It's Arngeir less powerful or more skilled?

[yetain]

The other greybeards have voices too powerful for normal mortals to hear but Arngeir is able to speak normally. Is his voice less powerful or is he able to control his power more than the others?
 

[Mazhen]

Arngeir is apparently the strongest, he has a higher mastery of the voice than the others, at least that is what i read..

Edited January 3 by Mazhen

[Mydisplayname132]

Do not know the source, but I thought i heard somewhere he was the eldest and most powerful of the greybeards. So I assume he is either more skilled or trained to be able to speak to others.

[Miauzi]

Vor 2 Stunden schrieb yetain:

Die Stimmen der anderen Graubärte sind für normale Sterbliche zu mächtig, doch Arngeir kann normal sprechen. Ist seine Stimme weniger mächtig oder kann er seine Kraft besser kontrollieren als die anderen?
 

 

Why do the developers of Bugdesta question the "deeper" meaning behind every poorly thought-out design decision?

 

The other Greybeards (apart from their actual "boss") simply weren't given any dialogue... but of course, you can always come up with other explanations in your imagination.

A much more logical approach would be: the Greybeards live in a monastery... ever heard of a "vow of silence"?

(Ultimately, this isn't much more logical either, but it does offer additional dramatic possibilities in a written "fanfiction"!)

[jfraser]

mechanically, Arngeir has the highest level of anyone in the game (150). but the Greybeards can speak normally, they just choose not to.

 

just like the player, as the dragonborn, can speak, so can they. it's not like their voices just become filled with power - shouts only happen when you purposefully speak certain words in the dragon tongue, not when you just speak any old language.

[MadMansGun]

3 hours ago, jfraser said:

the Greybeards can speak normally, they just choose not to.

no, they can't. taking to them causes the mountain to shake and kills most people, the dragonborn's initiation (when they all speak) even proves that point.

6 hours ago, Miauzi said:

ever heard of a "vow of silence"?

not a vow of silence, it's a vow of "we can't talk to outsiders because it will fucking kill them"

Edited January 3 by MadMansGun

[jfraser]

2 minutes ago, MadMansGun said:

no, they can't. taking to them causes the mountain to shake and kills most people, the dragonborn's initiation (when they all speak) even proves that point.

they were purposely speaking words with power in them in the initiation. they don't have to do that every time.

[Miauzi]

Vor 5 Minuten sagte jfraser:

Sie sprachen bei der Einweihung bewusst Worte mit großer Bedeutung. Das müssen sie nicht jedes Mal tun.

 

Thanks!

 

What was the name of that language in which these words of power are spoken... something with "Dragon" or something?

 

Are the Greybeards dragons? - No - except for that "scaly" guy up on the mountaintop, they're all Nords! And they were born as such and, of course, learned their own "MOTHER" language as children... long before they came to the monastery to follow the path of "Jürgen Wind-whatever."

 

Even Ulfric "Storm-Ass" can speak the Nord language perfectly well (it's his MOTHER TONGUE)... and before it's forgotten - he lived with the Greybeards in the monastery for years and was supposed to become one of them. The Empire's war against the Thalmor changed all that.

 

But even this little bit of lore from the vanilla game is completely ignored by some people in this thread.

[Count Chocula]

On 1/3/2026 at 10:57 AM, MadMansGun said:

no, they can't. taking to them causes the mountain to shake and kills most people

Apparently Lydia, Jenassa, Uthgerd, etc., are not part of "most people." Is that a hidden criterion to be the Dragonborn's companion: resistant to the unbridled power of the Greybeards' voices? Or is it perhaps because none of the Greybeards talk to a companion? Their voices are so uncontrollably powerful that they make mountains shake but not so uncontrollably powerful that they'll hurt a normal person standing mere feet away unless the Greybeard speaks directly to that person? And even if that speech is made up of Shouts? Is that the implication?

[MadMansGun]

2 hours ago, Count Chocula said:

Apparently Lydia, Jenassa, Uthgerd, etc., are not part of "most people." Is that a hidden criterion to be the Dragonborn's companion: resistant to the unbridled power of the Greybeards' voices? Or is it perhaps because none of the Greybeards talk to a companion? Their voices are so uncontrollably powerful that they make mountains shake but not so uncontrollably powerful that they'll hurt a normal person standing mere feet away unless the Greybeard speaks directly to that person? And even if that speech is made up of Shouts? Is that the implication?

likely a scripting oversight/forgot that the player may have a follower when visiting the graybeards.

one of the in game books also mentions one of Ysmir Wulfharth's deaths was caused by a failed initiation.

[Count Chocula]

1 hour ago, MadMansGun said:

likely a scripting oversight/forgot that the player may have a follower when visiting the graybeards.

one of the in game books also mentions one of Ysmir Wulfharth's deaths was caused by a failed initiation.

The first post of yours I quoted seems to provide an in-universe explanation. This one provides a meta-game explanation (overlooked scripting). Albeit the two explanations do not attempt to explain the exact same thing.

 

A failed acolyte (or whatever word we want to use) dying during initiation does not mean they died from exposure to the unfiltered power of the Greybeards' voices. If we want to go off on that tangent, my conjecture (without knowing anything more about it than what you wrote) would be that such a person died from their poor ability to control the power of their own voice.