I started out as a warrior, but chose redguard. They get a +10 for one handed (nords get +10 2h) and I'm glad I went with 1h at the moment. They also get +5 to archery and their racial ability restores stam quicker.

I agree that the nords 50% frost resistance is a lot better than the reguards 50% poison resistance, though!

At level 42, I feel like I'm in way too deep to start over again with a new char, even if I felt I had made some dumb choices. I did actually, magic blows! Nevertheless, I figure I might like to try out everything eventually anyways, even the magic path that I've started on and pretty much abandoned.

How many hours of play has it taken you to get upto level 42 on a character?

Magic is super baller, I don't know what you're talking about.

Hmm, I can't remember. Probably something like 60-70 hours or so.

Is it? Perhaps I'm doing something wrong, but I can't seem to find spells more powerful than the old lightning bolt which I've had for ages. The damage it or the fire/ice alternative does is absolute **** compared to melee/archery.

Ah damnit. I wasn't aware that Nords had their 2H buffed. Oh well. The frost resistance is nice though. Will come in handy when I'm tearing apart frost dragons. I also noticed that the most annoying and tough mages I've come across were all using frost magic, (some sparks, too, but mostly frost) so the frost resistance should help.

I was up to level 35 when I restarted. I don't really feel bad about it, either. I like going through it again, knowing what I know now. :)

WRONG. Orc is the way to go as a Warrior. The special ability, Berserker Rage, is amazing. 50% more damage dealt and 50% less damage taken? Basically boss- and dragon-rape mode.

If race is the only thing you're not satisfied with, there is a console command you can use to change it as well, although I think doing so wipes all your steam achievements.

Oh yeah, that's a good point. Sweet ability!

Don't wanna be an orc, though!

Nah, I'm willing to not be an Orc simply because Berserker is a once-a-day-power, like most of them. I see too much action for something that works once a day to be a factor. (especially because I extend the days/nights to be a lot longer than default)

P.S. Dragons are ridiculously easy, even as a non-warrior character. Get it to land, run to its tail, and just start chopping.... end dragon. I don't think I've ever even used a health potion in a dragon fight before. Dragons are TOO easy.

I've used console commands to get unstuck from walls due to bugs (toggle clipping command), and it never interfered with me getting Steam achievements. I wonder if there's some known criteria for that happening?

Have you faced elder dragons ? There is like 8 different kinds of them, the most popular blood dragons are indeed easy, but once their elder brothers and sisters appear ... they're able to damage you for ~350 hp (with no resistance bonuses) with one breath attack fly-by. Once they land though, well, it's the same old.
During the main quest you learn 2 very fun shouts - dragonrend which forces dragons to land and another one that lets you actually summon dragons.
To all that want to focus on the main quest: don't start the "The World-Eater's Eyrie" quest unless you're committed to finishing the game. It's not the end and there is quite a bit still to do after that, but once you do (I don't want to post any spoilers) there won't be a chance to fast travel to some distant town to resupply or do that odd quest. Oh, and I fell this needs to be stressed - after finishing the main quest, you are back in Skyrim, free to roam and do all the other quests. Just without an epic purpose http://pics3.city-data.com/forum/ima...ilies/wink.gif
I completed the game on lvl 46, it took me roughly 76 hours. And by completed I mean of course completed the main quest.
Also, once I crafted myself a full set of light dragon armor, with smithing at 100 and a +40% bonus from items, enchanted it with skill boosts (+30% one handed damage, +30% bow damage, +30% light armor skill and a full variety of 50% resistance boots) and got the dragonslayer katana - it all became waaay too easy.
Finally, I think choosing the khajit was a mistake. Why ? Well, has any one of you managed to get a wife ?? I read up a bit on it online (though there isn't much out there as the game is still new) and it seems every city has a handful of ladies you can marry, once you do they will e.g. run a store, providing you with 100 gold/day passive income, or increase the learning bonus you get when you sleep in your bed - from 10% to 15% faster skill learning if you sleep with your spouse.
As a khajit though, not one wanted me ... which seems kind of odd when you think about how many women out there actually prefer cats to men :D Though in some way it was actually refreshing.

I've seen in the stats that it says "stores invested in" or something and I thought "aha, so that's a possibility", but it hasn't come up in the game so far. So, I have to romance some ladies? Guess I'll add it to my to-do list although I have to say, money's certainly no issue at this point. I just got my house in Solitude fully furnished and my wallet's still brimming.

A perk on the Speech tree lets you invest in stores, though you need like 75 or 80 speech to get it, so it takes quite a bit of dedication.
Yac.

Have any of you gotten a good use of the werewolf curse/blessing? I mean, if you have people with you they will attack you, you can't loot corpses or chests, and you're still fairly easy to kill. I guess it looks cool and all, but I hardly ever end up using it, and I've had it since level 5 I think (I'm lvl 26 now).

There are 2 cool thinigs about being a werewolf: resistance to disease, since it's very easy to catch something running around tombs and madmen lairs, and the way you look. That's it. I think I changed into a werewolf 3 or 4 times, out of curiosity. It's
Also there is a huge drawback - you can never rest well, which means you don't get the 5%/10%/15% bonus to skill gains you get for resting.
I've found it disappointing, really. You don't get to fight better, sprint is only marginally faster, you have to wait till you change back which takes a couple of minutes longer than any fight you might have gotten yourself into. Eventually you get a ring that lets you control when and for how long you change, but it's not making being a werewolf any better.
Yac.

Yeah the werewolf is cool initially, but it turns out to be pretty useless pretty quickly. On the harder difficulties you take a lot of damage very quickly and you can't heal yourself short of finding a body to munch on, which is usually not viable in the heat of battle.

How about vampirism? I contracted the disease early in the game and got worried, but luckily it was removed by a blessing. There was of course a moment when I did consider just embracing the night!

Pff, you don't sparkle, what's the point of becoming a vampire ?
Cheap twilight jokes aside, I was thinking about it until I realized how much better the game looks during daylight and that exploring Skyrim at night would make me miss quite a bit of lovely sights.
Changing the topic a bit: who here loves shooting a bow in this game ?:D Melee combat is fun and can look great, with all the special death animations, decapitations etc.. but It simply cannot be compared to the satisfaction one gets after clearing out a bandit camp from afar only to come and see all 14 of the 14 arrows shot are sticking out of the dead bandits head. It's no bf3 sniping, but it requires more skill than bashing someone with a sword repeatedly.

I agree :) Archery was a bit weak with me at first, but now with my pimped bow and boosted by sneak attack perks, it rocks!

It's so satisfying in this game how an arrow can send a body flying.

As far as land battles go, I can't think of anything major. I think we may have had a skirmish or something, but most of the action happened farther north. BUT, we did have the Battle of Hampton Roads, which ****s on most other civil war battles.

If you give any kind of **** about the Revolutionary War, Yorktown is only like an hour from me. Not to mention Williamsburg and Jamestown. And I also sorta live right next to the world's biggest naval base. So yeah, take that New York!

I know that battle, its one of the most important naval conflicts of the war, my civil war book is quite in depth but doesn`t mention naval conflicts that much, unless it involves naval operations supporting land operation in locations such as the Mississippi River etc.

I played this but ended up ruining the game by hitting the very first guy you meet with sneak attacks for an hour till my sneak was lvl 100. At lvl 100 you get a skill that makes it so when you crouch you go invisible for a second. The thing is if you use a dagger while using this skill and do the timing right you can execute a sneak attack in the middle of combat and almost everything dies in one hit. This essentially means you can do 15 times damage on every hit you do. Now the game is so boring. Whyyyy did I do that. I can't go back either because its too tempting to exploit the game again.

Go full-fledged warrior. You can't cheat the leveling system.

Eh, I dunno about this one. I like sniping folk with arrows and all, but nothing compares to the action and thrill of a battle when you're face to face with multiple enemies and have to strategically use your shield to defend attacks, stagger them, strike, use a disarm shout or unrelenting force, get a sweet animation or two, and try to stay alive.

I don't know about other people, but I don't simply charge in and start swinging. I draw the nearest enemy in, let him swing, block, power attack, block again (or bash if necessary) and finish him off. All in time to rush another guy and attack him before he has a chance to swing, then rush the douchey magic sparkle shooter and bash him, cutting off his spell, and unloading on him.
For me, that's way more engaging than crouching and shooting some arrows from a distance.

I generally only use arrows if I need to prune the enemy force numbers, or for surprise attacks on powerful enemies to whittle their health down a bit.
Then it's right to the sword and shield.

As an aside, I find those huge Dwemer robots easiest to defeat with arrows. I wouldn't recommend going up against one with a sword. The trick to it is that they're so huge, they usually can't get through nearby openings, so you just run through one and unload arrows until he's down.

God I want this game terribly, I gotta save $60 to buy it at Walmart.

+ One-handed increased.

why walmart?

you can always be red beard

A couple of quickies,

1) When playing the game did you guys join any factions and take sides? At this early stage I`ve got the option of joining up with either the Imperials or the Stormcloaks and will probably join up with the Stormcloaks as the other bunch tried to lop my head off. Also does it hugely affect game development?

2) Are most of you playing in 1st person perspective or 3rd person perspective? At the moment I`m annoyingly switching between the two.

I play almost exclusively in first person view. Just yesterday, I completed the imperial quest line. As far as I know, it doesn't affect the game very much. I've yet to play much since, though, but I don't think Stormcloak camps will be hostile .. At least not until I plant my mace in their faces!

1. Yes it makes a big difference because one will rule skyrim. The choice is basically up to you.

2. Always first for combat. The third is only for admiring how awesome you are.

3. Everyone should play through the Dark Brotherhood. Its easily the most fun campaign and you get a bomb ass horse/weapons/money and et to kill tons of people.

4. I used to give better advice, but then I took and arrow to the knee.


ps: Freebase that girls video is incredible. But as the comments say it would probably be 1/4 as good with no post effects. Regardless it kickarse.

No, it doesn't affect much outside of the quest. People will still talk about an "ongoing" civil war, even though it's over, and nothing about the world will change. It's a bit of a disappointment really.

I play almost exclusively in 3rd person. I only switch to 1st person when I fancy looking someone in the face when I'm interacting with them, or to grab items that are close together.

1st person 99% of the time, I sometimes switch to 3rd person to check out how a new piece of equipment looks or if I can't find a chain to pull or a lever or something like that. The 3rd person view has been significantly improved, but it just doesn't feel right.
I have only joined the Dark Brotherhood before finishing the game, I figured I'll leave this quest line for another time. I remember it was by far the most fun quest line in Oblivion, and the horse looked badass.
As for huge dwemer robots - I was disappointed with them, to be honest. They look extremely "one man army" tough, but the only thing you need to defeat one is to avoid it's initial attack and stay behind it, delivering blows. I managed, without much trouble, to outmaneuver all 15 or so I've met this way.

Their is a mod that completely redoes the dwemer ruins and creatures. I havnt installed it but its supposed to fix what you mentioned.

There's also a mod that changes the 3rd person view. At present, I have the camera directly behind and above the character, instead of off to the side. It also fixes the zoom in/out when unsheathing/sheathing your weapon so that the camera distance stays the same, and extends the zoom limits. It really makes 3rd person perspective a lot better.

This is me. As a warrior, it's much more satisfying to see the entirety of my character lunging at his enemies with a 50 pound battleaxe in his hands.

Not only that, but you don't have this big ass shield and sword all in your field of view when you're fighting and blocking. It helps to be able to see more than a partial of the guy trying to kill you. Especially when there are multiple dudes coming after you, where attack and defense strategy comes in to play.

Only store here that sells video games.

I gotta say, all the Skyrim memes crack me up.
http://d24w6bsrhbeh9d.cloudfront.net...31446_460s.jpg
Click here if you don't know wtf this is

I'm dying.

haaaahahaha

I was on youtube today and even in completely unrelated videos on motorcycles and whatnot the top comments were arrow to the knee jokes.

My favorite comment on that:

SKYRIM.

WHY U NO HAVE KNEE ARMOR?

For you Yac