Oblivion's Thieves Guild questline actually has better writing than Dark Brotherhood

[EbonyWarrior]

The Dark Brotherhood stuff in Oblivion gets all the hype but honestly the Thieves Guild questline is way more satisfying. You're actually working toward something concrete - rebuilding the guild from the ground up, dealing with real guild politics, figuring out who's sabotaging you. It feels like you're part of an organization with actual stakes.

Dark Brotherhood in Oblivion is fun don't get me wrong, but it's mostly just contract after contract with some flavor text. Skyrim fixed that with the whole Sanctuary angle and the Listener stuff, but Oblivion's Thieves Guild actually nails what a criminal organization questline should feel like. You have to think about who you're stealing from, there are real consequences, people actually care if you succeed or fail.

Also the final heist mission (or whatever it's called - the big one at the end) is legitimately clever. Way better than just "go here and kill this person" over and over.

 

[ScrollsOfTamriel]

I get what you're saying about the guild politics angle, but I think you're underselling the DB questline a bit. Yeah, it's contract-heavy, but those contracts actually build toward something - you're slowly earning the Black Hand's trust, and then you get the whole Whodunit? situation where you're locked in a house with suspects and have to figure out the actual dynamics. That's genuinely clever writing, way more than "do jobs and rebuild."

The Thieves Guild stuff is solid though, you're right about that. The sabotage angle with the different guild halls and the progression from one city to the next gives it weight. But I'd push back on "real consequences" - most of those quests still boil down to stealing a specific item or doing a heist, and honestly a lot of them feel more repetitive to me than the DB contracts do. At least the DB stuff has weird flavor to it (the Whodunit house, the paranoia quests, the Purification stuff).

That final heist you mentioned - is that the one where you're hitting the Elder Scrolls Archives or something? It's been a minute since I played Oblivion. If so, yeah that's a solid capstone. But I'd argue Skyrim's Thieves Guild actually nails the "rebuild from nothing" thing way better than Oblivion does, even if it's shorter. The Thieves Guild in Oblivion is more about individual jobs than actually feeling like you're restructuring an organization.