In Which Elessir Thwarts an Assassination in Raven Rock

Latest catchup post for Elessir’s now-completed playthrough, dating from late August 2024. Main action in this post: thwarting the attempt to assassinate Councilor Morvayn, becoming a citizen of Raven Rock, and getting Severin Manor. As you do.

16 more posts before Elessir’s writeup is done.

Play by play

Play date: 8/28/2024
Session number in this run: 53
Picked up ready to run initial Raven Rock quests
First up: Raven Rock Mine, played through this pretty much as per previous playthroughs
Talked to Crescius and got both the mine quest from him, and Glover’s pickaxe
Then ran the mine, see below
Finally made it through, took out the dragon priest, and got the Shout word
Made it to the Black Book and ran that
Took Companion’s Insight power as I usually do off of that book
Then headed out through the reaver lair, got out, and ran the reaver tower structure just outside
Lucien and Serana did most of that, since I was well and thoroughly overloaded, but I did call up a dremora to help them
Looted the hell out of the place–and Lucien did have a Solstheim-specific line while we did that
Serana raised at least one of the reavers, as she does, which had amusing results
After that, headed back to Raven Rock
Read the Certificate of Authenticity on the Nordic jewelry I’d bought to kick off that little plot
That let me find the reavers and the dead jeweler on the way back in and deal with that
Stopped to talk to Glover and told him I’d gotten the pickaxe back, and he let me keep it
Invested in his business while there
Sold Fethis the pendant from the mine
Went to Crescius’ house to finish the plot with him
Then headed out of Raven Rock to try to kick off the ash spawn plot
Took out the ash spawn but Captain Veleth was a little buggy in the immediate aftermath
Had to go back to Raven Rock to find him–and when I tried to talk to him, we got distracted by the arrival of a dragon
He leapt in on the fight with that, but I was still able to talk to him after
His lines were still the usual ones even though the location of the conversation was off
I gave him the note off the ash spawn since I’d already found it
At that point got the objective to go to Fort Frostmoth as per usual
But first, went to Kolbjorn Barrow, found Ralis and kicked off that plot
Then headed to Fort Frostmoth, and started running the place
Played the fort as per usual, and got all the usual loot
Took out the General and got the Champion’s Cudgel
Then Arvak’d back to Raven Rock
Checked in with the captain and he pointed me at Adril Arano to kick off the Served Cold quest
Got the task to go wait in the Ulen tomb
Talked to Tilisu and again avoided confronting her directly
It was the middle of the night at this point, and I didn’t want to barge into the manor to update Adril on what had happened
So finished up the Nordic jewelry quest at Glover’s forge
Then once it was morning went into the manor
Took a few tries to get positioned where I could actually talk to Adril and Cindiri, Serana kept getting in the way, LOL
But finally got the quest to get the folio
Also got the objective to proceed to search Severin Manor for evidence
Sold Fethis my next East Empire pendant, then went to the manor
HI TILISU HI MIRRI oh dang you mad gotta stab you sorry
Left them both dead by the door
Got the evidence from the safe
Learned Conjure Seeker spell since I nabbed that while running the previous Black Book
Returned to Adril to report in, and got objective to proceed to Ashfallow Citadel
Headed out on Arvak because yep I was sure overloaded
Random encounter at Old Attius Farm I’d somehow managed to never see before: a mad wizard who was trying to make himself fly!
Then also encountered a random hostile Imperial on the way to Ashfallow Citadel, and took him out
Ran the place with no issues to speak of and got out again
Arvak’d back to Raven Rock
Checked in with Adril who took me to the First Councilor
Hurray, I got Severin Manor!
Took possession of Severin Manor and stopped there until next time

Raven Rock Mine, and Bloodskal Barrow

Gotta say, getting through the waterfall with the aggro Draugr Deathlords was significantly easier this time through, LOL. Serana helped out a lot with that.

And since I’d recently run Solstheim as Finds before doing this session, my memory was fresh about how to do the door puzzle with the Bloodskal Blade. So got through that okay, too!

Getting both Serana and Lucien through the seven swinging blades was challenging, though. I had to queue up regular healing on one hand and necromantic healing on the other, and keep zapping both of them. And it was challenging to hit the correct follower with the correct spell! Because have I mentioned lately that my aim is still kind of ass?

I was a little sad that neither of them had any particular reactions to the Black Book, though! In Lucien’s case, that wasn’t entirely surprising just because in general Lucien is not really Dragonborn-aware. In Serana’s, I was hoping for a bit more than what I got–and I was surprised that she did react to my running the Black Book in Miraak’s temple, just not this one. More on this later.

And on the way out of Bloodskal Barrow, I noticed (I think maybe for the first time?) that there were several draugr bodies lying around the campfire near the exit out. Which made me wonder if the reavers had actually been burning the bodies of the dead?

Or were the draugr just drawn to the fire and trying to ambush the reavers by it?

They just grow better zombies on Solstheim, apparently

While we were fighting the reavers camped out at Bloodskal Barrow, Serana of course raised one as she does–and I observed that the guy she raised threw regular dialogue lines, not zombie moans! Heh!

He also just leaned against the wall in what was probably that character’s usual hangout spot. Which is where he wound up disintegrating!

I’d seen before that characters on Solstheim tend to be more coherent raised zombies than Skyrim mainland NPCs, but it was amusing to see that again here.

Maybe Serana was sharpening her necromancy techniques?

Served Cold quest

This time through on running the Served Cold quest, when I had the initial conversation with Adril Arano about it, I took this dialogue option for once:

He ordered the execution. It’s on his head… not yours.

This felt appropriate just because Elessir, like the character he’s named for, was rather more cynical than many of the other Dragonborns I’ve run to date. And also, I was curious to see what Adril would say in response! Answer:

Now that’s just ridiculous! As second councilor, it’s my responsibility to protect Councilor Morvayn from harm.

So that was kinda neat.

Once I proceeded to the part of the plot where I found Tilisu at the Ulen family tomb, she also threw a line I hadn’t seen out of her since running Merawen:

Nice to see a fellow Dunmer following the traditional customs.

Which is kinda hilarious, given that I’m pretty damn sure Elessir gave zero fucks about traditional Dunmer customs. Well, maybe he had a picofuck to give, LOL. At least enough to still get traditional Dunmer customs, even if he stopped adhering to them a long damn time ago.

Mad wizard trying to fly

I was pretty amazed to have a random encounter in Skyrim I’d never seen before, after so many previous playthroughs. This one was a hard callback to an NPC you see in Morrowind: a Bosmer falling out of the sky when failing an attempt to fly, badly.

The guy I encountered in this session was trying to do the same. And he was successful, but only briefly. And he didn’t have a plan for how to come down again, so he went very, very splat.

He had a journal on him, which I read, and found that he was also very, very crazypants. Said journal mentioned his eating a book. And given that this was taking place on Solstheim, you could make a good argument for this dude having encountered one of the Black Books! You’d think he wouldn’t have been able to literally eat one of them, though, which argues against this. But on the other hand, if he was that bonkers, maybe this was just incoherent raving?

Still though, that was a fun and surprising encounter.

Getting Severin Manor and citizenship in Raven Rock

I noted when I played Merawen’s run that getting Severin Manor, and citizenship in Raven Rock by extension, hits a little differently when you’re playing a Dunmer.

And I think this also applied to Elessir. Like Merawen, he was a Dunmer without any existing ties to family, House, tribe, or any other type of Dunmer society. So to have an entire town of Dunmer explicitly welcoming him and giving him citizenship among them in gratitude for his deeds did, I feel, mean a lot more to Elessir than he was willing to let on.

Notable Lucien and Serana lines

Lucien did have a few lines that demonstrated he was Solstheim-aware, even if he wasn’t necessarily Dragonborn-aware. Like this line that he threw while we were looting Bloodskal Barrow:

It was here on Solstheim that the Snow Prince of the Ancient Falmer was slain at the Battle of the Moesring. By a twelve-year-old girl, indeed!

Here’s another one:

I wish I could have seen Solstheim before the Red Year. Now half of its beauty is buried beneath the ash.

And he threw this line when I found the stuff in Fort Frostmoth to make Elsweyr Fondue. And he’s not wrong, two hundred year old cheese had to stink, LOL:

What in the world is that smell? Ah, of course. Your cheese wheels.

And here’s a line that raised my eyebrows. I think this must be a callback to the Bloodmoon DLC in Morrowind, which I have yet to play, but UESP does have a page that talks about Raven Rock being founded as part of that content:

The Nerevarine was actually among the party who first started construction on this town. Amazing to see how much it’s grown since then.

So that’s neat, and just raises my estimation of the deep knowledge that Lucien’s creator, Joseph Russell, has of Elder Scrolls lore. <3 And how he utilizes it in Lucien’s own knowledge!

Once I got far enough along in the assassination plot to break into Severin Manor, Lucien did show a bit of buggy behavior, though. He threw this line, which I’d seen out of him before:

It’s a nice place you’ve got here. It would be a shame if it were to mysteriously burn down. What? No, it really would be a shame!

The problem with this? I didn’t actually own Severin Manor yet. Because Councilor Morvayn hadn’t yet awarded it to me. So, oops.

Next time

Elessir’s next post will feature finally moving Lucien’s personal quest along–by visiting Dumzbthar! Oh, and also, stopping by Miraak’s temple and stuff.