New Things, post something you've never seen before in Skyrim. Options

[Lopov]

The other day I discovered a small bandit camp a distance south of Riverwood. If you follow the dirt path and leave Riverwood through the south gates, the path eventually branches. Following the left path you'll arrive to this small camp where two bandits will kindly try to kill you. Following the right path brings you to the main road leading north to Helgen.

[SubRosa]

Oh yes, that is the one up on the mountain side above Riverwood. They even have a campfire, some sleeping mats, and a skill book (forget which one though). So it is a nice place to camp out, after you throw the dead bandits off the cliff.

[Lopov]

It's the Warrior skill book, I remember this because Lucius took it. He's on an unofficial quest to find all four books from Reven, namely Beggar-Thief-Warrior-King. So far he found Thief and Warrior.

[ghastley]

The other day, while I was play-testing the Orc Stronghold, my character went down to the river to look for an iron vein. There are a couple near the mudcrabs' island. As she was getting close, a couple of wolves decided to hunt one of the mudcrabs. It backed into the water, where it could fight, but the wolves couldn't.
Result: Mudcrab 2, Wolves 0.

And who said the AI in Skyrim was dumb? Of course, it didn't spare the mudcrab, as I needed the ore it was guarding.

[Lopov]

1) During the quest in the main questline, where you have to locate Esbern in Riften, Lucius and Lydia spotted a Khajiit that was following them. Whenever they went, she followed, and when talked to, she said "Pff. Go away, if you know what's good for you." After talked to, she Later it turned out that she was a Thalmor spy and she attacked them when leaving Riften with Esbern.

2) Arcwind Point! Do I have to say anything else? This ruin is stunning, since yesterday it's definitely my favorite ruin in Skyrim although not having any interior areas. It is huge and takes a lot of time to explore fully, when I thought that I've seen it all, I discovered another area. Maybe I haven't even seen it all yet.

[Renee]

Wow, a khajiit spying for Thalmor elves! Never would have guessed this.

It could be that you are traveling too near the fort, preventing the cell from resetting.

Yeah, could be this.

Some 'bird screeching' soft noises ahead that quickly get louder. Buffy and Superian are almost engulfed in a huge flock of passing bats for a couple seconds. Just as quickly, the bats moved on, out of sight. We didn't know what to think. Instinctively, Superian stopped and Buffy unshouldered her bow. She wondered if it was precurser to a vampire attack? Nope, just a big flock of bats probably on a bug hunt.

Heh huh I've seen this too! It's so weird because it's hard to tell if those bats are based on something from Dawnguard, or if they are just a very rare random occurance of Skyrim itself.

This post has been edited by Renee Gade IV: Feb 1 2015, 08:35 PM

[Acadian]

Someone mentioned finding an overturned cart of books. I had never seen that, but Buffy discovered it (or one of them?) north of Rorikstead in kind of a blind canyon. Neat!

Oh, she just discovered something else she has never found. Some stonehenge-looking stones out on the tundra with three of those Nordic puzzle things that you set to the correct critter. That lets a nearby handle open a grate over a shallow pit with a treasure chest. Nothing fancy, but unmarked on the map and something new for her. Here's the exact location:

[ghastley]

Oh, she just discovered something else she has never found. Some stonehenge-looking stones out on the tundra with three of those Nordic puzzle things that you set to the correct critter. That lets a nearby handle open a grate over a shallow pit with a treasure chest. Nothing fancy, but unmarked on the map and something new for her.

That's about the only instance of that kind of puzzle where the solution isn't shown right next to it. I wonder if they put it there for feedback during beta?

[Acadian]

It did take her some time and head scratching, but she did find the three clues for setting each of the three figures.

[ghastley]

And that reminds me that they did get a bit more subtle with Yngol's Barrow, and Ansilvund, where you have to read and interpret a book for the solution.

[Acadian]

Dungeon puzzles for me are normally a big turn off. I simply get frustrated and go to a walk through. Happily, I've found that, between Buffy and I, we can solve the ones in Skyrim all by ourselves. So if that means Skyrim is 'dumbed down', bring it on!

[Renee]

Dungeon puzzles for me are normally a big turn off. I simply get frustrated and go to a walk through. Happily, I've found that, between Buffy and I, we can solve the ones in Skyrim all by ourselves. So if that means Skyrim is 'dumbed down', bring it on!

Man, you should see some of the word puzzles in TES 1: Arena then. You literally are not given any sort of 'multiple choice' answer like we get in Skyrim, you have to come up with the answer on your own, then hit 'ENTER' on the keyboard.

[ghastley]

Dungeon puzzles for me are normally a big turn off. I simply get frustrated and go to a walk through. Happily, I've found that, between Buffy and I, we can solve the ones in Skyrim all by ourselves. So if that means Skyrim is 'dumbed down', bring it on!

Man, you should see some of the word puzzles in TES 1: Arena then. You literally are not given any sort of 'multiple choice' answer like we get in Skyrim, you have to come up with the answer on your own, then hit 'ENTER' on the keyboard.

Since I did Daggerfall after Oblivion, I was stuck for a long time entering Daggerfall Castle, where you have to answer the challenge of the doorkeeper, by actually typing "yes". It's not exactly a puzzle, but when you're not expecting text entry to be part of the UI...

[Lopov]

The most "difficult" riddle for me so far was the one on Solstheim where you have to swing the energy sword in exact directions to open the sealed door. It wouldn't be a problem if I was playing with the crosshair but because I don't, my swings weren't exact enough so when I accidentally swung in the right direction, I didn't even know what did I do. I managed to unseal the door without cheating but when I later read the UESP and found this sentence...

...and center your cross-hairs directly on one of the bright...

...I realized why I had problems.

Another one which gave me some thought, is the one in Volskygge where you have to press animal totems in the correct order. You have some hints in the book but I remember that I had minor troubles figuring out the correct order.

[Renee]

I figured out Volskyyge once on my own. But the last two times I went in there, I couldn't figure it. I went on UESP and cheated, for once.

Yeah, I haven't even started Daggerfall yet. I'm looking forward to more complexity, but it'll be interesting spending sooo much time on things which we normally breeze through in later games.

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I have a New Thing to report. Okay, Claire goes into Bits & Pieces to buy and sell. This is the shop in Solitude. She goes in there, and Sayma is nowhere to be seen. We stand there, my character starts thinking Sayma's been attacked, or something.

But then a boy comes out from one of the back rooms in this shop. He says "You're not supposed to be in here right now.", something like this. He then warned us he was going to call the guards. All of this would have made sense if Claire broke into the place at night, but this happened right around noon.



This post has been edited by Renee Gade IV: Feb 22 2015, 02:01 PM

[Lopov]

She probably nipped off to the loo and told her son to tell any customers to leave until she returns. Nothing wrong with that.

[Lopov]

I found a fur helmet the other day. For the first time! At first I thought that it's from some mod but then I read that it's a rare piece of armor, found only in a few specific locations.

[SubRosa]

That is true, you don't see them too often, and you cannot smith them - or any of the Fur armor - in the vanilla game. I recall you can find one fur helmet in the Nordic ruin down near Orphan Rock. With the two small ruins that are connected by a tunnel. Skybound Watch and North Skybound Watch!

[ghastley]

Another location is the Dainty Sload - also a source of Scimitars after you eliminated the Alik'r mercenaries, and a mysterious gem, if you're collecting those.

[Lopov]

And another location is White River watch, that's where I found it. It's on an end table in the circular room with several bedrolls.