In Which Tembriel Regroups For the Mages Guild

Low-key session, centered around me working on my skills and magic, and advancement in the Mages Guild quests. This is side work to get a bit more leveled up so that I can return to the Urshilaku Burial Caverns later, and continue the main quest.

Highlights

• Play date: 10/4
• Session number in this run: 24
• Picked up just outside the Mages Guild in Balmora
• Went on a walk just north of the city; practiced throwing Soul Trap at critters, fought some rats, a kwama forager, and a couple of nix-hounds
• Filled the three soul gems I had on me, then returned to Balmora
• Visited
• Bought three cheap daggers to see if I could enchant them; parked in the Mages Guild to practice that; all three enchantment attempts failed, so I blew the gems, oh well
• Then spent some time throwing about all of my gold at Sharn for training in Alteration and Mysticism
• Got Mysticism up to 20, and that let me actually finally get bumped to Journeyman in the Guild
• Got first two quests from Ranis Athrys back to back:
  • Have to go recruit a former Telvanni into the Guild or kill him
  • Collect some guild dues from another person (or kill them too, apparently?)
• Saved for the night at that point

Commentary

Super low-key session, this. My only real intent was to practice my magical skills, maybe fill some soul gems, and get some training. And all three of these things worked quite well.

I had only three soul gems on me, so I didn’t have to walk far outside of Balmora to find enough critters to kill for that practice. (I should probably find out where I can buy more soul gems? I haven’t seen them for sale so far with the vendors I’ve visited, I should doublecheck.)

Unsurprisingly, I am still not able to cast Soul Trap very well. But I did it often enough that I was able to successfully fill all three of the gems I had with me.

Decided to throw enough money at Sharn to pull both my Alteration and Mysticism up, in the name of improving my chances at casting both Levitation and Soul Trap. Which means those stats are now each at 20 or above. Still ass, but slightly less ass than the rest of my magical skills, and enough that I finally got promoted to Journeyman in the Guild.

That in turn let me queue up two more quests, finally, as Ranis will now actually give me quests. Both of which appear to mean I have to go either intimidate or kill people for the Guild? Geez. See previous commentary re: the Mages Guild generally not fucking around.

Next time

I’ve run a session since then, so that post will involve more Mages Guild work. I wasn’t ready to return to the main quest, and wanted to work on my magical skills some more. And also, I discovered Ranis’ quest line ends in acquiring a Daedric dagger that does Soul Trap and YES PLEASE I’LL HAVE SOME.

Screenshots

Editing to add

• 11/23/2023: Restored missing gallery.
• 10/11/2024: Converted gallery to single WordPress image.