goblins/sewers.
Yea, Bloodmoon is a good game, Tribunal is for making money (for Bethesda and your player character)
you get to build a town, own a mead hall, and meet crackhead santa in bloodmoon. Totally worth it over tribunal.
It's weird how you essentially are just a messenger for Raven Rock and you feel so accomplished at the end, whereas Hearthfire homes feel hollow and almost useless even on a character who's rping as a homesteader.
LOL crackhead santa lololol you aint wrong really xDD
Bloodmoon is still kinda shit though let's be real lmao. I love Morrowind but the dlcs just kinda suck
I love crackhead santa, he brings joy to all
Sounds like fun :)
Playing morrowind, getting lost in vivec city. Playing mournhold dlc, getting lost in the sewer, classic morrowind experience 😂
Those sewers are AWFUL. There's multiple interconnected areas of them and they ALL look the same, and only ONE leads to the damn Dark Brotherhood base. So bad, and this is coming from a MW vet with thousands of hours in it.
My understanding is that she wants you to wield Trueflame to show her people that you're Nerevar reborn, and get the whole "I'm re-united with my husband" thing, and intends to make you a martyr by killing you and blaming Sotha Sil and Vivec, so she can ascend the Tribunal as a solo act
Interesting. I must say I was a little shocked when I found out "I was her husband". I'm sure that's mentioned in the base-game but I thought that was funny
@@FrostbreakYT While Almalexia mentions it in her Tribunal dialogue specifically, it is mentioned a couple of times in the base game.
In the book "The Battle of Red Mountain, and the Rise and Fall of the Tribunal" is the line 'Nerevar's queen, Almalexia'. The book is found in the base game in the Palace of Vivec and the Hall of Justice Secret Library.
Additionally, she's referred to as 'the Lover' (whereas Sotha Sil is 'the Teacher', in reference to their roles vis-à-vis Nerevar) in "The Cantatas of Vivec", a book of poems/gospels by Vivec that is found in a few locations in the base game.
Yeah, your opinion on Tribunal is pretty much the consensus in the community.
The big issue to keep in mind is that it was designed to be "end game" content. From a purely story perspective it requires Dagoth Ur's defeat to make sense. But as a result of this, the game expects you to be near an end game character and have a lot of meta knowledge on the game. This is especially an issue with magic because Bethesda's idea for dealing with the power of magic characters was to give a lot of enemies magic immunity and even magic reflection to stop you. Melee doesn't fair much better because they give a bunch of enemies high ability and luck scores and even passive sanctuary (Dodge spell) effects to drop your hit rate to stupid low numbers.
It's interesting that you disliked Tribunal because it is often cited as the turning point from Morrowind's open quest structure with actual player choices so the more linear, guided structure seen in Oblivion and Skyrim where they frequently try to trick you with false choices that both lead to the same end (in tribunal if you with for Helseth you're told to do Almalexia's quests "as a spy" but there's no payoff or differences between the questlines minus a couple bonus quests for Helseth where you need to root out some dissidents).
Ultimately, Bloodmoon is a MUCH better expansion that utilizes what makes Morrowind great and there are two major questlines (main quest and a colony side quest) that have actual, meaningful branching paths that take the quests in pretty different directions. Especially the main quest where you participate in the same events, but on opposite sides. I absolutely believe you will enjoy Bloodmoon as much as base game. Just be prepared for, uhhh, some very challenging fights because you can't back out at the end.
Plus, as a Skyrim fan who most likely did Dragonborn, Bloodmoon sets the stage and informs much of the lore you find in Solstheim and it would be an interesting second look for you.
Regardless of whether you decide to do bloodmoon or not, thanks for this video and I look forward to what's next.
Oblivion isn't linear.
@@greenscheme2040 Its major questlines sure are.
LOL as soon as I saw that thumbnail I knew exactly what this vid was about. dw ur 100% not alone tribunal is widely regarded as rushed/subpar. prob a new r/morrowind post on it every few weeks about people being disappointed/upset. bloodmoon is 100% worth it tho don't give up just yet!
wow yeah I just searched in google "morrowind tribunal reddit" and most of the results are people complaining about it (after trying it for the first time). Glad I'm not insane
Main issue with Bloodmoon is, that it's not connected to the base game at all. Tribunal gives some closure to main theme, while Bloodmoon is completely separate Skyrim adventure on small island oversaturated with lvl 40 mobs.
Could be cool to make a comparison video between Solstheim in MW vs Skyrim
Ah Yes, Tribunal. I remember it well. 10 Hours of Fetch Quests in the Sewers followed by one of the best, yet unearned conclusions in a game. What is this a... 5 / 10 too much sewers?
Bloodmoon is absolutely a worthwhile DLC! So many unique interactions and quests, one of my favorites things is helping to develop the newly established Raven Rock colony!
Yeah I think I'll end up playing it. Just need a bit of a MW break for now :)
Throwing my recommendation behind Tamriel Rebuilt. There is no 'main quest' but wow for fan made, its enthralling to explore it all and as much content as the main game.
It's on my list. Just have to figure out how to download mods lol
You should give Bloodmoon a try, it's way better than Tribunal. Also I can recommend the Tamriel Rebuilt Mod if you want to visit Deshaan and the rest of mainland Morrowind. That mod alone is bigger than the base game + the DLC and it's been in development for many years with more updates to come.
Well, there is no Deshaan in TR. Maybe a bit if we go with ESO geography.
Yes! I just need to figure out how mods work in Morrowind lol
The area around Mournhold is probably gonna be out in like 2030.
wait until he plays bloodmoon as a frost wizard when everything has frost resistance lmao
As I recall, the best thing about the Tribunal DLC was the improvements to the journal.
When TES III: Morrowind was published, the Player's Journal was only accessible on a chronological basis, ie. it was like reading a diary with entries following one another in the order the information was obtained by the Player. The Journal entries could not be sorted by source or subject matter, it was simply available in the order which the player obtained the information.. If you used those features in your earlier playthroughs, you failed to experience the "True 2002 Experience" upon which you take so much pride. I also noticed that your game failed to crash as much as it did in 2002.
Tribunal was a real gamechanger, not for the DLC quests, lore, etc. Instead it was a gamechanger due to the Quality of Life improvements that came with it.
Your 100% right. I just discovered that addition at the start of this video and I should've mentioned it. being able to actually sort by quest is revolutionary for MW xD
Someone's probably said it already but a major problem of tribunal is it was rushed/subpar with likely a small budget but it also has the issue of expecting players to have beaten the large majority of content in the base game before starting tribunal; it ends up leading newer players to morrowind to learning that to get the DB to stop jumping them they gotta do some of the DLC early on which utterly floors them in difficulty
Don't think nobody saw the fireball at 4:08
That's still a frost spell! At least with openMW all "blast" spells (regardless of damage type) have that explosion effect. It's called "frost blast" which you can see at 0:37. Very expensive but good for AOE
If you ever intend to replay Tribunal I highly recommend the mod Tribunal Facelift. It makes the sewers A LOT less painful.
Bloodmoon has an actual map
I hope you do eventually check out Tamriel Rebuilt! As a fan expansion, it's amazing (and I say that as a fairly new Morrowind fan).
+1 for Tamriel Rebuilt, it adds a ton of content and is extremely well made for a community mod/expansion.
My next MW video will likely be Tamriel Rebuilt over Bloodmoon; but we'll see :)
I had played Morrowind for many years before tackling Tribunal and feeling the same way you did about approaching Bloodmoon. Took a break and came back and glad I followed through on it! Bloodmoon offers way more diversity and is far FAR more memorable. Although, I went the whole DLC without knowing that cutscenes were supposed to be playing at certain story beats (classic Bethesda bug) 😅
Blood Moon is so much better than Tribunal, especially if you played Dragonborn in Skyrim
Good to know, perhaps I will continue
The Tribunal DLC's reason for existing, is because it's a prerequisite for the Tamriel Rebuilt mod.
Yes I remember those feelings. It's somewhat of a sugar coating, but if you consider Almalexia, who has gone mad from losing the ability to renew her beloved divinity, to be the one pulling the strings from the start, the fetch quests start to make a sense. She's trying to kill off the Nerevarine and simply uses them as a means to an end.
To the player, however, Mournhold is still just a place that has everything jacked up to end-game levels. The clerks have big speechcraft skills, there's Gaenor the max luck guy and everything just works with bigger numbers in general. I think the biggest area of effect I saw in vanilla Morrowind was the fireball from a dremora. Here you can't outrun the blast that fills 90% of the room :D
Played this only a couple years ago, and I agree with almost everything said in this video. However I love it still specifically for the writing. Even the way characters ask you to do fetch quests makes it sounds more exciting and interesting that it had any right to be. Almalexia is a very tragic character because she was the best of the Tribunal. The fear of losing her power after a millennium drove her mad, but you could still see a glimmer of who she once was and why the people followed her. Even the former Hand she sends you to assassinate legitimately loves her, but his faith has waned. I like it because I felt like it could've happened to anyone in her position. She and Mankar Camoran are my two favorite TES characters.
But yeah it's crazy Tribunal has the worst escort mission in Morrowind after the numerous terrible escort missions in base game (without OpenMW). That acolyte got stuck on everything and the quest was nearly unbeatable. As for difficult, it's wild that goblins are stronger than the entire 6th house pretty much. I played a spellsword and found Almalexia much harder than the Imperfect, but the Imperfect was the more fun boss. Clockwork is probably my favorite dungeon in the game and I like both it and ESO's depiction. I think they can coexist. I like the dangerous aspect of it because Sotha Sil was trying "anything" to build a better world, so we should expect "anything", and I feel the exact opposite about steampunk. Anytime I hear that I think of very crude but functional technology, nothing sleek.
Also, Dwemer C4.
Edit: Oh I almost forgot my fun fact: Barenziah is famous for more than just the books named after her. She played a major role in the defeat of TES' first villain from Arena, Jagar Tharn (last name sound familiar?). She and her son Helseth were also prominent characters in the sequel Daggerfall. While she's mentioned in later games, Morrowind you could say is the end of her journey.
Adding mods and Tamriel Rebuilt would definitely spice up your experience. That mod is amazing. Also, I am a diehard Morrowind fan, but I have never finished the Tribunal DLC. I have used console commands to skip to the final quest to experience it, but I was bored to death after the very first sewer dungeon and did not want to go back. You are definitely not alone in wanting to put the game down after that.
Bloodmoon is really good. They completely nailed it with that one.
Idunno if I mind the sewers in Tribunal, a lot of the caves on the mainland kind of blur together to me. Not in a bad way, I do actually remember a lot of the memorable ones, but physically they also look very samey sometimes.
I’m on my sick leave and I’ve binge-watched all your videos, and I must say - I love your content. It is amazing how much your channel developed in such a short time, please keep up the good work! Thank you for the videos!
Thank you so much! Glad you think so and I'm happy to keep you company during sick leave :)
also very good choice of music as usual. not a classical fan but it works really well with the pacing
thanks :)
Bloodmoon DLC is WAAAAAAY better!!!
I would 100% do Bloodmoon and maybe take a peak at the "Offical" addons they released. Tribunal was very meh for me as well.
the most exciting thing for me in tribunal are the dwemer ghosts you find under mournhould. Everyone says they all disappeared out of existence but i guess the ghosts are spared.
The lore, atmsophere and sense of freedom and replayability especially with mods is where the game shines for me. The combat system is something you get used to and it's not a big deal after the inital couple of levels once your stats are better. As to the main quests and dlcs, I never bothered to much with that, I prefer to make my own adventures. But it's interesting to see others go through that aspect of the game and see what they think.
1:13 Bro did you skill up by practise? Make Potions, kill ordinators, sell that stuff and go to the trainer, youre not limited to 5 skillpoints per lvl like in the other titles. and turn the fog back on :(
You'll enjoy Bloodmoon, coming from Skyrim. It's set on Solstheim, so you'll get to see some familiar places in a new light
Try Tamriel Rebuilt, and Skyrim: Home of the Nords. Excellent expansion mods for Morrowind, especially if you're wanting more open land to explore. Another sister project, Province Cyrodiil, is about to drop a major expansion aswell.
The Tribunal dlc imo is better for the story because I really like the lore surrounding the Tribunal but Bloodmoon is the more fun dlc
P..S. Vivec does talk about you killing the mad Amalexia. He basically says that he knew that would happen after the Heart of Lorkhan was destroyed and that the Dunmer will go back to worshiping the Good Daedra and he leaves Morrowind.
Yeah tribunal was much more interesting lore wise blood moon changed settings and was a nice break but I still prefer tribunal due to the story
I had a similar experience, I tried getting into Morrowind many times. But finally made a good run and finished the main story with some sidequests along the way, really enjoyed it. Got to Tribunal, played for an hour or two and I just deflated and got bored, haven't played since.
Tamriel Rebuilt is absolutely FANTASTIC. also maybe try the mod "skyrim home of the nords"
there's also an entire fan GAME on the same version of gamebryo, called Anthirin or something? it's a prequel to Enderal. i'm certain you heard of it.
Since the ESO format sadly, sadly wasn't doing so well lately, how about you do a sort of laid-back review of the alliance's zone as one vid for each alliance, just giving your general impressions and some thoughts about exploration and story? I want to get into ESO in the future and your videos are helping to inform me where to spend time and most importantly, where to start.
Thanks for that. That was awesome.
I played Morrowind and the DLC’s as they came out and felt exactly the same about Tribunal. I’m a sicko but I enjoyed remembering how frustrating it was and seeing you do it to. You should definitely do blood moon!
I understand this is against the spirit of the review, but I feel like your experience could’ve been improved by following a guide. I realize that’s not the goal but I genuinely feel with some older games unfortunately that should be the intended first time experience. However, you hopefully go onto tri blood moon because it is commonly regarded as the best expansion tomorrow whereas I believe this one is the least favored.😅
Bloodmoon, the next DLC, is definitely a much better experience. It is set on Solstheim, the same place you go in Skyrim's Dargonborn DLC.
It also gives you an opportunity to turn into a werewolf. Imagine being a lizard doggo. wouldn't that be cool?
It took me years to figure this out since i mostly played Melee Warriors. But projectiles (spells, arrows, bolts, and thrown weapons) can intercept spells cast at you if you hit them midair
Yeah I had a couple of those "harry potter" moments with mages. That was fun!
When I was a kid I played the game out of order and finished Tribunal before the main quest. No guides and an under level character didn’t make for a fun time but I did it and it’s still my proudest elderscrolls achievement. I couldn’t do something like that today, I’d lose my mind.
I liked Bloodmoon more than Tribunal myself. If you do play Bloodmoon, go a bit easier on the pure frost magic build. Being a snow-bound heavily Nord-focused region, frost may not be the best offensive choice.
I never even finished Tribunal, and I didn’t even play Bloodmoon. I just made a new character and installed Tamriel Rebuilt. It’s the size of several DLCs, the quests are well-written, the world design is beautiful.
once you are done with your "first playthrough without help" of the game and dlcs, you should use the list of all quests in the uesp wiki to experience how much content actually is in this world. after that probably give the various mods that exist for this game a chance. stuff like postprocessing shaders and high detail texture packs make this game look almost like vanilla skyrim. tamriel rebuilt adds some portions of the mainland with new quests (needs a new playthrough).
if you are still up for more. sureai (the makers of enderal and nehrim) also had total conversions for morrowind called Arktwend and Myar Aranath. and who knows what else slumbers out there.
also im surprised you enjoyed the magic system. most enemies have a chance to resist or reflect magic, at least in the basegame. so using magic mostly results in your own death due to getting a drain health 100pts for 1 sec spell being reflected back at you. also do yourself a favor and never start abusing the alchemy system. i basically ruined an entire run because when you have 17000 personality, and the potion wears off, everyone who you have encountered so far hates your guts cause of the perceived loss of personality. so i was forced to rely on those potions for the rest of the run.
I think you're basically correct in your assesment. One very minor thing for me, at least, is that I think of the Clockwork City less as ordinary "steampunk", and more as "weird technomagic reality-altering weirdness", which sorta explains the tons of circuit-like patterns on the walls. The chunkiness? Eh, maybe not so much.
my man NEEEEEEDS to install Tamriel Rebuilt!! though unofficial, it's super super super high quality and i would love to see your comparisons to ESO!
I think the insane excitement my little Daggerfall heart had in seeing Helseth and Barenziah again blinded me to the fact that Tribunal was really... not great. I think you gave a really solid assessment of the DLC, the end is really the only interesting part. It was kind of cool seeing them try to realise Old Mournhold as it was described the The Real Barenziah, though. I wish they'd put in a little easter egg about the Staff of Chaos.
Haven't played Daggerfall yet, although it's been highly suggested :)
@@FrostbreakYT Take those suggestions with a grain of salt lol, I'm not so rose-tinted I don't know that my love for Daggerfall is heavily steeped in nostalgia. But if you do give it a try, I'll be here to watch!
I heard DLC, and I kinda knew where it was going. I like some of the things they did in Tribunal, but it wasn't great. And as much as other people seem to like Bloodmoon, it just didn't feel quite the same as the base game. I will recommend the mod Tamriel Rebuilt though...that's a really good mod, and probably a few videos worth of content lol.
@Frostbreak, I sure hope you choose to continue. I've never completely finished Morrowind, but I absolutely love seeing you play through both the good and the bad. I have to admit that seeing you "suffer" makes me want to restart the game again, haha.
Great video as always! Thank you!
I'm glad my suffering was entertaining xD thanks for watching!
I remember Bloodmoon as a proper DLC, this is pretty much just some endgame fights for people that have done everything else. I think the museum also points to that.
I felt the same way when I first played Tribunal. I had to take like a month break. But when I finally played Bloodmoon, it made me love Morrowind again. Now I playthrough it at least twice a year.
Do Bloodmoon. You're not going to be disappointed. Tribunal (from the lens of teenage me) was definitely the inferior DLC / story in all of Morrowind. The theme was cool, though.
Tamriel rebuilt is very very much peak ES in every thing
Ive come back to Morrowind probably once every other year since 2002. In that time, I think Ive done Tribunal once, maybe twice. Ive come back for Bloodmoon alone multiple times. I think especially if you've played Skyrim before coming to Morrowind, Bloodmoon is particularly cool as a proto-Skyrim.
I was 12 when this game came out. I liked and subscribed I'm glad to see someone a bit younger can still appreciate the older games
The percentage in the sewers bit had me cracking up. Great video dude
Haha thanks xD
Ive considered Morrowind my favorite game since 2002, and Tribunal is the only main quest content I've seen to the end. That said, you're 100% right about it all being fetch quests. The redeeming parts though is that many of the enemies are actually challenging, where I found it absurdly easy to overlevel in base Morrowind. It was nice having a challenge, as well as that artifact museum, as well as a vendor that had enough cash to sell valuable things to. Then there also was the addition of adamantine armor, which gave a top tier material to accompany glass and daedric. All in all, I would still rate it a 4 or a 5, but still lower than the rest of the game.
Wait till you try out Bloodmoon DLC, it makes you wana cry of how hard it is.
The only positive thing I remember about Tribunal is some cool hidden gear.
I am completely into Morrowind nostalgia 😅
If you know how it works, you can rush through the fetch quests (boots of blinding speed - yay!) and have some fun speaking to all these well written NPCs and the great lore behind the two big powers of the city. Also enemies are quite challenging even if you are experienced (damn Gaenor and Salas Volar have killed me so many times).
Almalexia is one of my favourite villains at all. Also the side quests are much stronger than in base game Morrowind for me.
Does it deserve a better score than base game MW? Depends on you - I am used to the repetitive dungeons of this over 20 year old game and play the main story once a year before christmas. So nostalgia seems to be very helpful if you want to enjoy outdated games.
But your video was great - I really like people giving Morrowind a chance! :)
Keep on the great work.
I gotta say this about the clockwork city design - even playing this in 2004 as a teenager, it fell flat for me. It wasn't what it was hyped up to be. I get the sense that because they couldn't actually DO curved lines (low poly count) and gleaming brass (no material textures) they decided to just cram it with spinning gears and intricately-detailed textures, but the textures are still that rust-brown shade that makes everything look dingy and old, which makes sense for dwemer ruins but not so much for Sotha Sil's city which isn't supposed to have been neglected for so long.
The other dlc is definitely better atmosphere. Really gives the pioneer mining company vibe. Tribunal had a lot more promise than it delivered
Interesting, thanks for the info. Maybe I'll take a break and come back to bloodmoon one day then
You're not wrong. Tribunal was never any good. The bugs prevented me from actually finishing it twenty years ago, so I never even saw the Clockwork City, and the only reason I ever visited Mournhold on subsequent play throughs was to get the fortify skill spell. Oh, and the high ordinator armour set.
Bloodmoon is well worth it, though. I hope you play it. :)
Still awesome of you to tough out this Sewer/10 dlc regardless, it's always a slog to get through. Also the appraisal of RPGs where your actions directly influence the story at the players discretion- had me realizing that you'd *really* enjoy Baldur's Gate 3 if you haven't considered it already. Another out of comfort zone game that did that same 'Morrowind when it hits' moment imo
I saw your videos, I have a lot of things to share!!!
First I don’t know if you got the fists of rangulf? I don’t know how to spell it, in the sixth house base when you get corprus
The guy in the haunted mansion is one of the only ways to get the daedric bow
Daedric quest and items in this game are awesome, my favorite is the the one were they give you a bear skull helmet
There is a dragon bone armor in the game is you are a Skyrim fan
The morag tong is a great guild to join, at least for me and one is the only ways to get the fortify skill spell
If you like enchanted equipment you need to get the azura star
You can build armor in mournhold
There is also another special vendor in caldera
Blood moon have a set of arrows that are just fun to use
Use the original plugins for the game (kind of mini dlc) they make the game a little more immersive and also get you area effect arrows
Medium armor rocks in this game, adamantine is awesome
And so much more
Played Bloodmoon 20 years ago and i don't remember ANYTHING about the story - BUT I had a ton of fun and that DLC was amazing and I remember that still to this day
You gotta do Solstheim! You have to get the Daedric Pauldron from the top of the waterfall in the cave! It's the only way to get a full Daedric set in Morrowind without slaying NPC's
I really enjoy the story of Tribunal and a lot of the new gear you can get and the unique items - I always run Hopesfire on a longblade character after killing Almalexia. But it is exscuted poorly and I agree with how tedious the fetch quests are. Bloodmoon is much better but it's a much different beast that will probably take you longer to do and longer to write a script up for. It's also much more difficult and you won't want to be using frost spells there.
I remember being disappointed with Tribunal when I got it back in the day too. Played it once and never again.
All I remember from Tribunal is fighting Almalexia at the end with a melee build and getting absolutely fucking wiped by her over and over
I'm an old player that got to play them when they were released. And tbh, I don't really even remember doing the tribunal content at all but bloodmoon I really do remember fondly
The writer and developer who created the world and setting and lore of Morrowind (Michael Kirkbride) left shortly after the completion of the base game which is why there is such a sudden drop in quality. Though he doesn't work for Bethesda anymore his contributions still forms the basis of elder scrolls lore even up to Skyrim which is based off of his writings: "from the many headed Talos" (heimskrs speech in game) and "the seven fights of the Aldudagga"(Alduin the world eater)
I think it's wrong to blame every bad decision Beth made on Kirkbride leaving. It's way to simple. The biggest problem with Tribunal is that they rushed it and had to develop it in 5 months.
Kirkbride was never a level or quest designer though, which is where the DLC struggles most. The basis for the story, look, and most of the worldbuilding for the base game came from him (and Kuhlmann), but the only development work he actually did for the game was writing in-game books.
Unfortunate that you didn't enjoy Tribunal but I really enjoyed seeing a fresh reaction from someone who played ESO first. Bloodmoon is a lot better I think and the other DLCs are of mixed quality. As a Skyrim player I think you'll find 2003's version of Nords interesting.
Tamriel Rebuilt and Project Tamriel content is higher quality than vanilla these days.
Bloodmoon is similar to the main game in exploration, bouncing back and forth between SEVERAL places
Tribunal is mostly bouncing back and forth between two places ✌🏻
Tribunal genuinely pisses me off lol, so my first time playing this dlc, I kept getting stuck in Almalexia's temple because guards kept blocking the hallway, even when I waited they still wont budge, and eventually I just decided to kill that guard, and now its a tradition that if I ever enter the cursed city ever again, I start by killing guards that patrol the narrow hallways. And then during the quest where u have to bring a priest down there to cleanse the tomb, he got stuck in a rock and I had to restart, but because I overwritten my save files, I had to restart the DLC from the start again. I mentioned this already but this DLC is genuinely the Anti-Morrowind, where Morrowind is big, expansive, and gives you the freedom to explore, then Tribunal is narrow, cramped, repetitive, and restrictive.
On a side note, Im glad you like the magic system, its what keeps me gmcoming back to Morrowind as a mage. Its something I'm GREATLY disappointed in when it came to Oblivion and Skyrim. Being a mage in Morrowind makes you feel like a god. Flying around, nuking everything from a far, the moment I could fly, I would never touch the ground ever again. In Oblivion it was alright, uncan still be powerful but it just doesn't feel right, but man, did Skyrim destroyed the magic system, being a mage feels good but god do you feel like a filthy commoner.
I do hope Bloodmoon gets a chance, I remember playing this game, not when it came out because I'm broke all the time even as a kid, but when I was able to snag the game of the year edition, used and for cheap, I was all in. And thankfully, all the DLC was included but Tribunals doesn't stand out to me much at all. I do think I remember the DLC's being a bit higher leveled, though. So it might be a double edged sword starting a new, informed character reroll but the low level is likely to pose an issue. But it's hard to say if a new build that doesn't miss quite as much or can use magic would be easier or if John Fortnite could handle himself
yes pls play Tamriel Rebuilt after the Bloodmoon DLC
Only reason to ever experience the Tribunal dlc is to stop the annoying assassin's from showing up.
Usually don't have it activated.
Do some Tamriel Rebuilt, you will be a happier person.
Hoping to see more Morrowind content
Tribunal was indeed way too much into sewer delving. May have something to do with the fact that it‘s all interior cells, even the city. But at least it gave us the improved journal.
Bloodmoon is much better as other posters already pointed out. It‘s a real worldspace extension instead of what was essentially a large, populated dungeon in Tribunal.
I remember booting up Morrowind for the fist time since 2010 last year. My last savegame was inside the sewers. Loaded it and was instantly reminded why I quit the last time.
Bloodmoon is soooo much better! It's also a fun contrast to seeing the same island again in Skyrim
Almalexia states the reason for helping you reforge trueflame. It was to test if you really are the nerevarine
Bloodmoon is a lot more open than Tribunal and the main story is a lot more enjoyable.
I really try my best to not take for granted my ultra modded install of morrowind, because there's a way to fix everything. But tribunal is almost not even worth fixing with mods although it's fun to do so. Bloodmoon is 100% better, though its also a little bit contrived. Other people have suggested Tamriel Rebuilt, and I completely agree. It's an extension of vanilla but with even more polish. Eventually the project will restructure tribunal so the environments will be better, even if the story stays the same. Lol sorry for the eall of text
Yeah, Tribunal is not the best experience. You are 100% right on "Too Much Sewers". There is some stuff in the deeper dungeons that's kinda neat to explore and find neat loot. It basically is a direct continuation of the events of you being the Nerevarine in the base game. Bloodmoon is a much more solid experience overall with a lot more stuff to just randomly explore, but it isn't necessarily as connected to the main story events around being Nerevar reborn.
-someone who first played morrowind in high school when it was brand new
Tribunal is like closure on the Tribunal age of Morrowind, along with a gameplay challenge for high level characters. Everything in Mournhold hits like a truck, so it's quite a lot harder than most content in vanilla Morrowind. Almalexia is really designed to whip your ass, and well, go to Bloodmoon, you'll get a few more high level enemies to fight. I enjoy them both, but I 100% understand the frustration and monotony of Tribunal, as the mob diversity is basically 0. That part is dramatically improved in Bloodmoon.
Tribunal was so thin that the only thing I ever used it for was the museum. lol It should be a standard in each game to have a museum or to be able to return the artifacts to their rightful place. I hate having all these epic artifacts just laying around my one-bedroom cabin. lol
facts. The museum is also an essential building in open world RPGs
mournhold city of light city of magic
I never finished Tribunal, but I remember liking the new mobs and locations. The other DLC is fun just on the premise, but again I have no cluie if the story or quest structure is good - just that becoming werefolf was amazing and I had tons of fun with that.
Are you going to try Skywind when it releases? I’m more excited for that than I am ES6
yeah there's definitely some cool stuff in Mournhold but I'm not going to defend the progression of Tribunal being mostly sewer romps and fetch quests. Bloodmoon has a much more interesting area to explore and as a Skyrim player you'll possibly recognise some things from the Dragonborn expansion as it's the same landmass it takes place on :)
Tribunal really needed to communicate better that its supposed to be an extension of the main quest, and probably should only be accessible after defeating Dagoth Ur. Its literally the only large area with proper difficulty for an at least somewhat optimized late game character, base game (and bloodmoon to a lesser extent) are just too easy if you know what you are doing and dont hold yourself back, even on the highest difficulty.
And the expansions main quest is a better end than the last third of the base game mq, storywise. Bloodmoon is kinda like oblivion and skyrim dlc, its better than the average of the base game, but completly seperate from the mq and the narrative of the base game. Like one giant side quest.
I'm so glad you mentioned Tamriel Rebuilt so I don't have to! Bloodmoon is seriously fun and completely different, and despite being a Morrowboomer myself I still haven't tried it. Would love to see Bloodmoon and then TR, the latter I'm very interested in but know nothing about.
Also, congratulations on wrinkling up your brain, Skyzoomer, it's been great watching the Morrowind episodes and following your journey. As a side note, reading is good and fun and just in general I recommend making it a part of your daily life.
Wealth beyond measure, outlander.
Bloodmoon is the best DLC for Morrowwind. Hell I think it's one of the best TES DLC's period. Not gonna lie I remember starting Tribunal back in the day and I don't think I ever finished it.
They were bad 20 years ago. Tribunal was fetch quest simulator but at least you actually learnt more about the figures of the Tribunal and their reason for being and cements the fact they are ALL assholes (at least base game Hortator quests gave decent lore dumps) and while Bloodmoon had some cool ideas, it kinda flubs it big time. That said, if you do another Bloodmoon playthrough use Tomb of the Snow Prince. It's a lovely mod that really gives you the actual vision for Bloodmoon. I got mega excited back in the day because "oooh werewolves".
My mom got me the game for Xmas when it came out back in the day, then I picked up the GotY addition as soon as it dropped thinking 'ok, 2 more xpacks, more content? what could go wrong?'
I played through bloodmoon first and was so happy with it that getting to Tribunal was a shock I wasn't ready for. I hate this dlc so much