Merawen Playthrough

Merawen

Playthrough Info
Game	Skyrim Special Edition
Race	Dunmer
Playthrough Dates	July to October 2021
Platform	Nintendo Switch
Language	English
Difficulty	Apprentice

This is the playthrough page for my second Skyrim playthrough, for the character Merawen of the Dunmer.

I began this playthrough immediately after the one for the Bosmer Alarrah, on 7/31/2021, just because there were large bits of the game I didn’t do with Alarrah and which I wanted to explore. I wanted Merawen to be my character to explore the Thieves Guild, to have a higher emphasis on using magic, and possibly also to explore the Dark Brotherhood.

I’d originally expected that the posts for Merawen’s run would not be quite as thorough as Alarrah’s, because of not wanting to write about the portions that would be the same. But as it turned out I had plenty of new material to talk about, as well as talking about the differences in how Merawen handled things vs. how Alarrah did.

Another notable difference I did with Merawen is the order in which I played major parts of the game. With Alarrah, I did the main plot first (and assorted major side plots such as the College of Winterhold), then Dawnguard, then Dragonborn.

With Merawen, I followed a track of cycling back and forth between several different things at once: Thieves Guild, College of Winterhold, and Dawnguard, with periodic diversions back to the main plot. Then I ran Dragonborn, and finally, closed out at the end with defeating Alduin and saving the world. I wound up liking this play flow kind of better, just because it seemed like a more satisfying narrative progression in terms of escalation of the stakes.

(However, I also found that cycling back and forth thing hard to keep track of, which informed my choices on later playthroughs.)

Like Alarrah, she is named for a character in my Rebels of Adalonia books, Valor of the Healer, Vengeance of the Hunter, and Victory of the Hawk.

Merawen’s Backstory

As Merawen was a Dunmer, I decided that as with many Dunmer coming to Skyrim, the eruption of Red Mountain early in the Fourth Era had to be critical to her backstory. However, I also decided she was too young to have witnessed it herself. She did, however, witness the impact of that eruption on her family.

While I never did decide for sure if Merawen’s family were Ashlanders, I was pretty sure they were–and that her family was reduced to hardscrabble existence and health issues that more or less wiped them out by the time Merawen came into the picture. She fled to Skyrim on a stolen boat, and probably got nabbed by the Empire not long after she came ashore near Windhelm.

This put her into a position to be very strongly influenced by the treatment of Dunmer she saw going on in Skyrim, particularly in Windhelm. And it informed a lot of the choices I made with her all throughout the game, up to and including her choice of spouse (Jenassa), and how Solstheim struck me very differently when I went there as a Dunmer.

All in all, it made Merawen a very satisfying character to play.

Playthrough Posts

Here are all the posts about Merawen’s playthrough! They’re listed in descending date order, so the newest posts appear first. Also, note the pagination controls after the first five posts. You can page through to see the newer ones.

You can also browse Merawen’s posts via her playthrough category link.

In Which Merawen Joins the Dawnguard and Seeks Azura’s Star - 08/12/2021
In which Merawen continues her search for Azura's Star, and also seeks to join the Dawnguard as well as go after dragons and giants, with the aid of a Dunmer mercenary.
In Which Merawen Joins the Mage College - 08/11/2021
In which Merawen acquires the Masque of Clavicus Vile, begins the search for Azura’s Star, and joins the College of Winterhold—and oh yes, also robs the house of Clan Gray-Mane in Whiterun while she’s at it.
In Which Merawen Takes Care of Thieves Guild Business - 08/10/2021
In which Merawen implements her orders from Maven Black-Briar to take out the competition at the Honningbrew Meadery; in which she completes a burglary job at the House of Clan Battle-Born; and in which she completes a shill job at the House of Clan Cruel-Sea. With a side helping of giant killing!
In Which Merawen Visits the Face Sculptor - 08/09/2021
In which Merawen, with Lydia’s assistance, defeats the bandits of Valtheim Towers and the mages of Sunderstone Gorge; in which she learns another Word of Power, and hunts for ingredients for Ingun Black-Briar; and in which she visits the Face Sculptor in Riften, to sample Galathil’s highly unusual gift.
In Which Merawen Hits the Goldenglow Estate for the Thieves Guild - 08/08/2021
In which Merawen successfully pulls off the Goldenglow Estate job for the Thieves Guild--and comes to the attention of Maven Black-Briar; and in which she takes out a couple more dragons, and a bunch of bandits and Alik'r warriors.

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