Talk:Ebony Blade (Skyrim)

Giving Your Follower The Ebony Blade
I gave this blade to Lydia to use... She's not gonna stab me in the back, right? I mean I'll play through and I'll say something if she goes berserk.

not unless you leave her at the alter... --Gwyllgi (talk) 07:52, November 26, 2011 (UTC)

Possible merge with other entry
This page was nominated for a merger with the older ebony blade entry and that might be reasonable. One issue that has popped up on many pages is conflicting information between games. If a page is cleanly divided between versions then merging the pages seems fine. Too often it seems that is instead leading to conflicting information so having a " (Skyrim)" page comes out the more functional solution. It seems like something the appropriate seniority/authority/community should come to a consensus on. Irrelevant Label (talk) 18:29, November 27, 2011 (UTC)
 * I think this page is rich enough, and the differences between the two versions distinct enough, that it merits its own page. Tyrasis (talk) 10:22, December 5, 2011 (UTC)


 * I thoughly agree with Tyrasis, if you were to merge the two pages, then there would be confusion between which stats should apply to the weapon. Esparc (talk) 07:56, December 8, 2011 (UTC)

"It doesn't work on X"
Not every kill produces a response from Mephala. Do not start listing things like "this character does not work because it didn't work for me" when not only is it possible that it simply wasn't a kill that produced a response but there are other variables present, i.e. your radiant story, that might/can/will be effecting it. Given the set relationshiprank cheat it is very likely a simple matter of that actor value which can vary from player to player for each NPC. Final verdict on mechanics like this will probably have to wait on the creation kit. Irrelevant Label (talk) 21:51, December 5, 2011 (UTC)

Some Digging into the 2h/1h bug
From a modder's point of view, taking a look at the mesh file and WEAP entry for the Ebony Blade within Skyrim reveals that the Ebony Blade is indeed bugged. The WEAP entry for the Ebony Blade appears to have been based on a template for one-handed weapons due to approximately 90% of the file containing the default info (Universal things like sounds, impact data, perks, etc.) for every one-handed sword in the game. However, the mesh file points towards two-handed animation. Because both of these things appear to based around templates, the error could be on either side - it's either a two-handed sword with the wrong WEAP template, or it's a one-handed sword with the wrong mesh animation ID. Regardless of which it turns out to be (Bethesda has yet to comment), I can say with 100% surety it is indeed NOT working as intended and is therefore a bug. It appears to be a simple case of copy/paste gone wrong, in one way or another. 96.28.195.153 05:11, December 8, 2011 (UTC)

As likely as it is to be unintentional that is hardly confirmation unless it would have been impossible for someone to make it that way intentionally...which it isn't. If anything this confirms that it is not glitched; item is doing exactly what it is coded to do and in a way that is constant with similar items, the traits are just mismatched relative to normal. Irrelevant Label (talk) 11:51, December 12, 2011 (UTC)

It's possible that this is the intended behavior for the weapon, as strange as it sounds. As far as I can tell, it is the only two-handed katana-like sword in the game. As it is a daedric artifact, it's not hard to imagine that the developers wanted it to behave in a strange and unique way. Making it require proficiency in both one-handed and two-handed weapons would be a way to do this. Realistically, this is also the best way I can think of to rationalize a weapon like this in Skyrim's setting. It is, of course, just as likely that I'm wrong and that two developers created this artifact but didn't coordinate their efforts and what we're left with is this mess of an item. In fact, that's probably what happened to the UI for the PC. Kastagir (talk) 23:47, December 14, 2011 (UTC)


 * It's look does not dictate its internal coding, though. It is the only 2h "katana-like" weapon in the game, but even other Daedric artifacts that are the only ones of their kind are 90% similar to their non-unique counterparts. The Ebony Blade stands out as one of only two items with this mismatched issue. The Headsman's Axe also has this incorrect data scheme. I could see it potentially being intentional if the Ebony Blade was the only weapon that has these effects, but nothing would account for a second item, especially two items that are far from similar.ZeroTorrent (talk) 03:48, December 21, 2011 (UTC)

Unable to get Ebony Blade if siding with Stormcloaks...
(Minor Spoiler Alert Below)

From what I can tell, if you start the Civil War quests early and side with Ulfric. Then take Whiterun, I don't think it's entirely possible to obtain the Daedric Artifact, considering you'll have to ask Jarl Balgruuf the Greater about his troublesome son in the first place. If it is possible in any way to obtain it, then someone please let me know.

The Jarl is sent to the basement of the Blue Palace, just talk to him there.MatthiasMiles (talk) 06:20, December 18, 2011 (UTC)

Weapon Racks/Plaques
Not sure about other systems, but while placing the Ebony Blade on a weapon rack or plaque doesn't work right, and the Ebony Blade falls as described, the problem does not seem to persist and greatswords placed afterwards work fine. Maybe the weapon rack issue described here was fixed in the patch? (PS3 tested in Whiterun on all three types of weapon racks/plaques.)

I assume the reason the Ebony Blade falls in the first place is that it doesn't have the right attachment points to be mounted, which might indicate that the weapon was created early on and not updated later. (aka a beta version of the weapon) That might explain the perk mismatch, it may have been created and put in-game before the two-handed weapon path was ready and somehow never got updated.

108.88.172.196 10:08, December 15, 2011 (UTC)

Follower turned hostile, any idea why?
When I struck ghorbash iron hands (which I gained as a follower through persuasion) with the ebony blade he turned hostile and a bounty of 40 was added. Killing him did not qu any dialogue by mifala either.. any ideas? And did the kill count towards upgrading the blade?

98.112.82.179I would turn hostile too if you struck me with a sword. The blade works on people who "trusts" you most likely since you accquired this follower through persuasion it doesnt count as a trusted follower.

The Irony of Ebony?
"The Irony of Ebony" keeps getting removed and readded, so I just want to add my two cents as justification for keeping it off the main page.

1. As some editor stated in the history, it is "baseless speculation". It cites the Daedric prince Mephala's personality as the primary reason for the piece of writing, but no precedent, either in or out of game seem to support this theory. The Ebony Blade has been in at least three other Elder Scrolls games (Arena, Daggerfall, and Oblivion; absent in Morrowind, as far as I know), and it was a one-handed sword in all of those with no mismatch of stats, despite the fact that Mephala and his influence were present in all those games as well. For The Irony of Ebony to be true, Bethesda would be nullifying the Ebony Blade's three essentially-uniform appearances in the series and completely reimagining it. While that is a possibility, the flip-side is that from a stat point of view, a weapon using the two-handed perks skill vs the one-handed perks skill is only one variable. A dev entering the wrong value is much more believeable than 15+ years of lore reconstructed.

2. The speculation made is based on the Ebony Blade being unique, when, however, the Headsman's Axe suffers from this same mismatch. All the supposed lore regarding Mephala intentionally bringing about this mismatch then becomes a non-factor, since Mephala didn't create the Headsman's Axe, and it and the Ebony Blade are completely unrelated.

3. The speculation is making lore from the meta-game, not the actual game atmosphere. Stats are meta-game. Game lore dictates what an item's stats should be, not the other way around with stats dictating a backstory.

4. The only justification the author provides for keeping the section on the page is that Bethesda hasn't patched the issue yet. The burden of proof, however, dictates that justification is on the author. Because Bethesda has said nothing on the matter, there is no proof. The fact that Bethesda hasn't said anything AGAINST the premise is not proof.

5. The author himself states that the section is only speculation. Speculation belongs on talk pages, not on the main page. The main page is for info that is proven true. If Bethesda ever releases a document or game change that confirms speculation, then it is a candidate for addition to the page, but not until that time should it be added.

I have opted to remove "The Irony of Ebony" based on the above points. ZeroTorrent (talk) 04:19, December 21, 2011 (UTC)

It is not about speculation on the behavior of the item. It is an accurate and fitting flavor text/lore extrapolation and that it should not be taken as commentary on the "glitch" and is at best a form of speculation about the game mechanics is included as a disclaimer. It should stay on there, or perhaps be some kind of footnote on mephala's page. The bottom line that should count is that it does provide a contribution to lore understanding surrunding the item and it's master.

On an unrelated note, the workings of the perks are well known thanks to reverse engineering from the weapon template codes now yet that section keeps being edited to include new inaccuracies....sigh. Irrelevant Label (talk) 07:57, December 25, 2011 (UTC)


 * I do agree in contributing lore, but my issue was with the fact that the extrapolation given has little basis in the game. The logic behind it seems to be that "Mephala is the prince of deceit" coupled with "this sword doesn't seem to function normally" supposedly equals "Mephala did that on purpose to trick us." The problem here is that the author of that piece does not take into account any of a number of other things, including the weapon's other issues. It is not just a perk and skill mismatch, but includes nearly every value of the weapon. If it was only the perks switched up, then The Irony of Ebony might be an interesting insight into one possible theory, but that is not the case. The fact that other data values are swapped, plus the fact that there is at least one other weapon out there that suffers from the same bug means that it has nothing to do with anything from a lore perspective. Like I said above, The Irony of Ebony is a reverse-engineering of lore from an observed abnormality in the game, rather than something written based on previous lore or anything Bethesda has released. This makes the lore conditional based on its coding, which is never a good thing. It should be the opposite.


 * Also, you're right - I was erroneous in my statement about the perks. I was thinking of the defining SKILL that was only a single variable entry. It was merely a mistype on my part. I changed the word to "skill" to fit what I meant to say. ZeroTorrent (talk) 03:24, December 31, 2011 (UTC)


 * I say we keep it.O_O (talk) 17:43, January 17, 2012 (UTC)


 * It's both speculation and clutter, as well as slightly incoherint. Aside from that, it's far more likely that the wonky stat's were just an oversight on Bethesda's part, same with the Headsman's Axe.  I vote we remove it.24.247.192.59 23:30, January 17, 2012 (UTC)

How does the upgrading work?
So, do you kill one friend, and it's upgraded and that's it, or can you infinitely kill friends to upgrade it every time? Or is it somewhere in the middle that there's a number you need to get to before it's done upgrading?


 * As far as I know, it upgrades to a maximum of 10 times, gaining 2 damage with each kill. After that, it no longer gains in power. ZeroTorrent (talk) 03:26, December 31, 2011 (UTC)


 * It hits a limit at which it is fully upgraded and it's leech is for 30 points. Mephala says something to the effect of such when it happens.  I don't recall exaclty but up to that point her comments will encourage continuing to empower the sword while the final one is more of a 'you've done it, keep up the good work, bye' message. Irrelevant Label (talk) 21:51, January 4, 2012 (UTC)

Katana vs Nodachi
Wouldn't it be more approiate to call it a nodachi, not a katana?

It is my understanding that a katana, generally speaking, was a one handed sword, in size terms, compared to europeon swords, even if the grip was a two handed grip.

A tachi, was usually a little longer than a katana, and had a more pronounced curve. This would be like a hand and a half sword.

A Nodachi, was a two handed sword.

Is the above correct?

If so, then the ebony blade would be a nodachi, or maybe a tachi, but certainly not a katana. Jabberwockxeno (talk) 21:44, January 1, 2012 (UTC)

Rewrote the characteristics section
Due to the nature of the WEAP data for the Ebony Blade, I rewrote the characteristics section for the Ebony Blade. The old section touched on only a small portion of the issue with the Blade's stats, and thus came to an incorrect conclusion that the Ebony Blade was a two-handed sword by all measures except for perks and damage enhancements. The opposite is true, however - the Ebony Blade is a one-handed sword in all regards except for its handedness.

I have rewritten the section to more accurately describe this strange issue. 96.28.195.153 04:37, January 4, 2012 (UTC)

Fixed on 360
I saw a bit on the main page that the Ebony Blade was fixed on 360. Can anyone confirm this? I have the latest update for the PC version thus far, and it's still the same as the past couple patches. Seeing as how consoles supposedly get the updates later compared to PCs due to timely authentication processes with Sony and Microsoft, and the latest PC version still has the errors, this shouldn't be the case. I don't have the 360 version to check, so could someone confirm if this is true or not?

Background quote
I couldn't find the page on how to handle quotes or lore. Before I edited its structure a bit, the background section had the phrase "the legend says", followed by the description of the Blade from Daggerfall. I opted to lead the background section with the description, as it seems to fit better in that position, but it is out of place on the page, due to its straight-from-game writing style. I was hoping someone better knew about handling direct quotes from the game series. If not, I suggest a slight rewrite of that description to better fit on this page. ZeroTorrent (talk) 07:38, January 5, 2012 (UTC)

Training?
So, if I understand correctly, it gleans almost all its data from the 1h template. Does it train 1h or 2h? If its own training does not help its performance, does that make it a purely late-game weapon (at which point much better alternatives are available)? 145.100.125.133 06:37, January 7, 2012 (UTC)


 * It both trains and uses the 2h skill. So, it will get stronger as you use it, since it will raise its associated level. But, if you don't also raise 1h, there won't be many perk benefits available to you. So yeah, it's probably best as a late-game weapon, or a hybrid build, at least as the current patch has it. ZeroTorrent (talk) 08:17, January 8, 2012 (UTC)

Ebony Blade characteristics and Stormbringer
I do wonder if the 1-hand/2-hand mix is less a mistake and more a direct a nod towards the 'Black Blade'/Stormbringer wielded by Elric of Melnibone? In the books it was always a 2 handed weapon but the enchantment allowed Elric to wield it one handed as well. The feeding on the souls of freinds is also a very Stormbringer characteristic so the use of friendly NPCs to charge it seems pretty consistent.

So, maybe not bugged, but the only way of mixing the characteristics of what was a very singular weapon?

Elric and the blade

Desktopcarl (talk) 17:39, January 10, 2012 (UTC)

Improvements
Do you get updated about improvements out in the wild or do you have to go back to dragonsreach?

Armor Glitch while holding Ebony Blade
I seem to have uncovered another glitch (sort of) with it on 360. I'm currently standing in the middle of a large melee wearing full Daedric (note: Heavy) armour with the ebony blade drawn. Why am I posting at the same time? Because it's levelling up the Light Armor skill.

Might it be that in addition to levelling the 'wrong' weapon skill, it also levels the 'wrong' armor skill? I don't know how to check code to verify, but if someone that edits this thing is so inclined, try it out for yourself. It seems to work any time the weapon is equipped, whether it's sheathed or not. I don't think I need to describe what a boon this is to heavy/twohand builds once you're around level 55. I will HAPPILY sacrifice weapon efficiency for my near-invincibility leveling an unused skill.

173.230.27.122 11:45, January 16, 2012 (UTC)MattWood