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Discussion: Soul Trap and Enchanting

Tags: #Enchanting  #RP:Discussion  #Soul Trap  #Soul Cairn  #Ideal Masters 
  • Member
    April 6, 2018

    So, Enchanting.  Arguably the most useful skill, yet one I find rather difficult.  From a roleplaying perspective.

    Ever since Dawnguard and the reveal of the Soul Cairn and the Ideal Masters, I can't quite forget that trapping someone's soul is sending them to an unspeakable hell of paranoia and fear.  Sure, my character doesn't know, but that raises a question.

    As a 'good' person, after discovering the Soul Cairn, would I just shrug and carry on, despite seeing the results of what happens to those you soul trap?  Or would you limit yourself to only animals?  Even then, we know that those also go the the Soul Cairn (through Arvak and a trader's cow) but all animals and creatures that have been soul trapped would end up in the Soul Cairn as well, forced into the hell you put them through.

    So do you just stop enchanting all together with the realisation of what you have done?  Like I said, you're the 'good' guy, and you've been ignorantly sending creatures (maybe some people, as well) to this hell unknowingly.  Stop trapping souls, stop buying filled ones, (knowing what happened for them to get filled), maybe even refuse to use enchanted gear at all, unless you can be absolutely certain that the soul trapped was 'worthy' of trapping?

    So, like I said, I find this one difficult as a roleplayer.  What do you guys think?

  • April 7, 2018
    I’ve also had this problem. It’s hard to come to terms with the Soul Cairn. For my good character simply stopped using humans as energy for my soul gems. I used animals instead. Sure it’s not the nicest thing to do for an animal but they’re not sentient beings so for me it doesn’t really qualify as an act of evil, whereas trapping a human would be. I wouldn’t want even my worst enemy to be stuck in the Soul Cairn.
  • Member
    April 7, 2018

    Interesting question, and it's something I struggle with often.

    As far as the animal front is concerned, do we actually know how animals experience the Soul Cairn? Maybe it's just because it's an easy excuse, but if animals can't understand where they are, does it really negatively effect them? I mean as far as a cows concerned they're now just chilling in some place a bit more purple than normal.

    Or, and this could stretch the definition of 'good', are animals 'worth' saving from a fate such as that? Think of a Paladin, saves the world, completely selfless type geezer. He values people. Can animals even go to one of the various afterlifes? Is it worth damning an animal's soul for the potential to use said soul to save countless people? Up to you to decide.

    I think Chaotic Good would generally be alright with it in moderation - they're the epitome of 'necesarry evil' after all.

  • April 7, 2018

    How are you managing to roleplay a "Good" character that Soul traps humans in the first place? The games have always been pretty explicit about the evilness of using Black Soul Gems. Ever since Oblivion (let alone the Skyrim DLC) Black Soul Gems have been presented as culturally taboo, so any character growing up in Tamriel that considers themselves "good" would be unlikely to use human souls without ever having to visit the Soul Carin...

    Of coarse everyone THINKS they're the good guy, so with a bit of mental gymnastics, it's possible to make such a character. Like maybe a "Smiter" RP of a judgemental religious character who thinks they are saving sinners from the anguish of a torturous afterlife. Though a character with the kind of beliefs that would justify human soul trapping in the first place would just extend that narrative to the Soul Carin. For instance, my "Smiter" would probably just see the Soul Carin as a sort of limbo where their victims are given another chance to repent...so I doubt they'd change their ways after visiting the Soul Carin.

    I do think it's an interesting question about the nature of Soul Trapping though, and it would be an interesting thing to face even if you just use regular Soul Gems. It's a pretty terrible thing to do to an animal...if you believe they're capable of understanding their predicament. One could (and many would) argue that Arvak traverses the Soul Carin much in the same way it used to gallop across Tamriel as a wild horse. Does it even know the difference?

    A lot of my good characters would argue "yes" or at least not think it's worth the risk of being the one who subjects animals to such a fate, on the off chance it is in fact torture to them, but definitely not all of them. Just like you can be a good person in real life and not eat vegetarian, I don't think the decision has to define the character. You can have a good character who doesn't believe the Soul Carin is torturous to creatures since they must likely wouldn't know the difference.

    I will say this though, as one of the most potentially overpowered skills, rejecting Exchanging all together after witnessing the implications of doing so would be an interesting way of capping the skill. Not to mention the fact that you'd be doing it through what I think is a really interesting roleplay mechanic.

  • Member
    April 7, 2018

    Tysoyaha said:

    How are you managing to roleplay a "Good" character that Soul traps humans in the first place? The games have always been pretty explicit about the evilness of using Black Soul Gems.

    Of coarse everyone THINKS they're the good guy, so with a bit of mental gymnastics, it's possible to make such a character. 

    Well, this is the key part, isn't it?  Only the most unrepentant would not think that they are the good guy.  There was a very good reason I use the word 'good' in inverted commas.  It's not an objective thing, goodness, and each different character would view the concept in varying ways.  One of my characters (After I had previously visited the Soul Cairn on a different character), was justifying the use of Black Soul Gems by telling himself that a 'soul' was just a magical construct that followed a set ofprogramming and didn't have any more purpose than that.  Another was a git who just didn't care for mortal life in the first place.  But like you said, mental gymnastics.

    Tysoyaha said:

    One could (and many would) argue that Arvak traverses the Soul Carin much in the same way it used to gallop across Tamriel as a wild horse. Does it even know the difference?

    I guess that this is the point at which the discussion changes to "Does having a soul mean having sapience?".  I mean, we are shown objectively in TES that the existence of the soul is a very real thing, and that every living thing has them, not just humans.  It's more than a question of role- and game-play, it's a matter of philosophy.  It's part of why I wanted this discussion.

    Not that I'm asking if anybody here believes in the existence of the soul - that's a very personal question and I don't want to pry.  But for the characters we create, and the stories that we tell through them, they will most likely have a very different outlook from us, the players.  in TES, souls exist, and the concept is integral to the game of Skyrim as a whole, considering that as the Dragonborn we absorb the soul of each dragon we kill, use it to empower ourselves, and meet the World-Eater in Sovngarde, the Land of the Dead, where the souls of heroes past lay to rest.

    So, to recap souls are real, we use them to power our arms, our armour and our Voice, and maybe we don't even consider the fact that we are horrible people robbing other living beings the right of an honourable or peaceful death, just because we want to grind up a skill.  At what point do we stop roleplaying for the sake of gameplay?

     

    As a side note, it would be a really interesting gameplay mechanic if everything that you've soul-trapped could be found in the Soul Cairn, so that for some it was much more populated than others, and mammoths, giants and the like could be found roaming the fields.

  • Member
    April 9, 2018

    Joshua Primrose said:

    As a side note, it would be a really interesting gameplay mechanic if everything that you've soul-trapped could be found in the Soul Cairn, so that for some it was much more populated than others, and mammoths, giants and the like could be found roaming the fields.

    I'm kinda disappointed they didin't do something like this, given that Sovngarde included notable people you've killed.

    And as a slightly less serious option, maybe an 'Idiot Savant' character could be excused to allow soul gems. I mean if they don't know they're using souls instead of just plain magic they won't think they're doing anything wrong. Is it excusable to do a 'bad' (assuming it is bad) thing if they don't know they're doing it?

  • Member
    April 10, 2018

    I think there's a lot of room for interpretation when it comes to Enchanting, and that even the sources to which one could turn for answers offer a bit of ambiguity. On one hand we have dialogue from Serana saying all souls trapped in a black soul gem end up in the Cairn, while the same questline also contains the hint that only those souls offered up to the Ideal Masters in exchange for power go there. 

    “When something is trapped in a soul gem, and then the energy is used for powering an enchantment, the remnants are sent here. Well, I think it's specifically the black ones. I don't know if the Soul Cairn takes just any leftovers.”

    But then...

    “You give the Ideal Masters souls, they give you powers to summon the undead. It's all very business-like.”

    Mannimarco makes it more complicated with his theory, although it could be that he overlooks the point about souls being offered up due to not considering why someone wouldn't, if you get me.

    I pored over the scriptures given unto me by the Master to determine the nature of the Soul Shriven, for their very existence seemed in defiance of the accepted theory that all stolen souls travel not to coldharbour, but to Soul Cairn. Nevertheless, in the confluence of events that followed foolish Varen's bid for Divine investiture, it seemed that all souls taken from that moment forward went not to Soul Cairn, but to Molag Bal's own clutches. On Soul Shriven

    That is to say, to him the idea of not entering into that contract with the Masters is something which maybe doesn't occur to him. In any case, stating outright that "all souls captured in a black soul gem go to the Soul Cairn" could well be incorrect.

    So that sort of leaves us with a bit of a question as to what happens to a soul bound to a gem which isn't offered up to the Ideal Masters. As seen in Azura's Star, the soul resides inside that crystal. Once bound to an item, said soul may or may not go mad, according to Ancestors of the Dunmer:

    Some spirits are captured and bound to enchanted items by wizards. If the binding is involuntary, the spirit usually goes mad. A willing spirit may or may not retain its sanity, depending on the strength of the spirit and the wisdom of the enchanter.

    However, the basic Enchanter's Primer argues that the reason a weapon's enchantment depletes is because the soul leaks out:

    One intriguing theory is that the soul leaks out a little at a time into the victims that the weapon harms. As a novice enchanter, the reason is immaterial.

    I guess, in terms of lore, that knowing presicely what happens to a "black soul" after being used for Enchanting is a really shady area.

    The nature of the soul is not knowable. Every wizard that has attempted it vanishes without a trace. What can be known is that souls are a source of mystic energy that can be harvested. Souls, Black and White

    For me, the whole ethical question revolves around intent. Soul Trapping a sentient creature removes free will, and is therefore bad. But if that person wasn't very nice - let's say a necromancer or bandit chief - then my character's intent is what determines the morality of the action. If I enter nto a pact with the Masters and send that soul to the Cairn, then I'm condemming that soul to an eternal damnation in exchange for my own power.

    However, if I trap that soul with care and respect, I could preserve the sanity of the captured one's identity. As soon as possible, I'd use that gem to enchant an item so as to avoid keeping that being's soul rattling around in the gem. That's more morally sound.

    So what happens to that soul once used for enchanting? I'd like to think that all I need is the animus, or power, of that soul. What use is the identity for me if I'm not trying to create an artifact with its own sentience (which would likely involve needing a daedric soul)? I'd like to think that when enchanting that I can release the soul's ID to whatever afterlife it has chosen for itself through deeds and actions in life.

    In summary, roleplaying Enchanting and Soul Trapping for me is based upon my intent. I can be more evil than evil or use it as a way of bringing the justice of imprisonment before freedom to wrong-doers.

  • April 15, 2018

    Somewhere on this site, either on a forum or in a story, or maybe not,  I read a work-around, or some mental gymnastics that proposed that the "soul" of the soul gem was a reflection, an imprint or a dream, or simply the energy component of the "real" soul. Or maybe my brain just gathered up a few words from the page to make my own picture.

    Only my bad guys use soul gems, but all except one of my good guys wear enchanted armour/clothes. Even my exceptionally non-deadric character will give enchanted things to her follower. 

    ES right and wrong isn't easy.