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[Doctor_20]

I love this game so far but have only managed to get my Nord up to lvl 6 (just killed my first dragon). I am lost when it comes to which perks to choose or even what stat I should upgrade each level. So far I have taken a Blocking, Heavy armor, and a bunch of single handed perks. I have also been increasing Health and Stamina at an equal rate. Things where going well until I ran into a Frost Troll and got raped. Now I am not sure if I am on the right path as far as my character build.

Does anyone have any recommendations for a pure warrior build? What skill/perk trees should I focus on, etc…

Ice Troll rape on your way to greybeards? Thats normal.

 

[Ghost]

I wish she had a unique name in every game. I hate to think that other people are having adventures with my Lydia.

Lydia got slaughtered in my game, a Necromancer was defiling this guys family so the three of us piled in, all good until the boss room, where everything went a bit crazy for a while, when the dust cleared I couldn't even find her body. Bad times.

 

[Recon]

Ice Troll rape on your way to greybeards? Thats normal.

Ice Troll wasnt that bad to me. I flamed him until my mana ran out, used some mana potions, flamed him more. Then Lydia and me just hacked away and he was dead.

 

[nicoga3000]

How do you know what icon there should be on the pillar puzzles? There's one with four pillars and I can't find the answer anywhere. Help!

As I'm starting to figure out, there ARE clues in whatever location you are. Books, wall markings, etc. Just gotta look!

 

[Enco]

I wish she had a unique name in every game. I hate to think that other people are having adventures with my Lydia.

Heck, give all non vital characters random names. Would make the game feel so much more unique. Wouldn't be worth the effort in the dev's eyes though.

 

[Ghost]

Ice Troll wasnt that bad to me. I flamed him until my mana ran out, used some mana potions, flamed him more. Then Lydia and me just hacked away and he was dead.

I died twice, on the third reload a random dragon appeared, got him to fight the ice troll (Dragon lost, but Troll was dead enough for me to finish off).

 

[CrazedProfessional]

Fuck being a mage man, it gets to the point where it takes all your mana to kill one dude and there's like 4 other dudes in the room. You eat potions like a pac-man

 

[KingK]

Ice Troll wasnt that bad to me. I flamed him until my mana ran out, used some mana potions, flamed him more. Then Lydia and me just hacked away and he was dead.

I'm pretty sure I killed the ice troll with flames before he could even touch me. Didn't have any problems with him. Some mages and the occasional badass bandit leader are the only things that really fuck me up so far (plus this Dewmer robot I had to fight at the same time as a bandit leader once).

 

[Philthy]

As a youngin', Pool of Radiance and Ultima 5 were my two favorite RPGs. I love when the world is totally open for you to discover it at your own pace, and this game reminds me of those old-time RPGs. I could not be happier.

Just wanted to throw in my 2 cents, as well as date myself

I'm in the same boat. PoR and Ultima 5 were my favorites as well. Along with Bards Tale 3. I lost myself for MONTHS in those games, and I've put maybe 20+ hours into Skyrim and this game is all of that and MORE. This is such a huge jump over anything I've ever played before. I hit a few bugs but the game is just that good I don't even care anymore.

I wish she had a unique name in every game. I hate to think that other people are having adventures with my Lydia.

Is this the housecarl you get? I don't think mine was named Lydia.. Either way, she's dead now.

 

[infinityBCRT]

Anyone know if the environment video on Blim's site (gamersyde) of Skyrim is the 360 version? If so, wow, I think I would have been very happy with that version.

Wish MS would release bluetooth versions of the 360 controller to make it easy to hook up one to my laptop. Those USB wireless connectors are so damn wonky.

 

[flashburn2012]

Disenchant that stuff, level enchanting, enchant your heavy with magicka regen/damage.

Gotcha, will do. Battlemage here I come! (Too bad I wasted 3 or 4 perk points in shields)

 

[HTuran]

For people playing stealth, do you use companions? I found it hard enough doing the Thief/

Spoiler

Nightingale

missions with NPCs designed around sneaking. Worried that the AI will just aggro on anything that moves.

 

[neorej]

Store them at your local General Goods vendor. Then you'll have enough to buy a house.

(hint: there's an infinite number of dragons)

THANK GOD!

 

[nicoga3000]

Gotcha, will do. Battlemage here I come! (Too bad I wasted 3 or 4 perk points in shields)

Dear lord shields are terrible. I tried to use sword and shield for close quarters with my archer, but I found an atronach works exactly like a shield, but better.

 

[bengraven]

1) have we heard when the Creation Kit is being released?

2) I've been to Whiterun, Riften and Falkreath (cool story about Falk coming soon).

What other cities should I check out? Specifically something nice and dark, or whatever the largest city in the game is, though I think that's Whiterun (which would be disappointing).

Lara Croft, is that you?

3) Whoa, where is she? Who is she?

 

[ironcreed]

God, the scenery in this game. Still working on the Companions Guild and last night some of the quests took me out a bit further and I just found myself constantly being gobsmacked over and over.

For instance, I was standing on this stone bridge that was over a huge waterfall as the sun began to rise. I just about melted in my chair as I sat in awe staring at the sun glistening over the water. Later, I entered Lost Knife Cave and was slack-jawed as I entered an opening with multiple waterfalls flowing into a lake inside a cavern. This game is beyond beautiful.

Anyway, I could obviously go on, but you get the picture. Anyone who says that this game is not pretty needs to get their head examined. It is pure art and feels more alive than any game world I can recall playing in. I am already just awe struck and have barely even scratched the surface. I can only imagine what awaits me.

 

[EviLore]

For people playing stealth, do you use companions? I found it hard enough doing the Thief/

Spoiler

Nightingale

missions with NPCs designed around sneaking. Worried that the AI will just aggro on anything that moves.

Far as I can tell, detection is completely separate for your companion, so they will constantly aggro enemies when they don't have good stealth stats. However, you can remain in stealth mode while this happens and then get sneak attacks off after they begin engaging, so it's viable if you want to.

I fly solo, though.

 

[f0rk]

Actually glad Batman was delayed another week on PC now

 

[ElyrionX]

That is true, yes. But for weapons, consider that a 22 damage Daedric Dagger becomes 44 damage when upgraded to Legendary. Also consider that a cheap Exquisite Elven Dagger is much better than a non-upgraded Daedric Dagger. Smithing is too good for weapons, really.

I think you can even stack +blacksmithing potions and gear and upgrade weapons even more, which is a tad ridiculous.

That being said, I was very disappointed I couldn't craft myself Daedric weapons for my thief...but I realized that Daedric weapons only provide ~4 more damage than Glass, even when fully upgraded. The upgrading system doesn't really scale with the base quality of the equipment, which is weird.

Do you need the perks to be able to craft Legendary weapons? Or just a 100 in smithing will do?

 

[TheContact]

Fuck being a mage man, it gets to the point where it takes all your mana to kill one dude and there's like 4 other dudes in the room. You eat potions like a pac-man

I'm level 13 or so, pure mages are overpowered I think. If mana is an issue, just use Flames. It doesn't cost a lot of mana and the damage is decent. Otherwise, cast firebolt. Fireball costs a lot of mana, and double casting it is just overkill.

 

[bizatch]

In my misc quests I have one that tells me to go to Bleak Darrow Falls and find the owner of the golden claw. My OCD self decided that I need to finish all the quests, so I went there. Looks like I already killed the owner,

Spoiler

the guy who betrays you

, but the quest is still there. Im assuming its bugged, am I right? Playing the PC version btw.

Edit: Im an idiot, http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20111111104623AApMWR3

 

[SpeedingUptoStop]

I wish she had a unique name in every game. I hate to think that other people are having adventures with my Lydia.

ME AND YO GIRL LYDIA, WE FUCKIN' TONIGHT

 

[TheExodu5]

Fair enough - I mean, I've got no reason NOT to dump points into smithing. I really haven't spent many points outside of archery and speech. Also, I imagine the armor perk bonuses will help, too. Assuming the light/heavy trees are the same, you get what, +25% armor for a wearing all light, and like another +25% for wearing the same set, right? Something like that. I guess after you factor that stuff in, it's worth it.

Besides that, I really enjoy finding various ore veins and smelting it to ingots. While the system is simple in nature, it just adds a unique level of depth to the game. I hope they add some mods later that add some new ores and crafts. That right there will seriously lengthen this [already] deep and engaging experience.

Smithing would have been much better if you needed to mine ore.

This is how my smithing experience went:

1) Buy leather, leather strips (about 15,000 gold worth)
2) Level smithing to 100 by making leather bracers
3) Make anything by buying the ingots from the blacksmith

If you had to actually go out and gather the materials for smithing, it would be more meaningful. For me, it was simply a matter of buying/smithing for 2 hours and having enough gold.

Personally, I wish smithing was not part of the game at all. It's boring, and too essential to not pick up for any physical character.

Enchanting is a much more rounded and balanced system.

Do you need the perks to be able to craft Legendary weapons? Or just a 100 in smithing will do?

You need the perks, otherwise you'll just be able to make exquisite (or Flawless with a blacksmith potion). With +smithing gear, +alchemy, and smithing potions, you can boost it up to legendary though, I think. One thing confuses me though...from a theorycrafting post, it seemed as if you could boost blacksmithing to an insane amount with enchanting/alchemy, up to the point where your augmentations are far better than legendary...I'm not sure if that's true or not. I really hope legendary is the cap, otherwise this is going to get silly.

 

[IMBored]

Hooking up my sixaxis to the PC and emulating 360 controller makes a huge difference vs K/M combo. Great game, bad, bad UI for mouse. Shame that I have to connect the controller with USB and have to be online for the sixaxis driver app to work tough.

 

[ToD_]

My Lydia died ages ago. I wish I could bring her back. My current sidekick gets the job done.. but it's not the same.
Strangely enough, I was getting married (in the game, yes) yesterday and was waiting for my ceremony to start. I decided to use the "wait" function for a few hours while in the temple. When the game resumed there was this mass panic inside with Lydia's body(!!!) on the floor and people being completely upset in the temple, telling me to get out and whatnot. Why was she on the floor? She died a good 15 hours of playtime ago, about 50 savegames or so!

This game. I'm telling you. I was sort of worried I wouldn't be able to get into it. 37 hours in now and I'm dreading the fact that I'm at work instead of playing. Absolutely awesome stuff.

 

[erragal]

Dear lord shields are terrible. I tried to use sword and shield for close quarters with my archer, but I found an atronach works exactly like a shield, but better.

Shields are incredible.

Shield bashing always staggers regular enemies it seems and power bash will stagger/knock down anything I've encountered so far. Interrupting dragon breath is epic; the damage is really good as well once you get the perk for it.

Of course I'm playing a shield/spell type character with no armor. I'd much rather have a shield than the underwhelming dual casting, especially the quest shield I have that raises a ward when you block.

 

[ElyrionX]

Also Ebony armour looks cool -

Speaking of Ebony... does anybody know a good place where I can mine for Ebony Ore?

So far I've only bought the ore/ingots from Merchants.

Jesus christ. That is ebony? Looks goddamn awesome. Maybe my mage should start wearing heavy armour. Goddamn.

EDIT: Are there any downsides to a mage wearing heavy armour? Shit, I don't have enough perk points to go around.

 

[HTuran]

Hooking up my sixaxis to the PC and emulating 360 controller makes a huge difference vs K/M combo. Great game, bad, bad UI for mouse. Shame that I have to connect the controller with USB and have to be online for the sixaxis driver app to work tough.

Yeah, I have to say, 360 > KB&M for this game, and I'm an archer.

there are more Claw quests??? ive done the Golden claw at the start of the game...im assuming you are not talking about that.

Oh yes, I've got my own claw collection!

 

[Arcipello]

Am I having a bug with the Sapphire Claw? I got the claw and go to the door and tried the pattern and the door doesn't open. Arrows shoot out of the wall but don't hit me. I tried a couple times and ended up giving up on that pattern and just tried every possible combination and the door still wouldn't open. Is it a bug or am I doing something wrong?

there are more Claw quests??? ive done the Golden claw at the start of the game...im assuming you are not talking about that.

 

[cametall]

I was wandering around in the wilderness, at the base of a mountain. I near shat myself when a dragon roared and started circling the peak of the mountain and then flew down to attack.

I gotta say, having

Spoiler

Lydia with you

makes things a lot easier. Fighting that dragon was easier than the first one.

I feel guilty

Spoiler

lugging her around with me

, I feel like I'm cheating sometimes.

 

[DeathIsTheEnd]

Personally, I wish smithing was not part of the game at all. It's boring, and too essential to not pick up for any physical character.

Really? I'm level 23 and I use light armour with sword/shield in adept. I haven't found that to be the case at all.

 

[Deleted member 17706]

What makes you say that? The only thing that's holding me back from joining the Stormcloaks is that I'm likening them to the Libyan rebels we have now. Sure they say they're fighting for democracy, but as soon as you give them power (which they now have) they will abuse (which they already have. Ethnic killings, etc.). I know I shouldn't compare a fictional civil war to an actual one but I have that vibe from the Stormcloaks. I don't know who to join!

Don't highlight this unless you've finished the Thalmor

Spoiler

Embassy

quest.

Spoiler

According to a dossier you find there, Ulfric is a dormant Thalmor pawn.

 

[bengraven]

ME AND YO GIRL LYDIA, WE FUCKIN' TONIGHT

Oh shit, son, I'M FUCKING LYDIA TOO.

Girl gets arrrrrround.

(does she worship Dibella? Do we have those fucking tokens from Riften? lol)

 

[Mechanized]

I keep Lydia locked up in my home at Whiterun. I can't bring myself to let her get killed in the wild.
I'll protect you forever Lydia!~

 

[Ace Harding]

I had my first Elder Scrolls moment last night after ~4 hours into the game. It doesn't sound that cool but at the moment it was pretty thrilling.

I left Whiterun to go to the tower for the

Spoiler

first dragon battle

, and immediately after exiting the gate I am ambushed by three dudes. I have no idea why. I might be able to take out one, maybe two of these guys, but three is not going to work. I make the decision to run for the tower and hope I can outrun them. After a few hundred yards into the fields I turn around, and they are gone. OK - weird that I was randomly attacked, but I can relax for now.

I trigger the whole

Spoiler

dragon fight

at the tower, win easily, and get the

Spoiler

shout

. There's that little dialogue with the soldiers, they tell me what's up, and I'm supposed to head back to Whiterun to talk to the Jarl. Cool.

As soon as I turn to head back, I'm met by the three strangers again, weapons raised and yelling something at me. Shit. I take a couple of swings, remember my new ability, and knock them back with the shout. Suddenly my new pal soldiers from Whiterun get my back and help me take out the three strangers. We kill them, I loot their corpses, and I find a contract for my head from Anise - some old lady living in a cabin outside the city. Yeah, I stole some ingredients from her, but I bid her good day and walked away clean - could she really have seen me? And isn't a contract killing a bit of an overreaction for stealing some crappy ingredients and meats?

I will return to Anise's cabin. I will give her one chance to admit what she did and repent. If she does not, she will die.

 

[TheExodu5]

Really? I'm level 23 and I use light armour with sword/shield in adept. I haven't found that to be the case at all.

Smithing will literally double the effectiveness of your gear. Sure, you can get by without it, but it's about the best way you could spend your perks.

 

[The Elite]

My Lydia died ages ago. I wish I could bring her back. My current sidekick gets the job done.. but it's not the same.
Strangely enough, I was getting married (in the game, yes) yesterday and was waiting for my ceremony to start. I decided to use the "wait" function for a few hours while in the temple. When the game resumed there was this mass panic inside with Lydia's body(!!!) on the floor and people being completely upset in the temple, telling me to get out and whatnot. Why was she on the floor? She died a good 15 hours of playtime ago, about 50 savegames or so!

This game. I'm telling you. I was sort of worried I wouldn't be able to get into it. 37 hours in now and I'm dreading the fact that I'm at work instead of playing. Absolutely awesome stuff.

Holy fuck. That's scary as shit. Lydia was secretly in love with you and her dead body trolled your wedding.

 

[ElyrionX]

Ok, I just saw some pics of Dragonbone armour. Why does it look so goofy compared to the Ebony and Daedric armours?

 

[nicoga3000]

Shields are incredible.

Shield bashing always staggers and power bash will stagger anything I've encountered so far. Interrupting dragon breath is epic; the damage is really good as well once you get the perk for it.

Of course I'm playing a shield/spell type character with no armor. I'd much rather have a shield than the underwhelming dual casting, especially the quest shield I have that raises a ward when you block.

What I love is that between this and what TheExodu5 said about my smithing comment, it shows how incredibly diverse the Skyrim experience can be for anyone.

I enjoy smithing in that it makes me feel like the mining side of things is worth my time. But if they worked it so that smithing was MORE useful (i.e. make truly legendary gear), it would be excellent. Mods I guess!

And shields, I just never got the hang of them. So as a result, I ignore them completely. But the fact of the matter is, there's no right or wrong way to look at the shield perks and equipment.

This game <3

 

[The Elite]

Lydia got slaughtered in my game, a Necromancer was defiling this guys family so the three of us piled in, all good until the boss room, where everything went a bit crazy for a while, when the dust cleared I couldn't even find her body. Bad times.

She almost died during that quest. I saved her life.

 

[fierrotlepou]

So, anyone else thinks that there isn't enough loot in this game? Or am I just not far enough? (lvl 20 now)

 

[Derrick01]

For people playing stealth, do you use companions? I found it hard enough doing the Thief/

Spoiler

Nightingale

missions with NPCs designed around sneaking. Worried that the AI will just aggro on anything that moves.

Nah I'm going solo. It forces me to be stealthy and work on 1h weapons if I come across something I can't kill fast and easy. I haven't found anyone able to withstand my 30x dagger damage yet, but I haven't done a whole lot of dungeon diving either.

 

[TurtleSnatcher]

You haven't explored much then. I guess it's a gaf thing. I was also amused to see so many posters on release day I mean posting on gaf was the furthest thing on my mind the last 3 days. The only reason I'm posting now is because I'm bored at work.


At level 31 I think I have about 9-10 points more in stamina than I do in hp. If I feel like I'm having too much trouble surviving in close combat I put a point in health or if I feel like I haven't put anything in health for the last few levels I may put a point there in anticipation for the future... but otherwise it's stamina all the way.

Congrats for being an elitist in Skyrim in 3 days..

Jesus..

 

[HTuran]

Nah I'm going solo. It forces me to be stealthy and work on 1h weapons if I come across something I can't kill fast and easy. I haven't found anyone able to withstand my 30x dagger damage yet, but I haven't done a whole lot of dungeon diving either.

Waitwaitwait, 30x? Tell me!

 

[ElyrionX]

You need the perks, otherwise you'll just be able to make exquisite (or Flawless with a blacksmith potion). With +smithing gear, +alchemy, and smithing potions, you can boost it up to legendary though, I think. One thing confuses me though...from a theorycrafting post, it seemed as if you could boost blacksmithing to an insane amount with enchanting/alchemy, up to the point where your augmentations are far better than legendary...I'm not sure if that's true or not. I really hope legendary is the cap, otherwise this is going to get silly.

Ok, the thing is, I'm an assassin mage, so I'm going to need just one really good dagger and nothing else. Is it entirely necessary to grab so many perks just to craft that dagger or will I be able to find one just as good?

 

[TheKurgan]

Ice Troll rape on your way to greybeards? Thats normal.

Yep that is the one. Just me and the horse I spend 1000 gold on. Saw the troll jumped off my horse and went after him with my magic sword and fire axe. I was dead before I could use my dragon shout, didn't even last 10 seconds.

I haven't used much magic in the game but have a few fire scolls I could use on him for our second encounter.

Anyway, for you higher level fighters out there. What skills, skill trees are a must and have the best perks.

 

[KoruptData]

In my misc quests I have one that tells me to go to Bleak Darrow Falls and find the owner of the golden claw. My OCD self decided that I need to finish all the quests, so I went there. Looks like I already killed the owner,

Spoiler

the guy who betrays you

, but the quest is still there. Im assuming its bugged, am I right? Playing the PC version btw.

The owner of the golden claw lives in riverwood.

 

[Echoplx]

Ok, I just saw some pics of Dragonbone armour. Why does it look so goofy compared to the Ebony and Daedric armours?

Luckily it's not the best armor, I would feel like a fool wearing dragon armor.

 

[The Elite]

Yep that is the one. Just me and the horse I spend 1000 gold on. Saw the troll jumped off my horse and went after him with my magic sword and fire axe. I was dead before I could use my dragon shout, didn't even last 10 seconds.

I haven't used much magic in the game but have a few fire scolls I could use on him for our second encounter.

Anyway, for you higher level fighters out there. What skills, skill trees are a must and have the best perks.

Lydia and I had no problems taking down the Ice Troll. In fact I found it a lot easier than the regular troll we found earlier.

Edit:

Is this unique to me? On the way to Greybeards we were attacked

Spoiler

by a random dragon near the mountain top. Came the fuck out of nowhere. Epic battle and we managed to defeat it with the help of a person who just happened to be around.

 

[erragal]

What I love is that between this and what TheExodu5 said about my smithing comment, it shows how incredibly diverse the Skyrim experience can be for anyone.

I enjoy smithing in that it makes me feel like the mining side of things is worth my time. But if they worked it so that smithing was MORE useful (i.e. make truly legendary gear), it would be excellent. Mods I guess!

And shields, I just never got the hang of them. So as a result, I ignore them completely. But the fact of the matter is, there's no right or wrong way to look at the shield perks and equipment.

This game <3

Agreed! Was so much fun raiding a gold mine, smithing it into jewelry (Which also allows me to disposes of some stolen gems), enchanting it, then selling it for maximum profit.