A fun and bewitching episode!

'Way ester Dan Sharowbanich Wwine.'
- - More kick too, I'd wager. . . .

What do you mean by grey skin problem? Missing textures for faces? Is that because you use some body replacer mods? I was actually contemplating this mod, even though I am not keen on having to play KoTN to get to it.

From the description;

“KNOWN CONFLICTS AND WORKAROUNDS
HGEC Based Body Replacers - If you use a HGEC based body replacer, you will find that skin textures are out of alignment for the Ayleid Armour. This is aesthetic only and does not affect gameplay. Nephenee13 has made a conversion that fixes this.”

With this bug there would be grey splotches in the body. A leg or half the back or one arm would be grey. It was hard to ignore. I’m unable to find the Nephenee conversion.

With OCOv2 the grey skin issue is noticeable with custom faces in many mods. It is noticeable in Pym’s face. Look closely and you’ll see the grey shadow in the face. Pym isn’t too bad and I’ve seen worse
OCOv2 also has a similar issue with Khajiit bodies. Instead of turning grey the mismatched skin patches are brown. I was able to find a fix for that.

Sorry no pictures, I used to have some examples but I don’t have them readily available. They’re not in my bug folder and I’m not sure where I filed them.

Oh I see - thanks! I read that but my eyes temporarily glazed over as I don't use any body replacers... I guess I should be Ok then! Now all I need to do is to find a suitable character who would be willing to undertake the KoTN quest, because Lena is definitely not doing it. She put a poisoned apple into the prophet's pocket on the very first night she couldn't sleep due to his shouting. In another life, that is.

20211117 Kvatch Rebuilt bypassing a bug

This is in response to an issue I encountered with Kvatch Rebuilt back in March 2018. After many attempts to find a workable solution and just plain ignoring it I’ve decided it would be best to just bypass Kvatch Rebuilt Sticks and Stones quest. I don’t like using setstage. I’ve experience game breaking issues before when using it.

It was a beautiful sunrise when we waved good-bye to Fiona as we left Shadowcrest Vineyard ready to go vampire hunting in Kvatch County. Why is it we still refer to the area as Kvatch County? The city is pile of rubble and the count is dead. Tradition, I guess.

“You know,” I mentioned to the Ladies as we walked along. “Fiona’s making good progress but I think the latest batch has a serious side effect. I can’t remember a thing after the first sip.”

As we walked I sang a happy little tune:

I don't want a pickle
Just want to ride on my motorsickle
And I don't want a tickle
'Cause I'd rather ride on my motorsickle
And I don't want to die
I just want to ride on my motorcy...cle
(Arlo Guthrie)

For the next hour or so my Ladies laughed and whispered amongst themselves.
Passing through Skingrad we made a quick stop at Castle Skingrad in hopes of negotiating building materials for Kvatch. As usual our contact, Monk Arnand (Kvatch Rebuilt) never shows.

He seems to be stuck in one of the Castle’s buildings (seems to be a persistent intermittent bug to the Sticks and Stones quest and Better Cities).

Deciding to bypass talking to Monk Arnand (setstage armain01 30) we learn that if we want to speak to the Count the count would like a favor done first. The Count has ordered a special delicacy from Somutius Entius, it is late, and the Count wants to know why.

The house of Somutius Entius lies just to the west of Skingrad. Somutius is home and when questioned he explains goblins from the north have stolen the Count’s supplies. Taking these excellent Morrowind like directions (HA!) we head north. How could we get lost?

Actually we didn’t have to go very far. Just north of the gold road we came across Green Fall Mine where we were attacked by a goblin. This must be the place I told my Ladies. Prepared for some fun we entered the Green Fall Mine.

It was just a small tribe of goblins, easily taken care of. We found the Count’s supplies, a bottle of a strange red liquid. Yeah, we know what it is. The Count is not fooling us. We know why there are no public executions in Skingrad. We can only guess as to why this bottle is so special.

Taking the supplies back to Somutius Entius, Somutius tells us to take it to Monk Arnand. From Somutius Entius’ house we can see Skingrad to the east. For a moment we stand there contemplating what we should do next. Delivering the bottle of special red liquid to the monk should be sufficient for Arnand to get us an audience with the count.

Yes, it should be. Only Arnand still won’t cooperate. We give up waiting around for Arnand and Count Hassildor and leave Skingrad.

It was late in the day when we arrived at Kvatch. Everyone has moved to a tent city setup inside the city walls. Other than that the rebuilding of Kvatch has come to a standstill. Finding Savlian Matius just outside the tent city we ask him what he knows about the vampires in the county.

Nothing apparently, Savlian will not talk about vampires but he has plenty to say about not getting the supplies needed to rebuild the city. It’s been two years and nothing.

I tried to explain that Monk Arnand is being uncooperative. With the typical Kvatch attitude Savlian suggests cutting through the red tape and going straight to the source.

Pushing back my fear of breaking the fragile threads of fate I relent and for a second time in less than two days I recite the most powerful spell “statuo scaena a r principalis 01 80” (setstage armain01 80).

I know the words but I’m never sure of the phrasing. Must have work though for I received feedback that Count Hassildor has given the OK to send masons and architects to help rebuild Kvatch. After informing Savlian help should be on the way by tomorrow, the Ladies and I went to find a vacant tent for the night.

We all agreed that the procurement of supplies could have, should have been handled better.

Ooh mod conflicts... I am glad you are making progress with Kvatch though - I am curious to read how that pans out. I looked at Kvatch Rebuilt for my own game, but I never delivered the Amulet of Kings in this playthrough, so we are still in pre-crisis Tamriel. Kvatch Rebuilt didn't have anything for us. They say in the description the pre-crisis Kvatch is very alpha. That's an understatement. It's an embryo of a pre-alpha, at best. I guess they focussed on rebuilding the city after the crisis.

I see Janus Hassildor is still alive and well... Well... you know.

(Ballad Of The) Hip Death Goddess is awesome, right? I love that lady's voice. And the guitar work is stellar. We always hear of San Francisco's psychedelic scene, and London, and L.A., so it's nice to know that Boston also had their own scene. Whoever would have thunk this without the internet to explore?

Anyway I have a lot to catch up to so give me time.

This post has been edited by Renee: Nov 20 2021, 05:30 PM

Poor Jandaga. Any chance he'll ever start traveling with a band of blokes?

Oh my gosh. Okay yeah, Gweden Farm. That's ghastley's mod. I get it now. One of these days one of mine is going to round up all those ladies.

Sometimes, macole, I get the sense that your writings include references, but I have no idea what these references could be. I usually pick up the psychedelic songs, but for instance what does this mean...



'It has unbalanced his Id' is triggering some memory for me. Or am I way off?

After all these years, I still remember that scene with Knights of the Nine.

Season of the Witch! Loved Donovan when I was like 6 years old. Sunshine Superman and Mellow Yellow. Do you know Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin) played all the guitars on those albums? Listen closely, you can hear his somewhat sloppy guitar work even as he strums.

Whoa, I don't think I've ever seen Jandaga without his armor. That's a great pic of him sitting with Fiona. Her outfit is wicked, too.

Apparently, the Jandaga takes off his armour every night when he goes to bed (I know it because he tells us about putting it back on in the morning). But we never get to see the pics!!!

Yes I make lots of references. The Id, the inner mind, is a reference to an old Sci-Fi movie. For an idea of what happens when the Id become unbalanced watch The Forbidden Planet.

The ‘60s were my teen years. I was 16 in 1966 when Donovan was hitting the charts.

Kaleah snuck in to make sure the mind altering experience worked and took a picture of her Feache with Fiona. The scent of Incense and Peppermint told Kaleah everything was going to plan.

Oh, have you heard of the band Pink Fairies? Uncle Harry's Last Freak Out and War Girl are perrty good.

Whoa. I think I'm too young for that pic! Lena, will that suffice for you?

Love those sci fi lazers! That'd be trippy to watch "on" something. Haven't heard of Pink Fairies, I'll check them songs in a few.

Whoah... Fiona is wearing GLOVES to bed? I think i'm too young for that too...

Haha, nice workaround on that mod. If I recall, we were able to get Kvatch Rebuilt to work okay and ended up with a nice finished city.

Rest assured the gloves are not enchanted with such things like increased endurance and agility. Fiona is a 1st class witch and has no need for such things. Rather they are to protect someone's back from Fiona's long talon like finger nails.

20211123 VH-OVB Fort Hastrel

We left Kvatch after receiving word from Savlian that masons and architects from Skingrad had arrived. By the time we return to Kvatch I’m certain there will be a significant change in the look of the city. We may even be able to place a bet in a new arena.

Roland had given us three places where the vampires had been seen. With Kvatch being a dry well we headed for the second location on the list, Lord Drad’s estate. It’s fun to see lord and Lady Drad toiling away in the fields but neither the Drad’s nor the Ogres have anything to say about vampires.

Perhaps the residents of Sutch would know something about the vampires? Didn’t hurt to check but nothing was gained by it. Well, can’t say nothing was gained. While in Sutch we did pick up 7000 septims in profits from our winery.

Still without any clues to the origin of the vampire infestation we head east to Camp Ales, the last location where these vampires have been said to gather.

As we near Camp Ales we pass by the ruins of Fort Hastrel. Something attacks us. Was it durzogs, wolves or combination of both I don’t remember but something gave us pause to look intently at the ruins. Eager to see some action we decide to explore the ruins. We made our preparations before entering the doors of Fort Hastrel.

Kaleah wrinkled her nose and hissed, “Take care my precious Feache, there’s an army of vampires here.”

She wasn’t wrong. As we began descending a wide staircase a voice called out a warning and we were soon under siege by chameleon cloaked vampires. First one, then joined by another, and another until we were fighting a small army of vampires.

During the fight the Light of Dawn collected the life force of its 300th vampire. The change was almost immediate. Cleansed of the fowl taint it’s now sharper, cuts more deeply and irradiates whatever creature that feels its wrath with the fire and light of the morning sun. Now with the power potential to instantly destroy vampires, the Vampire's Bane has at last come to shine as the sun rays at dawn.

The light magic effect could be better but it sure is fun to see high level vampires flying after just a couple of hits.

The fight was brutal and when it was done 13 vampires lay dead in the hall. And that was just the beginning. Soon we stood facing the door leading to Fort Hastrel’s Keep.

Again the fighting was fast and furious. We delivered the final cure to 10 more vampires. Among them lay the Abbot, the High Guardian of the Temple, Brother Northstar, Sister Janiss and Brother Sunrasth.

Elenya found it rather revolting to find these five vampires dressed as religious figures. She wondered whether they were just posing as religious to gain the confidence of the unsuspecting Kvatch survivors or were they actually trying to form a vampire religious order. The note from the Abbot references someone called the Night Lord.

“The End is Near. The Night Lord comes.” What does that mean? Who is this Night Lord? Maybe Roland will have an answer.

The battle was over, standing amid the carnage Kaleah pointed to the large central column, “On top of that platform is the War Axe of Seduction. Want to fly up and get it?”

It took some doing but we managed to collect all the useless junk for recycling and clean up the mess we made of Fort Hastrel. Tired and looking forward to the journey to the Imperial City we found a suitable place and bed down for the night.

Well rested we were in a very good mood when we left Fort Hastrel the next morning. With a skip and a dance to our step I broke out in a song.

Superman or Green Lantern ain't got a-nothin' on me
I can make like a turtle and dive for your pearls in the sea, yeah
A you-you-you can just sit there a-thinking on your velvet throne
'Bout all the rainbows a-you can a-have for your own

Kaleah touched my hand and her voice joined mine.

When you've made your mind up forever to be mine
I'll pick up your hand and slowly blow your little mind
When you've made your mind up forever to be mine.

Pym tugged at Kaleah’s arm to get her attention. Flashing a series of intricate hand signs Pym asked Kaleah, “I know he’s our super dreamy aelf but what’s this Green Lantern thing?”

Kaleah just smiled and told her, “You’re too young for that sort of thing.”

Once Kahleah finally sniffed out those vampires, the crew did some serious ash kicking! Loved seeing Twinkle in that screenshot.

20211128 Integration-SL - Monopoly II, Infested Mine Labor Dispute

“Twenty-four vampires in that small fort, could it get any better?” Kaleah laughed. “Ah, hahahahahahaha.”

“I don’t know,” I replied while trying to rub the pain out of my back. “I sure didn’t expect that.”

“You know you’re getting quite the reputation as “someone who likes to be slaughtered”, Elenya mentioned.
We all laughed at that one.

With Magnus glaring brightly on our backs we struck out westward in search the Ayleid ruin of Niryastare.

“I thought we were going to the Imperial City? Elenya asked dejectedly.

“While we’re in the vicinity I need to look into a couple of outstanding issues for the Stranded Light. Don’t worry, it won’t take long and you’ll be back at the Goddess Store before you know it.”

Niryastare, a medium-sized Ayleid ruin northwest of Kvatch not known for much other than containing a few undead. How were we to know that we’d run into a company of necromancers, a nether lich, and their ghostly servants!

Fighting our way through Niryastare and Niryastare Silaseli we came across a dead Ohmes-raht, J’therrin. On him we found a note from someone named Shivaya. The note ordered J’therrin to take his men and search the entire ruin of Niryastare for the Focus Crystal. The note made it clear that the Mages Guild must not recover the focus Crystal.

Shivaya, isn’t she the Kahjiit we met near Borderwatch?

While we hadn’t found any trace of a focus crystal, the note from Shivaya that the Ohmes-raht had with him shed some light on where the Focus Crystal went. If the five necromancers we had just dispatched were J’therrin’s men perhaps they had found the Focus Crystal? No, it wasn’t on any of them. So either Shivaya has it or… I have no idea. We’ll have to take this back to Jo’beala and see what she has to say about it.

It was not entirely a wasted effort though. We left Niryastare with a few notable items; 2 varla stones, 7 Welkynd stones, and a fine Adonney Guardian Longblade.

Traveling north toward Chorrol we climbed the mountains to the top of Suicide Falls. At the lake above the falls an Imperial Forester stood on the sandy beach looking out over the water. Walking up to him he greeted us and said.

“It’s beautiful here. I often come up here when things get a bit testy at home. The wife just doesn’t get my love of nature.”

A spriggan suddenly appeared at the edge of the forest and stood silently waiting as a gentle breeze rustled the long green wispy sprigs on her head (hair?). We instantly drew our weapons.

“Please, put them away,” the Forester said. Then he calmly walked up to the spriggan, took her by the twigs (hand?), and then they disappeared into the woods.

Well I’ll be. Kaleah made a statement that when politely translated it went something like; “I don’t understand his love of nature either.

“Show respect for the man who loves nature for he is favored in Nature’s House. So it is written in the Great Druid’s Book,” said Elenya.

There we rested along the shores of the small Suicide Falls Lake. A peaceful brief stop for lunch turned into playful afternoon swim and a night under the stars. The Forester was right, it is beautiful here.

Lock a Bosmer and a Zombie in a room, and you'll get either two Zombies, or a fat Bosmer and half of a Zombie. I put my money on the latter.

In the morning, well rested and ready to go the Jandaga performs his devotions before he and his Ladies enjoy a quiet lakeside breakfast. After breakfast the little band continue their journey north to Chorrol. They barely got to the north end of the lake when Kaleah called out.

“Look there’s a cave under the falls!”

“That should be Infested Mine,” Elenya offered after checking her dynamic map.

“Do you wonder why it’s called Infested Mine?” I asked. “I say, let’s find out.”
So in we went.

By the Goddess of all creation, what did we step into!

It’s a full scale labor revolt and the zombie slave laborers are taking their anger at management out on us.

Labor leader Valvius Nigilius’ (MOO) negotiating style is rather cruel. My Ladies decided I should give him a lesson in manners. He won’t be so obnoxious from now on or anything else for that matter. It was nice of him to give me his real nice bow in exchange for the lesson humility.

Zombies just keep on coming. Where are they coming from? Kaleah thinks she knows and takes a lift down to the Old Works lower level (Snus). The rest of us use the ladder to follow. Exploring deeper into the lower level we discover the source of the zombie infestation. It’s an oblivion gate to a zombie world (Snus). Every couple minutes it pops out three zombies to attack us.

Not knowing how to turn the gate off my Ladies shield me from the zombies while I loot a fancy looking chest (Snus). I’m able to collect among other things a Skull of Carnage (MOO). With the chest empty we hightail as fast as we could out of Infested Mine.

Oh wow, what a rollercoaster ride! From the nature-loving forrester (his wife is right - he is cheating on her - with a spriggan! ) to the zombie labour revolt... At first I thought the zombies were the labourers that were revolting... Well, revolting they were, anyway. Oops. Good job sorting them out!

Have you tried Oblivion Randomiser? If your head wasn't sufficiently messed up by OOO, MOO and MMM already, that is.

Which variant of Dynamic Map are you using, by the way? Does it have the entire Tamriel? (We need maps, or Lena will never get to Elsweyr. And if I work on maps instead of travelling, she won't get there either. )

Some fun Nyryastare Necro-huntin’.

A forrester and spriggan do make an odd couple. He was indeed right though about it being beautiful there. That night sky reflects the best of both Skyrim and Shivering Isles night skies.

’Lock a Bosmer and a Zombie in a room, and you'll get either two Zombies, or a fat Bosmer and half of a Zombie.’

Well, I guess we know what Infested Mine is infested with. Time to send in some hungry Bosmer?

I found something else in my game.

I thought that location was familiar.