In Which Marwyth Saves Sotha Sil and Clockwork City

More catchup for Marwyth’s playthrough on ESO, from mid-January. Main action here: finishing off the Clockwork City plotline! That was fun!

Play by play

Play dates: 1/18-1/21/2024
Session numbers in this run: 96-99

January 18th

Ran the geyser by Alinor since it fired off as I was gathering ingredients
Activated Ember for backup
Boinged off to Hew’s Bane to run some Guilds and Glory event action there
Did a retrieval quest for the Thieves Guild for event reward coffers 😀
This took me over to a world boss locale, Ko Estaran, and the place was fucking swarmed
Found a lost pendant and had to kill a bunch of lamia to get the pearls for it
Also helped take out the world boss once it respawned
Got tasty loot off of that including an Outlaw belts style sheet, and double drops off of harvest nodes too
After running Gyllerah, came back to Marwyth very late to run another bit of the Clockwork City plot, the bit I was running when the server went down the night before
Swapped off from Ember to Mirri since Mirri gives rapport for visiting Clockwork City
Had to solve a valve puzzle to activate an automation called the Imperfect, but had to rely on the wiki to get the solution
Powered up an animo core by solving that puzzle, and stuck it into the Imperfect, which activated it and sent it clomping over to burn a hole in the wall
Gascone was magically monitoring us, so he started bitching about the attempt being futile, and sending skaafin after us
The Imperfect fried a lot of them, and Mirri and I took potshots at several others
The Imperfect ran out of power once and I had to run upstairs to find another animo core to give it
Once that happened, it clomped over to burn through another wall and take out more skaafin, but it got fried by a charged fence blocking its way
So that left me and Mirri to get the rest of the way to Gascone
Gascone tried once more to take me out by a bigger skaafin summons, and I promptly took that out, too
At which point Gascone surrendered, and I listened to his pitch about why I shouldn’t kill him
Marwyth was, I feel, rather sympathetic to his being really fucking cranky at Sotha Sil for not seeming to give much of a fuck about his own city; since she’s already fairly anti-Tribunal, she couldn’t exactly argue with that
So she agreed to turn him over to the Apostles
Came out of the place to find Luciana and a couple other Apostles waiting for us, so I turned Gascone over to them and returned to the Brass Fortress
Talked to Varuni inside the Basilica about what to do next
Gascone had claimed that some crows stole a key from him, so my next objective became finding those crows
Also took the time to go find the person who owned the broken brassilisk
She was an Apostle who’d sent it off through the pipes for research, and she happily accepted it back and gave me a reward for it
Left off there until next time
ESO+ stuff: experimented with coloring the Thieves Guild costume

January 19th

Ran Thieves Guild daily in Hew’s Bane, which sent me back to one of the two delves (forgot to record which one in my notes, though)
So did a surgical strike on the place, got in, recovered the thing I had to get, and got out
With Ember as backup, ran the rest of the Mages Guild plot, Chateau of the Ravenous Rodent, and the end game to get back Eyevea
Played it the same way I did as Gyllerah, telling Sheogorath to cure Valaste
So now Marwyth’s done with that plot line anyway
Also boinged to Riften to find the Khajiit I had to find and follow up on Velsa’s letter
Khajiit in question turned out to be Velsa’s old love, Narahni
I liked that this old Khajiit was loved in Riften for making pies, and that there was a young Bosmer mage who was very protective of her and didn’t look kindly on my trying to find her
Narahni had the mage open us a portal to Abah’s Landing so I could take her to Velsa
Lolololol Ember was absolutely delighted that I took her into trespass territory: “You brought the right Khajiit for the job!” ;D

January 20th

Ran a Thieves Guild daily with Ember as backup, which let me go hit the world boss in Hew’s Bane I hadn’t hit yet, at Thrall Cove
Didn’t get any loot off that kill (same problem I saw with Gyllerah, Hew’s Bane wass swarmed for the event so it was hard to do enough damage to earn loot)
But did at least return to Spencer to turn in the quest
Later, shifted to Mirri as backup and returned to Clockwork City to run the rest of that quest
This required me to track down the crows that had been seen in Gascone’s office
And the crows were the most delightful part of the story so far 😀
As I understand it the crows are creatures of Nocturnal, but apparently have minds of their own, because I was able to convince them to help me find the Skeleton Key
Started off by getting the crows’ attention by bringing them a bauble from the constable who pointed me at them
The quest suggested I either loot the item or just talk to the constable
Marwyth opted to just talk to the guy; I mean, she could have stolen the thing, but it seemed unwise in a city where her status was precarious to begin with, and which is ruled over by one of the Tribunal
Got the item from the constable and let the crows have it
Then I had to help out one of the crows by bringing him a poem for the female crow he was trying to woo, and that part was fun, too
(Notes reconstructed from here off of screenshots, since I apparently forgot to fill in the rest of the notes when I ran this plot)
Went into the Hall of Records to do that and had to question several NPCs, including a factotum, about the correct poem to use
That got me the promise that the crows would lead me to the Skeleton Key in the Machine District
So I had to talk to Luciana Pullo again, and get her to buy off on that as well as come with me as backup
Once in the Machine District, had to also settle a fight between crow factions
That led me to the threat of the Shadow of Sotha Sil having actually imprisoned him, and needing to go rescue him
Questioned Gascone, now in the custody of the Apostles, for further information; he warned I’d have to go through the Evergloam
Reported this back to Luciana and she sent me on to try to navigate through the Evergloam to get to where Sotha Sil was imprisoned
While heading out to do that, came across a metal plate that triggered a side quest
Made it through the Evergloam and into the Mechanical Fundament with Luciana
Talked to Aios, the master factotum overseeing a lot of the operations of the city
Convinced it I was there to help Sotha Sil so please don’t destroy us, mmkay?
Defeated the Shadow and rescued Sotha Sil
Since Luciana was badly wounded during the battle to rescue him, asked Sotha Sil to heal her
Checked in with Luciana to tell her she’d be okay, and also updated Varuni
Sotha Sil sent me off to talk to Divayth Fyr, so I checked in with him too
And then had to go and meet both Sotha Sil and Divayth Fyr in the Elegiac Replication, for a final conversation and to conclude the entire quest

January 21st

Writs

More on Clockwork City stuff

I’ve written before about how in general, whenever I run into a puzzle in an Elder Scrolls game (whether it’s the base game or something added in by a mod), I usually try to solve the puzzle in good faith. But certain types of puzzles are ones I struggle to figure out in a timely fashion–and I have only so much patience for that.

The puzzle in the Ventral Terminus, which I had to solve to charge an animo core, was one such example. This was the type of puzzle where you have a whole bunch of fiddly things that you have to do something to, in order to accomplish a goal–in this case, directing steam over to power up the animo core for the Imperfect. But I did not find it intuitively obvious at first glance how turning the various valves impacted where the steam was going, or what pattern I was suppose to work out for how to turn the valves. So I looked up the solution on uesp.net, and I’m glad I did, otherwise it would have taken me for-fucking-ever.

Which let me reach the actual interesting part of the Ventral Terminus, i.e., reaching Gascone and hearing him out on why I shouldn’t kill him. Namely, that he was pissed off at Sotha Sil for neglecting his own city. This was, I gotta say, a hell of a pitch to make to Marwyth. She’s already fairly surly about the Tribunal as it is. So she wound up thinking Gascone’s an asshole–but an asshole she can sympathize with. So she was disinclined to kill him on the spot.

Later, when I got to meet the Blackfeather Court, that was hands down the most delightful part of the entire quest. The crows are great. <3

Did a hard push through the rest of the plotline on the 20th, and overall very much enjoyed it. There was crunchy fodder here for Marwyth’s thoughts on the Tribunal, to be sure. She’s still really not a fan of any of them, but I think she came out of this willing to tolerate Sotha Sil the most. Mind you, this isn’t saying much. She still doesn’t like how he’s handling running Clockwork City. But she’s willing to give him slightly more slack than Almalexia or Vivec, just because he seems to be slightly less in love with the idea of being a so-called god.

Also, his final dialogue to her was a lot closer to a conversation between equals than the final conversations Marwyth had with either Almalexia or Vivec. I mean, Sotha Sil even outright asked permission to confess a thing to her, and the gist of the conversation overall (documented here on the uesp.net wiki) came across as one of philosophical debate. Not exactly the kind of thing Marwyth expects from entities that want worship. Even Azura.

And of course, Sotha Sil gave me the pointers necessary to proceed onward to the Summerset leg of the Daedric War storyline. Which gets back into familiar territory, since that was after all the very first plot I ran with Gyllerah! More on this to come.

Finishing up the Mages Guild plotline

I made the same choice with this plot with Marwyth that I did with Gyllerah: namely, to tell Sheogorath to cure Valaste. Marwyth may be a thief, but that doesn’t mean she’s okay with letting a woman stay crazy, especially after Sheogorath had explicitly targeted her.

And really, I fully expect to make the same choice once Veghra hits that point of the Mages Guild plot. Just because I can’t see any character I play being the sort who’d willingly accept power at the cost of leaving someone to Sheogorath’s tender mercies, after ol’ Uncle Sheo had explicitly and specifically driven that person completely off her rocker.

Also, there are so many skyshards and other sources of skill points all over the game that I feel like I can stand to skip the two skill points off of making that quest choice! I’m a completist, but not quite enough of one that I feel like I have to get every single possible skill point. I’m not even sure if I want to bother to accumulate most of them, just because after a point, I’m not sure what I’ll want to actually spend them on!

Thieves Guild side stuff

When I started running Velsa’s personal side quest, I was very surprised and pleased to discover that a) it involved her old love, and b) not only was that old love female, she was also a Khajiit!

This is not the first same-sex romance I’ve come across in ESO, but I’m pretty sure it’s the first one I’ve found between mer (or human) and a Khajiit. Which establishes for me that yes, they’re willing to go there in general lore.

I liked as well that the story accounted for lifespan differences between Dunmer and Khajiit, too. When I found Narahni in Riften, I saw that she was old, because she’d aged that much since her prior relationship with Velsa! Whereas Velsa herself shows no particular signs of being old, in all the player’s interactions with her for other Thieves Guild stuff.

When I finally reunited Narahni and Velsa, I found it charming as well that Velsa was still absolutely in love with her, and showed no disdain at all for the age difference. <3 And Velsa’s snarky facade even slipped, letting emotion show through! Very well played there by the voice actor, and in the animation of the character as well. Velsa looked almost like a different character with her emotion plain on her face!