Does Tamriel Rebuilt edit vanilla Morrowind?

Tamriel Rebuilt’s goal is to create the remainder of the Morrowind province in a seamless fashion. That means that we need to edit Vvardenfell and Firemoth, and will sometime down the line also edit Tribunal and Bloodmoon expansion content.

Does TR edit vanilla content right now?
Meaning: Vvardenfell, Solstheim, Mournhold, or the official plugins

Yes, we have a few small edits in place. First, we have for decades now edited a few ocean cells that are technically shared by Vvardenfell. As of version 22.11, we also add new NPCs in several settlements on Vvardenfell that allow players to fast travel to the completed portion of the mainland via Guild Guide and boat. We only add NPCs and do not edit the cells they are in (except for a slight change in Seyda Neen). An optional addon esp, TR_Factions.esp, handles the edits to the original faction properties and dialogue required to better integrate their mainland content: as of 2025, this addon mainly slows down advancement in accordance with the increased amounts of quests, adds mainland Telvanni councilors to the corresponding Hortator quest, and allows you to optionally complete the Nerevarine quest also with mainland Ashlander tribes. Beginning in version 23.10 and continuing since, we have been adding small insertions of dialogue to some vanilla characters in TR_Mainland.esm, to more organically direct you to the Morrowind mainland. Lastly, In version 24.12, we completely overhauled the official plugin Siege at Firemoth and added it by default into TR_Mainland.esm (the latter can optionally be removed by an included patch).
 

Why does TR have to edit vanilla content? Why can’t you leave it alone?

The main trouble TR runs into is that Bethesda intended to make the entire province, but ended up shrinking it onto Vvardenfell. This affects mainly the great houses and the main quest. For instance, the Hortator portion of the quest does not include House Dres or House Indoril, even though they are politically important. Also, the houses that do have a presence on Vvardenfell (Hlaalu, Telvanni, Redoran) would then be oddly divided between Vvardenfell and the mainland. We hope to at some point in the future write out a unified quest line for the three great houses on Vvardenfell, and fix the Hortator problem.

As we are not at the stage of planning the unified questlines, now is the time to jump in and tell us your suggestions and feedback for what should or should not be edited.

What exactly is TR going to do? Are you going to break all my mods?

TR intends to change only three things about vanilla content on Vvardenfell: 1) the travel network, only as related to the mainland (see above) 2) scattered dialogue and quest hooks that reference the mainland (added in the most minimalistic, compatibility friendly way possible), and 3) the great house questlines and main quest (with minimal changes to the endgame content to reference the mainland).

We do not intend at this time to change any interiors or exteriors, move or change any NPCs besides their dialogue, change the landmass/heightmap, etc. We are not trying to give Vvardenfell a makeover, just smooth over the rough transition from Vvardenfell to the mainland.

Again, and we cannot emphasize this enough: the exact changes to the questlines are not set in stone yet. If you are concerned, we would like to hear your input on our Discord server.

 

What about Mournhold/Tribunal?

Tribunal created an oddly proportioned and cut-off city. Our solution for this is to recreate the city of Almalexia entirely. We will not be editing Tribunal content; instead, we will cut off access to it and build an entirely new and improved version of it. We will be copying over the NPCs and quests from Tribunal into TR. See more information »here«.

Like with the faction quests and hortator problem, we are still working out how this will be implemented. Now is the time to give your feedback and ideas.
 

What about Solstheim/Bloodmoon?

The shape of the northwestern spur of Morrowind's mainland has remained more or less consistent on all maps throughout the TES series – all the way from TES I: Arena, through those present in TES III books, and up to TES IV and later (Imperial Library link). In all cases, Morrowind's northwestern spur includes a bulge in the location of the city of Blacklight, reaching towards the northwestern corner of Vvardenfell near Gnisis.

However, likely due to technical limitations with Bethesda's implementation of the TES III in-game map, the makers of Bloodmoon chose to ignore this consistent depiction and place the newly invented island of Solstheim right where the aforementioned bulge would be located. This issue was noticed and corrected soon after by Bethesda themselves, once they had to draw a new Tamriel map [Imperial Library] for TES IV. Their solution was to move the island substantially northeast in order to accommodate the mainland.

Solstheim's problematic location, however, persists in TES III, being an issue for a project that aims to recreate the Morrowind mainland. (In fact, our earliest 2002 depiction of Blacklight was built right where Solstheim was placed, requiring the original modders to move the city several exterior cells south after the expansion was released!) For many years, we sought to lampshade the issue with a rather unsightly bite taken out of northwestern Morrowind, just barely accomodating the island, leaving a narrow strait between it and the metropolis of Blacklight. This always had the issue that Solstheim, the supposedly frigid and isolated backwater island far in the Sea of Ghosts, was merely a stones throw away from one of Morrowind's major trade centers, directly visible to anyone using even the barest amount of distant land.

More elegant solutions have lately been provided by the mods Anothology Solstheim [Nexus] or Solstheim – Tomb of the Snow Prince [Nexus], both of which move the island to the position Bethesda decided upon during the TES IV era. With a revamp in Redoran planning starting in 2023, we decided it would be best to rip the bandaid clean off, remaking the mainland into the shape depicted in most lore sources, thereby making either of the aforementioned two mods a requirement.

Obviously, this decision will have the consequence that mod makers who wish to edit or add to Solstheim, while still retaining compatibility with Tamriel Rebuilt, will have to make a compatibility patch (similar to what is needed for compatibility with Anothology Solstheim or TOTSP). Furthermore, no longer updated Solstheim mods may become incompatible with TR. Hence, we hope to provide documentation, tools and aid to make the required patching as painless as possible.

In any case, the conflicting lands will not be released any time soon, as development has yet to start on Blacklight and will doubtless take several years.
 

What about Firemoth?

Starting in TR version 24.12, the official plugin Siege at Firemoth was completely overhauled and included in the mod by default. The original was more a Construction Set showcase and less a serious addition to the game world. Hence, it suffered from quality issues that made it very inconsistent with both Vvardenfell and Tamriel Rebuilt. Since it also conflicted with our landmass, and since we had to provide a patch anyway, we decided to overhaul and improve the whole thing, adding a ton of new content while staying as true to the original's premises as possible.

Players who still prefer to play the original version can use the optional, separately downloaded plugin TR_Firemoth_remover.esp. Read more on the reasons for remaking Siege at Firemoth »here«. 
 

I have an opinion! Where can I tell you about it?

Either on the forum, on on the Discord channel. You will likely receive a quicker answer on the latter.