With Ravos I was hoping to collect all the dragon masks and learn all shouts as a sort of secondary goal, but with console I'm not sure how possible that is without joining and finishing different factions questlines. None of the factions in Skyrim suit Ravos for various rp reasons.

I know what you're saying about Falkreath. Ravos spends a lot of time there hunting and relaxing, not to mention he lives in Lakeview Manor. It rains a lot and the skies are grey more often than not. Skyrim can be rather depressing at times, can't it? It's all doom and gloom when compared with Oblivion.

Lildereth and Jerric look great in their gear, perfectly suited for the outdoors. Their camping setup looks good too, I'm guessing that you put that down using a mod. Glad they finally got to relax, sometimes you have to bash in a few heads before you can get some rest in Skyrim.

I'm thinking about rehashing Kayla's game sans dragon shouts.

Do it!

I've been thinking of resetting Aravi once again.

I think the lower levels are the most fun.

Elisabeth, would you just have no Shouts in Kayla's game, or no dragons at all? I like playing non-Dovahkiin characters who still have to figure out how to deal with dragons. It's the main thing that keeps me starting new ones.

Vital, thanks, I use Althir's Camping Tools for the campsite stuff. The cookpot works. They had venison chops for dinner.



ETA: Finding the final mask was Jensa’s last task in her PS3 game. She went to fight the Ebony Warrior, but he greeted her as a friend. I raced to the uesp to see if it was a bug, but that’s how he is. You have to attack him.

Jensa was having none of that. She wished him well and went home.

That was kind of a turning point for her. She was despondent over her role in the Dragonborn MQ, and this snapped her out of it.

Also I’m really glad she didn’t attack him. He would have killed her in two seconds from what I’ve read about him. Yikes.

Yeah, I would just have her knot know any shouts. Or just Ice Form. I can't function without that one lol

That's interesting about the ebony warrior. If any of my characters ever reach level 81 I can't imagine they would be willing to fight him like that. I also enjoy the lower levels, mainly because of the gear, Ravos often wears improved and enchanted furs and leather when not dungeon crawling.


From High Hrothgar Ravos headed to Whiterun. Restocking on arrows at the Drunken Huntsman, he couldn't resist the urge to pick up Jenassa and embark upon some dunmeri dual wielding devastation. With Jenassa at his side, Ravos decided to head out to the reach, complete some of his misc objectives and retrieve another aetherium shard.

The dunmer duo arrived in Markarth after two uneventful days on the road. Both of them are overly eager to take some forsworn names and kick some forsworn butt when they head out tomorrow.

I do too. Also, there's something about that time (Levels 0 through 20 or thereabouts) that I tend to really connect with my characters. Every choice they make has some sort of profound impact from my perspective. This is the time I seem to be surprised the most by my creations.


I wonder if I'll ever have somebody who makes it to L81. Probably not.

It always kinda shocked me back when Skyrim was new and there were these gamers getting to Level 81 in a month or sometimes less, and then complaining in a myriad of ways that the game was too easy or too "this" or too "that". I just get stuck on the 'how did you get there so fast?" bit. I gamed with Lord Haaf-Mersey for over a year, and he barely broke Level 47.

I am sure I will never see the Ebony Warrior in any of my games. I have never had a character get anywhere near level 81. Even if I had, I doubt they would want to kill him either. Not if he is friendly. Most of my character never even want to fight the Old Orc.



I have never used shouts, except for a few that I turned into spells, like Kyne's Peace. In fact, that is pretty much the only one turned into a spell I ever use. Though I have found other ways to make animals friendly in Skyrim as well.



I prefer the earliest levels too. The game just feels more interesting then. I also tend to like the low tier gear like iron and steel best as well, just because of appearances.



That's because you are a N00b! You need to roll an uber toon, grind up, and go on some raids!

But if my uber-avatar doesn't want to grind up all the skills in his stat sheet, won't that leave him as a useless milk-drinker, not to mention break my Legendary-leveled Immersion?

But that's the whole point of Role Playing Games!

From Markarth, Ravos and Jenassa headed out into the reach to retrieve another Aetherium Shard. Following the road north from Markarth, they soon came across some forsworn. The natives were easily dispatched of, but not without a loose arrow hitting a noble's horse.

The invisible eyes of supreme justice had already spotted Ravos' crime, but he thought eliminating the noble and his guard would remove his bounty. He was wrong. Ravos has always been a law abiding character, so his reaction to this was quite surprising.

Arriving at Karthwasten, believing his bounty was erased, Ravos was apprehended by a guard. Not wanting to face jail time he murdered two guards and ran off. Soon he located the second Aetherium shard in Deep Folk Crossing, and was on his way to Solitude.

Nooo!

That was my Oblivion NPC reaction.

This is the first time Ravos has acquired a bounty, so I wasn't sure what to expect. He just didn't want to be hauled back to Markarth over a loose arrow. If it had been a deliberate crime though, he probably would have faced the punishments.

Besides, he's not too worried about the loss of an imperial noble. Had it been an honest, hard working person, he probably would have done the time.

Anyway, Ravos has returned to Lakeview with the dog Meeko, who he's learnt is only keepable if he adopts a child.
He plans to do some hunting with the dog and Faendal. So, swapping glass for furs and ebony for steel, the trio headed to Falkreath to buy whatever provisions they didn't have...

I had a few minutes this afternoon to let Lildereth and Jerric play, and oh my goodness.

They had been relaxing at camp after the war that preceded setting it up. Jerric was cooking. He cooked for a long time while Lil sat on the stump. She was debating another swim while it was still not raining or going into the tent to sleep. She was also enjoying the view.

Before she could decide Jerric left the cook pot and went into the tent. Lil took that as a sign it was time for bed.

Inside the tent she found a big surprise.

Now earlier when Jerric had said, “I’m going to get us a redhead,” she assumed that 1. He was joking and 2. He meant another woman. Either way she was not interested. The new guy cleared things up by immediately asking if she had seen someone run by just then.

Aha, it’s part B of the ever annoying fugitive and hunter interaction, only the fugitive gave her the item so long ago she didn’t even have it in her inventory anymore. There was no conversation option to give the item back.

Lil told the hunter to bug off, but he just stood in the tent when they were done talking. Jerric still lay there sleeping. So an irritated Lil went back out to sit on the stump some more.

Then the hunter came out and started cooking. Here is a picture of him being rude to Lil while she stares at him going “Seriously, Nord?” By then she had enough so she went into the tent before she gave in to the urge to shoot him. (In Cyrodiil she had spells that would have chased him off. She doesn’t have the Skyrim Fear spell yet. Totally Jerric’s fault for hogging all of the game time.) Also it occurred to her that with that kind of midnight appetite he could be Jerric’s long lost kin.

Anyway just as she was about to kick her fur skirt into the corner the hunter said, “Who’s there?” and Jerric got up.

Troll attack. Here’s a picture of the aftermath. Now they have a dead hunter and a troll carcass next to their waterfall. Sigh. Skyrim.

Talk about wackiness! I modded out that thief/hunter encounter a long time ago. It used to drive me nuts.

You can pick up the bodies and move them somewhere else. Or just use the console to disable them.

I love it!

How neat, Grits. I love how wood elven mystic archers think alike; as soon as Lil mentioned enjoying the view, Buffy told me exactly what to expect in the screenshot. And Jerric did not disappoint.

I picked up Persephone's game again. She was last in the The Reach, so she stopped by Markarth, and decided to look at that note Eltrys slipped into her pocket the last time she had visited. In no time at all she was in Cidnha Mine, feeling very unimpressed with the Forsworn Rabble and their King in Rags. Malediction sang a dirge for them. Only Grisvar the Unlucky was spared, as he was the only one who did not raise a hand against her. I guess it was his lucky day after all.

Upon escaping the mine she was met by Thonar Silverblood. Given his hand in the whole bloody mess, Persephone sent him to Oblivion to join Madanach. That put every guard in the city after Persephone. Rather than stay and slug it out, and risk innocent people being killed in the crossfire, Persephone decided to flee. That made for quite a chase through the city. Once outside she leaped into the river, and swam it (and down all the waterfalls) to Kolskeggr Mine. Thankfully, Deadwalkers do not need to breathe.

Persephone looks awesome, Subrosa. Love the armour!

I've done that quest twice now, one time helping the forsworn escape and once killing Madanach and escaping myself. Neither decision felt right, or even justifiable, so everyone dies usually. Same thing happens with the girl in Whiterun and the Alik'r

I thought they could've done a bit more with the forsworn. They could've formed a mini questline or a bunch of related quests. Where instead they were basically a substitute for bandits, with one interesting quest.

Thanks Vital. I spend a lot of time on getting a character's look just right for them.

I have done the Cidnha Mine quest about three times now. The first time I tried it was with an archer character. That was a huge mistake, as there are no ranged weapons to be had at all in the mine or nearby dungeon. I don't think she ever even finished it. My second character was a dual-dagger wielder, and she did much better. She initially sided with Madanach, but that was just a ruse, as she turned on him and the other Forsworn once they gave her the Armor of the Old Gods. She was basically playing both ends. This time with Persephone she was just too disgusted with all of them, so she killed everyone. It is just too bad she could not have killed all of the guards who were in on the whole scheme as well. It is kind of disappointing that you cannot even expose them and Thonar to the Jarl afterward, and clean up the town.

Persephone is awesome. Good jawb on her looks. I'm like .. drooling. Can't wait to mod Skyrim.

Vital: I heard from a friend that there were some Forsworn quests being considered but they did not make it into the game. There was also more orc stronghold stuff planned, and all kinds of stuff.

I've heard lots of stuff like that too. I feel like they just wanted to release the game on 11/11/11 and didn't leave themselves enough time to really flesh out the game. Skyrim was good, but it could've been better IMO.

Today Persephone was witness to more Bethesda wackiness. She was walking across the tundra directly north of Whiterun headed for Dawnstar. There is a spot there that random encounters are set to happen. In my games I often get the hostile conjurer fighting an atronach. Well this time I Persephone spotted both, but there was also someone in armor running toward them with an axe. By the time she got there, the conjurer and atronach were dead, and the Old Orc was standing over their bodies. His two dead sabrecats were there as well. Somehow both encounters spawned in the same place.

So Persephone talked to him and found out that he wanted a good death. She tried to tell him that there was no such thing. Being dead for four thousand years, she ought to know. But nothing she said could change his mind. So she moved on, looking for iron ore.

The next thing she knew, Pesephone was at that smuggler's camp built into the side of the cliff by Whiterun. Only this time all of the bandits were waiting there (usually you kill a few, open the locked chest, and the rest show up). She summoned up Darryl to help, and started slugging it out. That is when the Old Orc came running in on her side. By the time it was all over Darryl had been put down by bandits, and Persephone went looking for the Old Orc. She found him dead by one of the bandits. So he found what he was looking for after all.

Awwww...

He should be a follower. Being around the player character is usually dangerous.

If you mistakenly gave your follower a staff of fireballs, being the player character is dangerous.

That is why my characters never adopt stray dogs. They are much safer living alone in the wilderness.


My first character Scylla had Illia as a follower, and gave her a staff of wall of fire. Now that made things interesting!

Just ran through "Blood on the Ice" with Serana in tow. When we entered the Stone District to try and stop Callixto getting another victim, she got in the way as usual, and he killed Arivanya before I could get a clear shot at him. So Serana does her usual "raise zombie" on Arivanya, and we take her with us, so she can tell Jorlief who killed her!

Well, it makes a change from her recruiting dead goats, skeevers, and mudcrabs to fight on our side.

SubRosa, what a fitting end for the Old Orc.

ghastley, that’s hilarious! Those wacky necromancers.


Lildereth and Jerric’s last day in the woods started out sunny. They took care of some camp chores (moving the previous night’s bodies) and then headed out to do some exploring. Lildereth’s map was soon full of castle and tower symbols. It seemed they couldn’t go ten feet without running into some stronghold or another. Lildereth found the open woodland to be more unnerving than soothing. There was little cover, even for a wood elf.

Then it started to rain, and I mean wrath-of-Kyne type crashing thunder and lightning. Lil sprinted back to camp, packed the whole thing up in about two seconds, and then told Jerric she’d like to go inside one of those caves he was endlessly pointing out to her.

Here’s a peek inside the first cave. Jerric’s curiosity about the arcane light was drowned out by Lil hissing, “Nord, have you lost your mind?” She does not like strange magic, especially when it is shining down upon a pile of corpses. Jerric is still curious about the blue light. Maybe later he’ll get some other fool (Darnand) to go back in there with him.

They had a bit of a tussle with the occupants of the next cave, but afterward Lil decided that this one was much better. They camped beside the waterfall where they got soaked by the spray, but it didn’t matter with all of the swimming. At one point Jerric remarked that he should have dressed more warmly. (Standard cave dialog.) Lil thought that was humorous.

On the way home they stopped in Falkreath to trade some pelts. The shop owner was a real jerk to Lildereth. Jerric spent the whole time trying to navigate through the door. Lil was not sorry to head home to Lakeview. Henceforth she will be sure to bring her pelts the extra miles to trade in Helgen.

Lildereth is curious about the Rift forests now, but it will be a while before she finishes making poisons with the mushroom supply she picked up in Falkreath. All of that rain must be good for the fungi.

Also the hunting was terrible. The deer must not like Falkreath either. They only had venison one night, then Lil had to use her emergency dried horker meat. Plus Jerric mysteriously had three potatoes in his inventory, so they had potato soup. They had a good trip, but there’s really no danger that Lildereth will want to live in Skyrim permanently.

Lil is soooo pretty

I use a mod that stops Serana from animating every corpse she meets. Everytime I would try to loot the body of someone I had just killed, she would animate it before I could get there.



The whole thing with the Old Orc felt very poignant from Persephone's point of view. Being that she has been dead for 4,000 years, and here he was wanting to throw his life away. Instead of looking for a good death, he should have been looking for a good life. But the snow is always whiter on the other side of the Hold.

Hillgrund's Tomb! I don't blame Lil for not wanting to spend the night there. Was the other cave the one with the injured hunter outside, who gives you his lucky dagger? Valdr?

Jensa was my only non-orc character who really understood the Old Orc’s perspective. She comes from a primitive hunting clan, and their version is to pick up a club and walk out into the snow hoping to find a wolf pack before the cold kills them. Sovngarde awaits, but not if you die in your sleep beside the fire. She also felt honored that Malacath had put the Old Orc in her path.

That is indeed the cave where Valdr gives you his lucky dagger. Now Jerric is carrying it around. Lil doesn’t think Valdr or his dead friend sound particularly lucky.

ghastley, followers seem to have three purpose: carrying all your cool loot, disappearing with all your call loot and getting in the way.

I did that quest with my breton battlemage and ended killing both Calixto and Arivanya with chain lightning... oops

Grits, you can never expect a full day of sun in Falkreath. It's always raining or cloudy. Ravos likes it though, the hunting's not as good as the Rift or Whiterun, but there's less bears and plenty of camping spots (consoles *sigh*) You'll find plenty of deer in the Rift, but the bear attacks always put Ravos off.

Be careful of those caves! Azura only knows what you might find. Piled corpses and blue light? Smart decision to avoid it, imo...

Grits, thanks for the snip and pix from Lil & Jerric's day. Wow, beautiful scenery (and characters, of course).

Grits: Yeah, I also can't stand the shop owner in Falkreath. His brother is even worse.


Wow. What a story, SR. Pretty epic stuff.

Pala took Serana with her to go do Molag Bal's quest in Markarth. We really only wanted the Amulet of Stendarr to make a shrine for the Lakeview house, and the Vigilant is guaranteed to have one. Anyhow, after the quest is over, I find Serana's old habits coming out.

Once a Daughter of Coldharbour,...

I let her keep the Mace as a memento.

Sad news. The lovely Channah has fallen. She led her team into a nest of necromancers where they kicked a lot of corpse-jockey tail. Then in the last chamber (I know because I’ve seen it before), Channah got surprised by a lightning trap. Covered in frost from the bad mage she was engaged in killing, Channah tried to break away and heal. But she was too slow. Because of the frost. A second lightning bolt flung her into the wall.

I thought someone had resurrected a draugr who Shouted at her (they’re in a mod area with a delightful corpse menu for the enemy to choose from), so I was holding my breath until she got up.

She didn’t get up.


RIP Channah.

Aw

Poor Channah. Those frost spells have done in more than one of my character's as well.

Didn't you know you're not allowed to create a DiD character who isn't a Nord? That frost resist is VITAL!!

RIP

RIP Channah The best part of DiD is the thrill of staying alive, the worst part is losing a character...


No I am VITAL!

Nord or Breton do seem to do best in DiD. Resist fire for the dunmer is pretty good (no favorite race bias here...) but that frost magic is killer. Little overpowered imo...

I've been playing a sword-and-board imperial (female bear-riding kind, of course) and just done Meridia's quest to get a nice-looking blade. I'd never done it before, as none of the other characters wanted the reward. I liked the "follow the light" thing, but I found Malkoran to be a bit of a wimpy boss. She killed him with one swipe, having run up close to persuade him not try try his ranged spells. I guess he's nastier if you waste time on the minions before you reach him, but they're best left to last.

Then I took Dawnbreaker to go and whack Potema's entourage with it, figuring it would be good for a necro-dungeon. I'd done this quest with most of my other characters and knew it was a bit of a grind to get past the sheer numbers of draugr, and the exploding corpse effect promised a reduction of effort.

However, every time I killed the last of the draugr in the final room, and the objectives updated, the game would crash. Eventually I caught a quicksave with only one left, and was able to retry a few times without fighting them all again. It still crashed at the same point. So then I tried leading the last one back up the corridor before killing him, and was able to delay the crash until I re-entered the room. I tried walking back out of the cell and coming back in, but it still crashed when I got to the last room.

The incantation that finally got me past it was to leave the cell completely (via coc in the console), re-enter, leave again through the door, and re-re-enter. When I got back to the last room, Potema was already gone, and I just had to pick up her skull and leave. I suspect that she'd been caught in the blast from one of the last round of draugr deaths, and died out of sequence. I was not in the mood to try it again with a regular weapon at that stage!

Oh, forgot the WTF moment earlier - I'd swum across the water from the Solitude Sawmill, to take a shortcut to Morthal, and a Slaughterfish must have noticed me. But also a Solitude Guard had seen the Slaughterish attack, and decided to arrest it. I climbed out the other side, hoping to get a shot at the fish from the shallows, but it was now engaged with the guard in mid-stream and getting the whole range of the guard's arrest dialog lines. It appears that guards can't engage in combat while swimming either. (Why do I never have Fraps running when these things happen?)

Days Passed: 243
Days as Vampire: 222
Necks Bitten: 42

Gold Found: 61,415
Quests Cmptd: 14
Misc Objtvs Cmptd: 13
Main Questrs Cmpleted: 1
Side Quests Completed: 2
DB Quests Comptd: 10

Level: 39
Class: Mage
Faction: Black-magic Witch


Fredas, 2:07 AM, 17th of Rain's Hand, 4E 202


Mycharonna the Ice Witch is headed towards Riften, where she hopes to have an amulet appraised for sale. This amulet is going to be taken to a man in the Riften Ratway who will hopefully buy it.

But before going to Riften, Mycharonna needed to stop at a small cabin near Windhelm. This cabin is owned by a lady, a simple farmwoman. This farmwoman is going to have quite a bad memory (or was it just a dream?) about lifeless terror who trespassed into her home, and then .. did something to her neck, though she cannot remember what.

Mycharonna has a couple places she likes to stay whenever she's in Windhelm, and this time she chose the Aretino Residence. In here, a boy named Aventus Aretino secretly prays to the Night Mother, and though Mycharonna is not actually the Night Mother, she occasionally 'answers' his prayers by showing up, and pretending to be appeased.

This time she gave him some guidance, and left him 300 gold in one of the home's dressers.

Aravi just fought him last night, and he wasn't wimpy for her. She tried to simply get close like you did, and Malkoran killed her with three spells. Reloaded and ended up using a scroll of paralysis.

Like all things in the ES games, it depends on the level of your character at the time you take a baddie on. Take Frost Trolls. They will kill a 1st level character in seconds. I usually cannot take them on with a reasonable chance of success until a character is in their teens. But when I have a character past level 40, they are a one-hit kill.

Darnand got revenge for sweet Channah at the necromancer nest today. He had KC’s Aravi companion and Kharjo as well as a quest guy for company, so he did a lot of shooting firebolts from ledges and then jumping down to heal them before running for his life up the ramp again. It worked! He has learned to shoot through a Ward (now that he has more perks) rather than going all-in and dual-casting against that many mages. Also they may have gotten blown up in the fight, but the lightning death traps did not trigger.

On Malkoran: the bastard nailed Abiene with an ice spike that would have been the end of her if she was on the DiD chopping block. She was feeling like a boss after melting all of those shades with her sun spells. Then she “woke up” by the door. Jerric (Nord with the Atronach blessing) is one of my only characters who didn’t have serious trouble with him. He tends to sprint in while casting his own frost spells and then give them a kiss with his shield, and that distracts them. He loves to shield-bash mages.

Yikes, Renee! Mycharonna gives me the chills.

My latest character, Thulia, Imperial sword-and-board bear rider, had just made herself some Daedric Bear Rider armor, which has the big spiky pauldrons, but is otherwise substantially topless. So she goes into Whiterun to sell off some of her old outfit, and the first person she meets is Severio Pelagia, who remarks "There's a nip in the air" In her case, both of them! I nearly fell off my chair laughing.

Renee, Mycharonna is EVIL! I've yet to have a character that cold hearted in Skyirm, but I'm sure one will come.

Grits, I'm glad Darnand could avenge Channah's death. There aren't many better ways in Skyrim to honor a fallen friend than killing their killer.

Ghastley, that was priceless. I do wonder about the social skills of Skyrim's inhabitants...


Note: This post does contain some MQ spoilers that I consider relatively major and also reveals one of the coolest locations in the game and could ruin the experience for someone who has yet to explore this area.

I've been playing Ravos' game a lot recently as I've had some free time and been without my laptop. After finishing the aetherium shards quest I decided to advance the MQ further as I'm quite interested to see where it goes...

Ravos returned to Lakeview Manor and did some work around the house, before chilling around there for a whole with Jenassa and Lucia. He also went hunting and bounty hunting with Jenassa. I guess that counts as a date? He the set out alone, headed north to obtain an elder scroll. On the way to winterhold dragons were fought, a horse was lost and Ravos just survived an encounter with some vampires. The mages at winterhold were able to direct Ravos to Septimus Signus, a reclusive, slightly nutty mage with an obsession for elder scrolls and the dwemer. With his help Ravos was able to discover the location of an elder scroll, hidden by the dwemer deep within one of their greatest cities: Blackreach. Fighting his way through the city of Altfand, Ravos eventually reached Blackreach. It is possibly the coolest location I've visited in the game and the reference to Sinderion (For those who've been there)was great. After painstakingly collecting 30 samples of a plant that makes Nirnroot look common, Ravos finally found the scroll. He is now making his way back south on the back of a new horse, who he's yet to name...

THank you. My job is done, then!

Ghastley: I agree with Vital: Priceless.

Vital: I agree, that city is a cool location.

Encel Firefist the Mage had an interesting week. I hadn't played him in months, and when I loaded up his game he was outside Pinewatch, in the dark, wearing Thalmor robes. It then immediately started raining. I changed him into his novice College gear, and Jennassa, Meeko and Encel went to find somewhere to wait out the night and rain.

The closest location was Helgen. After spending a few minutes trying to find somewhere dry, we were attacked by bandits. Not too much trouble. After we found a way into the keep, we discovered something: The "You cannot wait here" message is permanent, even after you escape the first time. Annoying to no end. We went out and finally found a bed in a ruined house, only to be attacked by another bandit. After we finally got some sleep, we set off again, me deciding to finally do Dragon Rising with him.

I stumbled upon Brittleshin Pass by accident, but it made things a lot faster. Encel picked up an iron sword, deciding he might need a close combat weapon. It came in handy fighting Necromancers. "Your magic is mighty, but ha! I have mastered the sword! Is that with a silent "w", Jenassa? Yes? Alright."

We made it to BFB, me deciding to avoid blatant metagaming by thinking he'd want to check it out for archaeological value. It was fairly uneventful. I decided to send Meeko home, because he kept getting in the way of Encel's zappinationfication.

So we kill the dragon, after having a sleep at the very same Watchtower on our way to Whiterun. We take the quest to get Amren's sword, and also get Raise Zombie. I always liked the Necromancy spells, they're cool.

So now, as far as I can remember, we're heading north to do Under Saarthal. I missed this guy, I tell ya!