Welcome to Skyrim Acadian!! I trust your journey north was pleasant enough

The magic system can certainly take some getting used to, glad to see you're getting the hang of it.

The mountains west and north of Markarth...

In Dawnstar.

Hiking from Falkreath to Morkarth.

Whaat? Hold everything!

You got Skyrim? When? .. O h wait, is this Buffy going through a modder's version of Skyrim (not the game that Bethesda made, but one that some modders made, like the Elsweyr mod?

Look back at the last page Renee. Acadian has joined us in the frozen northlands, and even now the toon he rolled is beating the game like a red-haired stepchild.

And I must say I am delighted he's joined us.

Aravi is up on the Throat of the World. I restarted her game recently because I could not remember where she was or what she was doing when I last played several months ago. Plus the early levels are my favorite.

Holy [censored] crap. Holy [censored] god [censored].

Sorry. But wow. I had no idea! ]... Wecome amongst us, Acadian. It is Acadian right, and not Buffy?

This post has been edited by Renee Gade IV: May 7 2014, 09:44 PM

Lol. Thanks, Renee! Yes, he's a Breton ranger with rather dispersed skills to check everything out. And he's doing well at level 13 now.

Renee, I got a glimpse of your post before editing and nearly choked to death laughing. I had to explain “Someone is being funny on the Internet” to the family. My response to the news was very similar!!

Acadian, congrats on lucky level 13!

New episode up: Eilidh's story - Fanfic Thread

Did you experiment with different Acadian races? .. I think you said you did this for Oblivion, right? .. What do you think of Steam? .. What do you think of the waterfalls and water in general? .... and and and the dungeons packed with more 'stuff'? .. What quests have you tried? .. And smithing? Isn't smithing fun? .. Sorry but I always knew if you'd try TES 5 I'd have dozens of questions for you.

Ah so you're at level 13; still kind of a newbie, then. One of the things I like about Skyrim is the leveling system isn't so jarring, so far as the way creatures & enemies show up. I mean, stronger enemies sometimes do show up according to level, but Skyrim seems to make this happen more subtly. In my opinion.

Anyways, I'll shush now. So glad you have joined us.


Oopsie!

Renee, thanks for your enthusiastic welcome and questions. So here are some quick-draw observations from this humble Skyrim newb -

I’m playing on PC (of course – I don’t even know how to spell ExBox or PeeS3). No mods at this point however. I’m just working with vanilla and the command console at this point. The version I got starts with all three DLC active.

So, as I said, my character is a Breton ranger. The bow is his main weapon. His back ups are pretty thinly spread so I can experiment with 1H+shield and magic. I remember it took me about a year of heavy play in OB before I really settled into bringing Buffy there. I expect that may occur faster here, but it will take some time and likely some changes to how she does business. Acadian’s job (as ever) is to be the ‘crash dummy’, learn the ropes and, when ready, announce the game ‘fit for elven consumption’. So, at about 50 hours, here’s some of my observations:

The outdoors areas are beautiful, in a gritty but majestic way. And the water & waterfalls are spectacular. On its own, the music is not as impressive as OB’s, but it does fit Skyrim very well. The dungeons are simply magnificent in their attention to detail.

Archery and sneak work great. 1H melee is fine (have not tried dual weapons or 2H). I simply love blocking, and shield bashing is very neat. In fact, I also love bow bashing when it becomes required in a pinch. Because I am experimenting with lots of skills, leveling is quite a bit faster than I’d like. The perk system seems okay so far.

Magic is very showy but (and I knew this going in) I certainly miss the ability to combine and make custom spells to suit the nature of a particular character. Equipping and casting is quite cumbersome – in fact that’s the reason I’m using sword & board as backup to the bow; I can tell it will take loads of time and practice for my old fingers to get comfortable enough with how the spells work to rely on them when things get hectic.

Although I’m not impressed with the idea of fighting dragons, I realize that some sort of epic save the world main quest is probably necessary to sell games. That said, it seems no better nor worse than the daedra invasion main quest in OB. That said, I have the main quest on hold for now.

As I gain knowledge and comfort with the game, I’m sure there will be some mods that I’ll want to look into. KC was really my coach to get things going and has helped answer plenty of questions. I’ve not had any problems with Steam.

I remember being quite put off by ‘Morrowind Elitism’ when I began playing OB and vowed to never become an ‘Oblviion Elitist’. I tried very hard to approach Skyrim with an open mind and embrace change. The game clearly ‘passes the test’ and is welcome on my puter alongside OB. I’m inspired by Grits’ example of treating the two games as simply exploring differing provinces.

Yep yeup very good. Smart. Take it slow.



Ha ha big surprise! .. Funny thing is, as much as I love bowplay with Saga down in Cyrodiil, I haven't had a character that's really embraced this so far in Skyrim. My characters (so far) have mostly been choosing an NPC follower who's good with Archery.



I figured you'd like this. Although I've only had one 'swimmer' in Sky ( a cold-water loving Nord, of course) whenever one of mine walks through some water I can't help but put the camera under the surface, just to see the ripples & reflections.



Mods.



I didn't even touch the Main Quest until a few months ago. So don't feel any rush to get on it, there's plenty else to do. I also have a prob with dragons. It's not the dragons themselves, it's the fact that in the vanilla game they show up so damn often. I've got a guy doing the MQ on Xbox (it's spelled Xbox ) but I abandoned his game back in February after one particularly annoying dragon attack.

Somebody here recently pointed out why the drag attacks are so frequent; it's due to Shouts. On consoles especially, most gamers are in a hurry to get the most Shouts (and therefore the most Trophies or Achievements) as possible, and so this means dragons need to show up more than it seems they should. This offends an old-skool gamer like myself, though. In the table-games, dragons rarely showed up; maybe a 1 in a 100 chance on most dice-rolling charts.


Heh, I'm actually doing the same with Elder Scrolls Online. I have heard so many bad things about it, but I don't want to pass judgement because I'm not actually playing it. Well anyways, thanks for your assessment, and happy gaming Acadian.

Tirdas, 4:26 AM, 23rd of Mid Year

Mycharonna has just arrived in Winterhold, and has found the Frozen Hearth Inn. She will be staying here, playing the part of a studious & curious mage from Cyrodiil, come to Skyrim to sharpen her skills in magic.

Who knows what mayhem she'll cause while she's here? .. I don't. There's a chance she might just fly under the radar, feed on nobody, and leave this hamlet unscathed. Then again....
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Middas, 7:29 PM, 24th of Mid Year

Lol moment: When Mych approached the college she met Faralda, of course. Faralda gives her little test, and I'm thinking this'll be a snap. Mycharonna is definitely my most powerful magic-user to ever approach the college. I'm thinking 'Destruction spell? Sure! Conjuration? We can do that..."

So what does Faralda want my vamp to cast: a frigging Restoration spell! Healing Hands! Mycharonna never uses Restoration!

Well, she did it. Cast her first and only Restoration spell, just to get in the College. This is important. She's got over 20,000 golds, so she's easily going to walk out of this place with a fattened spell book.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1:53 AM

She did it! Bought the following spells: Summon Dremora, Summon Storm Atronach, Expel Daedra, Dread Zombie, Invisibility (yes!), Frenzy, Wall of Frost, and Ice Spear. NOW let's see who's the boss of Mych. Another funny: now that she's got the spells she needs, she's literally going to leave. No Mage's College quests at all. Even Skankee Krahk-ho did a few of the early College quests. Then again, Skank was more interested in stealing and snooping around than Mycharonna.
-----------------------------------------------------
Fredas, 7:07 PM, 25th of Mid Year

She left the College but couldn't leave the village itself, due to sunlight. So she spent the day in the Frozen Hearth, nothing she could do about this. By the time she awoke she gained Stage 4, so all the innsfolk were freaking out! .. Thankfully Winterhold is such a small place. It was easy for her to escape, as guards and citizens now tried their best to burrrn the vampire!

This post has been edited by Renee Gade IV: May 10 2014, 10:07 PM

I wonder what Mycharonna's gonna get up to now she's upgraded her arsenal...

Yeah Vital I can't wait. Mych tends to 'come out and play' only on really gloomy days (here on Earth) so next time it's like this, I'll be able to tell her tales. I'm pretty psyched. Some of the mage's she's been encountering lately have been pretty pwnish, she often winds up running away. Well no more of that nonsense.

Well, it's been almost two weeks of pretty intense Skyrim play. My first ranger guy made it to level 19 before I decided to let Buffy have a try. She's taken about 4-5 iterations of herself up to level 7-8 using bow + differing options of support skills. Each time, we start off from Riverhold in a different direction on the map as well, so we are learning quite about about this frozen land and how to optimize the skills needed to survive. Learning a lot and, overall, liking it quite a bit. Still playing pure vanilla.

Good to know, and good to have you up north.

Mycharonna was successful with taking down Fort Kostav, this is one of those tougher mage-forts where they throw chain lightning in droves. My vamp managed to take them all down by casting Dremora Lords. The mages were able to defeat one of these, but what about another? And another? ... Eventually, they all fell, those dreadful mages.

She's also been having a blast with Invisibility. I gave her the Expert Illusion perk, so she can cast this spell as easily as I can microwave popcorn.

Wow, I am delighted and impressed that Buffy has crossed the mountains! Acadian must be very good at his scouting missions.

Renee, the thought of Mycharonna with all of those powerful spells in her arsenal is terrifying. All of those levels of skulking and scheming have really paid off for her!