Oblivion player breaks the bank to keep paranoid elf alive throughout his murderous rampage: 'I have created Super Saiyan Glarthir'

Oblivion Paranoia quest - Glarthir
(Image credit: Bethesda)

One Oblivion Remastered player has gone to extreme lengths to keep one rather murderous NPC alive: and in the end managed to fix things so not only did Glarthir take care of all his tormentors, but massacred half the town's guards too, and got away with the entire thing.

The NPC in question is a wood elf called Glarthir, who's found in Skingrad and asks the player for some help. Glarthir's questline is called "Paranoia" and revolves around his belief that there's a conspiracy against him: he asks that you help prove his neighbours are wrong 'uns by following three of them around.

"Told Glarthir everyone is spying on him," said Plane-Session. "I even went and bought him a set of full mithril and an elven battleaxe to reverse pickpocket. Turns out I can't reverse pickpocket in Remastered it seems… oh well."

"I have created super saiyan Glarthir," said Plane-Session in an update. "He has mowed down hordes of guards, killed all his enemies… and got away with it all?"

Oblivion Paranoia quest - Glarthir talking

(Image credit: Bethesda)

"Toutius is actually pretty tough, he runs to his bedroom door to leave, but I keep closing it on him," says Plane-Session. "Nowhere to run, Toutius. He helplessly tries over and over to open the door and leave while 100 Blunt Glarthir whacks him with an iron battle axe."

Last target: Davide Surilie. Glarthir makes his way to the house without incident, and another bout of door closing leaves Davide trapped in a room with a murderous wood elf and his buffed gear. Funnily enough this NPC has a brother, Gaston, who hears the commotion of his brother being killed and approaches the pair: "However, he lets us leave without violence and seems more concerned with the trespassing than with his brother's murder."

In a classic Oblivion moment, Glarthir then seems to kind of glitch out. He heads to Skingrad chapel and just hangs out, refusing to talk to Plane-Session. "Really Glarthir? After everything I did for you?"

Plane-Session helps Glarthir kill a couple more rogue guards, then leaves town and waits for four days. On their return, Glarthir is "safe and sound sleeping in his bed. Waiting further, he now doesn't seem to leave his house. So for now it appears he will live."

It's fair to say that this is an outcome Bethesda didn't prepare for: a random NPC should not be able to brute-force their way through several town inhabitants and take out half of the guards. But that's the magic of… well, magic I suppose, as well as one player's slightly odd fascination with helping a half-mad wood elf take out his enemies.

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Rich Stanton
Senior Editor

Rich is a games journalist with 15 years' experience, beginning his career on Edge magazine before working for a wide range of outlets, including Ars Technica, Eurogamer, GamesRadar+, Gamespot, the Guardian, IGN, the New Statesman, Polygon, and Vice. He was the editor of Kotaku UK, the UK arm of Kotaku, for three years before joining PC Gamer. He is the author of a Brief History of Video Games, a full history of the medium, which the Midwest Book Review described as "[a] must-read for serious minded game historians and curious video game connoisseurs alike."

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