Persephone and Serana cleared out the Soul Cairn today. They even found all ten pages of St. Juib's Opus without me having to look for their locations on the UESP Wiki. Now they are back in Tamriel, working their way down the coast toward Solitude.

I enjoyed the creativity of the Soul Cairn, but walking through that part of the questline (and the part when you are trying to find Auriel's Bow) is one of the few times I was glad once it was done, mostly because of all the walking it required. It's rare you'll hear me rant about walking in ES games, I usually enjoy it.

What I do not like about places like the Soul Cairn and Blackreach is the lack of the big map. The mini-map only shows the area immediately around you, even if you scroll it from side to side. So it is hard to tell where you have been and where have not. Sometimes it is hard to tell where you even are.

This afternoon the Dead Duo explorated the coast north of Solitude, knocking off places like Ravenscar Hollow, Broken Oar Grotto, and finally those pirates on the Dainty Sload who had been given a pass on the way to Castle Volkihar.

I decided to try something new, and made Persephone's Two-Handed skill Legendary. That gave me 9 perks back, and so far I only found homes for about half of them. Nothing really dramatic, just a few odds and ends like extending the range of her summonings (not that she summons Darryl much lately), a permanent Muffle so she does not have to cast the spell to be quiet, and the Light Step perk so I don't have to worry about stepping on things (unless someone is riding a horse in front of her ).

Mostly I wanted to try resetting her Two-Handed back down to 15. It has been more of a challenge, but no impossible so far. This ought to help make the game more interesting again. Her Enchanting and Smithing are both at 100 as well, but I don't think I'll bother making them Legendary. I don't know where I would put the extra perks to be honest, and I don't really feel like building either back up again. OTOH, with Two-Handed being Persephone's main fighting skill, it is something she will always be using.

Oh wow, so there are some good reasons to go Legendary. There's been so much confusion about this, what it actually does, how Legendary actually works. WOW a permanent Muffle spell? ... What do you mean by 'extending the range of her summonings?' ... Does this make them last longer? Or she can summon further away? Either way, it does indeed look like Legendary has some advantages. I'll have to try this.

Mych has the Light Step perk, yea that comes in handy for a vampire character who's supposed to be omnipresent. "Ow! Damn, another jaw trap!" I've never seen vamps get mauled by jaw traps in Hollywood.

I’ve never found all ten pages of St. Juib’s Opus. Congrats to the Dead Duo!

I made Jensa’s crafting skills Legendary in her PS3 game so I could fill in her combat perk trees. By then she didn’t need improved or enchanted gear, and she had enough potions to last for another 300 hours of play. She used One-Handed and Two-Handed as well as both Heavy and Light Armor depending on the situation, so she used most of the extra perks. She needed a lot of Block perks to make bashing with her greatsword worth the trouble.

I noticed something odd. When I made Persephone's Two-Handed Legendary it went down to 15. She did not level up again until she got it to 26, and that was after leveling up her Block by at least one point as well. Plus I think she had several skill increases toward leveling up before going Legendary. So it took over 12 Skill increases for her to level up once. I thought it was supposed to be 10 increases and you level? Maybe this is just a bug, I do not know.



It isn't really a spell, it is just the Muffle perk you can get in the Stealth perk tree. It acts the same as the spell is all. The same with extending the range of your summonings. That is a perk you can take twice in the Conjuring tree. It just lets you summon things farther away from where you are (your summoned creatures appear wherever you have your crosshair pointed).




I am in much the same place with Persephone. She ignores all but the Ultimate level potions she finds, anything less is just not worth carrying. She has so many of those that she tried to sell a dozen of them in Windhelm, but the alchemist did not have enough money to buy them! She doesn't need buffed up gear anymore either. She would probably do just fine without any armor at all (I already tried that with Inanna and found it works). But she likes how her Eisen White looks. She stopped using her summoned sword Malediction a long time ago, as it was just too powerful. Her Steel Greatsword has a frost enchantment (the chill of the grave), which I have found is probably the least useful of all the elemental damaging ones, since half the things in the game are resistant to it. That is why I use it!

I think the only Block perk you really need is the one that slows down time when an enemy power attacks you. That makes a big difference. Otherwise it is just a matter of timing your bashes. I have found that if you bash to stagger your opponent and attack in the right rhythm, you will never get hit at all.

SR: Oh I see. I'm pretty sure Mych has a couple of skills rated at 100, and I know Lord Haaf-Mersey does. I should go back to LHM and do a little experimenting perhaps.

The Dead Duo took a boat to Windhelm, where they got involved with the East Empire Company and their problem with pirate attacks. After a quick trip to Dawnstar and back, Persephone led the attack on the secret pirate base. For some reason the game would not let Serana come. But she still had Darryl to back her up when needed. When all was said and done, the sealanes were safe again, and Persephone was reunited with Serana again. When last I left them, they had just walked into Fort Dawnguard with all the Elder Scrolls they had been sent after. Next it is time to talk to Dexy's Midnight Runners Dexion.

That happened with Lord Haaf-Mersey too when he was traveling with Serana and Rayya the Overkiller. Sometimes Serana could come along, sometimes not. Same with Rayya, too.

Are you annoyed to have Serana as a follower? I know you don't like NPC followers in general.

She often gets annoying. All followers do. They always stand in the doorway I want to walk through, and only budge after constantly shoving. I am always getting shot in the back. I am tired of constantly hearing "Yes, what did you need?"

I always found Serana's most annoying trait was resurrecting the goats, skeevers, mudcrabs, and any other relatively innocuous creatures that had died any where near you. Usually they'd been killed by the same area destruction spell that you were busy healing from, and which she'd cast just after you'd killed your target.

It appears that any follower who can do the same will do so, but Serana has those spells with the player giving her a staff or anything. I made that mistake with Kharjo, but I just took the staff back, and that fixed it. Any mage follower does the AoE spell thing, though, and doorways attract them all.

The worst case of door-blocking I've had was my ridable bear chasing a Forsworn into Broken Tower Redoubt and not being able to get around the corner. That blocked the only route in or out, and my usual means of resetting the bear (fast travel to current location) wasn't available because enemies were near. I managed to get in somehow, but I couldn't get out until I'd cleared the whole location - solo, as my follower was blocked out, too.

I'm currently doing Thieves Guild improvement quests with a Khajiit archer/thief. She's the reason I recruited Kharjo this time round, and I'm finding him one of the least annoying followers in the game. Relatively taciturn, and what he does say is agreeable, unlike Serana's whining about the weather.

It is interesting seeing what folks think about the followers. Buffy hired Jenassa, then later hired Eric the Slayer. Both were okay, but she let them go. She just seems to do better by herself.

Buffy has hit it off quite well with Jarl Elisif, as both are young widows - and she is well on her way to becoming a thane of Haafingar. She's already bought the house. I guess the housecarl she'll get is Jordis. Is Jordis a pretty good follower? I know she's a heavy metal girl.

I think I had one character buy Proudspire, but I never had Jordis tag along with them. I imagine she would be the same as Lydia, or any of the other melee-weapon oriented followers.


That drove me nuts too. It seemed that every time I went to loot a body, it would get up and start moaning before I could get their money! Now I use a mod that prevents her from raising any dead.

I don't think there's any significant difference between any of the female Nord housecarls. Lydia, Iona, and Jordis are all steel-armored, one-handed, archery, block. They level-cap at the same point, and probably have the same dialog, and annoying habits. It's hard not to have experienced Lydia, so you already know them all.

The Proudspire house is the one I prefer for a family, as there are a lot of other kids in Solitude to play with. So I generally leave Jordis as house-keeper. Maybe I'll use the CK to give her a more domestic outfit for the next game.

I enjoy followers, it all depends which character I'm with though. Mycharonna prefers solitude, for instance. But yeah, they do some annoying things for sure.



See I found this hilarious! ... I dunno, it just cracks me up that Serana seems to have no boundaries when it comes to her revivals. Who the heck would revive a chicken? I get a kick out of it.


UPDATE: Mycharonna got to the part where she gets to kill Cicero, and the game gives a choice whether or not she'll let him live. It's one of the rare times I paused a game to have a look at UESP > if we let him live, does the DB questline not move forward anymore?

Turns out, it does move forward. That's great. She doesn't want to kill Cicero. Cicero. I know Cicero is annoying. You'd probably hate my game SR and ghastley; I like followers, and I like Cicero.

Jordis is my favorite of the female Housecarls. They’re all pretty much the same, but I think Jordis has the most pleasing voice. Iona gets on my nerves. Rayya of Falkreath has the same voice as Iona. Ugh.

Also Proudspire is a big house so Jordis does not sit around chewing in your ear the whole time you’re home (Iona) or watching you sleep (Lydia). Jordis still keeps a seat warm much of the time, but she’s out of the way. Plus, blonde.

The biggest drawback I find with the Housecarls is that they are not good at sneaking. On the PS3 Argis with a summoning staff and a frost staff made a pretty convincing Jerric. Constant mayhem. Not very stealthy.

Erik the Slayer with a zombie staff is one of my favorite followers. He seems sweet and not overly bright, so “Erik the Slayer’s Mudcrab” just makes me laugh. Besides, mudcrabs are fierce!

Bannor has gotten hopelessly stuck behind his summoned sabre cat a few times. The big fella likes to flop down and rest when there’s no immediate action. Bannor is small. He often has to re-summon the cat (I’m not sure if it’s official but his name might be “Dammit”) so that he can get out of a corner. NPC Jerric was worse than the cat. He would pin Bannor behind a door and then stand there smiling. Of course they both save Bannor’s narrow backside on a regular basis, so he does not complain.

Renee, I’m so glad Mycharonna spared Cicero! I was biting my tongue so as not to spoil it. I’m still biting my tongue.

Thanks all, for the thoughts on Jordis. Well, Buffy's now a Thane of Haafingar! She likes Jordis alot; like Buffy, Jordis seems simple and kind in her manner and that is mostly what Buffy needs. When Jordis said she would protect anything of Buffy's with her life, Buffy said, let's go! Then the two of them went straight to the stable and Buffy bought a beautiful heavy palimino for Buffy to ride and Jordis to protect.

Then it was off on the road toward Markarth to see if we could make the horse work. It takes some getting used to. Buffy is used to slinking along the roads, casting detect life often. Now she is riding, and relying on Heavy Metal Jordis to protect both horse and elf. So far so good. Jordis seems to do pretty well at pinning foes in place so Buffy can maneuver to protect the horse and get a couple mounted shots in.

Naturally, Jordis stays outside dungeons protecting the horse while Buffy ventures inside. If we can make the horse thing work, I know I'll have a very happy elf!

We had a wonderfully 'atmospheric' half hour or so yesterday in the Winking Skeever (Solitude). Buffy just sat by the fire sipping wine while watching and listening to Lisette sing. Wonderful.

Edit: The girls got safely from Solitude to Markarth on their 'horse' test run. Jordis was awesome and Buffy's learning to manage and shoot from the horse.

Thane of Half finger? Hopefully some day she will move up to be a Full-fingered thane...

Fingers or not, it is good to hear that the Buffster is having a good time with her four-legged friends.

Yesterday the Dead Duo took Dexy's advice and went to Ancestor Glade to have the moths read the Elder Scrolls. After fighting off the inevitable vampire attack, they were on their way to Darkfall Cave. Lots of Falmer slayage ensued. Now they are standing in the Forgotten Vale, admiring its icy, pristine beauty.

SubRosa, that sounds like Dawnguard? Buffy's got the College 'paused' before any of the limited faculty there gets killed. And she's Thane of Half-Finger. I do believe Dawnguard might be appropriate for her. . . .

We still consider this to be a good trial and learn playthrough. Buffy's decided that, despite the fact that she's level 30 now, she likes the hunting bow the best. So. . . I helped her with a little Acadian magic to temper her hunting bow up to snuff so she doesn't have to go to a bow she doesn't like as much just to get appropriate-for-level damage.

So at the moment, she's using a real bow (not the bound bow) and mage clothes (no armor). The bound bow can't be used from the saddle and it is also a bit more cumbersome to use (select & cast) instead of just select. Even though Buffy has the quiet cast perk, the flash and noise from conjuring the bound bow while slinking in a dark dungeon feels rather odd compared to silently slipping the bow from her back.

That is Dawnguard. The DG questline opens up some new areas to explore, and adds lots of new stuff. You can play it from the vampire side or vampire hunter side. But be warned, even if you play as a vampire hunter, you have to have a vampire for a sidekick for the entire questline. So it is not for characters absolutely consumed with the desire to kill vamps.

Thanks! Buffy learned from Count Skingrad down in Cyridiil that not all vamps have to be killed on sight. I think Buffy'll stock up on anti-cramping potions and we'll give it a try!

And even if you choose the vampire side, you still end up killing a lot of other vampires - other bloodlines, one assumes. The whole DLC is nicely on the grey side, as you never really identify with either faction, and can play it in more than just the two obvious ways.

Congrats to Haafingar’s newest Thane! Jerric is a big fan of Solitude. The stone-walled heights remind him of Kvatch. The hunting bow is Lildereth’s favorite. She’s using one I modified for her. I’m glad Buffy is finding her way with Skyrim horses.

SubRosa, the Dead Duo are in one of my favorite spots. Thankfully breathing is optional for them so the sights can’t take their breath away.

Valdi has just embarked on the Dawnguard journey. She’s on her way back to the fort to meet up with new recruits. Here’s a picture of Erik enjoying one of Sorine Jurard’s idle markers. He is not known as one of Skyrim’s great thinkers, so maybe he was just scratching his chin.

I absolutely love when Valdi checks back in at Aravi (Lakeview) Manor. Horses, dogs, and chickens everywhere, friends saying nice greetings, and everything she needs growing in the greenhouse and garden.

Valdi has evolved nicely in Skyrim. She stuck with bandit light armor for a long time while using the basic healing spell, war axe, and bow. By the time she got Lakeview Manor built with all of the Jerric’s world NPCs and KC’s Aravi follower settled in she was ready to learn from her mentors. She picked up Block from Jerric, Alchemy from Darnand and Lil (potions/poisons), and Abiene trained her in Restoration. (NPC Abiene had to train her before she moved to Lakeview. Somehow she loses her training dialog when she moves.) In the game Valdi simply started using these skills with the exception of buying more spells and training from Abiene. She’s a very conservative alchemist. She mixes up what she needs and nothing more.

She is still very much a vagabond, though. Lakeview is not her home. She doesn’t really have one. She travels with Erik the Slayer most of the time. Her horse Tage (the grey one) hangs out with the herd at Lakeview unless she’s going to the northern holds. Then she needs to bring more stuff. She’s always worried that what she loves will be taken away, so Tage gets to relax in safety while Valdi hauls the tent all over the province.

It’s interesting to play a young character who is so unsure of herself internally while at the same time she’s aggressive and capable. Fort Dawnguard and the motley crew that has gathered there remind her of her Ma’s gang of smugglers. If she ever thought of a place as her childhood home it would have been some creepy old abandoned fort or ruin. Erik the Slayer’s sunny Rorikstead makes her feel like she’s not good enough, even though she likes to stay there. It doesn’t help that Erik often says how he hates bandits and thieves. Every time she starts to get comfortable he accidentally makes her feel like trash. It looks like there will be two bedrolls in the tent for a while longer.

The remark about Erik scratching his chin makes me think of the intro to Fellowship of the Rings, and how hobbits are not counted as among the very wise...

I am glad to hear that Valdi is still roaming Skyrim. Even though it looks like Erik's careless remarks will insure they remain just friends. Maybe she will take a shine to Serana?

The Dead Duo have spent the last few days clearing the Falmer out of the Forgotten Vale. Today they made their way to the Inner Sanctum and confronted Vyrthur. When they were done, Persephone flung his body off the balcony, down to the frozen lake below. Now it is off to Castle Volkihar, with Auriel's Bow on Persephone's back.

It's good to hear that Valdi is alive and well!

And that Purse-Phone and Serana are happily hunting Forsworn.



Well, Buffy's now a dragon slayer! We are exploring the game, after all, and Buffy actually makes a surprisingly good tester. So we decided to embark on the MQ. And instead of Dawnguard, figure that maybe we'll let the MQ flow into Dragonborn to check that out. If we complete the College questline also, that will be plenty for this playthrough. Then maybe we'll look at some mods and try a different set of quests for the next playthough.

After evaluating what vanilla horses and followers can do, Buffy's back to solo. She's level 31 now and just helped kill her second dragon (the one with Delphine). She's seen a couple randoms, but they have just ignored her. We're finding that dragon fighting for her means lots of bow damage and lots of magic resistance - and she's well set for both. Her weakness (as ever) is to avoid melee at all costs. She's pretty sure one dragon bite can probably kill her if she lets them get close enough.

There are some horse mods out there that improve the riding experience. Though I suspect that you may be investigating them already. There is also a mod that makes Tolfdir the Arch Mage after the end of the College questline (though a few other teachers do get capped along the way). So you can finish it without everyone calling you the boss. In any case, it sounds like Buffy has plenty to do!

Tonight the Dead Duo returned to Fort Dawnguard to gather the troops. Then they marched upon Castle Volkihar and stormed the place. I do have to say, the final battle in the castle and then against Harkon in the cathedral is a good one. While Persephone is not an archer by trade, she still put Auriel's Bow to good use.

After all was said and done, the Dead Duo made a trip back to the Soul Cairn to find Serana's mother, and tell her it was safe to return. This is something I had forgotten to do in Helregin and Hervor's games. She turns back up in her study at the same time you return through the gateway from the Soul Cairn. On the way back, the Dead Duo stopped by the Reaper's Lair in the Soul Cairn. I had collected all the Reaper gems my first time through, but forgot to put them to use. The Reaper is not much to fear. He went down pretty quick, and did not have any interesting loot either.

Afterward Persephone left Serana at Fort Dawnguard and decided to go run some errands on her own, like selling those unknown Falmer books she had found in the Forgotten Vale.

Aww wow that's beautiful, you actually used Auriel's Bow. I think LHM may have fired off one shot (just to see what it does) but he was never an archer. He actually left the Bow at Harkon's castle, under Serana's care.



I'm going to want this one when I start modding Skyirm. The College questline (and Companions) felt too short to me. It's not that these quests are short, it's that my character shows up to the Mage's College (or Jorvaskr) and literally within weeks this char's now running the show. They are now at the top. This position didn't feel 'earned' to me. What bugged me was that some of the NPCs who've been at the College or Jorvaskr longer than me obviously want to be at the top.

I can't provide any examples, but I seem to remember there are snide comments here and there made by these NPCs. Would've made more sense if there were some sort of challenge or duel against one of these others, and so therefore the title of Arch Mage or Harbinger would truly feel earned after fighting for it. That would make more sense than 'okay, here ya go newbie, you win!"

I like Dawngaurd and Dark Brotherhood, in both cases it takes lots of time to make it to the top.

Thanks SubRosa. We'll take the College to the end this playthrough, but then I'm sure we'll want a mod like you mentioned. Buffy's not cut out to be 'in charge' of anything.

So Persephone's going to take a break from Serana. That should be good for a change. I'm guessing she'll still have Darryl on call.

Archmage Tolfdir is the mod. At the end of the College questline it gives you a dialogue option to make him Archmage instead of you.

However, people still call you archmage. You can fix that with these console commands:

player.removefromfaction 103372
player.addtofaction 1F259 4

Basically that takes you out of the Archmage faction, and puts you back in the regular college faction.

That sounds wonderful, SubRosa. Thank you!

Persephone did some puttering around today, exploring the little nooks and crannies she had not been to along the Sea of Ghosts and down the eastern mountains of Eastmarch. She has discovered most of the locations on the world map. I just checked her stats, and it says 305 locations discovered.

Right now she's in Raldbthar, and I think she has a couple places left to find in the valley between Windhelm and Whiterun. After those, she just has High Hrothgar to tackle, and she should have the entire eastern half of the map explored. She has huge swathes of the western half explored already too, thanks to all of her travels. She will probably be my first character to literally see it all.

Wow, Persephone the explorer! I agree that it's fun to uncover lots of places on the map.

I’ve enjoyed the Thieves Guild much more with the main questline slowed down (by a mod). Marius has done all of the city influence quests necessary to get the new vendors installed in the Ratway, but he still has work to do before Brynjolf gives him the third big quest. I set the conditions so that he would need 50 in Lockpicking, Sneak, and Pickpocket plus a random number of city quests, so even I am not sure when he’ll get the next big task.

Marius is still a nervous pickpocket, so he likes to train with Vipir the Fleet. This drains his gold faster than his former skooma habit. (He kicked it a while ago after a fellow addict from a mod offered to help him relax. That was it for Marius. He switched to moonsugar and then mead.) So rather than getting drawn into adventures Marius is doing what he does best, sneaking around and stealing stuff.

He recently decluttered the Blue Palace as well as several of the nicer houses in that neighborhood. He spotted Falk Firebeard in Irnskar Ironhand’s bedroom at two in the morning. Irnskar was sleeping while Falk sat in a chair drinking. Falk did not spot Marius even though Marius nearly soiled his britches in surprise at the sight of Falk. He’s not sure who Falk was visiting in Bryling’s house at night. Bryling and her maid were also awake in a different room. Irnskar may not be the focus of Falk’s attention.

Next Marius is headed out to the Reach in the hope that the city dwellers have some good stuff to steal. He brings Rune along on the road trips. Rune usually waits nearby when Marius is on a job, but sometimes he really needs backup.

Marius sneaked his way past nearly all of the Falmer and chaurus in Irkngthand. It was a good thing he managed it because the two Falmer he had to fight after Karliah and Brynjolf woke up the Dwarven centurion nearly killed him. There’s no way he would survive one big chaurus much less the swarm they found. All three of them made it silently along the pipes. It was fun.

Oh, and he had no problem letting the other two deal with the centurion. They both stepped in bear traps multiple times on the way in. Marius was disgusted by that performance and ready to let them reap the whirlwind. Also he was bleeding to death and chugging his entire supply of potions so they got to be badasses while he crawled around picking up arrows for a few minutes.

He still travels with Rune and Thrynn, mostly in case they meet a dragon. He and one guard had to fight one in Winterhold. It was a huge pain in the neck. Now he has better weapons and a rain of arrows is better than a trickle. Marius is not Dragonborn or any kind of hero, but letting dragons burn and freeze everything without consequence would be bad for business. If he meets another dragon he’ll do his best to take it down.

Valdi likes to explore even when she’s on an assignment. Today she found Lost Prospect Mine while looking for the Dawnguard canyon. (It moved when I installed a mod.) I had never seen Lost Prospect before. It’s a tiny place with a story to discover if you’re willing to scramble around and get wet. Valdi is very willing. She knows the kinds of places that bandits hide their loot. This time she didn’t find treasure, but it was a neat (and a little sad) discovery just the same.

Oh wow, Lost Prospect Mine is totally unoccupied according to UESP. Kinda neat.

No treasure? The place is a veritable gold mine! (which is useful if you're grinding Smithing - jewels use up your gems and turn them into perks).

6:19 PM, Turdas, 2nd of Sun's Height, 4th Era

"Ma'iq was soul-trapped once. Not very pleasant. You should think about this once in a while".

Not only have I never heard this one, but it was right on-topic too, because Ma'iq said this to Mycharonnna, who does a lot of soul-trapping.

M'aiq has a lot of nerve to say that to Mycharonna! M'aiq is lucky that one did not pierce his neck.

I'm glad she let Cicero live!


Valdi is oddly taken with Serana. Since Valdi is ungentle and largely uncouth and Serana is an actual princess I thought they wouldn’t get along. However Valdi has given the kindest conversational responses to Serana and opened up some dialog that I’ve not heard before. Serana recently asked Valdi about her parents.

Of course Valdi still loves to blow up the undead with her sun spells and she does not care at all that she might hurt Serana. I suppose that could be a result of the many ice spikes Serana has shot through her head and back. Quid pro quo.

She still has Erik along for the adventure, but as you predicted her feelings have mellowed to friend status. It was just a crush after all. Though she does admire the way he fills out that Dawnguard armor. Looks like the Amulet of Mara will stay in the pack. (Funnily enough I can’t remember if I added Erik to the potential marriage faction. I made a few changes like giving him Light Step and washing his face, but that’s all I can recall.)

Oh, and she has Serana styled in Dawnguard armor, too! Valdi gave Serana a brown “ranger” hood, gauntlets, and boots along with the darkest DG light armor. She also had Serana in face mask for a while. All you could see were her yellow eyes! Valdi is a little sensitive about traveling with a vampire, plus she knows that Lord Harkon will have his minions looking for Serana and her Scroll. (Which would have been a nice addition to the game.) So Valdi put Serana in a clever (for Valdi) disguise.

I would love to see Serana in her Dawnguard disguise! It has the added benefit of acting like a uniform, so the living members of the DG don't accidentally attack her.

Excellent point! Also without her vamp getup Valdi does not shield bash her in the dark as much these days. Here are some pics:

Serana in her hood. “Yes? What do you need?”

Serana Strut.

“I’m nothing if not persuasive.”

Mod disclosure: Madcat221’s Seranafangs, non-glowing eyes edition. I got fed up with Serana looking like something noticeably weird and yet not a vampire.

Serana's arms look huge in that first pic. Has Valdi been giving her steroids!

Wow, she looks so different in the DG cuirass. Not to mention with normal eyes. But fangs on Serana? It's not like she's a vampire!

S'krawni, my latest Khajiit, has discovered that there is a more annoying habit than Serana's mubcrab resurrections. She was escorting Esbern out of the Ratway Warrens, and every time there was any hint of danger, such as a wandering skeever, Esben summoned a Frost Atronach. Since he's rather large, he completely fills the low, narrow passages of the Riften sewers, and nothing can get past until he expires. Nor can he move out of the way, as he just walks in place with his head stuck in the roof.

She can't shoot past him, so if the enemy he's trying to reach is using a ranged weapon or spell, they're pretty safe from the whole party. Esbern is similarly prevented from doing anything useful. All he can do is re-cast the @#$% atronach when he expires.

Progress was really slow. Whenever the coast was clear, Esbern ran ahead, so that he could cast a fresh roadblock for them. S'krawni could probably have kept ahead of him, if she'd remembered to put her bow away in order to run faster, but she (I) tends to forget.

I realize I'm a Skynewb, but when a summon of Buffy's or someone else gets in the way, Buffy shoots it with her conjured mystic bow - her Oblivion Binding perk ensures any summons are banished and reanimated things are turned to her side. In fact, we just tested it this morning to ensure she can 'dispel' her own summons that way.

That's a handy trick!

Today Arduina finished clearing out Falkreath Hold, after knocking off Ilinalta's Keep (at least as much as you can do of it without doing the Azura quest). She moved on to The Reach for the moment, taking on Bard's Leap. She is the first of my characters to do it by taking the high road, from Bilegulch Mine. That made things a lot easier. She even survived the leap on her first try!

Middas, 8th of Sun's Height, 4E 202



Mycharonna is on the way to Markath, where she's supposed to eventually assume the role of a famous chef (I am assuming) who will be cooking for the Emperor's entourage. That's what I think is going to happen, anyways. She's become ultra-paranoid for some reason (as seen above).