Oblivion Remastered includes a number of factions and guilds to join. One of the least popular factions, according to Steam’s player achievements, is the Fighters Guild. Oblivion’s Fighters Guild is an easy way to make money in the early stages of the game and is advertised as a generic lawful good-coded guild with a simple plot.
At surface level, the Fighters Guild is the most boring of all the guilds, and comes as it says on the tin. However, Bethesda changed the traditional fighter’s guild by giving it a twist in both Oblivion and Skyrim. While Skyrim’s Companions include a storyline that involves werewolves, which offer a powerful 100% resistance to disease buff and a skill tree, the Fighters Guild in Oblivion builds up to a heartbreaking moment that weaves together The Elder Scrolls’ lore and some of the darkest storytelling in the entire franchise.
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Preconceptions About Oblivion’s Fighters Guild
There are a number of reasons why the Fighters Guild is the least popular guild questline to complete. Rather than getting all quests from a single source, such as in every other questline, the Fighters Guild requires traveling across Cyrodiil and is a constant back and forth, rather than simply returning to a single HQ. Additionally, it can be unclear about where to go or what to do next.
Another possible problem with the Fighters Guild is that its story is more slow burn than the other guilds, making its story unclear in the first half of the campaign. However, those who persist in climbing the ranks of the Fighters Guild are rewarded with a fascinating story, intriguing lore, and one of the most unsettling quests in The Elder Scrolls.
Oblivion Players Discover the Fate of Water’s Edge
During the course of the Fighters Guild narrative, the player completes a quest for Biene Amelion, who resides in the small hamlet of Water’s Edge. During the later Fighters Guild quest Infiltration, while infiltrating the rival Blackwood Company, the player and their new guildmates are tasked with killing goblins that have been threatening Water’s Edge.
The Hero of Kvatch then drinks a potion given to them, and wakes up in Water’s Edge, which is indeed filled with goblins. Upon killing all the goblins, the player passes out again, and wakes up in Modryn Oreyn’s house back in Chorral. Returning to Water’s Edge reveals a horrifying truth: that the potion was made from Hist Sap, and made the player hallucinate the goblins, which were in reality the villagers. The result is the murder of the entire village of Water’s Edge.
Infiltration is one of the darkest quests in Oblivion, and it’s made even more shocking by the fact that it’s completely unexpected in a guild like the Fighters Guild. Where it’s expected that the Fighters Guild would include purely lawful good questlines with clear objectives, that it includes a plot that involves killing innocents against the player’s will is devastating.
Cyrodiil is Home to a Hist Tree
Another interesting aspect of the Fighters Guild is the inclusion of the Hist, which are some of the most fascinating beings in The Elder Scrolls. The Hist are sentient trees that are theorized to be the oldest beings in Nirn, and are venerated by the Argonians. Hist Sap is known to cause hallucinations, and is used by the Argonians in rituals. Unfortunately, not much else is known about the Hist, and they remain one of the most mysterious groups in The Elder Scrolls. The presence of a Hist tree in Blackwood is incredibly unusual, and the Fighters Guild is the only time a Hist tree is encountered in Oblivion.
