The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion - Replay thread

[Cosmic_Guru]

I see that the recent video footage of Skyrim has prompted renewed interest in this so here is a thread where we can indulge ourselves in replays or reminiscing.

After a minor scare when I got an error message on trying to install the game to HD because of scratching on the disc, I booted it up successfully, did a double take at the hours and saves to date (one save every 10 minutes on average over 238 hours ) and created a new character.

After a male redguard who went on to become the saviour of Cyrodiil, and a few abortive mage types, I'm now playing a female Khajiit under the sign of the Thief with Assassin build.

She scooted round the opening section (longer than I had remembered) filling up her inventory with all those lovely lockpicks, torches and silverware which the now extinct goblins have no use for, and reached the open air in time to enjoy the last of the sunny afternoon (on the first play through it was already night and raining to boot ).

After a brief detour to Copious Cuthroat's establishment to relieve him of his silver dagger and mace handily lying around in the basement as always, she hit the road with no real plan other than to take advantage of the unwary, and if that entailed slipping her dagger between the shoulders of an unwary sleeper, so much the better...

To be continued.

[RubberJohnny]

I actually booted it up a couple of weeks ago for a quick run around. First time around I spent about 130 hours in and never completed the main quest (or the fighters guild, for that matter, thieving and sneaking all the way). Then I spent about 40 hours on playthroughs with various progression mods which were OK, but I was pretty burnt out.

This time I'm running the GOTY version picked up for a pittance in a Steam sale rather than my old DVD copy, so it's a fresh start. So I did the intro dungeon and then headed straight across the water to that Ayleid ruin to pick up the artefact and start Umbacanos quest. On the way I get like 6 quest popups talking about rumours I've heard (DLC quests), I haven't played any of those, or the Shivering Isles expansion, so that's kind of why I'm here.

One thing I note here is how much better it ran, my HL2-era PC struggled to run it without cutting down the visual detail, and I didn't get a 360 for months afterwards, and never double-dipped. Hasn't aged well in ways that are hard to put into words, though.

I wanted to get Kvatch out of the way so the gates started spawning, so visited Weynon Priory on foot, killing that Highwayman that's always at that Fort on the way and talked to Jauffre. I warped to Kvatch and started the quest which was longer than I remembered. I sealed the Oblivion gate and cleared the town, and it was fucking hard. I drained all my healing items and am clearing the castle but really am just repeatedly dying to four scamps that're killing me in a few hits, the NPCs are no use because one fled back to the entrance and the other is plot important meaning he keeps reviving with like 1HP and dying instantly.

I don't remember the game being this hard, so I go to some mod sites and spend a few hours downloading progression mods and looking up how to install them, only to find a folder on my PC already full of up-to-date installers. I remember this isn't my first abortive re-play, and I've pretty much followed this pattern "play a bit, download mods, lose interest" several times over already.

[Stig]

Ok so here's where I'm at.

I'm a Level 16 Redguard named Stigweard. The character was born under the Birthsign "The Mage" and is a Mage class. He's an expert in destruction and conjuring and is the head of the Theives Guild and Grand Champion in the arena. Oh and he's a vampire and I intend to keep him like that. His weapon of choice is Mehrunes Razor and he's currently sporting a Darwen Helmet and shield with a Heavy Raimeent of Valor

With 155 days passed I'm currently working towards Arena hero and recomdations from the Mages guild.

[Rayn]

I'm in too. I agree with RubberJonny about the game starting to show its age, but it's still playable. It all feels a bit more stiff and empty than I remembered it, but the nostalgia factor is quite high which makes the journey heaps of fun. Closing Oblivion gates are as boring as ever, still

[Anne Summers]

I started a new playthrough of this last weekend and am about 20 hours in.I have hardly done any quests but most of my skills are up to high journeyman or low expert level and I've closed about 20 oblivion gates.

i started with the intention of finishing the guild quests which I never got round to before.However have been slightly thwarted by apparent bugs , the diary I am supposed to find for the thieves initiation just plain isn't where it is supposed to be (even now, weeks of game time later,i keep bumping into my fellow hopeful initiate running around random locations looking for the diary , and I cant even kill her to deliberately fail the quest and start again, as she is an essential character).So now my aim is to get as buff as possible and have a go at the daedric quests, which I never even touched before on my previous plays.

[Boozy The Clown]

I've started this game so many times and have always followed a similar path.

Leave dungeon > Copious Coinpurse > Waking up on a boat captured by pirates > Arena > End up skulking about raiding bins at night to make really crap potions > Being a pretty crap hero.

This time it's going to be different...

I've downloaded all the DLC minus horse clothes and Shivering Isles. I'm really going to make a stab at it this time. I've managed one playthrough where I completed all the guilds but have always found difficulty in levelling up over time. I'll be staying away from the main quest and just trying to get by being as drunk as possible and going on the odd adventure to earn more beer money.

Actually looking through my achievements it looks like I've never really played the fighter's guild and only managed about half of both the thieve's guild and the dark brotherhood.

Adventure ahoy then !

[Talk Show Host]

If I replay this I won't even bother with the gates.

I really can't replay those.

[Cosmic_Guru]

i started with the intention of finishing the guild quests which I never got round to before.However have been slightly thwarted by apparent bugs , the diary I am supposed to find for the thieves initiation just plain isn't where it is supposed to be (even now, weeks of game time later,i keep bumping into my fellow hopeful initiate running around random locations looking for the diary , and I cant even kill her to deliberately fail the quest and start again, as she is an essential character).So now my aim is to get as buff as possible and have a go at the daedric quests, which I never even touched before on my previous plays.

That's weird and very bad luck - never had a problem with that quest and I've done it several times. Often bugs don't seem to be universal in this game - I remember a lot of complaints about pressure plates in certain dungeons too, which I didn't experience either.

I noticed the game was updated again (on 360) though after all this time, so maybe they are still working through some stuff in relation to the US release of the anniversary edition.

I paln to avoid Oblivion gates, and after a suitable criminal career, go back to Shivering Isles which I didn't fully appreciate first time around (and was bugged).

[Uzi]

Great idea, if you guys are replaying, I definately recommend unlocking the unofficial "companion mode"

Details here:

http://j.mp/eFzmX2

[SqueakyG]

Looking at my Xbox 360 saves... 2006, ouch!

I don't think I'll have time to actually replay this, but I should have a tootle around to see how it holds up. I reckon my fairly old PC graphics card could do it now too, but I'm not paying for a PC version.

Since 2006 I've mostly played Bioware RPGs (I'm in the middle of Dragon Age 2 right now, which has none of the freedom, exploration or complexity of Bethesda games), so the Bethesda model will be quite alien to me again. When Skyrim comes out it will probably seem quite hardcore.

I remember back in 2006 I reached a point where the game had no challenge because I was completely invisible, so I'd roam around caves and dungeons and the enemies would be stood there doing nothing and I'd kill them in one hit. Still, that's better than how God-like you could become in Morrowind, where I was flying around like Superman due to levitation and speed enchantments. They somewhat nerfed the enchantments in Oblivion so this wouldn't happen.

Wasn't Sean Bean in Oblivion? Winter is coming!

One thing I didn't like - as an inexperienced RPG player - was the confusion over whether I was supposed to be grinding in dungeons or not. I would clear out a random dungeon, reaching a pointless empty room at the end, then walk all the way back to the entrance. Then 10 hours later a quest would take me to THE SAME dungeon, where there would be a quest item in the room at the end, and a quick exit in that room. It was tiresome, I'd already BEEN there! So I ended up not bothering to go into any dungeons unless a quest took me to one. Was that right or wrong?

[SqueakyG]

I noticed the game was updated again (on 360) though after all this time, so maybe they are still working through some stuff in relation to the US release of the anniversary edition.

More likely your Xbox downloaded the last update again, however long ago it was made. Patches don't stick on Xbox 360, they get pushed out after playing so many other games.

[Monkeyboy]

That's weird and very bad luck - never had a problem with that quest and I've done it several times. Often bugs don't seem to be universal in this game - I remember a lot of complaints about pressure plates in certain dungeons too, which I didn't experience either.

I had some major problems with pressures plates not opening gates, even ending up getting trapped in one dungeon because of it. Thankfully, I remember there being a really weird workaround on the 360 that someone discovered. It involved stuff like logging out of your live account, turning the 360 off, turning it back on again etc. It was pretty convoluted, but incredibly, it got the pressure plates working again.

[Guest]

After some discussion I got into this again the other night. Did the first Oblivion gate (after much messing about) and took Martin to the Blades. They went through all the blah and then I was told I could stock up in the East Wing.

As they were all calling me "Lord", or whatever, upon entering I decided to chat to the guy in the corner - "Sorry I'm busy".

WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK! HOW DARE YOU! HOW DARE YOU!

Having just braved the gate and Hell itself these ingrates, in their safe little castle, mincing about with Katana blades thinking they're the best.

So I did the only thing I could without butchering them; I picked up each book individually and slung them around the room - at their bodies, heads, and all over the place. I cleared the book shelves and then moved onto the tables. Everything was on the floor and I shouted "CLEAR IT ALL UP YOU LAZY FUCKERS!". Which of course they didn't.

I love the pettiness that Oblivion can bring out in me.

Guy in the corner ignores the mess, bastard

Then I killed them all.

[unleashedmaniac]

Time to get started again, though as has already been said it doesn't seem to play quite as well as my memories remember. Still an excellent way to get through a lazy Saturday though!

[NecroMorrius]

I've been replaying this, on-off, for most of this year. Determined to at least see all the content, so I'm running around going to places I've never been rather than trying to do all my 'favourite' bits.

[Anne Summers]

Yeah that's the idea of this play through for me as well, finally tidy it all off.

And kill as many people as possible. Currently have a bounty of around 50,000 (I always played as a good two-shoes before so this is a lot of fun).

My Breton Battlemage is currently scouring the Volus mountain range for Daedric shrines, some of the goodies you get for clearing them sound quite nice.

[unleashedmaniac]

And kill as many people as possible. Currently have a bounty of around 50,000 (I always played as a good two-shoes before so this is a lot of fun).

That is what I shall do!

[fragglerock]

[locke_211]

I started this again about a month ago, to do the Fighters and Thieves Guild, which I've not done before, and Shivering Isle. Within a week it had completely taken over my life again. I decided to play as an archer, since I never do that usually, and the bow is suprisingly good once Agility is up to 100 and Marksman in the 80s. Think I'll probably try the same in Skyrim.

I've now done the Thieves Guild and found most of the missions on it excellent. The Fighters ones, which I've done most of, are more solid and dependable 'go to this cave/fort and retrieve this artifact' types and so quite repetitive, but in an enjoyable and comfortable way.

Surprisingly, I didn't enjoy Shivering Isles as much as I expected. Despite spending ages convinced of the superiority of the strange Morrowind type environments over Cyrodil, I found SI a little too "wacky" and found myself kind of missing the reality of the main map. I think I perhaps preferred Knights of the Nine as an add-on, though it obviously has far less scope.

I was also reminded that the enemies don't ALL always level. At level 16, I'm still seeing plenty of Goblin Scamps, rats and mudcrabs.

And I still think the landscapes look absolutely beautiful!

[Hello Goaty ♥]

I'd like some advice here actually!

Xbox 360 Oblivion is done and dusted, I played the original release at the time.

However I have recently ordered the GOTY version with Shivering Isles on etc.. which will be in the post soon.

what do I do with the GOTY edition to access the extra stories?

ie- can I try one at a time from a specific disc? or does it dump the lot onto the drive?

[Quest]

You rip the DLC stuff from the second disc onto the 360 HDD. They're treated as separate installs, so you can grab them one at a time if you wish.

[Hello Goaty ♥]

ta!

[Cosmic_Guru]

Well, things are going roughly to plan for the Furlicker!

Joined both the thieves and the assassin's guilds, got into more than one scrape with the law and delivered the amulet (to access the storeage chest). So I've got my fence sorted and no worries with running out of lockpicks either. I'm about to visit the Den and get tooled up with poisons and scrolls for the tasks ahead.

I'm on the lookout for the small details all the time - e.g just outside Bruma there were two Imperial foresters having a ruck with arrows - what an opportunity to rifle the possesions of the dead.

Having much more success with the persuasion game too - no idea why I didn't get that first time round

Onwards and downwards!

[Joyrex-J9]

I've seriously thought about giving this another go.

The mistake I made first time, was I got too clever with my character build. I went quite far down the "stealthy, archer with alchemy skills" route. So I could make poison arrows and take shit down unseen like a silent assassin. Great in theory - but it didn't quite work. The end result was I made the game very hard for myself. So I abandoned it

This time I'd probably build a basic, sword-mage type guy. Fireballs and sword bashing.

[Monkeyboy]

How did that make the game hard for you? I played it as a stealth assassin, and didn't have a problem. If anything it got ridiculously easy. I think my close range combat was pretty good though, from what I remember. Always handy if you do get caught.

[Guest]

I started this up on the PC too yesterday (previous pic was obviously from the 360 version).

Decided to go on a slaughter fest; great stuff! Into the Dark Brotherhood straight away; let the carnage begin!

[locke_211]

One annoying thing for archers was never being able to get back as many arrows as I shoot, so at some point you'll have to spend a lot of money on more. Shivering Isles is very good for this issue! You'll end up with loads of Amber and Madness Ore, each piece of which can be swapped for 25 really good arrows, which are levelled but always the best you can get at that level.

One of the few non-levelled weapons you can come across at any point in the game is the Frostwyrm Bow, which was comfortably the best bow I could find until I got to about Level 14. So archers should try and look that up at the earliest opportunity!

[footle]

Anyone got a PC mod guide? What to install, in which order to install it most easily, whether it plays nicely with the Steam version etc. ?

[Rudi von Starnberg]

http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3310676

This thread is a pretty good guide although some of the images are broken now.

[Uzi]

Think I might go through this again on PC as well. Any must have mods to recommend?

Edit- Lol, I should read, thanks guys