Knights joust during a tourney - by Mark Evans; ©Fantasy Flight Games.
A tourney is a tournament popular in Tamriel.
Format and Rules
Tourneys in Tamriel vary according to the region in which the tourney is held, the desires of the hosting lord, and the rules devised by the lord's master of the games. They may be held to celebrate a marriage. Many forms of competition are known, including jousting (also called 'the lists'), mock battles between teams of knights, archery competitions, or the melee, in which many warriors fight individually in one large battle. Tourneys can be small events focusing on one competition held on a single day, or they can be large events that take several days and may include several different competitions.
The central event of many Tamrielic tourneys is jousting, in which two armoured knights aim to knock each other off their mounts with a jousting lance, continuing on foot with a variety of blunted weapons. The loser of a joust must often forfeit their horse and armour to the winner, thus jeopardising a considerable part of their possessions. In Skyrim, melees are more commonplace than tourneys, which are viewed as pompous by the winter-hardened northerners.
Many tourneys pit pairs of warriors in rounds, where the loser is eliminated and the winner proceeds to the next round. The winner of the last round is declared champion. This is similar to how many tournaments in real life were performed, with exception of the best-of-three rule. Some ladies allow contestants to wear their favours during a tourney.
Another format consists of five champions who defend the honour of a person, often a daughter or son of the lord who arranges the tournament. Other participants can challenge one of the champions to a joust, and if successful take his place.
Some Tamrielic tourneys, particularly in the Summerset Archipelago, are open only to anointed knights, whose privileges are jealously guarded. Indeed, tourney culture is closely connected to chivalric tradition and its spiritual basis, the Church of Alaxon and those religions which can trace their roots back to it. These traditions dominate most of Tamriel, especially in the Summerset Archipelago, High Rock, and Cyrodiil, but they are uncommon in Skyrim, where their culture continues to have many traditions of the old gods, despite no longer worshipping them. However, the rules for entering tourneys vary with time and place, and there have been many events where freeriders, squires, or followers of alien religions have entered the lists.