UESP Forums

Who do you stay with?

Does it matter? They are both pretty useless. Greybeards provide word walls which you should have found a few just randomly exploring playing treasure hunter. Blades provide dragon lairs which is your job to kill the things guarding them, so they do not work out either.

For the PC version there is a way to keep both happy. Head over to the Steam Workshop and pick up a mod called The Paarthurnax Dilemma.

Not everyone plays a treasure hunter Dovahkiin.

For me, it's the Greybeards. Because most of my characters, if not all of them are not the type to kill an ally at the request of someone. The blades actually drag us into stuff we want no part of(depending on character). Delphine causes us to become an enemy of the Thalmor because she believes they are behind it and literally gives us no proof to justify why we should help her. We see Alduin and see him bring back a dead dragon. Chances are, if he can do that, he is in charge not the THalmor. But she just ignores him and sends us on an errand. And they are not really that helpful. The Greybeards train the Dovahkiin and guide them. Admitly, the training should have been done a lot better.

Only for a couple of words/shouts. The rest you have to find and learn on your own. That is not training. That is giving you a couple of freebies and letting you do the rest.

The main quest would have been better without either of them.

True but they do tell you the location of every shout untill there are no more left to find. DLC aside due to techincal reasons. I disagree as the Greybeards are a part of TES lore and they have trained Talos himself. Without them, we would not have developed our Thu'um. Yes, the excution is flawed but they did train the Dovahkiin and through them, we discover Parthy. Without them, chances are, we would attack him on sight due to him being another dragon if we decided to go to the throat of the world.

And you can find them on your own or simply pull a non-offensive shout in town. No need to stick with the Greybeards unless you plan to use one or two specific shouts EVERY CHANCE you get.

And they do not help you develop your thu'um, killing dragons and using their souls to unlock shouts does.

Or prehaps i could roleplay that they are helping me.

That is the only it could work in my opinion.

Anyway, the Blades should have been an optional faction and an optional part of the main quest. There is no real reason for the Dovahkiin to help them whereas the Greybeards are the Greybeards.

And you can basically tell the greybeards off, and they will not train you, just point out word walls for you to train on your own.

The LDB does not need either of them. at all.

Actually they do as they need Parthy in order to learn how to defeat Alduin and he is the head of the Greybeards. Without them, they would not have learnt that an elder scroll was required to learn Dragonrend.

Paarthy only mentions the shout, he does not help you do anything to get it. You have to go to a crazy scholar to get the Great Help Paarthy is.

But by mentioning it, he informs the Dovahkiin that there is a shout that can render Alduin mortal. Without it, they would have lost but we're getting off topic now.

It is not off topic. The fact that it was lost in time made the shout useless without the Elder scroll. The Blades can point you in the direction of the scroll as well as the greybeards.

again, both sides are just as useless as the other. They essentially do the same thing (A lot of Dragon lairs are word walls).

Greybeards. I don't agree with the philosophy they have to just "let everything happen" (after all, you are the Dragonborn - there was a reason you were born as such), but otherwise I can admire their dedication to learn The Voice. They also help you, and admire your natural affinity to learn shouts. Plus, Parthy is really cool.

As for the Blades? Screw them. I hate Delphine with a passion. Esbern is alright, but Delphine is stuck-up and bossy, and frankly if given the option I would have loved to soul trap her and send her to the Soul Cairn. >___> Or atleast soul trap her into some useless weapon, like a wooden sword, and name it "Delphine's Woe" LOL.

But as I said, I REALLY hate her. You're the Dragonborn, and the Blades are meant to help YOU. Instead, Delphine becomes the de facto leader and bosses you around. Like, what the hell? Plus, she drags you into the whole Thalmor thing because of her own hatred and paranoia. Honestly, using any kind of logic, how and *why* would the Thalmor be involved with the dragons at all? For a Blade, she seemed to be a pretty crappy one. Not to mention of you do their "request" you're basically kicked out until you fulfill it. I really, REALLY wish Bethesda would have let you make an "official" decision and be able to kill her. :/

Or even better yet, kick her out. I'm all for the whole Dragon slaying thing - within reason.
ex: The Dragons that won't preform and try to become peaceful, but instead go on killing. It would have been cool being an elite warrior band, determined to destroy "bad" dragons, and recovering lost artifacts and knowledge.

That said Blades are basically useless. They're meant to serve the Dragonborn emperors, which are no more, and you're also the last Dragonborn. They were cool in Morrowind and Oblivion, but they're now obsolete v__v If anything, after the Dragonborn is dead and gone, they'd probably be some other kind of mercenary group, and probably end up messing stuff up between the Thalmor even more. As long as people can be trained to take down dragons, since they seem to still be around quite a bit after the main questline, the Blades aren't really even needed.

On the flipside, the Greybeards just sort of do their own thing, and study. -shrugs- People can come to them to try to learn the voice (for example, Ulfric), and they're willing to take them in and teach them a very specialized skill. Granted it would take a long time for a normal person, but in comparison, Blades are just warriors.

Greybeards, hey they have helped more than hindered. So that is why I am going with them. They are not out starting wars, and allowed peace talks at the temple so their minds are in the right place.

You do not even need shouts to be dragonborn. People put too much emphasis on what they do not need, like, at all.

In the 4th Era, the role of Dragonborn reverts back to being the ultimate dragonslayer and needing shouts is main priority. They could be very [&@%!] in combat but the power of the voice would be their most powerful asset. Without the shouts, the Dovahkiin would have fallen to Alduin.

Oh guys, after Imperial vs Stormcloaks, we have to decide Blades or Greybeards?

You do not need to use them, is the point. You can kill dragons without them using either spell or bow. The only shout you "really" need is the dragonrend one, and Esbern and even Arngier point you in the right direction, unlike that layabout Paarthurnax.

Paarthurnaux stays at the top of the throat of the world for his and everyone else's protection. He struggles to defy his nature every day. And most people do use the shouts for dragon battles at some point.

If you would have not met Parthy, how would you have ever known to use an Elder Scroll? Somehow, I doubt the idea to find an Elder Scroll and use it to look back into the past to see Dragonrend shout in action would have ever popped into your mind.

And it is only usuable at the throat of the world. If we did get the idea on our own, we wouldn't have a clue of where to use it.

And it is only useful because the Devs made it so. Paarthurnax, the greybeards, and the blades are all equally useless when it comes to facing dragons, since you only need to shout a rare few times on Alduin, and after that, they cease to be useful.

Dragonborn>all who "help" the Dragonborn.