In Which Merawen Does Yet More General Adventuring and Crafting

Very, very low-key session. Still in the midst of the push to get to level 80, and to get my magic skills up to 90/100.

Highlights

• Play date: 10/21/2021
• Session number in this run: 82
• Geared up to set out from mage college: Arch-Mage robes, Aetherial Crown, stalhrim gauntlets and boots, Amulet of Articulation, ring of Carry Weight + Smithing
• Set out on foot from college
• Took out snow bear with Bound Battleaxe + Flaming Familiar
• Fast Healing for Restoration practice
• Ran Stillborn Cave
• Got in practice with Conjuration with Dremora Lord, Bound Battleaxe, Bound Sword, Soul Trap; had to work out how to use the Soul Trap spell, figured out I have to hit the target with it, then hit it with the weapon/other offensive spell
• Restoration practice with Close Wounds
• Got killed once by Falmer and chaurus
• Switched off to stalhrim to clear the dungeon
• Got out of the dungeon more towards Fort Kastav; swung south towards Windhelm
• Skeever vs. dog fight, killed remaining skeever
• Unmarked location with altar and wispmother and wisps; WOW are wispmothers hard to hit with fire spells
• Spriggan near Windhelm, which got a horker and a mudcrab also fighting me; soul trapped the horker
• Went into Windhelm to buy things; gave a gold coin to Silda
• Did some enchanting work at the table by Niranye’s booth; sold a bunch of stuff to Niranye
• Shopped with Quintus, Oengul, and Revyn; invested in all three; bought a bunch of soul gems and ingredients and smithing materials
• Headed on out from Windhelm
• Cleared Traitor’s Post when bandits came out to attack me after they heard me fighting a troll
• Overloaded! Time for Arvak
• Rode south to Shor’s Stone; stopped there to use the forge since it was after hours and nobody was using it
• Killed two bears and a troll just north of Fort Greenwall, soul trap + fireball
• Readed into Riften; bought and sold a whole bunch of stuff in Thieves Guild; slept there
• Came up into Riften; shopped with Balimund, Bersi, Hafjorg, invested in all three shops
• Headed out from Riften
• Soul trapped a wolf
• Cleared Autumnshade Clearing: spriggan earth mother, wolf, sabre cat
• Killed hostile Arch Pyromancer at the unmarked altar with the convector; quite the fight, took two dremora lords, a couple of frost atronachs, and finally a storm atronach to take her out
• Also quite the fight with an Arch Necromancer outside Boulderfall Cave, threw a lot of storm atronachs at him
• Bigger boss mage inside Boulderfall Cave, that mage killed me twice; third time through, I went fuck it, let’s do this with archery
• Took out a bear
• Went past two hunter women going after deer
• Fast traveled to Honningbrew
• Hi Blood Dragon! Started throwing Ice Spears at it
• Guard was snotty: “Go cast your fancy magic someplace else.” Fuck you asshole, I was trying to help
• “It’s like the ancient legends…” Oh so now you’re impressed, now that you saw me eat its soul?
• Sold things in Honningbrew like I was trying to do before the dragon interrupted me
• Reached forge in Whiterun; transmuted a bunch of ore, started smithing and leveled up to 78!
• Took Mystic Binding perk to raise damage done by bound weapons
• Invested in and shopped at Warmaiden’s and Belethor’s and Arcadia’s
• Got five rounds of Restoration training from Danica Pure-Spring for level 78 training
• Went north from Whiterun towards Heljarchen
• Attempted to casually saunter past that unmarked bandit camp near Whiterun; they killed me once, until I unleashed the dremora lord on them
• Overloaded at that point so Arvak’d to ride to Heljarchen
• Did a bunch of smithing there to improve the gear from bandits, and also make jewelry; dropped off a lot of the higher level smithing materials to get unburdened
• Headed north-ish to Dawnstar
• Took out a couple of bandits killing a peddler, again with dremora lord
• Stopped in Dawnstar to invest in the forge and the apothecary, bought more materials
• Fast traveled to Windstad to drop off materials there and do a little more smithing and enchanting; transmuted some iron to gold and made more jewelry
• Got Golldir to hire a carriage driver and a bard
• Fast traveled to Solitude to do one more round of enchanting and then save for the night

Commentary and next time

Since this was another general adventuring/crafting session, not a lot to comment on here.

One thing I will talk about though is playing around with the Soul Trap spell. Since I set my Enchanting to Legendary, having filled Soul Gems is a necessity. But since I’ve been using magic as my primary combat mechanism right now, filling my Soul Gems with my weapons has had to be replaced by filling them with magic. Fortunately, there’s a spell for that!

It took me a little bit though to get the hang of how to throw the Soul Trap spell. I eventually did learn though that I have to actually hit a target with it, and then actually kill the target. Either with another offensive spell, or with a weapon.

Also worth noting: I am now at level 78, on the verge of leveling up to 79. Which means I am now high enough level that I should start seeing Legendary Dragons! So that’s exciting. 😀

Tonight’s session will probably be a lot like this one, involving just general derping around the map, seeing what locations I haven’t run yet that I can explore for magical combat experience, and doing a boatload of Alchemy, Smithing, and Enchanting practice.

So let’s see where my magical skills are:

• Illusion: 83, needs to be at 100 because Drevis’ dialogue prompt for the quest is bugged and I won’t see it until the skill is at 100; therefore minimum ten more rounds of active exercise of skill + seven rounds of training
• Conjuration: 80, needs to be at 90, ten more rounds of training and/or active exercise of skill
• Destruction: 90, needs to be at 100 for same reasons as Illusion, cannot train any further, so ten more rounds of active exercise of skill
• Restoration: 84, needs to be at 90, should be able to get there with six rounds of training and/or active exercise of skill
• Alteration: 83, needs to be at 90, seven more rounds of training and/or active exercise of skill

So this means that if I trained everything here that needs training, I need 30 more rounds of active training. Five rounds of training per level up means I do this in six more levels.

So if I want to go faster than that, I need to exercise all these skills a lot.

And that means more general adventuring! I’ve been cycling through using Conjuration, Destruction, and some Illusion in combat. I need to remember to throw Alteration spells just before combat—to do Ironflesh or Ebonyflesh in particular. And to throw Restoration for healing when I need to.

This means I gotta cycle between different types of spells very quickly. This makes magical combat a very step by step process for me, more so than just shooting at things, or hitting them with physical weapons. I need to strategize what spell has to get thrown next.

Also, if I have an active quest pointer, I need to remember that the Clairvoyance spell is an option for exercising Illusion.

It’s an interesting challenge to think about!

So next time, the session will look a lot like this one. I think I’m going to seek out more locations I’ve discovered but not run yet. And I may go re-run Shriekwind Bastion just because I did get that extra quest pointer to get the “blessed iron greatsword” there.

Also: I now have at least five treasure maps! I think going around hunting for the treasure should provide me a fine opportunity to exercise all these magical skills.

Screenshots

No screenshots taken this time.

Editing to add

• 11/17/2023: Added a session number.
• 10/5/2024: Added a play date to the highlights section.