The College of Winterhold might seem Skyrim's small, friendly arcane university but beneath the veneer of civility might be a much darker past. Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim College of Winterhold lore. Support me on / avarti
@@Valencetheshireman927 Agree with you on that one, the only time you need to really use magic is the beginning when they ask you to perform a certain spell. The rest of your time at the college can be spent smacking skeletons in the face with a giant unenchanted hammer, and then they make you the archmage
If u dont go to the college then that elf dude gets the eye of magnus and becomes pretty much unstoppable as he will ptobably kill everything around him and u wont know to get the staff of magnus anymore
Lol... They have classes dude... If u give money they will teach you... But you need a lot of money to do that. I just use console command to master me in everything
She's right to doubt herself. Her school of magic is useless, she's outdone by fire/silver and some health potions. Oh and the Spell Breaker shield for a ward. Restoration is pointless
@@derpyboi8591 As useless as your team's healer. The one who basically carried the team and still got nagged at for being useless. Then when they rage-quit the team, and you wondered "what's up their butt?" Before your team got hit with a massive loss streak... Yeah...useless...
@@edi9892 There are not enough speech and dialogue functions for that in Skyrim. Skyrim characters are pretty much limited to being more or less low-functioning. Then again, so are the NPCs, so I guess that balances it out.
@@tarvoc746 To be honest, you can't join a good faction in Skyrim. All of your options are: unwitting daedra worshipers, werewolves, morally questionable mages, two wrong war factions, vampires, anti-vampire zealots with a horrible and disgusting past, whole lot of plain daedra...
It is kinda poor design that they made a piece of a hidden side quest (collect all the dragon priest masks) behind the second to last quest in a storyline.
Itz a wild Potato imagine waiting another 5 years on a game they promised only for them to finally say that they aren’t ever gonna make another elder scrolls😢
One of my favorite moments playing: *Savos Aren lies dead after the Eye of Magnus explodes* High elf that teaches Alteration: “I think the college is due for a change in leadership”
I kinda wish they went the slight thieves guild route, where you can only become arch mage when u master a school and get 90+, till then someone else covers for you. Just like Brynjolf did, Tolfdir could instead.
@@trollisourbriteeggs6282 thieves guild is slightly different, you have to complete so many of the radient quests given from the thieves, then u get full quests which open stalls in the guild and then u eventually get promoted : )
Like the thing eso did right because its a mmo is that you can never be archmage( because then everyone will be archmage and running around :D) If in skyrim you can only be lets say master sorcerer but never archmage would be good. Because the archmage before you literally says he worked hundred years to achieve if im recalling right. Thats just absurd that we can be an archmage by using swords.
@@tomo4977 many quests? Skyrim is poor in this context and any path, any guild not offer anything comparable with Oblivion or Morrowind. That's really sad how ridiculously the potential of Skyrim was wasted
Also becoming harbinger of the Companions after the equivalent of two weeks game time. If I was a senior companion and passed over by a five minute wonder I would be well cheesed off!!
"The mages college suffered the great collapse like 80 years ago, conjure up a friggin hammer already and fix the goddamn bridge" 👍to those who get this reference.
The winterhold college questline You prevent a hypercompetant thalmor from unmaking nirn, free the souls of two apprentices from a dragonpriest and discover the ultimate wizard staff.
as well as completing two shouts (ice form & slow time), acquiring three more mage-followers (onmund brelyna J'ZARGO) plus another FENCE merchant (enthir).. .😉
My biggest complaint of playing Skyrim is you are so special everywhere you go. What's annoying about the college and other guilds, is it blocks you from getting certain items. Wish we can choose to lead or not cause damn, a warrior who wants the complete disarm shout needs to be a thief don't make sense for lore or immersion
Agreed. I think other than the dark brotherhood, we should choose the next leader or at least have the choice if we want to be the leader (and loot the special gear of we choose not to). That for me makes the whole quest line worth it, rather than never making a leader's decision after the fact. In reality, one person cannot lead all those factions at once.
@Wirr Ling definitely agree with your statement too. The game makes you special when joining the guild but the world doesn't acknowledge your heroics or criminality. Just guard saying lines.
Yep, it's probably my 6th or 7th playthrough (+ some problematic attempts, lol), and it's my first mage one, and only because Ordinator kinda made me stick with it. Normally, I'd have given up and gone back to slashing things about 20 levels ago.
You realize if left to his own devices, without the Dragonborn’s intervention, Ancano would have tapped into the Eye fully and become a god right? And considering the Thalmors agenda that would literally spell the end of Mundus as a whole?
@@chrisklitou7573 no, they planned the expedition without the dragonborn, I'm pretty sure they'd have found it, after all some mage was gonna pick up that amulet and break into the secret passageway
he wouldn't have became a god because that's not how the eye works. ancano gives a hint when he yells "i have the power to unmake the world at my fingertips." the game does a crap job of explaining it, but if you understand the lore of magnus and how time works in mundus, then it's pretty clear what happened. magnus was the one who designed the world that elder scrolls takes place in, therefore the eye's power relates to the structure of the world. time in the elder scrolls doesn't flow in a backward or forward manner. all events in the elder scrolls take place all at once. time is simply the tool (arui-el, pun intended) that anui-el uses to reflect on his creations. knowing these two things, we can understand what happened in winterhold. when ancano taps into the power of the eye, he destroyed winterhold 80 years in the past. it's really that simple. if you don't join to stop him, he could very well succeed. this also falls in line with the goal of thalmor, which is to destroy talos and mundus in order to regain their immortality and their rightful place in aetherius with the rest of the gods.
@@theghostofthomasjenkins9643 Actually the main storyline was supposed to be you, the dragonborn, ending up traveling to the past (don't know if ancano would or not as well) and then you the player would be the one to cause the great collapse in order to stop the end of the world. But they were pressed for time with deadlines coming up and were already late, so they cut that content and much other college content (origin of the augur of dunlain, the missing students, the summoning hand and so on) and we ended with the underwhelming quickly rewritten and finished questline where psijic order abruptly takes away the eye of magnus. They never completed it or did a dlc later on because the other main storyline with alduin also already involved time travel and so they decided to spend their time working on dlcs instead which would also bring in fresh money. Honestly I would have loved to play that original questline they planned. I mean the psijic monk talked about this choice you would have to make and how they were watching you, and then we never did get to make this epic heartwrenching choice in the game. *sad sigh*
The Mages Guild in Oblivion was even more boring than the College of Winterhold and it completely undermined Mannimarco's power. Mannimarco, Lich, and God King of Worms. The main antagonist of Daggerfall and the secondary antagonist of ESO. Spreading fear all across Tamriel and the most powerful mage ever to come out of the Mages Guild, other than MAYBE Vanus Galerion. Two swings of your sword and he dies instantly in an anticlimatic piss poor final quest of the shit-tier story of Cyrodiil's Mages Guild.
@@DjangoFatt yeah but they're probably going to do something like the college of winterhold. where Nords "hate" magic but people can still isolate themselves safely in the collage.
@@traeirvine2844 yeah my strongest character is also a mage and I'm lvl 85, had to start using ebony armor cause not even mage armor perks with The lord Stone were enough after lvl 60 or so. Edit: I wear ebony armor, but with the dragon priest masks that boost fire/shock damage
Your evidence is circumstantial *at* *best*. While I am sure the College has some not-so-nice secrets, the same can be said for every Jarl-dom in Skyrim as well. It seems just as plausible that when the great collapse came, the mages were able to protect the college or perhaps were only able to protect the college. I am not saying you are wrong. I am saying you haven't proven your case, and given the benefits that joining gives, you don't make a compelling case not to.
I believe the Collapse was simply an accident,that had unforseen consequences.It mayeven be a combination of the eruption and the college.As for how the college remained standing,I assume it was advanced alteration magic,not dissimilar to Icathia's Deep.If a bunch of necromancer can keep a fortress from flooding,then a massive contingent of apprentices and magic school experts can keep a building barely stable.The fountains with the weird blue fluid are also strategically placed right above the foundations of the college(one of them being in the very centre of the iceberg upon which the college nests and houses the Augur,that might serve a medium to channel the environment's magicka into those pools. This doesn't prove the involvement of the college with the Great Collapse,but it certainly highlights a grim explanation,as to how the college protected itself against it.And with the track record of Savos Aren(him binding the souls of his friends to seal the Arch Priest),it would not be above the Arch-Mage sacrificing a student to serve a purpose,especially for self- preservation.
I mean the simplest answer for why the college was left relatively untouched is that its simply higher up. It was built on a hill. During a tidal wave the highest point of land will be the most likely to survive.
Its not that I’m a psychopath that doesn’t care about the past of the institution, more, its my desire to implant myself as the new archmage and (lore wise) make the college a better place.
Highrock would be the perfect setting, plenty of room for several types of playstyles, from magical institutions, knightly orders & cutthroats to simple merchants, alchemists and of course the various temples to the divines in each kingdom
@@wiibrockster my thoughts exactly, all that replay value on a grand scale would justify the supposed "limitations" of this generation of consoles holding the team back from fully realizing a decent entry into the franchise
Red mountain is still erupting, you hear that from Neloth and Ralis, also, the College has been standing since at least the merithic era, and was rumored to be built by Shalidor himself, it's not hard to imagine that there are some powerful enchantments over it that would prevent any major damage, also keep in mind, that Magic is disliked to begin with, and many people would find reasons to hate it, or cause it to disappear, but here is the thing, Magic is used to cure vampirism, Magic is used to enchant weapons and armor to make them more powerful, Magic is a tool, and a tool that should be used and embraced fully
It's also imbued into everything on Nirn, literally everything. The Nords have traces of Magic in them but don't try to learn about it and blame it instead over men and mer, yet quite a few of them practice Alchemy - which I must remind you, is imbued with Magic, it's the only reason why it exists. Our equivalence for alchemy is purely scientifical, normal medicine & poison, with magic existing in ES this would not normally exist as everyone studies magic over science 99.9% of the time. The Voice, Shouts/Thu'um, warps the surrounding area through Magic in the area to create the effects that it does. Point is, looking at everything objectively Nords are racist heretics as a whole.
I heard one theory that the reason the Great Collapse took place was not because of magic but rather a lack thereof. After all, Winterhold was founded by Shalidor, it's very much plausible that he used magic to create the city. After the Oblivion crisis, the locals grew a strong hatred for magic so magic stopped being used around the city. Over time, the ground started to become less stable and eventually collapsed, yet the college still stands as that was the only place where magic was still practiced regularly.
My problem with the Dark Brotherhood questline in Oblivion is that it force you to be evil. In Daggerfall, and in the Morag Tong from Morrowind, it was just a job. Skyrim's DB is more of a middle ground.
@Sky Dome The fact that you prefer them is not an argument. Guilds are not supposed to be jobs, but institutions in which knowledge is shared. You should read the books of those factions. Not to mention that those types of fetch quests are also in Skyrim. For example, you can carry enchanted items, find books, etc. And they reward you for each of those things. The big difference with Morrowind is that they also introduce a plot that feeds the lore and the gameplay value to that guild. No, even if you have high levels in your abilities you cannot stop doing fetch quests, because each guild has a double system to let you climb in the ranks and grant you missions. And as I said, most are fetch quests. Each guild in Morrowind only has on average two or three missions with some interesting content. That's why they are the worst.
@@void9399 That's exactly my issue with the mage faction quests. You should be forced to be a certain skill level before you be permitted to proceed. You could be the best damn delivery boy on the planet but a scrub can't be a master wizard. The facilities should also serve their purpose as a school and help level you up to an extent. Perhaps you be given assignments to test certain spells in certain situations to get players feet wet, "written tests" with books providing aid, and functional practice grounds, all earning skill experience upon completion. And for fun role playing, skill experience and reading books should open up new dialogue opportunities, like in old Fallout
@@alpharabbit2353 I think I had already explained. From the moment that each guild contains its own plot, it is difficult to demand a certain level of ability to move forward, since they would be attacking the passing of the story. Imagine that in Skyrim they told you: "Sorry Dragonborn, we know that Ancano is about to destroy the world, but we cannot give you the next mission because you are not yet level 90 in destruction." So it is clear that Bethesda left that responsibility to the players. No one forces you to pass the history of the College of Winterhold without using a character dedicated to magic. And I agree that the guilds should give missions to test your skills.
"Don't join the college, because... morals, and stuff." Lol I don't give a sh*t, I'm in it for the fancy room and sweet magic perks. Its a video game, I'm not going to lose sleep if I make an immoral choice in a fictional world
Brennen Streicher I think Avarti wants you too think like your in the game But even so would morals really hold you back when you can blast a lightning bolt into people
@WoodPileDenmark precisely this, if there were ever a "why avarti is an idiot" that would be the premise. he sounds like a all knowing god telling you to choose/do something because of reasons your character has no bussness knowing in the first place.
Oh, depends, you could be a true and absolute saint in a video game, an antisocial murdering psychopath with sadistic tendencies or everything in between (kinda like in real life, actually), but it can be more fun.
It's is so dificult to enter in the arcane university in oblivion,and i love that! And in Skyrim you cast an spell in the ground and enter in the college of winterhold,that sucks.
@@Valencetheshireman927 So , you don't have to work for the C.O.W.? The only difference is the fact that you don't have to do chore quests to join them.
@@shadowstrider5033 The main issue I have with the College of Winterhold is that you don't actually have to be any good at magic to progress. From memory, I got by with just basic spells and Shouts, and suddenly I was Arch-Mage, whereas in 'Oblivion' you have to be reasonably good at a variety of spells (or good at finding a way round using them) and prove yourself to multiple leaders before you're even allowed into the Arcane University.
@@TranscendentLion Yeah no. Oblivion was roughly the same , except with the chore quests to enter the arcane university filled with a bunch of lying , manipulative mages , lead by a shortsighted , irresponsible archmage. Oblivion has better quests in general , but I didn't like the mages guild quest at all. In fact , I gave up around Count skingrad's quest and just decided to watch it on RU-vid. Even the fighter's guild gets better than the mage's guild.
You kinda got to think about this in the perspective of your character. Would your dragonborn be suspicious of the college's involvement in the collapse? I mean ultimately it's the player's choice weather or not the dragonborn knows.
When you get the Azura's Star from Malyn Varen's house out you learn that the experiments they performed on the star caused the island the hideout was on to sink. I don't know if the college caused the calamity, but I'm sure they had the power to. The fact that the game devs made this quest that way may be a clue to the truth.
I always kind of figured the college survived mostly because it's a giant stone structure, and has magic flowing through it, while Winterhold had a lot of small wooden buildings. Although it's hard to deny that some dark magics have gone on below the college.
With only one entrance (the bridge) being guarded by magical forcefield-emitting wells the College never had anything to fear that involved the city. They would never cause The Great Collapse on purpose.
I liked the last mission of the college. A dragon priest talking to you while you slowly approach his chamber. One of the few times i felt any connection to a dungeon boss.
They shouldve let you read an elder time travel scroll while at the college that would teleport you to Winterhold before the collapse and send you on a mysterious questline, similar to the Forgotten City mod, a perfect mod... and then you get transported back to real tome once you find out what caused it and either carry out justice, or hold a secret
Everything you give is hypothetical. Toldfir knew him, and he certainly isn't old enough to have been a student before the collapse, which sort of disproves everything. he entire video is just what if, what if, what if. Also most of the distrust towards mages was *because* of the great collapse.
It is literally said in one of the loading screen texts that the college was "once a source of pride" for Winterhold, until something, presumably the collapse, changed people's attitudes towards it Suggesting that the mages triggered the collapse intentionally to kill off most of Winterhold is just dumb anyways. What would happen if people found out they did it? They have to face not only a few hotheads from Winterhold but probably an entire army of guards and soldiers from all over Skyrim who would come after them to bring them to justice for the murder of thousands of innocents. In fact the collapse could have triggered people into attacking the college simply over the suspicion that they were responsible
@@divotrinugraha9690 you realize the red mountain exploded in 4E 5, and winterhold collapsed in 4E 122. Call me crazy but that is way too long after the explosion to have much relation to the collapse.
You are right. For the moral integrity of the Dragonborn, we should strictly join other noble factions. Like the Dark Brotherhood. Or the mafia aka Thieves guild. Or the Companions who are bloody werewolves.
Actually augurs did not make prophecies based on blood, blood, bones and other matter. That'd be haruspicies. Augur literally means "one who directs birds" and they made predictions based on the flight patterns of, well, birds
Dark Brotherhood: Philosophy of death "we think we should be allowed to kill innocent people" College of Winterhold: Philosophy of Magical preservation "we think we should have killed the innocent people to preserve the college and advance our institution" A- You give acknowledgement of that perspective to the Brotherhood and not the College. B- Whether or not any of them are benefiting, supporting the greater good, and/or its for the best is not shared between both factions here. (if you only NOW bring this up it's a little late. You've established and built up your perspective based on the evidence in the videos you've provided.) NO! You didn't say the Dark Brotherhood was evil or good. You questioned it. NO! You didn't say the College was good or evil. You questioned it. Why not apply the same standards in your questioning and if you're truly open minded here you wouldn't have a title saying "Why You Should NOT Join The College of Winterhold." Umm... I think you're intentionally opposed to the perceived popular opinion to stand out from the crowd. Don't just start with the belief that "Hey, everyone thinks A, so before I even begin to investigate I'll just say that they should think the total opposite which is B, then I'll build up any evidence for it ignoring other standards that wouldn't come to this conclusion if applied to my previous topics." Rather than investigate FIRST and come to honest conclusions, and applying the same standards to similar circumstances. I guess that's ok but there's a clear pattern here of double standards and inconsistencies in how you come to these conclusions. I really like your videos bro. Please continue the good work. I know I'm sort of calling you out here but please start providing the same standards and investigation tactics to similar topics like factions or characters. Keep a list and breakdown your own logic and keep that cheat sheet handy for when you make similar topic videos. Keep your consistency. If you truly mean to just intentionally oppose and question the dominant opinion, I can truly respect that. For real. I personally analyze all cases together and not with a case-by-case basis. This comment was meant to question your inconsistency in similar topics. Not to question this video itself at all.
Can you do one for Dawnguard/Volkihar? Would love to hear your opinion on both of them and maybe Imperial/Stormcloak? Like a combined video for each set on who to join and not to join. I know opinions could get in the way, but a thorough investigation of the both sides would be fantastic. It's a hard debate for sure.
dont know why youre loosely throwing around the word 'psychopath' for joining an organization with a dark past majority of the factions in elder scrolls have a dark past and thats what makes them fleshed out and unique its more or less what the organization becomes in the future and not what was back then i mean, hell, even many countries and organizations in real life were corrupt in the past and have improved since then so its not hard to imagine that the college can improve and be a better place despite its past
I'm sorry... people FLOCK to that bullshit? That quest line alone makes it a test of will to not quit half the mage based playthroughs I do simply because it's so soul suckingly droll
Me: great, I'm gonna join the college and learn so much about magic! The only actual learning experience about magic: sTaNd OvEr ThErE aNd HoLd ThE wArD uP
Or alternatively, the trainer system, but then again, you see that outside of the college too. You can buy spell books elsewhere as well. So it is indeed (at least a bit) underwhelming.
The teachers are available for skill training, and they also explain that the College is mostly a place to grant convenient access to information and resources, where mages can study whatever they want and experiment in peace.
The position of augur in ancient Rome had nothing to do with "blood and bones", while there might have been some animal sacrifices performed in his presence his main task was to tell the future and the fortune and the will of the gods based on the observation of birds.
I actually enjoyed the questline for the College of Winterhold it was a unique questline and it was fun the only problem I had was at the end when I had to try to kill ancano he pissed me off quite a bit but after some problem solving I figured out how to beat him and I enjoyed it and now I'm the archmage I even did that final quest for tolfdir where you close the rupture it was a fun Quest least favorite Quest was the boring first lesson is there was only it was was a lesson on Wards which okay I wish it would had a little more depth to the quest but overall fun quest line keep up the good work
Skyrim isn't a choice based RPG about deep moral implications based on player's actions. It's a dungeon looter RPG with an open-world slapped onto it. If I don't join the college of winterhold, I'll be locked out of siezeable portion of content, rewards, quests, rare spells, shouts and loot given to me by the game.
Dang props to you for still playing on ps3 even if it's your only choice. But idk about buying a ps4, ps5 will likely come out within the next year or two so if you're purchasing anything, buy a PC. It's just the better financial option if you're on a tight budget is all I'm trying to look at for ya.
I feel like everyone forgets this Sandbox game like a medevil GTA and mods make these Sandbox games so fun and much more enjoyable experience than the vanilla experience
“Why you should not join.” Well it doesn’t help that Bethesda FORCES you to join the college even if you’re a warrior build just so you can read a couple books
That's exactly the case with the Thieves Guild. I hate that guild, but every time I enter Riften, Brynjolf starts stalking me; and if he gets to initiate chat I'm instantly getting the first thieves guild quest, whether I accept or decline it. i don't want to see forced quests like that in TES 6
This was just kind of dumb, in my opinion. Even if the College of Winterhold did cause the great collapse, that was a long time ago, and none of the people who were in charge then are in charge now. You present it as if Savos Aren is lying about it, but he could literally not even know that it was involved (if it was) since he was just a student at the time. Overall it's pretty poor reasoning for not joining the college, especially since it's just speculation and not really supported by any evidence.
Also the shock waves from the errupting of the red mountain couldnt have effected any other hold in skyrim because they are farther away and arent at a higher altitudes of a cliff like the college of winterhold and the town was. The only town i could possibly see be effected would be dawnstar if there was a tsunami created from the shockwaves of red mountain errupting.
@Arvati' I mean if the Great collapse was caused by an Earthquake wouldn't it be logical enough to assume that the mages used magic to keep the college from collapsing with the rest of the town? Perhaps they were not able to prevent the great collapse as a whole but were able to save their college.
Considering how adamant the masters of the college are about not doing any too dangerous experiments, I believe winterhold was destroyed by an accident that happened in the college
I've always kinda known that the college was involved. It seems kinda obvious, actually. What I didn't know was how it happened. This is an interesting theory. Though.
But you didn't know. Ancano caused the Great Collapse that happened 80 years ealier, when he poked the Eye of Magnus. Since you know,, Magnus created Nirn.
“...Unless your a psychopath and don’t care about the institutions shady past.” Says someone who has played the Dark Brotherhood quest line enough to create a 10 minute video detailing the failure of its leader to be more efficient and successful at killing people for hire. 🙄 😂
I avoided it because of how the quest line was immersion-breaking. Late into the game I was already the most powerful mage in the world, yet they had the audacity to place me at apprentice level! There should have been a branch path where depending on what level your skill in magic is, it would cause a different response from the interviewer at the beginning at the bridge, where she would either accept you as a apprentice or as a teacher once you pass the test.
Jay Walker one wants you to be a werewolf one wants you to kill vampires while the other wants you as a vampire one wants you to be a murderer for hire
Shady past? Really? We judging things by the past? Times change, things change, people change...great institutions all have shady pasts, yet may not be shady today.
I've got an ad for Harry Potter mobile game before this video. Is youtube suggesting that Skyrim and Harry Potter happen in the same universe with College of Magic/Hogwarts being the linking point of both?
It's honestly easy to forget just how devastating the great collapse was, I'll admit I forget about winterhold more often than I should, what was once a city is now barely a town the size of riverwood.
News flash earthquakes can happen without a volcano having to explode and some earthquakes can happen in specific areas and not affect an entire country
i only join for the power and so when i become the high king thanks to other mods i can enslave all the mages and enjoy my cliff side fortress alone with the select few i allow to stay
