After hearing the king of funny Elder Scrolls clips explain how Oblivion NPCs work, I have a newfound respect for elves who steal food when they’re hungry and husbands who fight their wives’ dogs
If you’ve seen a funny Elder Scrolls clip on YouTube or elsewhere on the internet in the past few years, it was probably from Bacon_, whose wry editing and lack of commentary allow his videos of the notoriously janky games to just speak for themselves. His own favorite video in his catalogue, the eight-second “I love dogs,” could literally only happen in the Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion.
“I’m Rena Bruiant,” declares the Chorrol resident and central casting Oblivion potato NPC. “Doesn’t everyone?” Bacon_ then pans the camera to Bruiant’s husband, Rimalus, as he brings a double overhand hammer strike down on poor Bailey the dog, the video cutting to black after voice actor Wes Johnson’s triumphant “yah hah!”
But why doesn’t Rimalus Bruiant love dogs, and why does stuff like this only seem to happen in Oblivion, and not Skyrim or Fallout 4? The answer, as Bacon_ explained to me over email, is an intricate system of NPC goals and modifiers, one that was significantly simplified in later Bethesda games.
By the Nine
“The Oblivion Radiant AI actually has a lot of layers, systems and different stats that affect what NPCs will do and how they react to things,” said Bacon_. “You have stats like Aggression, Disposition, Responsibility, Confidence, Fame, Infamy and I think a few more.”
It turns out that our anti-canine friend Rimalus actually has a “send this man to therapy” aggression score of 50—that’s compared to his wife’s aggression of five. To top it off, someone forgot to tag him as a member of the “Bruiant Family” NPC faction, leading to his violent outbursts.
Watch On
I asked Bacon_ about another viral video of his, “These fines are ridiculous!” and got a bit of a crash course in how Radiant AI can go off the rails. In the video, low-ranking Fighters Guild schmuck Ohtimbar grouses to an inkeep about the state of harsh, law-and-order policing in Cheydinhal. He then proceeds to crouch walk to a nearby table, steal some food to the loud protests of the owner, and calmly eat it while continuing the conversation. Ohtimbar then steals even more food before sneaking off on his merry way.
“Ohtimbar’s responsibility is set to 0 (probably by accident) and anyone with a responsibility of 30 or less will steal items to complete their actions, so if they need to eat but don’t have any food, they’ll steal it if they have to,” said Bacon_. “Since they steal, they can get a bounty, and since they can’t go to jail, they either have to pay gold or resist arrest, which can lead to the guards killing them if they don’t have enough gold.”
I finally witnessed this in one of my own playthroughs for the very first time in Oblivion Remastered. Skingrad NPC Shameer is right on that 30 responsibility threshold. Sure enough, I witnessed him steal fellow vineyard worker Bernadette Peneles’ lunch during the quest Paranoia.
You’ll see strange, unintended interactions like this all throughout Oblivion.
“There guy called Ontus Vanin who has slightly higher Aggression than most, and also gets a negative Disposition modifier towards Mages Guild members,” Bacon_ explained, “which increases more the higher rank you are, to the point that if you reach arch mage, he’ll probably attack you in the streets, unless you have gone out of your way to increase your disposition with him early on.
“Sometimes you’ll have such a high Fame that your disposition will cause NPCs that are supposed to be hostile towards you to not attack and just talk to you like a friend.”
Positively Radiant
I’ve always thought Oblivion never got its flowers for how good its guild and side quests are, particularly compared to the fetch quests and straight-up dungeon delves of Morrowind—Dark Brotherhood murder mystery Whodunit is a prime example of that. Now Bacon_ has me convinced that Oblivion’s AI deserves a similar reappraisal.
“When you take a step back and look at it technically, all the weird NPC behavior actually makes perfect sense,” Bacon_ said. “It’s one system reacting to another, then another, until the situation resolves and the NPCs move on to whatever’s next. In most videos you can usually pinpoint exactly what is going on and why they are doing it.”
“It just works,” he quipped, referencing Todd Howard’s infamous quote about Fallout 4’s settlement building system.
Oblivion’s Radiant AI may have been a bit rickety, but when it went haywire, it was surprising and even charming. I would never remember replacement-level nobody, Shameer, if he wasn’t such a prolific lunch thief. Now he’ll always stick in my mind as an emergent slapstick hero, weirdly relatable like the “Gimme that!” guy from the I Think You Should Leave sketch.
“I am a big fan of the Radiant AI system and honestly a bit sad to see how much it was toned down in the later games,” Bacon_ said, citing Kingdom Come: Deliverance as a recent RPG he thinks captured more of this systemic magic.
In Skyrim, Aggression and Responsibility (renamed “Morality”) were chopped down to scales of 0-3, and Disposition -4 to 4, instead of Oblivion’s 0-100, and NPCs seem to be incapable of committing emergent crimes.
“Despite Oblivion only having small towns with like, 15 people living there, those people have their own homes, jobs, unique schedules, they react to your actions and the actions of the other NPCs differently depending on their stats,” said Bacon_. “There are so many ways you can affect all of it that really makes it feel so alive.
“I feel like Oblivion has always been treated as this awkward middle child when it comes to the modern Elder Scrolls games. Morrowind fans find it too dumbed down and Skyrim fans find it to be too dated. It wasn’t talked about that much.
“It had a much smaller and quieter community, but those who liked it, loved it, all the good and bad that comes with the game.”
