Oblivion talk:Glitches/Archive 2

This is an archive of past Oblivion talk:Glitches discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page, except for maintenance such as updating links.

Complete Rewrite

I propose that we completely rewrite the Oblivion:Glitches page from scratch. This page has gone way out of control, and has turned into a discussion of experiences with RAI stupidities. This page is absolutely useless for readers. Should we decide to rewrite this, we can begin to do so on a subpage. --Aristeo 19:08, 25 July 2006 (EDT)

I think we also need to archive most of this talk page, because it's just as impossible to use.

As for the main glitches page, I think we need to take into account how the page gets used. Given that some contributors seem to be compelled to fill in RAI stupidity stories, I think that may need to be a separate page from the rest of the glitches. The jumping-out-of-cities stories might also benefit from being split off. If there's a way to divert some of the miscellany that accumulates really rapidly, I think the effort to reorganize the page will be worthwhile. Otherwise, it will just deteriorate again right away (unless someone is willing to take on the effort of constantly reorganizing new additions). And the other todo with this page to bring up is: should we also try to merge in the XBox page? Just to make an impossible task even harder! --Nephele 19:22, 25 July 2006 (EDT)

Okay, let's start with the easy one first: Archiving this talk page. How should we archive the talk page? Here are the two most popular ways:

Move to /Archive 1, copy the discussions in progress back over, or
Copy the sections to be archived over to /Archive 1

The difference between the two is the location of the page history. No big deal, since we'll be using the edit summary. My vote goes to prior, as there aren't a tremendous amount of active discussions on the page. --Aristeo 19:51, 25 July 2006 (EDT)

Archived. --Aristeo 21:45, 27 July 2006 (EDT)

I agree. I feel the Glitches page should be confined to bugs, exploits, and problems. AI stupidities and trivia like how to get out of cities could go elsewhere. Quillan^Talk 22:35, 27 July 2006 (EDT)

How about we split the page into two: Oblivion:Bugs and Oblivion:Exploits? The Oblivion:Glitches page can then give a short summary of how glitchy Oblivion is in a NPOV sort of way, and we can redirect them to both the exploits page (profitable glitches) and the bugs page (for non-profitable glitches). --Aristeo 23:54, 27 July 2006 (EDT)

I think we should take off the "Goofs and Stupidities" part, and create a whole new section for that, since they're not really "glitches." There, the RAI stupidities and other goofs can go. As for the jump out of cities part, create a new section for that part (because it is so large) but link it with this page since it is pretty much a glitch. --Sigaven 11:39, 29 July 2006 (EDT)

Definitely needs some work. My opinion is we split the page into the following:

Oblivion:Exploits -- Any bug that can result in a player advantage of some form. Should be merged with Oblivion:Cheats (i.e., keep one or the other).
Oblivion:Bugs -- Significant bugs that can affect game play but not result in a player advantage. There might be some ambiguity whether a particular entry should belong on the Exploits or Bugs page, but for most things it should be obvious.
Oblivion:Glitches -- Minor bugs that do not affect gameplay to a great deal. A player getting stuck in geometry would be a bug, a texture misalignment would be a glitch.
Oblivion:Gripes -- General opinions on the game design.
Quest Specific Bugs -- Bugs or anything related to a specific quest should probably go under in the quest page. A link to the bug information on the quest page can be added (if needed).
Oblivion:Player Stories -- (better name for this page welcome) Holds general stories from players like the current AI Stupidities section. Some of these might be considered Bugs/Glitches but many just seem to be assuming stories.

This should cover most of the content currently on the page and organize it into more manageable sizes. Each page can be further organized into relevant sections. For example, the Exploits page could have sections for Magic, Combat, Alchemy, Misc, etc... -- DaveH 13:46, 1 August 2006 (EDT)

Looks good to me. What steps should we take to divide up the page? --Aristeo 12:14, 8 August 2006 (EDT)

I agree that any quest-specific bugs should be moved to the quest's page (and I listed a bunch of them below in Deleted Sections). Instead of having a link for each on the bugs page, we could set up a bugs category that contains all the pages that describe bugs or serious glitches. That would allow all of the bugs to be documented, but without having to fill half of the bugs page with a long list of links. --Nephele 21:22, 9 August 2006 (EDT)

What I did was I removed the glitches that Nephele told me to remove, then I started sorting the glitches into the three sections that Daveh introduced. I'm not sure if we want to make three separate pages as of yet; we can see how this turns out. --Aristeo 13:27, 12 August 2006 (EDT)

OK, I've done my bit for the night; the first round of sorting is done. I ended up adding a few more sections, because minor glitches was just much too long. I put in brief descriptions of the sections, but they could probably do with some more elaboration. So now there are seven sections (eight if you include other, which I left there to allow new contributions to be stuck there instead of being put into strange places). And now it's much too late for me to think clearly any more, so I'll just leave it at that. --Nephele 03:13, 14 August 2006 (EDT)

"Patched" Template

I was thinking about how to handle the errors that have been corrected by the patch. Deleting them would probally decrease the article size, which might not be a bad idea since this page is the 8th largest article on the site. However, I think we could still use the patched material as historical reference.

For now, I created the Template:Patched template. For every glitch that was fixed with the 1.1.511 patch, place this in below the section's header:

{{patched|[[Oblivion:Patch|Oblivion 1.1.511]]}}

Which will look like this on the page:

Oblivion 1.1.511

Hope this helps, --Aristeo 15:38, 9 June 2006 (EDT)

Only problem, what's the point of making a template that's longer than the text it contains? It would take less time just to type out that note. If you could make it something simple like:

{{patched|1.1.511}}

it would be easier on the editors. (Even the version number may be optional now, but presumably there will be more patches?) --TheRealLurlock 00:05, 28 July 2006 (EDT)

How about a template for each Oblivion patch (not likely to be too many). So it would just be {{patched_1.1.511}}. -- DaveH 13:50, 1 August 2006 (EDT)

Template:Patched_1.1.511 has been created. Now we can either use {{patched|[[Oblivion:Patch|Oblivion 1.1.511]]}} if they want to do something custom, or {{patched_1.1.511}}. --Aristeo 08:31, 5 August 2006 (EDT)

Link removed?

Was the link under Oblivion: Cheats and Secrets supposed to be removed? I see the page has been locked pending the redesign, but the link to the page was removed earlier by someone who added a new link to the Adoring Fan. Quillan^Talk 10:53, 12 August 2006 (EDT)

Fixed. --Nephele 20:37, 12 August 2006 (EDT)

Glitch Clarification

I know the explanation behind two of those that you wanted clarification on.

The first: "Out of Cyrodiil" refers to the fact that if you do any of the "Escape from" tricks in the major cities, the invisible wall that prevents you from leaving Cyrodiil will be gone, so you can cross the line into what would technically be Elsweyr or Hammerfell, etc. It's pretty much useless, as the game thinks you're still in Anvil or whatever city you escaped from, and the only way to get back to where you can play the game is to go back to that city. (So you can't take a shortcut and make a bee-line from Anvil to Leyawiin that way, because the Leyawiin doors will not exist in Anvil-world.) Anyhow, this should probably be moved to the "Accessing Places" section, as it's similar in concept.

The other one is Rope Bridges. Quite simply, if you're on a horse, you can't use some of the bridges, because your head crashes into the top bar of the bridge. You must either go around or push your horse across the bridge, annoying to do when you're being chased. It's less a glitch I think than a simple design flaw, and a matter of lacking the ability to lean low on the horse to duck under the bar. But it's an annoyance, might qualify as a Gripe.

Don't know about the other two, never seen them. I suspect they may be dependant on the user's hardware. Video card incompatibilities or something. If we're going to include things like this, I've got tons of them, but then I'm using Oldblivion just to make it run at all on my dated computer, so I don't know how much is from that and how much is from the actual game, so I've just learned to accept stuff like that for now. --TheRealLurlock 09:21, 14 August 2006 (EDT)

Clavicus Vile crash?

Where is it? I can't find it. Was it deleted? It should be here for players to be warned about. Or was it fixed by the patch?

It was indeed fixed by the 1.1.511 patch. We've been trying to work on reorganizing the Glitches page, and the plan is to move the information on that bug to the Clavicus Vile page, but we hadn't gotten around to doing it yet. But I'll take care of that right now. --Nephele 17:16, 20 August 2006 (EDT)

Wolves can bark

Wolves also bark, which they do when nervous or to warn other wolves of danger. Wolves bark very discreetly, and will not generally bark loudly or repeatedly as dogs do; rather, they use a low-key, breathy "whuf" sound to get attention immediately from other wolves. Wolves will also "bark-howl" by adding a brief howl to the end of a bark. Wolves bark-howl for the same reasons they normally bark. Actually, pups bark and bark-howl much more frequently than adults, using such vocalizations as cries for attention, care, or food.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canis_lupus

As I have only just registered I don't want to alter the article myself, but I could not let this go un noticed as I knew Wolves could bark. GoldenDragoon 20:44, 21 August 2006 (EDT)

Wolves don't usually attack people in real life either. Oblivion's wolves must be crazy :P --Aristeo 18:44, 26 August 2006 (EDT)

I'll attest to that too. A friend of my family has two pet wolves, and they definitely bark. And not just when in danger, they'll bark when they're playing, too. Granted, these are only mostly wolf, and it might be that 1/8th or 1/16th dog in them that's doing the barking, but I don't think there's that much difference in that respect. Very friendly animals, by the way. Nicer than a lot of dogs I've seen, and definitely a lot smarter. --TheRealLurlock 19:26, 26 August 2006 (EDT)

Seems like the consensus is that wolves can actually bark. I have removed the entire section from the page. We might mention that wolves are not known for attacking humans. Of course wild bears aren't insanely agressive like the ones in the game either. We can probably say "it's just a game" and leave the animal behavior at that. SaintD 16:32, 28 August 2006 (EDT)

And most rats aren't bigger than your head, either. And they're also not known for attacking humans. Mudcrabs are a bit big and overly agressive as well. About the only creatures in the game that behave at all like their real-life counterparts are deer and sheep. --TheRealLurlock 17:05, 28 August 2006 (EDT)

Slowmotion

A bug occured while i played the game after 135 hours .My character became to move in slow motion forward but only with his legs. his arms were moving with normal speed.Everything else was also normal.I still have not found permament solution to this problem(i fix it by restarting the game) so if anyone please can give me a tip on how to do it.BTW i still haven't patched the game so can that help? Write on my e-mail goran_klingon@yahoo.com thanks

Do you have a joystick installed? If your joystick moves out of the dead zone just a tiny bit, your charactor will go extremely slow and the only way to fix this is to unplug the joystick and restart the game. --Aristeo 18:40, 26 August 2006 (EDT)

Unpatching?

i have a question, if you un-patch oblivion can you still use the official mods? (i have 360 version-i can only install mods for blockland anyway.) and about the mudcrabs, they were Bigger in morrowind :p

Content criteria

In order to get a handle on this page, Aristeo and I think it could be useful to define some content criteria. So here is an initial proposal for what belongs and what doesn't belong on this page:

Entries must describe a glitch, i.e., some type of game malfunction. Game features, even if obscure or exploitable, do not belong here.
Glitches that are caused by a player cheating, in particular by using console commands, do not qualify. Cheating is not part of normal gameplay; furthermore, there are an infinite number of ways to cause glitches using console commands.
The glitch description must include some description of the conditions which caused the glitch. Just saying, for example, "the game crashed" does not provide useful information. Some attempt must be made to explain how the glitch can be reproduced.
Quest-specific glitches should primarily be described on the appropriate quest page. The entry on the glitches page should only provide a brief description of the problem, and then provide a link to the quest page. All details on how to fix the glitch belong on the quest page.
Both XBox and PC glitches belong on this page. There is no need to document the platform on which the glitch occurred, unless there is evidence that the glitch is platform-specific. On the other hand, possible remedies may need to be separated into XBox and PC sections.
For glitches that have been fixed by the patch, only major glitches (i.e., exploitable or problematic ones) belong on the page. The glitch needs to clearly identify that it has been fixed in the patch, preferably by implementing a template as discussed elsewhere on this talk page.
Titles of sections should be concise yet clearly identify the topic of the glitch; the topic of a section needs to be obvious when scanning through the table of contents. "Goof or a sign?" or "Raindrops keep falling on my head" are examples of poor titles.
(Possibly controversial criterion) Entries should be at most three paragraphs in length. The small number of glitches that need a longer explanation should be given their own page. The glitches page should include only a brief description and a link (as for quest-specific glitches).

My thinking on this one is that scanning through long entries, and identifying where entries start and end, is very difficult on a page of this size. A quick look says that there are probably just two longer entries that would be given their own page: "Duplicate Items using Arrows" and "Permanently raising attributes, skills, and resists" Possibly "Permanent Effects from Quest Items" could also use its own page. In all other cases the material is either quest-specific (i.e., should be mostly moved elsewhere), or is currently bloated and in need of some good editing.

Does anyone have any additional criteria, or are there suggestions for modifications? If we can reach a consensus on these criteria, they could be posted in some obvious places (for example, as a permanent entry at the top of this talk page, with a link in the main page's introduction). Of course, there's no way to force all editors to read them before posting, but having them available would make it much easier to justify why various entries need to be deleted. --Nephele 03:47, 20 October 2006 (EDT)

I think they're great! This should allow editors such as myself to go through the glitches page, delete something, and justify it by reciting the proper criterion. --Aristeo 13:22, 20 October 2006 (EDT)

Some more:

Entries should NOT be anecdotal. If it's a freak accident that you couldn't reproduce if you tried 100 times, it doesn't qualify.
Do not use first person. While this is of course a site-wide policy, it bears repeating here, as the majority of such offenses occur on this page. If you can't find a way to say something without using the word "I", it's probably just another anecdotal fluke. See above.
Search the page and make sure your glitch has not already been discussed. I swear if I see another post about guards fighting eachother, I'll just go berserk...
If your entry is removed for failing to meet any of the above criteria, do NOT put it back up. If you feel the removal was unjustified, defend it here on the Talk page. Repeatedly reposting the same thing even after it's been removed once or twice is just not cool.

--TheRealLurlock 14:51, 20 October 2006 (EDT)

On Wikipedia, they have a rule called the "3RR (Three Revert Rule)". After someone reverts a page more than three times in 24 hours, they get a nice little 24 hour block from editing. That might work fine for them, but experience has shown that things here work somewhat differently. First, Editor A may put something up Editor B does not like. Editor B reverts the edit explaining why on their edit summary. At this point if Editor A wants to place the same content up on the page, Editor A must put a note on the talk page explaining why he feels the content should be included, then he can put it back up. At this point, Editor A and Editor B work together to determine what should be done. An Editor C might be called in if necessary.

At this point, both Editor A and Editor B have only one revert a piece. Therefore, there should be no point in reverting an edit more than once unless of course in the case of simple vandalism. If the above procedure or something similar does not occur, and everyone keeps reverting each other, that's called an edit war. --Aristeo 14:48, 3 November 2006 (EST)

Get Inside Cheydinhall Method #2

Can someone else confirm this way to enter Cheydinhal?

Go outside to the north Cheydinhal wall (this is the castle wall--other parts of the wall may also work). Now, note how the wall is composed of straight segments and (circular) towers. Walk into the seam between a tower and a straight segment. If all goes properly, you should be inside Cheydinhal, just as if you had jumped over the wall at its low point. The same method can be used to get out again.

This has been tested on a patched PC version.

-- Keknehv 18:52, 2 November 2006 (EST)

Yep, works on Xbox, too (patched). --Nephele 00:31, 3 November 2006 (EST)

Re-enter the imperial palace

A new twist to the floating paintbrush glitch is that it is possible to return to the imperial battlemages chambres through the shaft you fall down at the end of the big heist. it is very hard though but after an hour of jumping, falling, repositioning brushes and a lot of annoiance you can get back in via a door, a normal looking door. It is difficult because due to the narrowness of the shaft you have to be in the corner and place the next brush in the opposite corner. a very high acrobatics is nessecary to make the high jump to the next brush.— Unsigned comment by 82.173.122.140 (talk)

"Damned" Respawns

I've taken this down, as I have not been able to recreate it. The failure to recreate it may be that the Lighthouse does not spawn guards. But, that raises questions as I only have 4 apples gone, but 6 dead guards that I saw drop dead. --Timmeh 09:29, 12 November 2006 (EST)

Found out what the problem was. You must wait 3 days in a different place (or simply adventure like you are supposed to). --Timmeh 17:47, 12 November 2006 (EST)

Locked-Unlocked Doors

Added comment for current section: The glitch is probably the unlocking and locking of doors compared against the time of day. When fast-traveling and waiting, it can take up to several seconds before the local "locks" run a "time check" for the descriptions of the items. However, when you attempt to access the door, it will use the exact time to determine, if it is locked or not. For some reason, that particular house must be near the end of the list that gets checked because it can take several seconds to catch up. — Unsigned comment by 207.67.99.162 (talk)

Animation Bug

Here's proposed text for the animation bug, to be added to the Graphical/Display Glitches section or the Problematic Glitches section. The page is locked, so I can't edit directly.

Animation Bug

After playing the game for a long time, all kinds of animation (torches, doors, spell animations, corpse mashers, etc) stutter, move very slowly, or not at all. Switching to third person view or moving away from the object usually helps. However, the best solution is to download zBobGuy's Animation Fixer. Each affected save game (ie: any save descended from an affected save) will need to be fixed individually. Make sure you read the instructions! (This information sourced from the Unofficial Oblivion Patch v1.3.0.)

StarliteLemming 01:12, 18 November 2006 (EST)

hey

I have a glitch to add. but i cant edit the page. :( — Unsigned comment by Xcrissxcrossx (talk • contribs)

I protected the page so that newcomers wouldn't be able to flood the page with trash. Allow your count to mature for a few days and read some of the guidelines people have suggested for this page. --Aristeo | Talk 15:31, 19 November 2006 (EST)

"Name Potion" potion

I haven't seen any mention of this odd, semi-expoitable glitch that I sometimes get. Occasionally, when making potions at the master level (one ingrediant per potion), as I quickly click "Create Potion," it will let me click it an extra time after the ingrediant I'm using runs out (Ex.: 3 carrots, but it lets me create a potion 4 times). This creates a potion in my inventory called "Name Potion," that has no listed effects. Of course, it's useless to take, but it can still be sold. I don't know any way to trigger this glitch, but it seems to happen at rare random intervals.

Flying Ulfgar

A recent glitch that should be considered as an addition to the "Inconsistencies" menu of "Glitches" would be Ulfgar's tendency to fly when he falls. Here is sample text:

Flying Ulfgar

To see this glitch, set your difficulty to the easiest level and have acrobatics skill of at least 50. Climb to the top of the anvil lighthouse and save. Then, push Ulfgar Fog-Eye (the lighthouse keeper) all the way against the railing. Try to position him in between two of the railing spikes for better results on the next step, and try to put him against the railing over the entry to the lighthouse basement so the fall isn't as long. If you fire an arrow at him from sneak mode (marksman of 35 or more), there should be enough power for him to be knocked off. If you immediately jump with him (landing on the roof for a larger survival rate) you will drop faster than he can fall (watch him as he falls the whole way down, or you may miss it). The inconsistency is that when he touches the ground, it will end his unconcious state and he will imediately fly back up to where he was standing when you knocked him off at the top of the light house.

He does not normally report any of this as a crime, so most good characters should be able to get away with it. This glitch is more interesting if you have a "detect life" spell or enchantment at nightitme, as you can clearly see the whole event with such a situation.

Prev: Archive 1

Up: Oblivion talk:Glitches

Next: Archive 3

UESPWiki β