Xencthlu's Homes

I roleplay and decorate in the Elder Scrolls Online. I'm a big advocate for traditional builds. You can find me and my builds @xencthlu

[xencthlu]

Welcome to your local Temple of Dibella. One part temple, one part art gallery, one part community art centre, Dibella is as hands-on a goddess as anyone could want. You're going to get your hands dirty.

This is actually an unusual build for me, in that I made it for my specific roleplay character, Sibyl Delphyn Sidile. Most of my public roleplay builds (part of my public roleplay projects!) are generic spaces intended to slot into your roleplay whenever, where ever you need them. This one is a bit more specific.

Pictures again courtesy of the ever-wonderful @princesspurpleblob. We took way more than 30 pictures, so strap in. This is going to be a long one.

I wanted to put a bunch of flowering trees around, but it turns out we only have one of those (the flowering gingko) so I had to settle for just very colourful trees. Gyae said it looks like a Rembrandt. I take that as a win. Be welcome!

This is the temple main hall, for services and sermons and such. I don't do a lot of cobbles, so I was very proud of my altar. Sian suggested going very red for this space, and I was surprised how hard it was to manage that. There's not a lot of red lighting in game?

The back of the room isn't nearly so important, but I didn't want it to be bare, either. I think there's some rich details back here.

Office immediately adjoining the temple, for private meetings and advice. I feel like relationship counseling happens in here.

The smaller of the two clergy bedrooms is attached to the main temple hall. This is for a lesser priest.

Upstairs from the main temple hall is an art gallery. I like to imagine this is filled with the work of people local to the temple, all at varying skill levels, who used the temple's ateliers and donated what they made. I'm most interested in temples as a community institution. We took so many shots in the art gallery, and I just can't include them all if I want to show off every part of the build. I'm already at 19/30 of tumblr's post limit?

Here is the band hall, for the traveling musician, the local flutist, and the hapless beginner. You have a closet on the left there, and then the tailor's workshop in the corner, and the high priestess' bedroom on the right. I like to think local art classes and performances are pinned on that bulletin board.

The arches that are normally where I've put doors are lovely, but I knew I wanted to squeeze as many art ateliers into this build as I could, so I had to hard section off rooms. I'm really proud of how this counter turned out as a workspace.

The High Priestess' bedroom comes with a lovely bay window you can lounge in. I think it was the bay windows that made me need Willowpond in my life, honestly. Those rugs are my favourite in the game.

Did you know writing is an art? So obviously Dibella needs a library.

The study is attached to the hall-library. Princess changed my mind on this room - I thought it was simple, she thought it was elegant. She said it was her favourite room. I've come around to really liking it.

The painter's atelier is, I think, the real star of all the art workshops. I wish I could show all the great shots Princess took in here. This was actually the last part of the build to be finished. I needed furnishings from u46 to polish it off. Look at that muller board in the background! Totally worth it.

On the top floor is the dining hall. There's overhead lights if you need a brighter space to roleplay. They're off by default because Sian thought it looked more romantic this way. You might not be able to tell now, but that corner near the stairs was originally one of my problem spots. I left it empty for the longest time because I wasn't sure what to do with it. It wouldn't be a good space for another seating area. I'm happy with how I fixed it.

Aaaand I hit the post photo limit. I can't show you the kitchen (cooking is ART,) the outdoor seating space with its own altar, the upper floor patio date nook, or the secret ritual room under the waterfall. Damn. I thought I was doing such a good job pacing myself, too. Well, if you're looking for a Dibellan temple to roleplay in, look me up on home tours @xencthlu. If you like what you see, give my build a recommendation so other roleplayers can find it. :) There's even more to see and discover I couldn't show you here.

My only regret is that I don't have the requisite 3 white cats every Temple of Dibella needs. (I'd screenshot my source, but *gestures helplessly at the photo limit.*)

[xencthlu]

Tiny build Friday. Welcome to my healer's workshop in the Sisters of the Sands apartment. This might be my last post on my public roleplay spaces project. I haven't made any more! Next I'll show you my private builds for my personal roleplay characters. You're not invited.

Quick shot of the entrance where you can see this healer is prepared to rescue your unconscious body from the gutter if necessary. But your roleplay characters aren't doing anything so sordid they might end up unconscious in the gutter, are they?

Just around the corner from the front desk is the workspace. Where a healer (perhaps your character!) brews their medicines and potions. Definitely no poisons. Poisons aren't good for your health. I recommend against them. Tiny Bosmer woman Princess for scale. (Another thank you to my dear friend PrincessPurpleBlob for again doing a professional photoshoot of my build. She surprised me with this one, because I figured there wasn't any point in doing a photoshoot of a tiny one room build.)

And behind the privacy curtain is a little patient room, for treating patients or consultations or such. That shitty Leyawiin bed always looked like a place someone sick with dysentery would waste away. I think my mom had a cot like that when she was deployed to the Persian Gulf. Can you believe it costs like 30k gold to craft because it requires an Ivory Brigade Clasp? I would have so much more gold if I didn't decorate.

I picked that painting explicitly because it is very mid. I didn't want a nice painting making the workshop look posher than it is.

I can't tell you how many times my roleplay characters have needed to see a healer for inadvisable life choices. If yours do, too, consider coming to visit. Or perhaps you have a healer who needs a place to work. Either way. You can find this build @xencthlu on home tours. Consider giving it a recommendation.

[xencthlu]

These are smaller builds, so I thought I'd group them together into one post. For your roleplay night on the town, let me welcome you to Coppermarket, Tomes for Cheap, and the Climbing Vines Cafe. Let's visit Coppermarket first. Pictures courtesy of my good friend Princesspurpleblob, featured in that lovely shot of the cafe with her lovely character. These are traditional builds, intended for roleplay characters to inhabit, made to match the style that other Elder Scrolls spaces use.

The Coppermarket is actually one of my oldest builds. I don't build this way anymore! If I were to make a market again, I'd do something totally different. But I think it's worth keeping your old projects around so you can see how far you've come. And people still really seem to like it -- it's my build with the most recommendations on home tours.

Of course, any good market is going to have snacks, drinks, and places to rest your feet in between visiting all the stalls. Every build in this post is part of my public roleplay builds project, so feel free to come in and play as a shopkeep or a shopper as you'd like. You can find my builds @xencthlu in game. Onto Tomes for Cheap!

There's some nicely shaded outdoor reading spaces, for customers who like to enjoy a bit of nature and a cool afternoon with their purchases. Princess was frustrated during this photoshoot because it was raining, and we didn't have weather control when she did it, but I actually think the overcast lighting is pretty.

My good friend Princess is here behind the counter, again demonstrating how comically short Bosmer are. She's like a doll! And what's a bookshop without a book cat? My best friend, Victernus, hates that the silver safebox is a furnishing. He always tries to rob it when he visits.

And just behind the bookshelves, you have a little reading nook next to the fireplace. This was just after I got the Elsweyr chaise lounges. I was very excited to use them here. Have you ever read on a chaise lounge? It's a million times better than reading in bed.

This is also a very old build of mine. I think I made it right after the Coppermarket, when I actually needed a bookstore for a roleplay scene I was doing. I have way more bookshelves now! And eclectic knick-knacks. Anyway, once you finish picking out your books, come read them at the Climbing Vines Cafe!

I didn't have any anniversary cakes when I made this build initially. Not that it stopped me. Can you tell weather control was important for this build? I swear Twin Arches is in a sandstorm 90% of the time without it.

I actually really like the base game High Elf furnishings, and I thought they would go well with the Redguard architecture in Twin Arches. (The High Elf Tea Table is my beloved.) I think I ended up being right! And, bonus, I think they also go well with the Elsweyr tapestries.

I got that Hew's Bane Well for less than the luxury vendor sells them for! I was very lucky. It's a beautiful furnishing, and I haven't been playing long enough to see the Hew's Bane furnishings come by the vendor.

Isn't Princess pretty? And doesn't she take amazing screenshots? Note the cat on the bookshelf. This is a cat cafe. My personal animosity with ESO's housing system, besides the furnishing limit we're all constantly at war with, is a lack of truly comfy sofas and arm chairs. The cushioning on the sofas in game all look stiff and uncomfortable. Which is weird, because the beds generally look fine, even if you need to add some extra pillows to fill them in. I've learned about making cozy couch cobbles from studying Princess' builds.

And here's the kitchen behind the counter. I wanted to put in a rolling pin, but those fuckers are worth half a mill, and the day I spend half a mill on a rolling pin is the day I have 20m in disposable income. If I had a few more slots, I'd put in one of the clockwork city grates for a cooling rack. And some bread cooling on it.

Come! Roleplay! Be a baker or a patron or a server or a huge problem! And if you like my builds, give me a recommend on home tours!

[xencthlu]

Have I mentioned today that Princesspurpleblob is one of the kindest people you can meet in ESO? She went to every one of my builds she could to take screenshots to convince me they can photo well. So here's part two of my roleplay builds showcase. Welcome to Ungracious Drinks, a rustic but clean tavern for when you're in need of a good drink and warm food with friends. All of my home tours homes are designed to slot into your roleplay stories, wherever your characters are, whatever they're doing. I think every roleplayer knows you simply can't have too many bars and taverns to roleplay in. (Once, my roleplay group did a pub crawl across a bunch of different tavern builds. That was a blast.)

Let's give a warm round of applause to Princess on the lute. We have live music every night here. I have a music box on the bandstand because I wanted some nod to music, but I have my permissions set so anyone can turn it off. I think they can get pretty annoying pretty quickly.

One of the things I do in my builds is that I try to design different areas to support roleplay groups of different sizes. You should be able to find an area for the "main party," six or more people, an area for a couple friends, four or so people, and an area for a duo in just about every build I post. How often do your characters need to step away for a private conversation during a big important roleplay? I've had to circulate a lot in a party before. I don't know why we can't sit on bar stools, Zenimax, but all of these bar stools are pulled out so your characters can at least stand in front of them.

My itty bitty Bosmer friend barely peeks out from over the top of the bar. Guess I should put a stool behind there for her to stand on. And probably in the well-stocked pantry, too. I know she can't reach that burlap sack. And, hey, if you want to roleplay the bartender and proprietor here sometimes, go right ahead. I've had fun roleplaying a publican before, too.

I think the tricky thing about roleplay builds for most big time builders is that the build's main purpose is to facilitate roleplay. If you make it too flashy and loud, it actually gets in the way of roleplaying.

You even have your own quarters right above the bar. (Just remember to close up when you're ready to turn in.)

And here's Princess' favourite part: the outdoor dining. When the weather's nice, you can even enjoy your drinks and food under the sun, or in the gentle light of Masser and Secunda. The shed I turned into a pantry is definitely supposed to be some sort of stable, but since there's no gate on the walls of the yard, the only way you could actually put a horse in it would be to lead it through the house's interior. Insane.

Thanks again to my good friend Princess, who's a very snazzy builder herself, and I can't recommend her builds enough. Make sure to go check them out and recommend them, once you're done with mine. >> (And thanks everyone who checked out and upvoted my Golden Stallion Inn! That was very exciting to wake up to.)

[xencthlu]

I was really surprised and honestly delighted to see this post on reddit the other day. When you're in the ESO housing community, it seems like people respond the best to own builds, which is to say, homes players make from the ground up, completely ignoring and hiding the actual housing plot that's there. I wish I had a reddit account to plug my stuff -- What this poster asks for is essentially every one of my projects! My builds on home tours are specifically made for roleplay, for any roleplayer to pop in and use for their scenes whenever they want. You have to build your houses in specific ways to make them good for roleplay. I'll make a full post about the qualities I try to build towards and the things I consider requirements for a good roleplay build later. Firstly, though, you better be able to sit in your chairs. A chair you can't sit in is a space someone can't roleplay in. My good friend Princesspurpleblob went around to some of my builds and took screenshots for me to prove this kind of build can screenshot well, so here's my Golden Stallion Inn for example, built in a Strident Springs.

I used the Alkosh Hourglass to set it to eternal night, because that's when you're going to be looking for an inn to stay the night, right?

It's a small inn, so check in might be overdoing it a little. I actually started with the front desk and fountain and built up from there.

A bar on the first floor for all your barp needs and a cozy lounge upstairs for less alcoholic roleplay. Say hello to Princess' beautiful character here. Fun facts, my good friend Siankan looked at my bar and said "No one roleplays at a bar! You need a space people will actually roleplay." I did laugh at him and explain that about 95% of MMO roleplay happens at bars.

The inn's standard suites. Made for two or so roleplayers at a time to have private scenes, but I'm not going to stop you if you want to throw a massive party. I can't stop you. I'm not your boss, and there's no fire marshal here to enforce the maximum occupancy limit.

And if you want something a little more special, the Golden Stallion has a luxury suite in the tower that overlooks the surrounding countryside. The lights of the nearby town twinkle at night. Where is the Golden Stallion Inn? Wherever you need it to be for your roleplay. Who owns the Golden Stallion Inn? Whoever you want for your roleplay. And, hey, if you think this place is a good backdrop for a story for your characters, be sure to give me a recommend on home tours to improve visibility for more roleplayers.