ES4: Oblivion - Retrospective @ Spawn Kill

[aries100]

As the fourth anniversary for Oblivion is coming up this weekend, the guys at Spawn Kill made a retrospective (http://spawnkill.com/2010/03/21/spawn-kill-favorites-oblivion/) about it. Here's a bit about the non-player-characters in Oblivion:
The non-player characters in The Elder Scrolls IV deserve a special mention here. Through proprietary technology Bethesda has dubbed Radiant AI, NPCs of various towns are enabled to make their own decisions about their lives. Many characters the players come upon throughout the course of the game are literally living their own lives - going to church, working for a living, eating, going to bed by 9 PM, and starting all over again the next day. Many NPCs hunt and kill game to be able to eat, others simply steal food from markets or people's homes.
More information. (http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/newsbit?newsbit=14662)

[Korplem]

The non-player characters in The Elder Scrolls IV deserve a special mention here. Through proprietary technology Bethesda has dubbed Radiant AI, NPCs of various towns are enabled to make their own decisions about their lives. Many characters the players come upon throughout the course of the game are literally living their own lives – going to church, working for a living, eating, going to bed by 9 PM, and starting all over again the next day. Many NPCs hunt and kill game to be able to eat, others simply steal food from markets or people’s homes. While the weight of the AI characters’ actions may not directly affect the person playing the game, their need to live and ability to react gives Oblivion a very grand scale.

What Oblivion did they play? I only remember NPCs having about 2 or 3 things that they do everyday, all day long. And, I'm pretty certain that they didn't NEED to do anything to live. Sure, they ate, but they never had to hunt for the food.

And ability to react? I slaughtered a dozen citizens of a town and nobody mentioned it... Or how about people milling about in a storm? What did they react to??

[Maylander]

That quote is just plain redicilous. Most NPCs in Oblivion do no such thing - they simply walk around talking to each other about completely random things (the conversations rarely makes sense).

The predetirmed schedules in Gothic 1 work a whole lot better than the AI in Oblivion.

[Tragos]

I remember a post in official site by the Devs , it was something like :

"A hungry NPC stole an apple , a guard attacked him , a friend of the NPC attacked the guard and after half an hour entire city was dead"
I ate many in game apples watching rangers killing each other .

[Zaleukos]

What a joke of a quote.

I saw NPCs getting into spontaneous fights, but that was usually a result of friendly fire. The AI was very "good" at getting into the line of fire of NPCs and PC alike.... Escort missions where the f-tard I was supposed to escort deliberately ran in between my sword an the enemy contributed to my hatred of the game.

[LuckyCarbon]

I don't think whoever wrote that actually played the game, they just quoted what was promised by Bethesda before release.

I'll see their ridiculous quote and raise them an Oblivion Dinner Party!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KN7cKO8-P0

I've never heard of spawnkill.com before but this article alone adds them to my "gamespot list"

[crpgnut]

Did any of you guys play Oblivion? The NPCs certainly followed a schedule where they got up, went to work, stopped after work for supper, and then went to their homes. Many wandered around to their favorite haunts in the evenings. Comparing the thousands of NPCs with schedules to the few dozen of Gothic isn't really fair. Of course Gothic could have a small handful of folks have a deeper schedule than the masses of Oblivion. By the way, if someone followed me around, they'd find out that most days I follow the exact same schedule. I get up, eat breakfast, go to work, put in my time, drive home, make and eat supper, and then retire to my computer/book for the evening. It varies some nights, but not all that often.

Not saying the AI was perfect. As someone mentioned, the conversations were mostly inane. Some were repeated every single night until a trigger would happen. I could watch the merchant from the Copious Coinpurse talk to the Nord bad-guy forever if I didn't get close enough to trigger the script to move on.

The rampant jealousy of Oblivion really gets me tickled. Some of you foam at the mouth every time there is a post about the game. Are your lives that dull? Get over it!

Bethesda fanboi checking out :)

[wolfing]

Did any of you guys play Oblivion? The NPCs certainly followed a schedule where they got up, went to work, stopped after work for supper, and then went to their homes. Many wandered around to their favorite haunts in the evenings. Comparing the thousands of NPCs with schedules to the few dozen of Gothic isn't really fair. Of course Gothic could have a small handful of folks have a deeper schedule than the masses of Oblivion. By the way, if someone followed me around, they'd find out that most days I follow the exact same schedule. I get up, eat breakfast, go to work, put in my time, drive home, make and eat supper, and then retire to my computer/book for the evening. It varies some nights, but not all that often.

Not saying the AI was perfect. As someone mentioned, the conversations were mostly inane. Some were repeated every single night until a trigger would happen. I could watch the merchant from the Copious Coinpurse talk to the Nord bad-guy forever if I didn't get close enough to trigger the script to move on.

The rampant jealousy of Oblivion really gets me tickled. Some of you foam at the mouth every time there is a post about the game. Are your lives that dull? Get over it!

Bethesda fanboi checking out :)

I agree my friend. It's almost too similar to the way some Republicans in the US see every single thing the government does as 'evil' and 'socialist'.

[Maylander]

Did any of you guys play Oblivion? The NPCs certainly followed a schedule where they got up, went to work, stopped after work for supper, and then went to their homes. Many wandered around to their favorite haunts in the evenings. Comparing the thousands of NPCs with schedules to the few dozen of Gothic isn't really fair. Of course Gothic could have a small handful of folks have a deeper schedule than the masses of Oblivion. By the way, if someone followed me around, they'd find out that most days I follow the exact same schedule. I get up, eat breakfast, go to work, put in my time, drive home, make and eat supper, and then retire to my computer/book for the evening. It varies some nights, but not all that often.

Not saying the AI was perfect. As someone mentioned, the conversations were mostly inane. Some were repeated every single night until a trigger would happen. I could watch the merchant from the Copious Coinpurse talk to the Nord bad-guy forever if I didn't get close enough to trigger the script to move on.

The rampant jealousy of Oblivion really gets me tickled. Some of you foam at the mouth every time there is a post about the game. Are your lives that dull? Get over it!

Bethesda fanboi checking out :)

Actually, they don't follow a schedule. That's the whole point. It's an AI that is supposed to react based on the personal needs of the NPC. However, the end result is significantly worse than the simple scheduling system used in Gothic, due to all the things the NPCs do that simply makes no sense (i.e walking in circles, back and forth between two destinations where nothing happens, etc). They'd get a better result by simply programming the NPCs manually to do specific things every day (get up, get breakfest, go to work, go home, eat, go to bed).

Hailing the Radiant AI in Oblivion as revolutionary is a redicilous claim, because Gothic got better results 4,5 years before Oblivion was released.

The underlying mechanism is irrelevant; it's the end result that matters. Hopefully, all the money they invested in making the Radiant AI will give us better NPCs at some point. So far, I still haven't seen anything that surpasses Gothic's simple scheduling system.

[GhanBuriGhan]

Actually, they don't follow a schedule. That's the whole point. It's an AI that is supposed to react based on the personal needs of the NPC. However, the end result is significantly worse than the simple scheduling system used in Gothic, due to all the things the NPCs do that simply makes no sense (i.e walking in circles, back and forth between two destinations where nothing happens, etc). They'd get a better result by simply programming the NPCs manually to do specific things every day (get up, get breakfest, go to work, go home, eat, go to bed).

Hailing the Radiant AI in Oblivion as revolutionary is a redicilous claim, because Gothic got better results 4,5 years before Oblivion was released.

The underlying mechanism is irrelevant; it's the end result that matters. Hopefully, all the money they invested in making the Radiant AI will give us better NPCs at some point. So far, I still haven't seen anything that surpasses Gothic's simple scheduling system.
The way it was finally implemented it actually was more of a streamlined scheduling system than an agent-driven AI system. the only difference to something like Gothic is that the tasks could be assigned in a relatively simple way as AI operated chunks instead of scripting every waypoint and every animation. In principle a good system for a large-scale sandbox game, just neither "radiant" nor "AI". The actual emergent elements in the system were hardly used in the final game, as they obviously led to too many unpredictable consequences, like the apple-to-genocide example above. Still, there were some good aspects of the system - unlike Morrowind, you'd actually meet some people on the roads (until they eventually get killed by animals or bandits) :) You witness occasional fights of guards and bandits, people move around, etc. It was buggy, but a move in the right direction. They should just never have hyped it as much as they did. The example they showed in that video with the woman and the dog just raised totally unrealistic expectations.

[Zaleukos]

Did any of you guys play Oblivion? The NPCs certainly followed a schedule where they got up, went to work, stopped after work for supper, and then went to their homes.

Played it, just found that particular Bethsoft title seriously lacking (I loved Morrowind and found Fallout 3 pretty good). The AI behaviour was nowhere near the hype that this journalist reminds me of, and occasionally did incredibly stupid things when left to its own devices.

[Maylander]

The way it was finally implemented it actually was more of a streamlined scheduling system than an agent-driven AI system. the only difference to something like Gothic is that the tasks could be assigned in a relatively simple way as AI operated chunks instead of scripting every waypoint and every animation. In principle a good system for a large-scale sandbox game, just neither "radiant" nor "AI". The actual emergent elements in the system were hardly used in the final game, as they obviously led to too many unpredictable consequences, like the apple-to-genocide example above. Still, there were some good aspects of the system - unlike Morrowind, you'd actually meet some people on the roads (until they eventually get killed by animals or bandits) :) You witness occasional fights of guards and bandits, people move around, etc. It was buggy, but a move in the right direction. They should just never have hyped it as much as they did. The example they showed in that video with the woman and the dog just raised totally unrealistic expectations.

Aah, that explains a lot, thank you! Doesn't make the overall experience any better, but it's nice to know what we experienced was not the Radiant AI they were talking so much about.

Also, I believe this is something the author of the article is not aware of (considering the specific mentioning of Radiant AI).

[Thaurin]

...and occasionally did incredibly stupid things when left to its own devices.

Just like real people!! (Sorry!)

[holeraw]

The way it was finally implemented it actually was more of a streamlined scheduling system than an agent-driven AI system. the only difference to something like Gothic is that the tasks could be assigned in a relatively simple way as AI operated chunks instead of scripting every waypoint and every animation. In principle a good system for a large-scale sandbox game, just neither "radiant" nor "AI". The actual emergent elements in the system were hardly used in the final game, as they obviously led to too many unpredictable consequences, like the apple-to-genocide example above. Still, there were some good aspects of the system - unlike Morrowind, you'd actually meet some people on the roads (until they eventually get killed by animals or bandits) :) You witness occasional fights of guards and bandits, people move around, etc. It was buggy, but a move in the right direction. They should just never have hyped it as much as they did. The example they showed in that video with the woman and the dog just raised totally unrealistic expectations.

True. In the end however it looks pretty bad... and I personally find it 'impractical' as well - I found it annoying that many NPCs would keep moving around so much that it was way too much of a chore to locate them when I needed them without relying on the compass. I never had any such problem with any other games that featured NPCs with less radiant schedules, but Oblivion was the one game made me wish it had completely static NPCs.

Overall I find that Oblivion aged very badly and very fast.

[JDR13]

Overall I find that Oblivion aged very badly and very fast.


I agree.

Morrowind > Oblivion.

[Korplem]

Did any of you guys play Oblivion? The NPCs certainly followed a schedule where they got up, went to work, stopped after work for supper, and then went to their homes. Many wandered around to their favorite haunts in the evenings. Comparing the thousands of NPCs with schedules to the few dozen of Gothic isn't really fair. Of course Gothic could have a small handful of folks have a deeper schedule than the masses of Oblivion. By the way, if someone followed me around, they'd find out that most days I follow the exact same schedule. I get up, eat breakfast, go to work, put in my time, drive home, make and eat supper, and then retire to my computer/book for the evening. It varies some nights, but not all that often.

Not saying the AI was perfect. As someone mentioned, the conversations were mostly inane. Some were repeated every single night until a trigger would happen. I could watch the merchant from the Copious Coinpurse talk to the Nord bad-guy forever if I didn't get close enough to trigger the script to move on.

The rampant jealousy of Oblivion really gets me tickled. Some of you foam at the mouth every time there is a post about the game. Are your lives that dull? Get over it!

Bethesda fanboi checking out :)

Actually, I quite enjoyed Oblivion. I'm much more tolerant toward game design than the rpg purists but there is no way somebody can tell me the Radiant AI was everything that author said.

[K-Tuck]

Hey everybody, this is K-Tuck of Spawn Kill. I'm excited to see how passionate of a response my words have caused on your community. It's good to see the article has inspired some of you, even though it appears that inspiration is seems to have created a debate.

I have seen it questioned whether or not I have played this game, and yes, I have. My last save was just over 71 hours into the game.

There does seem to be concern about what is actually dubbed "Radiant AI." Whether or not this is truly the technology behind NPC actions in Oblivion is debatable; it was, however, the name given by Bethesda for the system. I have also made no claims about AI behavior that are untrue, most of these actions can easily be verified in-game or online through videos or tutorials. Several members here and across other websites seem to have seen very realistic behavior in the game, while others may perhaps be a bit too pessimistic to have paid much attention.

For the record, the recurring Spawn Kill Favorite articles at SpawnKill.com are not explicitly retrospectives. They are more like recommendations. In this context, it helps to keep that in mind. No SKF article is written without implying that the title is worth the reader's time.

[crpgnut]

K-Tuck, any post anywhere in the world that sheds Bethesda, especially Oblivion, in a good light will be heavily discussed at the Watch. There are a handful a radical haters of that game here, so every article will be debated. It's almost a "signature" of this website to pan Bethesda. It can get to almost Codex levels here when the topic is Oblivion, though that hasn't happened in this thread...yet.

[Sir_Brennus]

[QUOTE=K-Tuck;1061004958]Hey everybody, this is K-Tuck of Spawn Kill. I have also made no claims about AI behavior that are untrue, most of these actions can easily be verified in-game or online through videos or tutorials. Several members here and across other websites seem to have seen very realistic behavior in the game, while others may perhaps be a bit too pessimistic to have paid much attention.[QUOTE]

Hello and welcome K-Tuck. And, yes you have made untrue claims.

If you randomly follow NPCs about in Oblivion you will find out that the most common behaviour is walking aimlessly around, only to pause once in a while to watch paint dry for some hours or make a meaningless conversation with another NPC.
For the record: I don't think that the NPC behaviour is tragic or damages the playing experience, it's just not what was advertised. It's the same with Oblivion's grafics. The hyped the sh*t out of them, but then the dynamic shadows were gone - just gone.
The problem most Codexers/Watchers have with Bethesda are not the games, but the fact that they are hyped for their claims and propaganda, not for their real achievements.

[JDR13]

The behavior of the Radiant AI is certainly inconsistent, but K-Tuck did not make any untrue claims.

[Korplem]

What about the hunting? I only remember seeing that strange hunter around Bruma. I wouldn't call one hunter a large source of food for the empire. And stealing food? Really? I have honestly never seen an NPC steal anything and I've put well over 200 hours into Oblivion.

I just did a quick Google and found this wiki page (http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Crime)… If this is true then I must be pretty f'ing oblivious to Oblivion.

[GhanBuriGhan]

What about the hunting? I only remember seeing that strange hunter around Bruma. I wouldn't call one hunter a large source of food for the empire. And stealing food? Really? I have honestly never seen an NPC steal anything and I've put well over 200 hours into Oblivion.

I just did a quick Google and found this wiki page (http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Crime)… If this is true then I must be pretty f'ing oblivious to Oblivion.

I have seen stealing (well pickpocketing) - rather hilarious, with a guy very obviously sneaking in front of guards in broad daylight, and the episode ending with bloodshed and a dead thief - It was rather funny, but not exactly very convincing - rather akward, in fact. I have seen hunters maybe 2-3 times, I think.
I too liked MW >> Oblivion, but RAI was one of the least of my concerns, despite the occasional hilarity or stupidity of it.

[Korplem]

I have seen stealing (well pickpocketing) - rather hilarious, with a guy very obviously sneaking in front of guards in broad daylight, and the episode ending with bloodshed and a dead thief - It was rather funny, but not exactly very convincing - rather akward, in fact. I have seen hunters maybe 2-3 times, I think.
I too liked MW >> Oblivion, but RAI was one of the least of my concerns, despite the occasional hilarity or stupidity of it.

One of my favorites from RAI was at the beginning of my first character. I was thrown into jail for theft and and broke my lock pick trying to get out. So, I did the logical thing and punched my cellmate. The guard then ran in and beat the crap out of my cellmate, because I punched him, allowing me time to escape.

[Thaurin]

The problem most Codexers/Watchers have with Bethesda are not the games, but the fact that they are hyped for their claims and propaganda, not for their real achievements.

Game development projects are multi-year affairs, during which PR statements may be made that change during the course of it. It's not hype. Hype comes from consumers. If a feature gets canned during development, tough. It happens. Why feel bad?

(I remember how the original Quake by Id Software was... "hyped". Not much of the original description--which was pure awesomeness--remained in the final game. Oh, well.)

[GhanBuriGhan]

Sorry, but RAI was indeed hyped. By the developers. Consistently through development, and up until and after release. "Revolutionary AI" or something to that effect is right on the box, IIRC.

[JemyM]

In retrospective, TES4 was a graphics engine presentation. It was a beautiful game but in every angle a weak rpg. Uninterseting NPC's, none you ever felt for. Few and poorly written quests. Awful dialogue. Broken mechanics. Scaling foes/loot that robbed the point with exploration. Awful storytelling, main plot, quest architecture. Meaningless near nonexistant faction system etc. Etc.

Radiant AI was not a new idea and the TES4 version didn't work as intended. Gothic 1 for example executed the same idea in a better way. It was first in F3 i thought it worked.

[DArtagnan]

There's little doubt that the Radiant AI was less than ideal, but I think it's fair to say it wasn't entirely bad.

Actually, I think it's the right direction to move in - because eventually such an AI WILL be convincing "enough" - or at least I think it very well might be.

Bethesda fail in many areas, in my opinion, but in terms of technology - I think they're pretty strong.

They just need to hire some decent animators already ;)

[DArtagnan]

In retrospective, TES4 was a graphics engine presentation. It was a beautiful game but in every angle a weak rpg. Uninterseting NPC's, none you ever felt for. Few and poorly written quests. Awful dialogue. Broken mechanics. Scaling foes/loot that robbed the point with exploration. Awful storytelling, main plot, quest architecture. Meaningless near nonexistant faction system etc. Etc.

Radiant AI was not a new idea and the TES4 version didn't work as intended. Gothic 1 for example executed the same idea in a better way. It was first in F3 i thought it worked.

Many things were wrong with it, but I think in terms of scale, immersion, and overall freedom - it's pretty strong.

I'm as much a basher of the game as anyone, but I think it's being blown out of proportion. In many ways, it really did something special - but ultimately it failed due to what I consider a total lack of appreciation for what the genre SHOULD contain.

[JemyM]

When a geme gets celebrated as a rpg and downscale every possible component important to that genre, then it's ok to comment on it. In the case of TES4 it really did downscale every possible component except graphics.

[DArtagnan]

When a geme gets celebrated as a rpg and downscale every possible component important to that genre, then it's ok to comment on it. In the case of TES4 it really did downscale every possible component except graphics.

I don't recall saying it wasn't ok to comment on it.

But I don't agree about it downscaling everything except visuals - but I will agree that it downscaled NEARLY everything that I, personally, consider vital to the genre.

[GhanBuriGhan]

Mostly, agree, JemyM, at least within the TES series, although not necessarily within the context of all RPGs. I disagree on quests, somewhat - these were, individually, mostly an improvement over MW - what was lacking was the overall structure, e.g. the absence of multiple exclusive factions, etc and the loss of the grounding in the world lore. That made it feel like picking one ride after another in a theme park, which I began to hate. But seen by themselves the quests were overall more imaginative, longer, and also provided more choices than in MW, I would say.

[DArtagnan]

I think the whole Dark Brotherhood questline was a cut above most quests you find in the typical CRPG.

[JemyM]

Mostly, agree, JemyM, at least within the TES series, although not necessarily within the context of all RPGs. I disagree on quests, somewhat - these were, individually, mostly an improvement over MW - what was lacking was the overall structure, e.g. the absence of multiple exclusive factions, etc and the loss of the grounding in the world lore. That made it feel like picking one ride after another in a theme park, which I began to hate. But seen by themselves the quests were overall more imaginative, longer, and also provided more choices than in MW, I would say.

There were, with the expansion, two quests that gave you a choice in how to finish or solve the quest. One was the whodunnit part of Dark Brotherhood. The other was the main story in the expansion in which you had to pick sides. Beyond that there were no choices in the game, beyond giving up content (the choice to skip a quest). I doubt MW had that uncommonly few choices.

[bemushroomed]

The RAI worked pretty well i think, i mean in comparison to what's out there.. sure, they didn't really take advantage of all its possiblities that it has, but there are mods that do that.. its really nice and immersive to have NPC's that are adventuring just like you, meeting them in dungeons and either killing them or helping them.

Again, i see their games just as a tiny "demo" of what can be done with the engine. The community then creates how it's really "meant" to be played. Bethesda's games are best played 2-3 years after release (or as long as you can possibly hold out! :D) with 100 or so mods.. usually takes me a week or more to set up everything, but totally worth it, nothing comes even remotely close.

It really puts Bioware and just about any RPG developer to shame, their NPC AI is plain stupid + the NPC's stands in 1 place day and night (oops forgot, they dont even have seamless day/night cycles anymore) - how immersive…

[GhanBuriGhan]

There were, with the expansion, two quests that gave you a choice in how to finish or solve the quest. One was the whodunnit part of Dark Brotherhood. The other was the main story in the expansion in which you had to pick sides. Beyond that there were no choices in the game, beyond giving up content (the choice to skip a quest). I doubt MW had that uncommonly few choices.

We don't need to argue about Oblivion as a great example for choice and consequence. It is very clearly not. But to be honest, I don't remember a single quest with choice from MW atm.
These are the few I recall from O that had seemed to offer at least some choice on how to proceed through them or (even rarer) how to complete them:
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Paranoia
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Corruption_and_Conscience
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Whodunit%3F
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:A_Shadow_Over_Hackdirt
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Two_Sides_of_the_Coin
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:May_the_Best_Thief_Win

Paranoia was actually my favorite. Also one of the first quests I did, which raised expectations the rest of the game could not fulfill.

No choices but still cool:
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:A_Brush_with_Death
and everybodys favorite, the dark brotherhood questline

I never got the expansions, so can't comment on them.

[JemyM]

The quest I remember the most is actually part of the fighters guild. I so hated it when I found out the truth.

[crpgnut]

You guys are going to force me to play it again. Oblivion is like crack for me. I love exploration and alchemy and magic and Oblivion has all of these in spades. It's storylines aren't very good, but I just read the 3400 page Codex Alera series so I'm not hurting for good storytelling at the moment. I like the non-main quests of Oblivion well enough that replaying them is always fun. They're not deep, but I don't need deep.

[Sir_Brennus]

You guys are going to force me to play it again. Oblivion is like crack for me. I love exploration and alchemy and magic and Oblivion has all of these in spades. It's storylines aren't very good, but I just read the 3400 page Codex Alera series so I'm not hurting for good storytelling at the moment. I like the non-main quests of Oblivion well enough that replaying them is always fun. They're not deep, but I don't need deep.

Then, I think the debate is over. I respect this, because Civ2 is the same thing for me. But I can't stand any of Bethesda's RPGs (no, not even Daggerfall) for the love of god. The only exception is Fallout 3, which is bearable.

[DArtagnan]

I'm playing it again at the moment ;)

The game is pretty great with the right mods.

I can strongly recommend Deadly Reflex and Oblivion XP - and one of the non-scaling mods, as a basic setup ;)

[JDR13]

I've always been curious as to how exactly the non-scaling mods work for Oblivion. Do the authors of such mods manually place loot in every chest?

[Zaleukos]

We don't need to argue about Oblivion as a great example for choice and consequence. It is very clearly not. But to be honest, I don't remember a single quest with choice from MW atm.

It's not exactly the strength of MW either, but the game has a few with choices. Dealing with mafia boss Orvas Dren (blackmail or murder), the no-good guy who bought clothes and crap on credit, and the murder in Balmora can IIRC be resolved in a few ways.

[crpgnut]

@JDR- The items are still scaled in most cases, but much more stingily. If you're in bandit caves, even at level 15, you're not going to find much more than steel. Oblivion is too easy on normal without any mods, but the devs will freely admit that modding is a huge part of the whole idea. They make a world and modders help flesh it out. I absolutely love them for that, though I understand those that don't.

[Tragos]

I think they are editing

ILevCreaLevelDifferenceMax &
ILevItemLevelDifferenceMax

in CS .

[Maylander]

In Morrowind, you had to choose between guilds and houses though. Such choices had quite an impact. Those choices are gone in Oblivion.