In Which Shenner Consults the Augur, Fights a Bandit Chief, and Claims a Mage Tower

Mix of new stuff and old stuff here, as I moved the mage college plot a little further along and spoke to the Augur of Dunlain. But I also did some fishing, acquired the Wabbajack, met and fought and slew Tyra Blood-Fire, and claimed her ebony plate armor. And I acquired Myrwatch, the mage tower near Morthal!

And oh yeah, I’m thane of Winterhold now. Yay!

Highlights

Play date: 6/24/2022
Session number in this run: 24
Started in Lakeview
Did some building to begin the storage wing
Did a run around the lake to find additional fishing spots
Boinged to Whiterun to sell some stuff and buy a bit more iron
Boinged to Windstad to start the main hall there
Boinged back to Lakeview and smelted some iron ore, then built out one of the safe banks in the cellar
Boinged next to the College of Winterhold
Told Gogh to wait for me by the entrance to the Midden
Ran the place and burned two of J’zargo’s scrolls to take out the one draugr and one skeleton
Got a little turned around when an ice wraith knocked me off the ice bridge, but managed to jump back up to the bridge
Called up a Seducer warrior to take out the frostbite spiders
Consulted the Augur and got pointed at the Staff of Magnus
Returned topside; went to talk to the Arch-Mage and reported what the Augur said; got his directive to go speak to Mirabelle, and his mage’s circlet
Went outside to go find trainers but HELLO SURPRISE FROST DRAGON
Called up a Seducer archer to help shoot at the dragon; mages also gathered to watch, and Savos Aren called up a dremora, ha
Took out the dragon
Got five rounds of Restoration training from Colette since she’d come up to watch the fight
Went down to Winterhold to check in with the Jarl; got named thane of Winterhold
Boinged to Solitude next
Stopped to talk to Dervenin to clear my quest prompt for that, and actually took a few more of his conversational prompts this time, learned Sheogorath had forbidden him to speak his name, LOL
Started running Mind of Madness plot
Got Falk to give me the key to the Pelagius Wing; also bought the alchemy lab for Proudspire, and got a bounty to go kill a bandit leader at Ironback Hideout
For now though started running the Pelagius Wing
Killed once by the dragon priest night terror; response time using the Wabbajack not good on my old stupid PC, particularly if the target is fast ;P
However, made it through okay the second time
Went back out and got the scoop on Angeline’s daughter from Captain Aldis
Ran the Ironback bounty; noted the bandit’s main camp respawned but the cellar where I’d nabbed the crossbows did not
Bandit chief however was wearing ebony plate armor, helmet, and gloves; nabbed those for important housecarl purposes
Rode back to Solitude in case the Khajiit were there (they were not)
Sold bandit loot to achieve necessary amount of money for the enchanter table in Proudspire; bought that from Falk and also collected the bounty for the bandit
Rode down to the Solitude Sawmill and did a bit of fishing
Boinged back to Lakeview and did more building and smithing
Boinged from there to Windhelm
Ran the plot to find and fight Tyra Blood-Fire
But first took a room in the Candlehearth Inn; derped around a little to look for the book to give me the clue about where the two warriors had their contest
I did find the book and only belatedly realized it was the journal of the writer who hangs out in the inn; chatted with him and got his favor quest to take a book to Giraud in Solitude; consider this my apology for taking your journal, sir, and also because you are apparently the only person in all of Windhelm who likes books?
Went out the next morning and bought all of Sofie’s flowers
Spotted an Argonian on the docks I hadn’t seen before, Stands-in-Shallows
Found the beggar on the docks relevant to the Tyra plot and gave him 100 gold
Got objective to go find Tyra at the shrine west of Windhelm; found her and she cut straight to the chase; she was a pretty decently hard fight, burned through several potions to keep her from killing me
And heh, as soon as I was done killing her a thief also attacked me, apparently he was pissed off that I didn’t let him mug me? Sorry, too busy fighting with this woman trying to kill me, wait your damn turn, oh wait i’m sorry, were you trying to take my stuff? <STAB>
Boinged back to Lakeview and dropped off Tyra’s ebony plate armor, and also the dragonscale as I felt like wearing the Remnant gear for a bit
Boinged to Riften; dropped off the dwarven axe Laila Law-Giver gave me in Honeyside
Got Iona on duty and boinged back to Solitude
Experimented a bit with console to see if I could un-stick the two stuck guards near the ramp up to Castle Dour, by the sewer grate; answer: no
Decided to head out to get Swift Wind from the stable, only to be rudely interrupted by dragon, which Team Dragonborn proceeded to kill along with help from guards
Got on Swift Wind and fast traveled to Folgunthur
Found nearby camp of necromancer with captive bone wolf, and now I have a bone wolf? Yay?
Told it to go wait for me in Dead Man’s Dread, at least until I have Bloodchill Cavern 😉
Then decided to ride down and investigate Myrwatch, which I then acquired
Boinged back to Solitude and sold things
Saved for the night

Commentary

Okay, so this was a pretty busy session! Lots of things done, nothing huge by itself, but a lot of smaller things accomplished.

Initial College of Winterhold action just reinforced my amusement about seeing Savos Aren actually being one of the mages in the place who will respond to dragon attacks! As opposed to standing around making smart-assed remarks like “those fools are actually fighting!”

And as I’ve observed already in running a PC build of the game, running the Midden was easier with it being less dark. But I still got a little turned around with the whole “where the hell is the Augur again” question. I’ve run the mage college now on every single playthrough I’ve done, you’d think I’d remember exactly how to get to him by now, LOL. But it didn’t help that I fell off that ice bridge during the fight with the ice wraith, either. That threw me off. It was nice to discover though that I could jump my way back up to the bridge if I climbed the correct rocks.

I was actually slightly surprised to get killed during the Mind of Madness plot. But I think this was a direct consequence of my combat response time not being ideal on my old stupid PC. I’ve always had a bit of trouble using staves in the game even on the Switch, and now on the PC build, that problem’s exacerbated. Particularly if I’m trying to hit a fast-moving opponent like a dragon priest.

I also liked getting new info just by talking further to Dervenin. The bit with Sheogorath having forbidden him to speak his name was cute, and tied in well with Sheogorath’s introducing himself to the player.

It was slightly disappointing, though not at all surprising, that the cellar at Ironback Hideout where I found all those tasty crossbows and crossbow bolts did not respawn, even if the main hideout did!

The bandit chief, however, had ebony plate armor, helmet, and gauntlets on. Tasty! Those need to get handed off to housecarls, I think. I need to get a full set of the gear improved up and handed off to at least one housecarl. Probably Lydia? I need to doublecheck what she’s got on and whether fully improved silver beats fully improved ebony plate.

And speaking of ebony plate armor, went to Windhelm and tracked down Tyra Blood-Fire. She was a good hard fight! And the enchantments on her ebony plate gear are tasty, as well. That actually may be the gear I hand off to Lydia? As heavy armor goes I haven’t really found anything yet that wins out over the Imperial Dragon gear. So I’m pretty sure I don’t want to wear Tyra’s gear myself. And I’m kind of holding out anyway for the Spell Knight armor.

Next item after that: finding the necromancer near Folgunthur who was conducting experiments on bone wolves. He was not a hard fight. And now I have a bone wolf. Yay?

Last but not least, the end of this session saw my acquisition of the mage tower Myrwatch. Of the new homes available to you in the AE content, I may actually like the design of this one the best? I really like the seal you have to throw flames at to get into the house, similar to the seal at the access point to the mage college. And I like that there’s a portal between the two levels of the tower, rather than stairs!

It strikes me that the portal in particular is actually a really nice touch. Not only because “it’s magic” and therefore in character for a mage tower, but also because Skyrim is a dangerous place. And if you’re old, or injured, or infirm, you could have trouble getting up and down stairs! But if you have a nice stable portal, that could be way less strain on you! So in addition to being magical, it’s also rather nicely accessible.

And it’s got a staff enchanter. Which I did play around with, because up until this point I never bothered to use Neloth’s in Tel Mithryn. I’ve rarely been inclined to use staves in combat myself. But I’m coming to appreciate that it could well be very, very helpful to have a good staff carried by your follower! Having Iona able to summon an atronach during the fight with the Messenger, for example.

I’m a little disappointed, though, that there doesn’t appear to be a storage chest by Myrwatch’s forge.

On the other hand, I also found a pair of Fine Armguards just laying on one of the cupboards. Neat. 😀 Now if I could find the fur-lined cloak that Bryling wears with those, I could use that as a nice outfit!

I think I really like Myrwatch, although the nearest town being Morthal is kind of meh in terms of desirability of location. Not to mention it’s known that Morthal’s residents aren’t exactly welcoming to their main local mage, Falion. So you’d think they’d take more notice if there was an actual mage tower in their immediate vicinity?

Not to mention I’d think Falion would have taken notice of the place. Hell, I’m surprised he’s not actually taken it over. It would sure be a lot safer for him, if he insists on a) living in Morthal, and b) continuing to practice Conjuration magic.

Specifically because of where the tower is located, I kind of wish you’d have the ability to reset the seal. I mean, it’s not necessary in terms of game mechanics, I think? The only times I’ve ever had NPCs that don’t live there show up in my houses is in cities, if an NPC is actively talking to me when I enter a house… or, at one of the Hearthfire homes, if hostiles actually spawn inside when I show up.

But there’s no game mechanic for NPCs breaking into your house when you’re not there.

That said: the Dragonborn doesn’t know that! So I would think that if I had me a mage tower, from a purely IC perspective, I should have to activate that seal every time I enter. That I have to do it only once is simply a matter of game convenience–you don’t have to activate the seal at the College of Winterhold every time you show up there, either.

On the other hand, a mage tower having a remote location in Skyrim is very appropriate, so! Because no city in the game, really, is exactly friendly to mages. So if anything I should think that the tower should be more remote than it actually is. It is not very far from Morthal at all. Absolutely easy for any Morthal residents to find the place, in theory.

Next time

I’ve already run a session after this one, and what y’all can look forward to in that session post is my acquisition of Bloodchill Cavern, finally moving along in the Fishing quests, and running Avanchnzel!