In Which Delga Routs Necromancers in Hob’s Fall Cave and Bandits in Silverdrift Lair

Another side quests type session, focusing on getting the word off the Word Wall in Silverdrift Lair, and then retrieving the flute for Pantea at the Bards College.

Where, I discovered to my shock, it is actually possible for the college NPCs to have a class! :O

Highlights

• Play date: 11/11/2021
• Session number in this run: 13
• Shopped a bit in Whiterun
• Bought five rounds Alchemy training from Arcadia to settle training for level 25
• Set out from Whiterun for Silverdrift Lair
• Started crossing the plains
• Heard somebody yell WE ARE ROUTED FALL BACK, off to the right; probably a bandit?
• Didn’t see who got killed, but I did see a distant sabre cat settle down on the ground–but it was glowing
• Went to investigate and oh okay spriggan! With two sabre cats
• Hmm maybe not bandits maybe hunters? Found a dead hunter but it looked like a woman, and I thought i heard a guy yelling? Ah well onward
• Additional critters confronted: sabre cat number three this time without spriggan; three frostbite spiders
• Mined iron vein
• Dark Brotherhood assassin number four, this time a female Khajiit
• Weynon Stones, where we killed ice wraiths, and I got a couple of steel ingots there
• Passed Talsgar the Wanderer yet again
• Reached and cleared Silverdrift Lair
• Got the word for Disarm Shout, also assorted loot, including a glass bow fuck yeah
• First Draugr Death Overlord sighting in this game, I think?
• Burned a lot of potions of healing taking him out, and he didn’t even have any ebony weapons, booooo
• Overloaded but took a potion of strength and fast traveled back to Watchtower
• Tromped into Whiterun to sell loot, crafted a bunch and sold a bunch, almost got to level 26
• Headed out instead to go to Dawnstar vicinity to get to Hob’s Fall Cave for that flute
• Took the carriage to Dawnstar, walked towards Dawnstar only just close enough to discover it for the map, then headed towards Hob’s Fall Cave
• Two different packs of three wolves, mostly ice wolves, got me up to level 26
• Took first Alchemy perk
• Went past Frostflow Lighthouse
• Fought a frost troll, and cool! Lyds shot a snowy sabre cat off the edge of an ice cliff 😀
• Found and cleared Hob’s Fall Cave
• Got the flute, and also got a copy of the Aetherium Wars book finally, so yay pointer to Katria’s quest
• Took out all the necromancers
• Enchanted the glass bow and the ebony sword I got from Olaf
• Ooo Orcish Boots of Muffling SWEET
• Off to Solitude to turn in the flute!
• Fast traveled to Meridia statue to get over there
• Made it to the Bards College and dropped off the flute; got the quests for the other two instruments
• Got five rounds of Speech training from Giraud to settle level 26’s training
• And holy crap they were actually having a performance class? CLASSES ACTUALLY HAPPEN IN BARDS COLLEGE WHO KNEW
• Did more shopping, then fast traveled back to Watchtower
• Except Lydia didn’t follow me whut? Fast traveled back to Solitude to find her, she caught up with me then, fast traveled back to Watchtower
• Finally! Warmaiden’s had some orichalcum!
• Improved all my Orcish armor pieces; surprisingly they are competitive with the Nordic? Okay then Orcish armor set for Delga is GO
• Gave all the Nordic gear to Lydia, looks better on her anyway <3
• Sold extra boots to Elrindir
• Parked in Breezehome; saved for the night

Commentary

Hob’s Fall Cave and Silverdrift Lair are places I visited before in both my previous sessions, so I don’t have too much new to say about them for this post.

But I will say that it was very satisfying to get a tasty glass bow, finally, as well as finding those Orcish Boots of Muffling. Getting far enough along with this character now that I’m starting to find the better armor and weapons. Awesome.

Also satisfying: finding a copy of Aetherium Wars so I can get Katria’s quest underway! That remains one of my favorite quests in the whole game and I look forward to running it again. It’ll just be a question of when.

Satisfying and startling to discover that when both are improved up to Epic, which was far as I could get with the blacksmithing potions I had available, my Orcish armor pieces were actually competitive with the Nordic. Not all of them were exactly equal, but the Orcish were mostly only a few points under the Nordic. And one piece, the Orcish Helmet, was actually clocking in at higher than the Nordic for protection! All in all, the Orcish armor is now in play, which pleases me. I feel like Delga will take some pride in being able to wear her people’s armor for a while.

I’d keep her on the Orcish bow–but sadly, the Orcish weapons are definitely not competitive damage-wise.

And one more thing worth noting for this post: I was actively startled to come into the Bards College to find Pantea and give her the flute, only to discover that she was giving an actual class to the student NPCs on performance of songs. Holy crap the Bards College NPCs actually do classes. Who knew? Not me!

Between that and getting Speech training off of Giraud, I feel like Bards College suddenly feels slightly less useless. 😉 And more like an actual college! They do still totally need an actual quest line though.

Next time

I have both of the other two instrument quests for the Bards College, so I will probably do those just to get them done and get the skill bumps.

After that, unless I find me a Daedra heart at one of the apothecaries in various places, I will probably go to the nightmare quest in Dawnstar, since Nightcaller Temple is a known place where I can find Daedra hearts. And I need one of those to continue with the Cursed Tribe quest! So I can get Volendrung!

Because Delga needs that hammer. Oh my yes.

Screenshots

Editing to add

• 11/18/2023: Fixed missing gallery, and added play date and session number markers.
• 10/6/2024: Converted gallery to a native WordPress one.