The Elder Scrolls Online’s next expansion gives Bretons an overdue close-up

polygon.com:

Bretons, the “Man-Mer” race of The Elder Scrolls lore, have long been a favorite choice among role players looking for a capable magic-user who isn’t an’t elf. But, of the standard races in Bethesda Softworks’ fantasy universe, the Bretons’ homeland of High Rock has been overdue for a closeup. It gets one with The Elder Scrolls Online’s next major expansion, High Isle, launching June 6.

“This is probably the most accessible piece of content that we have added to The Elder Scrolls Online in terms of people that are familiar with the franchise,” said Rich Lambert, the MMO’s creative director for Zenimax Online Studios. “Morrowind [which got a huge expansion in 2017] is very alien and, you know, it has these weird mushrooms, and things like that. When you look at Blackwood [last June’s big expansion] like, this is a big, giant demon that’s coming in, and if you don’t know who Mehrunes Dagon is, you don’t necessarily know or care.

“But with this, this is kind of your traditional medieval fantasy storytelling,” Lambert added. “It’s focused on the noble houses and the politics that intermingle with all of that, and knights. So it’s super accessible and super easy for anybody to get into.”

High Rock (the name of the province; High Isle is a location there) has been a playable space in The Elder Scrolls Online since the MMO debuted in 2014, but it hasn’t been given the full chapter treatment until now. In TESO, the Daggerfall Covenant faction, comprising Orcs, Bretons, and Redguards, controls High Rock, and so missions there advance the lore of that alliance as a whole, rather than the Bretons specifically.

High Isle, Lambert said, pivots on the Three Banners War, which is the factional conflict underpinning TESO; in the