I finally played this over the summer. After Morrowind, it was pretty much everything I'd hoped for and more. Plus, even on my average computer(by cutting edge standards), the graphics were just sumptuous. One of the few things that bugged me a bit though was the bartering system in comparison to Morrowind, I got continually ripped off, left, right and centre even after bribes and increasing my mercantile skills. As far as I know, unlike Morrowind, there's no one to go to for getting the full "value" of an item and the most any merchant seemed to have to barter with was 2000. I guess it was for game balance purposes but there you go.
The other thing was the way in which items and armour were loaded into the game based on your current level, so glass armour only appears post level 20 etc. In Morrowind I stole a set of Glass armour very early on from Ghost gate. Again for game balance it seems.
As far as I know with the emperor's robe, the only way to get it is to use a cheat to add it into the game. I remembering reading about it a little and if you kill the emperor (!
) it does not appear with him to steal. I guess the detailed information regarding it like it's stats and spells effects are a product of the dynamic world they created with Oblivion. The emperor, along with a whole host of other NPC's were not just hard wired machines that reacted to scripted events with precision but they were more like the player with given stats to allow them to interact with the environment around them unpredictably much like the player.
Did anyone take part in the
Tournament of the Ten Bloods to get the Goldbrand sword that dealt approx 20+ fire damage, plus all the extra loot you can take back with you (if you can carry it!), definetely a highlight of the game for me. Great fun.