Awww.



Yeah, a little help from Imgur's blurring tool and that 'special effect' was good to go.

Ushak was devastated to find Borgakh gone when she returned to Lakeview Manor. Her steward, Rayya, didn't have anything to say on the subject, but offered to travel instead with her. Ushak declined and instead has begun adventuring on her own again.

Genevieve took Mjoll to Breezehome to meet the kids.

Are you sure you're not a kid yourself?

Ok, I take that back

See the mod thread for more.

So far Whiterun has not gone well.
To summarise, Eilidh having been arrested in Markarth for brawling and drunken behaviour set out for Whiterun and Ysolda, whom she had been told knew more about what was going on with Sam who had stolen money off of Eilidh and dumped her in Markarth.

A couple of days later she arrived, worse for wear by several bottles of cheap wine and a flask of skooma she'd picked up from somewhere. (She does not do Skooma often, in fairness).
Figuring to have some refreshments prior to looking for Ysolda she headed for the Bannered Made and proceeded to get a little more "loose".
Anyway, she remembers leaving the inn and selling some things and then meeting Ysolda.

Apparently she's betrothed, to a woman, and Sam is to be handling the affair. There was something about a ring as well...
Now anyone who knows Eilidh knows that unless there is a lot of coin involved she is as straight as they come, and apart from that she's not the marrying kind, anymore.
Eventually she "persuaded" Ysolda to tell her where Sam was; "Mor..." something, as far as she can remember.

After that it's a blur, it seems she ran out of money in the inn, but "gained" some later outside, when it was dark, only about 100 gold but it was a spur of the moment thing and one of the guards apparently gave her an extra 10.

She's been told that she then broke into Ysolda's house and having found nothing attempted then to pickpocket one the very guards she had "favoured" earlier. He was much less generous this time and she's now languishing in jail.
Again.
The fact that she was wearing nothing but a hat when she was caught did not help much either...

So not a good night, then...

Yikes, sorry about Boragkh’s ditching of Ushak.

ghastley, Hulked out Genevieve looks great! I love it!

Phon, good luck to Eilidh. I always enjoy that quest, but it sounds as if she’s having a rough time with it.

She isn't really, bless her; she's been making some bad decisions recently and it's not going well. The other trail's gone cold and she's saddled with chasing after the Sam individual, who not only dumped her in Markarth but got her into all sorts of trouble *and* stole 1500 gold from her.
Nothing about the situation is good at all. Her increasing dependancy on alcohol and drugs in order to keep her abdominal pains at bay is not helping either - (I suspect she's got an aggravated and possibly ruptured ulcer, along with a fairly severe kidney infection) - she's always been a drinker but it's really getting bad now.
Turning down mercenary jobs, like those offered in Whiterun isn't helping her reputation or her cashflow either...

Turning tricks and petty thievery is about all she's good for in the cities at the moment, but the night's events show that with the sort of impaired judgement she has at the moment, these are hardly good career moves.
I would NOT want to be Sam or the Legionary when she catches up with them.

Fortunately for them, she's here currently: Dragonsreach

Ninette allowed NPC Jerric to tag along on her school trip. This picture pretty much sums up what she likes about him. Her most comfortable spot is right behind his shield.

Ninette has no problem summoning her flame atronach and then dashing back down the corridor away from the fight. Jerric is obviously capable of taking monsters on by himself, so she has no qualms about leaving him to it. With the backup of her atronach, of course.

She has talked to each of her classmates in the hope of finding one who might share her adventures, but none of them wears armor or carries a big shield. Tolfdir has given her a job to do for the College. Kind of by accident. Ninette was just kissing up to the teacher and found herself with a task. So it seems that she will keep the big guy around for a while.

Damn, so Eilidh went from being the King's daughter to drugs, brawls and turning tricks? Mercy.

I lvoe that look on Ninette's face! Yeah, that's the look of a face that gets over-anal about organizing her things, no doubt.

It's not the same Eilidh - they are two sides of the same coin.
This one is the rough half.

Genevieve has gone to Labyrinthian with Mjoll in tow to get the Staff of Magnus. She's done Ok so far, but in the last zone, there's a corridor with a triplet of spell-casting traps at the end, flinging fireballs. All my previous characters have managed this section by dodging between the fireballs and ducking behind the pillars until they could grab the soul gems and stop the traps.

This time, Mjoll comes running up next to her, attracting a fireball, which is an AOE effect and therefore hits anyone nearby, meaning Gen behind her pillar. Mjoll has enough health to survive (and I'm certain she just knows she's essential). Gen has only the base 100.

It's a good thing I don't play DiD.

I've tried Unrelenting Force and Whirlwind Sprint on this section without success. UF doesn't displace all the gems, and WS still lets the traps get off a second blast before she can grab the gems. She can't take more than one. So she'll have to tell Mjoll to wait, and heal behind each pillar if she gets splashed.

I could probably do this by Hulking out for the extra health, but I want to save that for a test against Morokei.

More from Genevieve and "Shulky" (or is that Sjulki?) - took Mjoll to Avanchnzel to put the Lexicon back, and saved up her hulking for the centurion at the end. Got a nice kill-cam moment - and discovered I didn't have Fraps running

Oh, well. We got a lot of Dwarven metal and made bows and arrows to pump up her Smithing skill. So she was able to reward Mjoll for her help by upgrading Grimsever to Epic. The downside to doing that is that she has less incentive to hulk with the extra melee power available. But on the gripping hand, she can do it for aesthetic reasons, rather than sheer panic!

So Sam turned out to be Sanguine. Oh how very amusing.
Cursing the feyness of Daedra, Eilidh found herself back in the Skeever, better off to a degree monetarily - (although not from Sanguine) - but worse off in terms of her primary mission, from which she has been badly derailed.

All is not lost however, the Skeever is one of the very few places in the province where she can ply her "Other" Trade and remain relatively secure, even and especially amongst the Imperial soldiers. Sure, she has to give the inn keeper half but that's fair enough for an actual bed, a roof, and a decreased likelihood of being beaten up.

Why is this a good thing now? Well it's surprising what your average soldier will give away when he's "distracted", and she may just learn something to her advantage, and make a little more money in the process. She's actually not doing badly on that front, which makes a change; although I doubt she'll hang onto it for too long, keeping hold of cash is not one of Eilidh's strong points. She has no reason to hang onto it now either given that her contact in Solitude is nowhere to be found.

Using herself as a tool to get what she wants is, however, something she's quite proficient at even given her distinctly uninviting appearance; and 3 bottles of wine, 4 legionaries and 75 gold later she may well have struck lucky...
...it's going to involve a bit of a trek, but it's better than nothing.

All she needs now is a bath and a kip.
Definitely a bath.

This post has been edited by PhonAntiPhon: Apr 11 2014, 06:17 AM

Genevieve is collecting the Dragon Priest masks, as she's done the one quest-line she wanted to (College of Winterhold) and she's still checking out her Hulk power. She transformed against Hevnoraak fairly successfully. He uses a lot of shock, and that essentially disables a mage, but he didn't appreciate being cleaved by a large greatsword driven by an 8-foot Orc.

And then they went back home to Winstad Manor and dropped around the corner to High Gate Ruins. They met Anska, who asked them to help her find a scroll. Anska proved to be a poor companion, as she reacted to any opposition with a fireball spell that did as much damage to the friendly combatants as the enemy. Mjoll finally snapped and beheaded the woman, and we made much better progress after that. When we finally encountered Vokun, Gen was annoyed not be able to hulk again, but it was still the same day, so she had to use her Breton Dragonskin power instead. She'd already become accustomed to fireballs, thanks to Anska, so she was running with her fire resistance boosted by potions anyway. She did need to heal and replenish her magicka during the fight, as he's a tough fetcher, and Mjoll got stuck behind a pillar and didn't help much.

That was her third mask (having got Morokei during the college quests), and she's planning to rest and get her Hulk back before going for number 4.

So it's back to Helgen via Dawnstar. Information hard-earned.
A side-trip to Meridia's shrine proves yet another Daedric distraction...
...or does it?

This post has been edited by PhonAntiPhon: Apr 11 2014, 06:17 AM

Sounds like Genevieve is going well Ghastley!

Phon, Eilidh's certainly been busy. Sanguine's quest is a real fun one

Well... I've had an interesting few sessions in Skyrim recently.

Attia died (RIP) in a vampire ambush on the way to Serpenstone Isle, to gain the Stormcloak's trust (for the Empire, though). I kept her first save, so maybe one day I can revisit her. If I feel like it.

Ravos, on the other hand, has had more success. He left Whiterun on the 2nd of Morning Star, 202, still feeling a little muzzy from the celebrations. He reached Rorikstead by nightfall that day, and left the Frostfruit inn the next morning with Erik the Slayer along side him. Ravos and Erik headed north with Dawnstar as their primary destination. Along the way they cleared Dead Man's Respite, which turned out to be the tomb of Olaf One-Eye. Later they slew the dragon at Eldersblood Peak and cleared a bear den at the side of the mountain (can't remember the actual name). From here they headed to Morthal, where Ravos had a few bounties to collect. Morthal has no general trader so they had to keep most of their loot for Dawnstar.


After a night in Morthal, Ravos and Erik ventured into the vast marsh north of the town. It was slow going as Ravos wanted to collect as many ingredients he could. He doesn't often visit Hjaalmarch so he needed to stock up on Deathbell and Swamp Fungal Pod. Eventually they reached Folgunthar and after a nights rest at the camp set-up by other treasure hunters outside the ruin, the duo geared up and braved the tomb. Inside they found the deceased bodies of the treasure hunters whose camp they had used and ultimately retrieved the Gauldur Amulet fragment (as well as lots of other loot). Ravos has put retrieving the other fragments on his long to-do list, but whether he will ever get around to it remains to be seen.

Ravos, his horse Blaze and Erik are resting up in the campsite outside Folgunthar. They are running low on provisions and high on loot so a stop in Dawnstar will soon be necessary. On the way they might have room for one more dungeon raid. Ravos has his eyes set on High Gate Ruins, where he has been informed there is some source of power.

Indeed she has.
I'm not sure she would call it "fun", but it was certainly "unexpected"...

That said, she's now in Dragonbridge, somewhat better off monetarily, and with a shiny sword, and more importantly the gratitude of Meridia which has extended as it goes into some rather interesting Help and Information.
Turns out doing favours for Daedra, something the (very) irreligious Elf has traditionally stayed away from, has it's benefits after all and whilst she didn't exactly agree to be Meridia's representative on Nirn, she'll chuck her the odd favour, quid pro quo, as it were...

This post has been edited by PhonAntiPhon: Apr 11 2014, 06:17 AM

Genevieve now has seven of the eight masks, and the last one of course is in Skuldafn, and she's not advanced the MQ far enough to get that. She left Delphine at Sky Haven Temple, so she wouldn't keep bumping into her around the towns, but it looks like she'll have to get involved again if she wants the last mask. So it may be a trip to talk to Arngeir next.

Game-wise, Eilidh is stocking up on provisions amongst the bandits just outside Whiterun. She's setting off for Helgen once more.
Back in the Bannered Mare, Uthgerd has learnt painfully that picking a fist fight with the Bosmer is a bad move.
(Thanks to the fact that all NPCs are nonessential, it was briefly fatal as well, or unconscious if you will...).

The trail leads back to Helgen for Him, but the amulet; well the amulet is proving trickier to locate thanks in large part to the owner of that stupid museum in Dawnstar. Eilidh will do what she needs to do, I think...

In the fanfic: Eilidh and Larellee are still dancing around each other between Helgen and River wood. An update *is* coming soon!
Eagle-eyed readers will note that Larellee has never been mentioned ingame...
...more on that later.

This post has been edited by PhonAntiPhon: Apr 15 2014, 07:47 PM

Mycharonna the Ice Witch just returned to the Sanctuary, where she reported on the death of Vittoria Vici. Astrid congratulated my witch for getting the job done, but refused to give her any compensation. Apparently, Vici was supposed to die exactly as she was giving one of her little speeches.

It's no big deal. Mych is getting extremely wealthy either way. She's got well over 30,000 gold stashed away back at Anise's Cabin. She has no desire to buy an actual house, does not buy horses, doesn't buy anything except rare ingredients, raw meat, and occasional odd items she finds curious.

Eilidh finds herself in Riften, pretty much the only place she's remotely appreciated - if only for her "skills" - although fairly obviously she's always sort of fitted in, though as you can imagine she pretty much considers herself better than everyone else.
But then, so does everyone else in Riften.
The trail had gone cold at Helgen and Skybound Watch had proved a bust. If she can't get what she wants in Riften...
...there may be "favours" involved, though.

On a side note she's playing with fire again, nightly activities include going through various of the good people of Riften's domiciles for coin and trinkets. The phrase "Ne'er sh*t where ye eat" is not one that our Bosmer has ever had much truck with...