Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

[Jarik]

Sunk quite a bit of time into this & so far my main critcisms about Oblivion seem to have been addressed, namely the samey dungeon/caves that were usually just a clearing-out exercise. Only done 2 areas for sidequests so far, but i'm pleased to see the attention to detail that's gone into both the layout (some really great sights) & the little bits of dialogue & story you come across as you explore.

I've chosen to play a Khajiit as my preferred method is to skulk in the shadows & take enemies by surprise with a well-placed arrow, but i'm also trying to keep up with the magical skills too, not only because they look awesome but I want to use magic more than I did in Oblivion. Will being Khajiit always hold me back in that regard though?

[Davros sock drawer]

As lovely as Skyrim is to play, I do have some grumbles.

• The menus. Too many presses to get to your inventory/map. Or have I missed a way to assign the map to one button?
  
• The map itself. I don't like how it rotates, I want to scroll it in the usual way.
  
• The blocky shadows. I'm no graphics whore, but these do rather leap out.
  

I think that's about it so far really. Pretty impressive.

[meatbin]

My character (I cannot recall what I called him):

[Jarik]

How do enable my Khajiit's night vision power, I've tried pressing RB & nothing happens?

You need to set it as active first (the little marker appears next to the power). Its useful to a degree, but I don't like the blurring effect on everything except the centre of vision. Still, much better (& more stealthy) than a torch though.

[Broker]

Penny Arcade are bang on with their observations of this:

[siread]

As for bows, they are wicked outside - the range is incredible - I was standing on the high bridge of Valtheim towers and there was a single bandit standing on the other bank of the river - no problem sniping him down in one shot.

How did you know it was a bandit and not a traveller?

[hub2]

For the first hour or some playing this I just thought it was Oblivion II, which is fine, but didn't expect it to grab me in the long run. However, it really is clear that Bethesda have stepped up their game - loving it and it seems they've ironed out a lot of the quirks and issues Oblivion had.

Still has a woeful user interface though (IMO), and some tiny irritating things like an NPC saying stuff like "The Dancing Rose is a great place to drink, you should go there some time" while in the bloody Inn!! Easily fixed by having a flag which tells the character not to say a particular phrase in a particular place.

Been played for 3 days and only done Riverwood, Whiterun and a few on the quests in the local environs.

[CrispinG]

as a Destruction mage with a brother mage backing me up, I am pretty unstoppable. For the first ten levels of this character's life every scrape was a narrow escape and I was going through health potions like Pringles but now I don't even bother assigning a heal spell; dual cast Fireball one shots pretty much anything. i took on a Necromancer boss and raped him in like 3 hits.

[rockstarjez]

I have been seeing videos of people using some sort of epic magic bow.. Where do I get this amazing bow?

I freaking love this game!!

[Padaxes]

For the first hour or some playing this I just thought it was Oblivion II, which is fine, but didn't expect it to grab me in the long run. However, it really is clear that Bethesda have stepped up their game - loving it and it seems they've ironed out a lot of the quirks and issues Oblivion had.

QFT

[CrispinG]

I wish you could respec your talent points somehow. I put one in Conjuration that i feel is going to gnaw at me like a splinter.

also is there any sense bothering with weapons at all as a mage? I haven't tried conjuring a weapon - do I need physical weapon skills to use magic weapons? I figured it's like in WoW and as a magic caster my weapons are just there to boost stats and hang limply from my weak arms

[MrPogo]

There's a quest-line mentioned in passing about someone, somewhere, performing a rite (barmen rumours?); and some other people discussing (in the street) a very strange child in one of the cities.

Thanks

[ph0rce]

Last question for now; in the perk tree, if I want one of the higher level perks, do I have to have all the perks on the same branch before I can get it or can I skip straight to it?

[Broker]

I fucking hate having things to do during the day, played until 2 last night and I can't wait for 4:30 to roll around so I can go home and dive straight back in.

[Cosmic_Guru]

Have they changed the way you join the dark brotherhood? The old "murder someone, then sleep in a secure location" doesn't seem to work this time round. I spent ages finding a suitable victim too (some old git who was really rude!), cos I can't bring myself to murder total innocents!

Me too, so far, but that could well change. Only killed one guard deliberately so far to test the sneak+backstab combo - it workds!!! He was guarding a confiscated items chest just outside Riften which seemed an odd place for such a chest - maybe all the patrolling guards use it if the folk just pay up to avoid jail.

I was doing some quest chain and at some point a brawl became unavoidable. I'm completely magic orientated so fist fighting is not my strong suit (I'm level 25 and haven't equipped a weapon yet!). Every punch I threw took a tiny sliver of health off this guy. If I was going to win it would take forever and I couldn't be bothered. Unfortunately losing seemed to bug out the quest in some way. I ended up going back to an earlier save and leaving the quest for later. What's the deal with brawling in this? What affects your skill at it?

All I know is that the Master Race of Khajiit are supremely good at this - +15 to claws damage has so far made them a walkover - even to the extent of killing one shopkeeper who initiated a brawl and his good lady wife who took it into her head to intervene, sword swinging away, it didn't help her. There is no strength stat or unarmed skill, so who knows? Do mage types suck at it?

I've chosen to play a Khajiit as my preferred method is to skulk in the shadows & take enemies by surprise with a well-placed arrow, but i'm also trying to keep up with the magical skills too, not only because they look awesome but I want to use magic more than I did in Oblivion. Will being Khajiit always hold me back in that regard though?

The main problem with Khajiit is shortage of magicka - I met up with some court mage and bought conjure fire beastie and fire rune trap to help with some of the frosty types in dungeons but of course I only have 130 magicka at present and they need more. I guess it's a question of either using levelling points in magicka or finding a potion which temporarily boosts magicka before casting. There are lots of interesting spells to experiment with though such as transmutation which transforms base metals into silver and gold ingots

As lovely as Skyrim is to play, I do have some grumbles.

The menus. Too many presses to get to your inventory/map. Or have I missed a way to assign the map to one button?

There is no way.

You need to set it as active first (the little marker appears next to the power). Its useful to a degree, but I don't like the blurring effect on everything except the centre of vision. Still, much better (& more stealthy) than a torch though.

It seems most useful in certain burrows to avoid traps and pressure plates in particular. Not needed in the more organic areas, but I also preferred the old flat blue light.

I have been seeing videos of people using some sort of epic magic bow.. Where do I get this amazing bow?

I freaking love this game!!

There are 80 unique weapons in the game, of which bows will form a proportion. Alternatively, use enchant + skill perks to wield a beast of a bow.

[Cosmic_Guru]

How did you know it was a bandit and not a traveller?

Good point - I didn't from that range know this with certainty, but later inspection of his corpse proved it. If he had turned out to be some named NPC I would have reloaded to avoid the fear that somewhere down the line this would matter.

[Cosmic_Guru]

Last question for now; in the perk tree, if I want one of the higher level perks, do I have to have all the perks on the same branch before I can get it or can I skip straight to it?

You need to work through the tree and also have the skill raised to the necessary threshold level first. So a bit of planning is required to figure out what is really going to be useful to your playstyle. Thankfully you can conserve skill points and only get subtle text reminders rather than big flashing icons.

[Space Gibbon]

Last question for now; in the perk tree, if I want one of the higher level perks, do I have to have all the perks on the same branch before I can get it or can I skip straight to it?

Yes, you need to take all the perks lower down in that branch. If a perk has multiple ranks, you only need to take the first rank.

[Dimahoo]

My character (I cannot recall what I called him):

MF Doom?

[Thread Astaire]

My character (I cannot recall what I called him):

Skeletor?

[Space Gibbon]

I got the storm-summoning shout last night. Had to test it out so I went to the Eastmarch where there's inevitably a dragon messing around. Killed a giant (by accident) using the storm, then eventually managed to take out the Blood Dragon in the area after waiting six minutes for it to recharge.

[Mogster]

Speaking of the interface, Bethesda really haven't done much to tweak it for the PC. They've added a few shortcuts to get to the various menus (M for map, I for inventory and the like), but they haven't bothered to optimise anything for a mouse. Also, the favourites are all very well but you you'd think you could map items and skills to your number keys like in every PC RPG ever made. Instead they don't do anything. The interface is actually worse than Oblivion's!

Obviously that stuff's going to get modded in before too long, but Bethesda shouldn't be relying on mods for such a high profile title. It's a shame because everything else about the game is sublime.

[robdood]

How "caught up" in the fire was she? I have hit her many times by accident, fire and ice, she has taken many hits by enemies but she doesn't seem to have a problem. I'm playing on expert difficulty.

She was in the middle of doing the 'down on one knee nearly dead' thing, when I clipped here with a bit of fire. But since I crashed and had to reload she hasn't died again I was debating whether or not I should just murder her, but she's too useful as a packhorse tbh. Love how she puts on any armour etc you give her!

In my adventures this morning I came across a stray doggie, who joined Lydia and I - awesome He died at the mandibles of a giant ice spider thing though

Just did my first ever dragon that was unscripted - he chased me along the river to riverwood, where with some guards for distraction I could run up close and dual cast flames up his arse I loved how after killing him, pretty much the whole town came up to congratulate me and gawk at the corpse!

And with that, I'm going back.

Oh and one more thing:

How do enable my Khajiit's night vision power, I've tried pressing RB & nothing happens?

You have to set it to your power/shout slot first - any chance you've somehow not 'equipped' it?

[Cosmic_Guru]

I got the storm-summoning shout last night. Had to test it out so I went to the Eastmarch where there's inevitably a dragon messing around. Killed a giant (by accident) using the storm, then eventually managed to take out the Blood Dragon in the area after waiting six minutes for it to recharge.

I can see the enchantment which reduces shout recharge time will come in handy then.

I will probably need two distinct sets of gear

For the urban lifestyle of pickpocketing, backstabbing and general larceny.

For the rural expeditionary who could be confronted by huge scaley flying things at any moment.

[Delargey]

How did you know it was a bandit and not a traveller?

I did this...I thought that I came across a bandit fort, so from the shadows I took out all the guards with my bow (I've got archery + helm and bracers- which made it awesome) without them knowing what hit them. I was going through the inside taking people out and thought I'd bash someone's brains in with my mace instead. It turns out it was a stormcloak base (i haven't decided what side I'm gonna be on yet) and they didn't want to attack me. So I decieded to leave, naturally stealing their horse as I went as a final 'fuck you'.

Later, the horse killed me after I accidentally maced his face.

Does anyone know how leveling up conjuring works- Does the deadra actually have to fight people for you to gain experience or is casting enough?

[meatbin]

MF Doom?

Ha, exactly what I was thinking, can you rename your character?

[Space Gibbon]

I did this...I thought that I came across a bandit fort, so from the shadows I took out all the guards with my bow (I've got archery + helm and bracers- which made it awesome) without them knowing what hit them. I was going through the inside taking people out and thought I'd bash someone's brains in with my mace instead. It turns out it was a stormcloak base (i haven't decided what side I'm gonna be on yet) and they didn't want to attack me. So I decieded to leave, naturally stealing their horse as I went as a final 'fuck you'.

Later, the horse killed me after I accidentally maced his face.

Does anyone know how leveling up conjuring works- Does the deadra actually have to fight people for you to gain experience or is casting enough?

Casting was enough in Oblivion, but I have a feeling that the summoned/raised creature has to be around when there are enemies nearby in Skyrim. My reason for thinking this is I've had several times when I've raised a guy and then my conjuration goes up 30 seconds later when we move on a bit and enemies show up.

[Cosmic_Guru]

Does anyone know how leveling up conjuring works- Does the deadra actually have to fight people for you to gain experience or is casting enough?

According to the guide, you have to use the spell effectively and not spam it e.g send a creature into battle, kill using a bound weapon or trap a soul.

[Space Gibbon]

According to the guide, you have to use the spell effectively and not spam it e.g send a creature into battle, kill using a bound weapon or trap a soul.

Does the guide have any tips for levelling Speech?

[Monkeyboy]

Selling a lot of your swag is one way to level speech.