_____) __ _____ __ __) / /) /) (__/ ) /) /) (, / (, ) / )__ // _(/ _ __ / _ __ ___// // _ / | / / (/_(_(__(/_/ (_ ) / (__/ (_(_)(/_(/_ /_)_ ___/__ |/ (_____) (_/ (__ / | ________ ___ __ __ __ _____ _ |__ | | |__|__ _|__| ____ ____ / | | __ | | | / / |/ _ / / | _ |_| | /| ( <_> ) | _______ /___ /____/__| _/ |__|____/|___| / / / / *** ATTENTION *** At this early stage in the guide, I really appreciate any feedback I can get from people using it regarding pretty much any topic. I'm particularly interesting in hearing if you came looking for information on a particular subject and didn't find it. If you let me know what's missing it's almost certainly something I can still add at this point. I'd also really like to know if you find any mistakes or errors so I can correct them as soon as possible. Anything else you wish to send (email address below) is fine too. Also note that the guide is being updated almost daily right now, so if you're using it on a regular basis you might want to try hitting "Ctrl + F5" in your internet browser about once per day, just to make sure you're looking at the latest version and not an older one that is cached in your browser history. Same applies if you have the guide saved to your hard drive, you might want to check back for updates now and then. In the end, it's up to you. Enjoy! ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~| | || Guide written and compiled by A I e x || | |_||______________________________________________________________________||_| |~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| | Author: Alex Eagleson | | Began: March 25th, 2006 | | Completed: Eventually | | Email: StarOceanDC(at)gmail(dot)com | | University of Guelph, Ontario | |____________________________________________________________________________| |~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~| | || Feel Free to contribute anything you wish via email || | |_||______________________________________________________________________||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || CT.TS || Table of Contents || CT.TS || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| |~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| | - Table of Contents.....................CT.TS | | - PC Controls...........................CN.PC | | - Xbox 360 Controls.....................CN.XB | | - System Requirements...................00.00 | | - Basic Tweaking........................01.00 | | - Out-of-Game Settings.............01.01 | | - In-Game Settings.................01.02 | | - Advanced Tweaking.....................02.00 | | - Read this First!.................02.01 | | - INI Performance Tweaks...........02.02 | | - INI MIsc. Tweaks.................02.03 | | - Nvidia Coolbits Tweak............02.04 | | - Gameplay Mecchanics...................03.00 | | - Combat...........................03.01 | | - Interaction......................03.02 | | - Freedom..........................03.03 | | - Crime............................03.04 | | - Everything Else..................03.05 | | - Quests......................03.05 | | - Guilds......................03.05 | | - Persuasion..................03.05 | | - Lockpicking.................03.05 | | - Haggling....................03.05 | | - Leveling Up.................03.05 | | - Health......................03.05 | | - Magicka.....................03.05 | | - Fatigue.....................03.05 | | - Vampirism...................03.05 | | - Skills................................04.00 | | - Descriptions.....................04.01 | | - Statistics.......................04.02 | | - Character Creation....................05.00 | | - Choosing the Right Character.....05.01 | | - Race & Appearance................05.02 | | - Birthsigns.......................05.03 | | - Character Class..................05.04 | | - Introduction: The Prison..............06.00 | | - The Prison.......................06.01 | | - The Imperial Substructure........06.02 | | - The Imperial Subterrane..........06.03 | | - The Main Quest........................07.00 | | - Deliver the Amulet...............07.01 | | - Find the Heir....................07.02 | | - Breaking the Siege at Kvatch.....07.03 | | - Weynon Priory....................07.04 | | - The Path of Dawn.................07.05 | | - Dagon Shrine.....................07.06 | | - Spies............................07.07 | | - Blood of the Deadra..............07.08 | | - Bruma Gate.......................07.09 | | - Blood of the Divines.............07.10 | | - Miscarcand.......................07.11 | | - Allies for Bruma.................07.12 | | - Defense of Bruma.................07.13 | | - Great Gate.......................07.14 | | - Paradise.........................07.15 | | - Light the Dragonfires............07.16 | | - Daedric Quests........................08.00 | | - Azura............................08.01 | | - Legal & Copyright.....................LE.AL | | - Credits & Thanks......................CR.DS | |____________________________________________________________________________| |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || CN.PC || Controls || CN.XB || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ O== PC VERSION ==============================================================O o================o====================oo================o====================o | Key / Button | Function || Key / Button | Function | o================o====================oo================o====================o | Q | Auto Move || Tab | Menu | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | W | Move forward || Caps Lock | Autorun | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | A | Slide left || Ctrl | Sneak mode | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | S | Move backward || Alt | Block | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | D | Slide right || F5 | Quicksave | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | E | Jump || F9 | Quickload | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | R | Switch view || Spacebar | Activate | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | T | Wait || Left Mouse | Attack | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | F | Toggle weapon || Right Mouse | Block | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | Z | Grab || Middle Mouse | Change view | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | C | Cast magic || Mouse Wheel | Zoom in / out | o----------------o--------------------oo----------------o--------------------o O== XBOX 360 VERSION ========================================================O o================o====================oo================o====================o | Key / Button | Function || Key / Button | Function | o================o====================oo================o====================o | N/A | Auto Move || B | Menu | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | L Thumbstick | Move forward || N/A | Autorun | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | L Thumbstick | Slide left || Click L Analog | Sneak mode | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | L Thumbstick | Move backward || LT | Block | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | L Thumbstick | Slide right || N/A | Quicksave | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | Y | Jump || N/A | Quickload | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | Click R Analog | Switch view || A | Activate | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | Back | Wait || RT | Attack | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | X | Toggle weapon || LT | Block | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | LB | Grab || Click R Analog | Change view | |----------------+--------------------||----------------+--------------------| | RB | Cast magic || N/A | Zoom in / out | o----------------o--------------------oo----------------o--------------------o ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 00.00 || System Requirements || 00.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As you are undoubtedly aware, Oblivion is one of the most graphically intensive games to be released in quite some time, and there are a certain number of hardware "requirements" that you should meet before you attempt to play this game. You should also be aware that there are many settings in the game that can be tweaked in order to let you play with some pretty ridiculously old machines assuming you don't mind having the game look like Daggerfall. We'll begin with the basic manufacturer requirements. Minimum: -------- Windows XP 512 MB System RAM 2 Ghz Intel Pentium Processor (or Equivalent) 128MB Direct3D Compatible Video Card DirectX 9.0 Compatible Driver 8x DVD ROM Drive 4.6 GB Free Hard Drive Space DirectX 8.1 Compatible Sound Card Recommended: ------------ Windows XP (with Service Pack 2) 1 GB System RAM 3 Ghz Intel Pentium Processor (or Equivalent) ATI X800 Series, Nvidia Geforce 6800 Series or Higher Video Card 8x DVD ROM Drive 4.6 GB Free Hard Drive Space DirectX 8.1 Compatible Sound Card When it comes to upgrading your system for performance (assuming you at least meet the minimum requirements) then upgrading the video card will usually be the best option for maximum performance and quality increase. Upgrading your RAM will typically get your a decent performance and framerate increase to a point while as long as you meet the recommended requirements for your processor, you should be fine in that category. Now we'll assume that you have the game and have it installed and want to start getting better quality, with better performance. Believe it or not, even after you set the game up to fit your computer, there are advanced tweaks you can do outside of the game's video menu that can increase graphical quality AND performance if done right. ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 01.00 || Basic Tweaking || 01.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ __) /(, ) / / / / +-- (___ / UT-OF-GAME SETTINGS ------------------------------------- 01.01 --+ This means that for now, we'll look at changing the game's various in-game settings for better performance while staying away from system files and mods for the time being. I'll outline what each of the settings does and how it affects performance so you'll have a better idea what to change to get your game running well. We'll begin before you even go into the game. When you click the desktop icon it will bring up a little mini menu with options like "Play", "Data Files," "Elderscrolls.com," etc. There should be an option there called "Options." Click that tab first before you play the game. Click the "Reset to Defaults" button at the bottom which will automatically detect the hardware you have installed, and change the game's defaults based on that. For the typical player that will be enough, and they can play the game using these default settings. These defaults however are far from perfect and you can undoubtedly get the game working a lot better. The first option "Adapter" shows your video card after auto-detecting. If that's not your video card, or you have more than one, then select yours from the drop down menu. If it's not there then it probably isn't installed correctly. Resolution is arguably the most important setting when it comes to making the game look nice. The higher the resolution, the more pixels are displayed and therefore the more detail can be shown. For this reason it's also one of the more performance intensive settings. TO be honest your should almost certainly base this setting entirely around the monitor you are using unless your hardware really sucks. If you think you can handle the game pretty well, then match the resolution to your monitor's highest possible setting. You can turn down other things later to get it to run well. If you have a widescreen monitor make sure you select one of the widescreen resolutions. Usually the maximum resolution option you see if based on your monitor's maximum, so if you don't know your monitor's highest resolution then just click the biggest one and give it a try. If it doesn't work, then scale it down a little. Antialiasing is another important one, especially for people with lower resolutions. It works as follows (here's a bit of a technical lesson to help you understand, feel free to skip to the next paragraph.) The idea is that sometimes on a pixel-sized level there is some overlap between objects as to what colour to display on a pixel. Usually it will decide between one or the other and display that colour. Antialiasing means that rather than making this decision, it blends the two colours and then displays it giving everything a more detailed and less jagged look. To put it less technically, the more antialiasing you have the less jagged edges you have. Turning antialiasing up higher will smooth the edges between objects and give everything a nicer, smoother look. I recommend antialiasing for people who have good hardware systems, but crappy monitors that can only support lower resolutions. Since lower resolutions cannot display unique colours in smaller areas as well as higher resolutions, blending becomes a better option. For example, my monitor handles up to 1680 x 1050 resolution which is extremely detailed, and the minor difference antialiasing makes does not make up for its hit to performance, so I keep it turned off. For someone with a powerful video card who is only able to handle 1024x768, or 1280x1024 then antialiasing will be a good choice for them. Just note that it is extremely performance intensive (compared to other settings) and I don't recommend anyone, regardless of system set it any higher than 4x. You don't need any more. Next we have windowed and full screen which is pretty self explanatory. People with weak systems who have to play on lower resolutions might prefer windowed mode so that it isn't stretched (but probably not). The V.Sync option is a very important one below those two. V. Sync is used to sync up refresh rates between your system and your monitor. Its purpose is to prevent "tearing", which is what happens when pieces of two different frames are displayed at the same time. Whether you should turn this on or off depends on the hardware you are running. Personally I don't experience tearing whether the option is on or off, but since I take a minor performance hit when I turn it on, I keep the option off. As I said you should try playing with this option on and off to see which works best for you, and if you start to see glitches with the frame display, it means you'll probably need this on. Screen effects is an interesting one. For a lot of people the option for HDR won't even be selectable. This is because HDR (which stands for High Dynamic Range) is a feature only available on newer video cards. It's basically a type of (arguably) more realistic lighting that is pretty performance intensive. Bloom is another type of lighting that sort of emulates a realistic lighting effect, but less intensively. Don't be too disappointed if you can't use HDR, there are a lot of people out there with massive video cards that prefer the look of Bloom light to HDR. One drawback of HDR is that you cannot use it at the same time you're using antialiasing, so if you want AA then you are forced to stick with Bloom lighting for your game. Distant rendering is pretty self-explanatory. Turning on distant landscapes will eliminate the fogging effect that doesn't show distant terrains and actually show them (but not nearly as well rendered as the near stuff). You can choose to show these landscapes but without any trees or building using the buttons below it (but not vice versa of course.) This about does it for the out-of-game setting changes. There are a lot of settings that you can't change in game without restarting so try to get them right here so that you don't have to keep quitting and restarting. Some of them can only be changed in game however. These include texture size, antialiasing, HDR/Bloom lighting, resolution, and possibly one or two others I'm forgetting. ______________________________________________________________________________ _____ (, / / ___/__ +-- (__ / N-GAME SETTINGS --------------------------------------- 01.02 --+ Press Esc to open up the options menu and select video. Here is where the mid-range tweaking begins. We'll go through each setting one by one and determine how it should be changed to give best performance. Resolution -------- As I mentioned before, resolution is one of the main settings that you should change to get the game to look better. Check "Out-of-game" settings to figure out what you should set your resolution to. Brightness -------- Only applies if you are playing the game in full screen as opposed to windowed mode (windowed mode will default the brightness to whatever your desktop brightness is at. This will not affect performance in any way and depending on what your have your monitor set to, I typically like to set it about 75% across so that you can actually see where you're going in dark dungeons (still usually need a torch.) Texture Size ------ A very important one, and not "too" performance intensive compared to other ones. Lower end machines will still want to turn this down. You do get quite a bit of bang for your buck though. What I mean is that it will make the game look a LOT better when maxed out. All you have to do is head to any town, or look down at the ground below you. If there's a sign hanging out front of a shop it probably says "Bob's Weapons" when textures are high, and "Blurry Smudge" if textures are low. Higher textures are more detailed with fewer edges blurring together. Set this to large if you can handle it. Tree Fade --------- One of the numerous options relating to draw distance, specifically for trees. Slide this all the way to the left and you will see miles of trees ahead of you. Slide it all the way to the left and they'll be popping up directly in front of you every two seconds. Even for low end machines you'll want to slide this a little to the right. It does have a pretty heavy effect on performance. Actor Fade -------- I'm not entirely positive, but I believe it has to do with NPC characters and creatures and how far it will render them before they disappear. Has a minimal effect in the outside world and a makes a difference mainly when you're in towns. You can probably set it around the middle on low-end machines, and max it out on high-end. Item Fade --------- A relatively unimportant one that just judges how far in the distance to render items and such. It's directly related to the next setting so you probably shouldn't really change this one much at all, just the next one. Object Face ------- Determines how far ahead to render objects like rocks, flowers, buildings, and more. Directly ties to the previous setting, when you turn this down then Item Fade goes down automatically as well. It's not heavily performance intensive, slide it all the way right for high-end machines, otherwise make a judgment call. Grass Distance ---- One of the most important settings in the game, period. In Oblivion, rather than using green textures everywhere, the developers have opted to place tall grass all over the place which is rendered in full 3D and makes everything look that much more beautiful. It's also one of the most performance intensive options you can select. People with weak machines should slide this down to almost 0 (left) if not all the way. If you can live without the grass (the ground textures still look quite good) then you will have an extraordinary performance boost. There are actually people out there with high-end machines who slide it all the way left for one of two reasons: to get a huge performance boost since it still looks really good, and second (to a lesser extent) because sometimes items and objects get lost in the tall grass. Make sure you select the right option to match your computer with the grass. You can slide it pretty far left and get a lot of grass pop-up, but if you kind of look down while you run it's not all that bad for lower-end machines. You should be aware that in the advanced tweaking section, I'll tell you how to change an option so that the grass is still there but not quite as dense (in a path of five grass stalks, it might only display three) but still render it for the same distance. View Distance ----- An important one for most people because turning it all the way down really uglifies the game, but increases performance. If you have a mid to high range PC then I would recommend maxing this out. Only turn it down if you're desperate for better performance. The options below it only apply if you have it maxed. You don't necessarily have to show that poorly rendered distant land if you don't want to by turning these off. Some people think it makes the game look more realistic (foggy distance rather than blocky green hills). I don't agree personally, but to each his own. Be aware that there are settings in the advanced tweaking section that allow you to increase the amount of rendering on distant textures (to add realism) at a minor performance hit, so you might want to check those out. Int. Shadows ------ I'm not too familiar with the various shadow effects in these games, but I do believe this is the setting for interior shadow detail (shadows indoors.) Turning it up should increase either the shadow detail, number of shadows or both. Personally I don't find it makes much of a difference and even on a high-end machines I keep it low to increase performance. Ext. Shadows ------ The external shadows this time, a little more important than the previous setting but still not too important. I'd set it around the same setting as you used for Int. Shadows which can be as low as just a little right of the far left. Self Shadows ------ You'll have to forgive me for not being a big shadow expert. To be honest I can't really see much of a difference at all when this is on. Some people actually claim it makes the game look worse (just a rumour). I have a high-end machine, but I leave it off. It was poitned out to me recently that self-shadows means: shadows cast on an object, by an object. To use a character for example, self-shadows would display shadows cast by his / her body, on his / her body. Supposedly this option is actually a little glitched at the moment, weird shadows being cast where they shouldn't, so you should almost certainly turn it off for now and wait to see if maybe a patch is released. Shadows on Grass -- This setting is only for the most powerful computers out there who just like to max everything. It is totally unnecessary to show shadows on grass, you take a performance hit, and you'll barely notice it. Turn this setting off. Tree Canopy Shadows One of the few really important shadow settings, this actually makes a big difference. You'll get a pretty heavy performance hit for this one so I only recommend it for high-end cards, but I think it looks quite a bit better and a lot more realistic. What it means basically is that trees will cast shadows on the ground. Turn this off and they won't. Go into a forest and turn it on there, you'll definitely see a difference. Specular Dist ----- We're out of shadows now and into lighting effects. From what I'm told (though I don't see a huge difference) this increases the crispness of light on objects (or the "shine") which is already pretty high with HDR by default. A lot of users won't notice a difference when they turn this on. I recommend you find something shiny (like a suit of armour) and look at it with this setting on min and max, then judge where you want it. If you don't notice a difference, you're probably not alone. In many cases I'd say just dump this all the way left. HDR Lighting ------ This was covered fully in the "Out-of-Game Settings" in the section above. Look there for more info. Bloom Lighting ---- This was covered fully in the "Out-of-Game Settings" in the section above. Look there for more info. Water Detail ------ A judgment call here. 95% of the time you're playing you probably won't be looking at water, but there are nice rivers, streams and lakes here and there that will probably look better if you turn this on high for a minor performance hit. Unless your hardware is really weak, I'd say leave it on high. No big difference, and there isn't a low setting anyway. Water Reflections - Again, I don't notice much of a performance hit and it does look a fair bit better with this on than off. I would say turn it on if you're using anything but a low- end machine. Water Ripples ----- Even with this setting off the water kind of still ripples, but this will make it ripplier. Barely noticeable quality difference, barely noticeable performance difference. Whatever. Window Reflections I've made it a point to try and remember to look in a window sometime to see this setting in action, but still haven't done it. Same as above. Makes very little difference either way. Blood Decals ------ These make virtually no performance difference at all, it's more of a "censoring" thing. If you want blood all over your hands after you bludgeon a wolf to death, then turn this on. It takes no computing power at all. Anti-aliasing ----- Covered above in the "Out-of-game" settings. ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 02.00 || Advanced Tweaking || 02.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ _____ (, / ) /__ / ) / _ +-- (_/ EAD THIS FIRST! -------------------------------------- 02.01 --+ Here we will go beyond the limits of the in-game graphics menu and start changing some settings that we "may or may" not be changing. I'll begin with a few important points to note before we get started. We're going to be editing an INI file, which stores various different game configuration settings (a hell of a lot of them), but since we're going to be editing this file and we want to make sure we don't screw up, we'll need to make a backup. Here's what to do before proceeding at all with this section of the guide: Open up My DocumentsMy GamesOblivion folder on your computer. If you don't know how to do that then you're in way over your head already and you shouldn't try any of this under any circumstance. See a file there called "Oblivion.ini"? Well you had better. Make a new folder called "Backup file" then copy and paste Oblivion.ini and put it in that folder. Now anytime you screw something up you can replace the file you edit with that backup. Also note that while I did just tell you to make a backup, and there's virtually no way you can screw anything up that can't be fixed in two seconds by replacing it with the backup, I'm still going to point out that I am in no way responsible if you completely **** something up. Remember that's it's pretty much impossible to do that in this case, I'm just saying is all. Some people do crazy stuff to their computer sometimes, and it's not my problem. The worst thing that can happen with the following tweaks is that your game performance starts lagging or glitching. Replacing Oblivion.ini with your backup will ALWAYS fix that and put you back where you started. Lastly I would like to say that most of these tweaks are a combination of, and my own personal interpretation of, a lot of word-of-mouth suggestions, forum posts, rumours, and other wacky stuff. For a list of the base sources and where you can find more information, check out the credits section of the guide. Here's how you do it: open up Oblivion.ini in Notepad and you will see a whole lot of weird settings with equals signs and numbers beside them. This is where it all begins. I'm going to outline as many different changes you can make as I can, it's up to you to decide which ones are best for you. DO NOT CHANGE ALL OF THEM THAT I LIST. Read the description first and then decide for yourself. I also recommend making only one or two changes at a time, then running the game and seeing if you like the results. The best way to test the results of a tweak is to judge framerate (how fast and smooth the game runs.) While playing the game press the ~ button (usually above Tab) and type in "tdt" and press enter. This will bring up the little debug information window which shows how many frames per second you are getting. Anything above 20 is good, above 30 is great, more is fantastic. Finally, before we go into any of the INI tweaks there are a couple miscellaneous things that most people recommend you do to increase performance. After installing Oblivion which has quite a few extremely large files, it is recommended that you defragment your hard drive (Start -> All Programs -> Accessories -> System Tools -> Disk Defragmenter.) The second thing is that you upgrade all the drivers for your graphics card. For example if you're using an ATI X800 (or higher) then don't user the drivers that come on the CD with it, go to www.ati.com and click on the "Drivers & Software" tab. Download the drivers from there to get better game performance. ______________________________________________________________________________ _____ (, / / ___/__ +-- (__ / NI PERFORMANCE TWEAKS --------------------------------- 02.02 --+ So open the file My DocumentsMy GamesOblivionOblivion.ini right now and get ready to tweak! Use Ctrl + f to find each one rather than manual searching. bAllow30Shaders --------------- This is a pretty harmless one if you've got the hardware to support it. Newer video cards will have support for 3.0 Shaders, just check the specs. If yours does then changing this from 0 to 1 will give better performance with no hit at all whatever to graphical quality. iPreloadSizeLimit ----------------- This is a controversial one going around right now that seems to help some people a lot, and others not at all. It's a real "trial and error" setting. Make sure you test the game after changing this one. As far as I know it changes the amount of system memory Oblivion can use to preload stuff for you. The higher RAM you have, the higher you set it. It defaults to 26214400 (the value in bytes). If you have 512 MB of RAM then leave it there. If you have a gig you might want to boost it to 100000000. 2 gigs to 200000000. As I said some people love it, and others (myself included) see no difference. This can increase the amount of time it takes to load an area, but while in that area it should ideally give you smoother play and better framerate. iMinGrassSize ------------- ooooo o o o A very important one with a very real effect on performance. ooooo -> o o o I mention this in the basic tweaking section as well. It ooooo o o o determines the density of the grass (not the grass stalks), but rather how dense grass patches. The diagram on the left illustrates the difference. Imagine each letter O is a patch of grass. The ground on the left would be with it set to the default, 80. The one on the right would look more like a setting of 150. Changing this setting allows users to still have grass, but not so much so that they don't take as big of a performance hit. It also lets people set huge grass draw distances (another setting listed below) but make it so you don't have to render as much. This is an important one for people with low-end computers who like having grass. iMaxGrassTypesPerTexture ------------------------ Grass looks the exact same with 1 type (default 2) and you get a performance boost from it. Lower this setting down to 1. bUseHardDriveCache ------------------ As far as I know this will cache some of the textures and whatnot onto your hard drive from the game disk so that in the future when you load an area, it should go faster and performance should be increased. More of a "long run" kind of thing than something you'd notice, but it's harmless to turn on. It defaults to 0 (which means off) so set it to 1. uGridsToLoad ------------ This has a direct effect on how detailed distant textures are. About as much of a performance hit as you'd expect from something like this. Nothing too heavy. It defaults to 5. If you want more detail then set it to 7, and if you want a lot more detail then set it to 9. No higher. uGridDistantCount ----------------- Similar to the previous one, it increases detail in the distance. Basically the more you turn it up, the more of a performance hit you take. uGridDistantTreeRange --------------------- The same as "Tree Fade" in the game settings, except here you aren't limited by the slider. Set it as high as you want based on your hardware. fGrasssEndDistance ------------------ The same as the grass draw distance in the in-game video settings, except once again you can set it a lot higher. Even on max in-game you still get grass pop up in the distance, turn this up to get rid of that. fGrassStartFadeDistance ----------------------- Supposedly sets the distance at which grass starts to fade out. I'm not quite sure how it's any different from the previous one. Most people turn this up as well when they turn up the end distance, so it's a judgment call. bGrassPointLighting ------------------- More realistic grass lighting if you set it to 1. Not really necessary but if you have the hardware to back it up, it will look better. iShadowMapResolution -------------------- More detailed shadows. Higher for quality, lower for performance. iThreads -------- One of those settings that's kind of up in the air right now. Some people say you get better performance if you change it from 3 to 10. Others say it makes absolutely no difference. It's up to you. iOpenMPLevel ------------ One of those settings that's kind of up in the air right now. Some people say you get better performance if you change it from 10 to 20. Others say it makes absolutely no difference. It's up to you. bForceFullLOD ------------- This is a good one. LOD stands for "level of detail" which forces the game to show maximum detail on nearby objects. Barely any hit to performance and it should make things look a little better overall. uExterior Cell Buffer --------------------- What does this setting do? Who knows. Why do people suggest changing it from 36 to 72 or 128? Still don't know, but feel free to try it. iFPSClamp --------- Supposedly it will force the game to play at whatever frames per second you set it to. The game will slow down in order to meet that requirement. If you seem to be able to play the game at a stable 25 FPS, changing this to 25 might actually give you an even more stable framerate. Try it out. iNumHavokThreads=3 bUseThreadedBlood=1 bUseThreadedMorpher=1 bUseThreadedTempEffects=1 bUseThreadedParticleSystem=1 ---------------------------- Some say that along with the iThreads tweaks mentioned just above, these one being set to the values I listed will also help overall performance. This one is a real toss up, save before you change these. bDoSpecularPass bDoDiffusePass bDoAmbientPass -------------- This is only for people whose graphics cards suck ten kinds of ass, and they're desperate for a way to play this game no matter how it looks. Change all three of those values to zero and your game will look like crap, but you'll get an enormous increase in performance. uSurfaceFPS=15 bUseWaterReflectionsMisc=1 bUseWaterReflectionsStatics=1 bUseWaterReflectionsTrees=1 bUseWaterReflectionsActors=1 ---------------------------- This is a pretty popular one out there right now. Supposedly it makes water look a lot better than it does by default. I've seen comparison screenshots that would seem to suggest these people are right. Minor performance hit. ______________________________________________________________________________ _____ (, / / ___/__ +-- (__ / NI MISC. TWEAKS --------------------------------------- 02.03 --+ SIntroSequence -------------- Here's a neat one. By default it equals a whole bunch of crazy stuff. Delete all that stuff and set it equal to nothing "SIntroSequence=" and now when you boot up the game it will go directly to the main menu, skipping the opening. bEquippedTorchesCastShadows --------------------------- Just like it sounds, gives shadows to torches and has pretty much no effect whatsoever on framerate or anything like that. bHealthBarShowing ----------------- Shows a typical health bar. Want to see health bars? Set it to 1. uDepthRange ----------- The water transparency value. Experiment with it and set it to your liking. fGlobalTimeMultiplier --------------------- Changes the game speed. Make it higher to speed things up to crazy amounts, make it lower to play the game in slow motion. fWaveOffsetRange ---------------- Basically sets the curve of grass. A value of 1 gives you straight grass while a value of 10 would give you slightly curved grass. bInstantLevelUp --------------- Change this to 1 and every time you get a level up, you should be able to distribute stats right there without having to rest. bForceReloadOnEssentialCharacterDeath ------------------------------------- This one is neat. If it's set to 1 then whenever an important character dies then you get game over so that it never becomes impossible to progress. fDecalLifetime=10 iMaxDecalsPerFrame=10 fMinBloodDamage=1.0000 ---------------------- The violence setting! The first two determine how long each splatter of blood lasts on an object, and how many splatters there can be at once respectively. No performance issues with this at all. The last one supposedly (I haven't tried it) determines the amount of blood you get. Raise it from one to something like four or five to get a hell of a lot more blood. Hooray! Field of Vision --------------- This isn't an INI tweak but it doesn't really belong anywhere else. Press the ~ key while playing and type "fov (number)" to change your view degrees. A maximum of 180 shows everything in 180 degrees from you and skews the world to hell. FOV 90 is actually half decent. FOV 30 is hilarious, everything seems so... significant. I find it oddly more immersive in a way. ______________________________________________________________________________ __ __) (, /| / / | / ) / |/ +-- (_/ ' VIDIA COOLBITS TWEAK ----------------------------------- 02.04 --+ One of the best performance enhancers out there is exclusive to Nvidia users. Supposedly this tweak can almost double your framerate with absolutely no graphical hit whatsoever. Easily one of the best tweaks available. Personally I don't have an Nvidia card so I can't use it, but the steps aren't too difficult. Make sure your video card drivers are up to date, then search Google for the Coolbits registry tweak. Once you have it installed on your system then go to Control Panel, Display, Settings, Advanced, then click on your video card in there. Under "Performance & Quality" settings there should be an option "Additional Direct3D Settings". Under this heading is where you will find what you are looking for. The ultimate tweak is right there: "Max Frames to Render Ahead." Change that from 3 to 0 and bam, apply it and you're set. Hopefully the actual results you get on your card live up to the hype created by this particular tweak. ______________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 03.00 || Gameplay Mechanics || 03.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ) ___ (__/_____) / / +-- (______) OMBAT ------------------------------------------------- 03.01 --+ While the general design of Oblivion does allow for all types of characters can be played, the world does seem to reward those players with an ability to destroy everything in their path. Combat can be separated into three types based on the three types of character classes, those three types are melee combat, magic combat, and ranged combat. Each are discussed in detail below: Melee Combat ------------ For the warrior in all of use who choose a physically powerful class, this is where it's at. Skills like Blade, Blunt and Hand-to-Hand comprise the melee combat category. Your weapon should reflect what type you are specializing in. For example, a character skilled in Blade would want to be using either a one or two handed sword, while a Blunt specialist would prefer a club, and a Hand-to-Hand specialist would wield no weapon at all. Oftentimes you will find enemies who are strong against a particular type of melee combat and weak against others, that's just the way the game is designed. The basics of combat are quite simple. When you have your weapon equipped, click the left mouse button to attack with your weapon while aiming at the target. Magic Combat ------------ More applicable to the mage classes, the school of magic associated primarily with combat is Destruction, but skills like Conjuration could also apply. Destruction magic is cast by pressing the C button by default. If you're playing a solely magic character, I find that mapping the casting button to right mouse button works better since you don't block nearly as much as a mage. To learn new spells all you have to do is go to a Mage Guild in virtually any town. They will teach you new spells and sell them like equipment. Different cities have different kinds of spells for you to learn so make sure you do lots of exploring. Ranged Combat ------------- The practice of attacking with stealth from a distance, with the hope of catching your enemy by surprise and avoiding damage yourself. Even a ranged attacker should have some specialization in melee combat as the enemies they attack will often come charging. That first shot is almost always the most important. As a Marksman increases his skill, his arrows will have a better effect on the target often paralyzing them. Keep in mind however that you must keep a reserve stock of arrows at all times, and you don't have an infinite number of those. ______________________________________________________________________________ _____ (, / / ___/__ +-- (__ / NTERACTION -------------------------------------------- 03.02 --+ The opposite of combat is of course verbal interaction. There are hundreds of NPCs to interact with around the world, and with over 50 hours of dialogue recorded for the game (which incidentally fills half the game DVD) they've probably got quite a bit to say. When you speak to someone you'll usually get a number of options to ask them about. Only relevant topics will appear so usually if you can ask about something, it means they probably have something to say about that topic (unlike other similar games where you can ask about everything, and always get the same generic response every time.) Options which have been grayed out means you have already asked about them. The "Rumors" option which often appears is an important one which will often yield new information or locations on your map from people who have heard this or that from so-and-so. When you speak to someone about something but the option does not get grayed out, it means they're holding something back and that's when the persuasion option comes in handy. To learn more about this option and how to get people to talk, scroll down to the section that covers all the skills in detail and look up the skill "Speechcraft." ______________________________________________________________________________ ________) (, / /___, ) / +-- (_/ REEDOM --------------------------------------------------- 03.03 --+ In such an open ended game, there is no end to the amount of things you can do just for the sake of... doing them. With a completely non-linear storyline that allows you to do whatever, whenever you feel like it, then sometimes those feelings are bound to manifest themselves in a way that's less than... legal. But we'll get to that. Let us first discuss the various choices you have that don't involve breaking the law (and of course, being punished.) There is a "main quest" so to speak and the game will guide you along it from right when you exit the sewer. What happens if you decide to ignore the main quest and go exploring for hours? Not besides whatever you find on your adventure. You could come across a woman who lost her cat, find it for her, and the same man you're supposed to speak to will still be waiting for you back in his house with his arms crossed. Doesn't matter how long it takes. But what happens if you happen to kill the man who is waiting for you, to tell you where you need to go next? Well as both raders Lassie and Veritas have reminded me, I made the error of stating that these people could be killed making it impossible to progress with the main story. The fact is that in reaity, the worst that you can ever do is knock them unconscious (from which they will eventually wake.) It is not physically possible to do enough damage to kill these characters, this way they make sure that you cannot get yourself in permanent trouble. There are still some characters of some importance that can be killed, but not if it hinders your main quest progress. ______________________________________________________________________________ ) ___ (__/_____) / / +-- (______) RIME -------------------------------------------------- 03.04 --+ Committing Crimes ----------------- Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. In this game you have the power to sneak into an old woman's house and take her spoon. You also have the power to kill her. There has to be some kind of punishment for this right? Well there is, and I'll explain how it works in this section. Each crime has a certain "value" to it if you will depending on its severity. The severity of these crimes is approximately ranked as follows: entering a restricted area, stealing, violence, and murder. Let's look at each one: Entering a restricted area means unlocking a door when the crosshairs is red. This means the lock is one the door for a reason. In a dungeon you might find a locked door, and no one cares if you open it or not. When you're in someone's house and a the door to their bedroom is locked, breaking the lock is going to get your in a bit of trouble. Sometimes you can even find yourself in a restricted area without braking locks, but you'll usually be told to leave and only get in trouble if you don't. Stealing means one of two things, taking items that someone owns from their dwelling, or their person (pickpocketing.) Stealing from someone's house or business is easy, just hover your crosshairs over and item and press the space bar to take it. If the hand symbol is red, this means the item belongs to someone else and if you take it you're going to get in trouble. TO pickpocket someone you need to activate sneak mode, and then come up on them without being seen. Instead of talking to them you'll pick their pocket and have a chance of being caught based on your sneak skill. Stealing is slightly more illegal than entering a restricted area, but not as illegal as... Violence! Run up to someone and punch them in the face? Suddenly you're the bad guy in this situation. Fortunately there are some ground rules here since violence can occur accidentally sometimes. If you attack someone by accident, try holding the block button constantly and sometimes they will realize your pacifist nature. While you are in combat with friendly NPCs helping you, you can usually hit them once, or twice, or thrice and they'll call out angrily, but not hold it against you unless you just don't stop. This is more of a crime than either of the aforementioned ones, but not even close to... Murder. When you kill an innocent person, and it's not out of self defense then you are a murderer. No doubt about it. Run up to someone in their house and punch them, that's violence. Keep punching and punching and don't stop until they are a bloody heap on the floor, that's murder and you're going away for a long time. Top of the crime chain right there. Now that we've looked at all the various crimes, we'll see how the punishment system works. Punishment ---------- First I really want to stress this fact, it's only a crime if you get caught. There are issues with stolen items and vendors who won't buy them, but other than that you're pretty clean. It's when you do get caught that the law comes into play and they're pretty relentless. Being caught for a crime will trigger one thing: the person who witnessed it (or was victimized by it) will report it immediately to a nearby guard. This isn't a completely scripted happenstance, depending on what kind of person they are they may be more or less likely to report you, but for the most part you'll be getting in trouble. Especially for shop owners, they love to really stick it to you. Once a guard has been made aware of your crime, he or she will hunt you down relentlessly. When they finally catch up, you'll have three options: Go to jail, resist arrest, or pay a fine. Resisting arrest means the guard will attack you, and a whole lot of other guards, and no matter what level you are guards are always at a higher level. It's basically the "kill me" option. Going to jail is an interesting, albeit non-preferable option. All of your things will be confiscated when you are taken for the, the one exception being a single lockpick if you have one. You have two options when in jail, waiting it out or breaking out. To wait it out simply examine the bed and choose to do so. You will have to wait one day for every 100 gold of bounty on your head (bounty is discussed in the next paragraph) and for each one of these days one skill will be decreased (tells you which ones after you get out.) The exception to this rule are sneak and security which will get increased if chosen, but since it's random it's a lot more likely to decrease something. If you use your one lockpick to break out of jail, you'll have to sneak past the many guards and find your equipment in the evidence chest. Breaking out of jail will increase the bounty on your head as well. Not a good idea. Finally you have the best option (aside from not committing a crime at all) and that is to pay a fine if you can afford it. Nothing bad will happen if you do this besides having the stuff you stole taken back. The amount you have to pay is based on your bounty, which is approximately equal to the value of the item you stole, based on the level of the person you attacked, and 1000 or more gold if you actually do kill someone. If you can't back away from a crime this is the best option you have for making up for it. ______________________________________________________________________________ _____) / )__ / +-- (_____) EVERYTHING ELSE ---------------------------------------- 03.05 --+ Quests ------ Like most open-ended RPGs, Oblivion uses a quest-based gameplay system to allow users to complete the game at their leisure. There are quests that fall under various categories like "main game" and some that are simply miscellaneous, while others are guild quests. Quests usually take the form of "this needs to be done" and a location is marked on your compass. You go there, do whatever needs to be done and come back for your reward and next quest. Many of these quests progress the main story and many do not. Guilds ------ They're like factions, or groups of similar people who come together with a common interest. There are three main guilds in this game that you can join, but are not necessarily connected to the main story and they are: The Fighters Guild, The Mage Guild and The Thieves Guild. Most guilds have locations in each of the cities, with the Thieves Guild being the exception to that rule. Typically to join a guild you simply enter the guild headquarters and ask to become a member. The exceptions to this rule are the Thieves Guild, and the Dark Brotherhood which I have no yet mentioned. In order to get into these guilds you must follow a different path, and usually that path involves committing some crimes. TO learn more about how to join these guilds then simply scroll down to the section that covers the quests for that specific guild. The rewards for being in a guild are various, but for the most part worthwhile and you'll miss out on tons of unique quests if you don't join. Persuasion, Lockpicking & Haggling ---------------------------------- To learn more about these three particular topics, check out the skills section. Everything you need to know about Lockpicking is under the security skill. Everything you need to know about Persuasion is covered in the Speechcraft skill and everything you need to know about buying and selling is covered under the Mercantile skill since that is directly what they apply to. Leveling Up ----------- To level up in this game, similar to Morrowind but unlike most other RPGs, instead of fighting enemies and gaining EXP or getting it from quests, you must simply increase any combination of your major skills a total of ten times for one level. For example, increasing five of your major skills two times apiece would give your character a level up. When you gain a level you must find a bed to rest in (waiting doesn't count). At that point you will have the chance to increase three attributes of your choice. The more they apply to the skills you increased, the more you can increase them. For example, increasing Blade five times and Athletics five times would probably mean you can get a +5 bonus to strength and speed when you level up. Health, Magicka & Fatigue ------------------------- The game's basic stat values are pretty self-explanatory with the one exception being fatigue. Health is the amount of damage you can take before you die. Magicka is the amount of magic you can cast before you need to recharge. Magicka and fatigue recharge automatically, health does not. Fatigue affects most of the stuff you do, primarily melee combat damage. As you jump and attack your fatigue will drain. When it's maxed you will do maximum damage and as it drains you will do less and less damage each time making it so that the more you fight without resting, the weaker your attacks get. There are potions which restore each of these stats. Vampirism --------- When you are fighting vampires you might contract a condition known as Polyphyric Hemophilia. This is a pretty harmless... that is as long as you cure it within 72 hours or so. After that point you might notice that you're beginning to change physically. Suddenly your face is a little more pale, but that's okay because a lot of your stats and skills just got a +5 boost. You also have some new abilities, this might just be the greatest thing ever. That's how it starts of course. You are now a vampire. You can no longer use a cure disease potion to get rid of it. There is a quest to remove the vampire curse, but it's a lot easier to just avoid contracting vampirism in the first place if you don't want it. Basically I'll just outline what it's like to be a vampire, as well as the pros and cons associated with it. In the first stage of vampirism you will look pretty normal and people will treat you normally. You can go out during the day and everything is fine. You've got stat boosts and a couple new abilities. The next time you go to sleep after more than 24 hours have passed you will progress to the next stage. New weaknesses and new abilities appear. Suddenly you can't go out in the sun without taking a bit of damage for every second you spend. You look more like a vampire and people with low disposition don't want to talk to you anymore. There is a solution, it's not pretty, but it's what vampires do. You must suck the blood of a human. To do this, find someone who is sleeping and make sure no one is around. Now you can simply suck their blood the same way you would talk to them. This will revert you back to the original vampire stage where you look pretty normal and don't really take sun damage. The main weakness you have in the first stage is increase damage taken from fire. Note that there are three or four stages you can progress though. You move between stages by going more than 24 hours without feeding on someone and then taking a nap. At the final stage you pretty much can't go out in daylight at all, you can't talk to anyone unless their disposition is maxed, BUT you have a huge arsenal of great powers you can use over and over again. As I have shown, there are great advantages and disadvantages. It's not really recommended that you play the whole game as a vampire, but when you're looking for something fun to do then maybe vampirism is right for you! ______________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 04.00 || Skills || 04.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ______ (, / ) / / _/___ /_ +-- (_/___ / ESCRIPTIONS ----------------------------------------- 04.01 --+ Acrobatics -------- Acrobatics is a great sill for those players who really want to be agile and... jumpy. Useful? Absolutely not. There are very few cases where this would actually help aside from letting you fall greater distance for less damage. I would highly recommend you do not select this skill as a major skill unless you want to level up quickly, but poorly. Too many of the skills upgraded each level will inevitably be acrobatic and you'll find yourself falling behind when it actually comes to combat. The plus side of this perk though is the fun factor. Being able to jump huge distances and great heights when it's almost maxed out and you're wearing very little is always a plus. Alchemy ----------- This skill is really good if you know how to use it well. Put all of those various pointless ingredients you find in flowers all over the world to good use by turning them into potions. In order to create potions you must first have a Mortar and Pestle which you should be able to acquire in stores. From there you can move onto things which will improve the power and effectiveness of your creations like the Retort, Alembic and Calcinator. The menu for creating something through alchemy is brought up by selecting your alchemical apparatus in the menu and then choosing your ingredients. From here it's mostly based on your Alchemy skill. Alteration -------- These will alter the physical property of... things. People for example, or objects. You can alter your stats, or you can alter a lock to swap it from the "locked" to "unlocked" state. It's not exactly the most useful skill out there, but it can come in handy when the time is right. Armorer ----------- This dictates your ability to fix equipment rather than having to pay someone else to do it for you. As you wear your equipment and use it to either beat enemies with, or to wear while being beaten, then it's going to wear down and become less effective / valuable. What you need to purchase are items called Repair Hammers which repair your equipment. The better your skill, the more you can use them without breaking them. Athletics --------- This includes a number of things like your movement speed on both land and water, as well as the amount of fatigue that depletes and how fast it recovers. Basically the more athletic you are, the better shape you are in. The skill is leveled up simply by running so like Acrobatics, it can be leveled pretty easily. More useful than Acrobatics since the higher the skill, the faster you get fatigue back. Blade ------------- Your skill with a sharp weapon like a sword or a knife. Of the three possible melee combat skills, this one is arguably the best overall as there are so many good bladed weapons out there to choose from. All you have to do is attack more with Bladed weapons to level up this skill. There are three primary melee combat skills, Blade, Blunt and Hand-to-Hand. Of the three you should only choose one as a major skill; trying to focus on more than one will simply make you weaker in the long run. Block ------------- This is a great and often underestimated skill that will become better the more you use it. The right mouse button allows you to block and reduce the damage of an enemy attack. It has an added bonus of doing more than that as you level it up. Proper timing when blocking can make the difference between winning and losing in a difficult battle. Blunt ------------- Blunt is another melee combat skill that you would choose if you plan to use large weapons like clubs and maces. The higher the skill level the better you are at pounding enemies with these weighty weapons. The more you use them the more this skill will increase. There are three primary melee combat skills, Blade, Blunt and Hand-to- Hand. Of the three you should only choose one as a major skill; trying to focus on more than one will simply make you weaker in the long run. Conjuration ------- Basically this is the "summoning" category. Whether it be creatures or equipment, Conjuration does it all. Sometimes the creatures you summon aren't all that great at fighting, but they sure work well as distractions. Not only that you can summon them, beat up on them and increase other skills! The magical soulbound weapons you create aren't half bad either. Destruction ------- This is the primary school of magic for a mage. Spells in this category will be used to make it so your enemies are no longer alive any more. Fire magic, frost magic, shock magic and more all fall under this category. Utilization of the Destruction skill is an absolute necessity for anyone who wishes to become a powerful mage. Hand-to-Hand ------ This particular skill gets to be fleshed out even more than any other skill, and why is that? Because it's my favourite skill in the game. I don't think I could bring myself to play any other kind of melee character. For the record, this entire guide was written while playing as a Redguard Pugilist character named "Truck Badass" who utilized not but his fists and the power of the special Adrenaline Rush to bludgeon the **** out of any enemies that pissed him off. I can't even begin to describe how cool this character is. The lack of any powerful weapons is of course the main drawback to this skill. I can't even think of any noteworthy advantages. To be honest the only reason I can possibly see to playing a H2H character is just that it's tens of thousands of times more badass than any other character type. A stealthy assassin comes close, but the competition is frankly dominated. This one aspect of the game will probably keep me playing forever. Heavy Armor ------- Your ability to wear and be less encumbered by heavy armour like iron armour, dwarven armour etc. The more you get attacked while wearing it, the more your skill will increase and the more bonuses you will get. Illusion ---------- Magic that involves the art of illusion, deception and control. Allows you to screw around with the minds of creatures, to create light where there is no light, and more! Light Armor ------- Unlike the skill of heavy armor, armour that is not so heavy gets the advantage here. Fur armour, or cloth armour, robes and the like will all give bonuses when worn and your skill is at a higher level. The only way to level it of course is to be attacked while wearing light armour. Marksman ---------- This is the primary skill of a ranged attacker. It directly affects how much damage you do with a bow, how accurate you are and how likely your arrows are to cause additional negative effects to your target. A skilled marksman can have his enemy down and incapacitated before the enemy even has a chance to react. Mercantile -------- Directly associated with buying and selling. This determines your ability to Haggle. When you go to a shop there will be an option to Haggle. When you slide the bar to the right you are trying to get a better deal, but when you try to sell or purchase an item the shopkeeper might not accept your offer and you might have to slide it back left in order to make the deal. The shopkeeper's decision as to whether or not to accept your offer is based on three things. Your Mercantile skill, their Mercantile skill, and their disposition toward you (increased through persuasion.) It's a trial and error process. Every time you buy or sell and it works disposition goes up (especially for expensive stuff.) Having your offer refused lowers disposition. Mysticism --------- A semi-useful school of magic that is focusing on both protection and detecting. You've got your protection against diseases and draining effects as well as the bonus of being able to detect life and more. Not exactly all that useful, but it has its moments. Restoration ------- One of the most important schools of magic for a mage, this is directly connected to your ability to heal lost health. A higher Restoration skill will allow you to learn more restoration magic and have it heal more health for the same amount of Magicka. A necessity for all mages and sometimes a good skill to major in for other classes. Security ---------- This skill is directly associated with your ability to lockpick. Sometimes (well, really often) you will find locked doors and chests in the world of Cyrodiil and you'll want to be able to open them without a key. That's what the security skill is for. Fortunately (or unfortunately depending on how you look at it) the game is designed so that if you're good you can pretty much open any lock regardless of difficulty, at any skill level. The Security skill should only be selected as a major skill if you're playing a stealthy thief who does a LOT of Lockpicking. As for Lockpicking itself, it's not too complicated. When you examine a locked object you'll get an inside view of the lock. Position the pick under any one of the tumblers that is done, and most the mouse up. This will knock the tumbler upward, then it will fall back down. The speed at which it falls is pretty random. The difficulty of the lock is based on how many tumblers are in the "down" as opposed to the "up" position. When all the tumblers are up then the door / chest is unlocked and you may proceed. To keep a tumbler up you must move the mouse up to knock it upward, then click the mouse after it stops but before it falls to lock it in place. If the timing is off on your click then the lockpick will break and every one of the tumblers will fall back down that you have already locked into place (but not the ones that were up when you started.) The Security skill affects two things: tumblers fall back down slower, and not all of the tumblers come loose again if you break a lockpick. Slower and fewer as you level the skill up (level it up by clicking tumblers into place.) Basically you should quicksave every time before you try a lock, and if you break too many picks then load and try again. Sneak ------------- Sneak is the primary skill of a stealthy character and it comes in handy for all sorts of situations. When you activate sneak mode with the Ctrl button, an eyeball will appear on your crosshairs. When this eyeball is dark then you cannot be seen or heard by anyone. When it's bright then someone detects you. While you are not detected there are a number of things you can do. Stealing items is possible if you do it without being detected and you won't get in trouble for it. Even killing can be done undetected as long as its fast and not messy. When you sneak up behind a friendly target you can press the space bar to pick their pocket. The higher your sneak skill the less likely they will be to notice you took something. Also the weight of the item makes a difference too. The same applies for sneaking in general, the higher your skill the less noticeable you are. It also helps for combat. Sneaking up behind someone and using a charged attack will give you a bonus of up to 6x as much damage for the hit. This helps for characters that don't even specialize in sneak. Your ability to sneak also depends on the boots you are wearing at lower skill levels. Speechcraft ------- Finally we come to Speechcraft and the art of persuasion. For the record this is one of the most useless skills there is, but no matter. When you talk to someone you should see an option at the bottom beside the X. Unless this person is a shopkeeper or trainer, then this is probably the persuasion button which appears for almost everyone. Persuading people to like you increases their disposition and makes them more likely to give you information. For example, if you ask about something and the subject you ask about does not get grayed out after asking, then they are holding something back that they might tell you if their disposition is higher. When you click the persuade button it brings up a weird wheel, with the options "Start" and "Bribe." We'll leave bribe for now. When you click start you'll see four different sized cones over top of four different options: coerce, boast, admire and joke. When you click on each of these you will perform that action, it will then be blocked and the cones will rotate once to the left. You must click all four of these in any order to finish the session. Clicking them will have either a positive effect or negative effect on the person's disposition. There are a total of four options as I mentioned, two of them will always decrease disposition and two will always decrease. Which are dependent on the person, but they never change. So how do you use this information to your advantage? Well it's basic strategy. Let's say when you click on admire and joke, disposition goes up, and it goes down for boast and coerce. The size of the cone on each topic affects the change. A big cone on admire in this case means disposition goes up a lot while a big cone on coerce means it goes down a lot. Small cone on admire means it goes up a little etc. Each time you click one they rotate and you can't click that option again. The basic idea is that you always click the big cone when it's on a good option, and the small cone when it's on a bad one so that the disposition increase is bigger than the decrease. The problem is that with the rotate and the blanking out of options, you are often forced to choose between the lesser of two evils. The "less bad" of two bad choices. After a bit of practice you should be able to get a strategy down pretty easily. Maybe clicking a small cone on a bad option you can see will move a big cone to a good option. When you're planning ahead then that's when you'll do best. Even if you keep screwing up there's nothing that stops you from doing it over and over again until it gets maxed out. A person's maximum disposition is based on your Speechcraft skill. The higher it is the higher you can go. As for the "Bribe" option it actually lets you pay money to increase disposition beyond the maximum. ONLY USE THIS OPTION when you max disposition first, otherwise you're paying money for something you could do by just using the wheel. Most times you don't need to bribe though, the max disposition you can hit is sufficient to get them to talk about whatever it is that they're holding back from you. ______________________________________________________________________________ __ (__/ ) / ) / +-- (_/ TATISTICS -------------------------------------------------- 04.02 --+ o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Acrobatics | Governing Attribute: Speed | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Cannot attack while jumping / falling | | Apprentice | Can use normal attacks while jumping / falling | | Journeyman | Dodge ability and Block + jump to roll | | Expert | 50% fatigue loss for jumping | | Master | Jump on the surface of water | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Alchemy | Governing Attribute: Intelligence | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Recognizes the first of four ingredients | | Apprentice | Recognizes the first two of four ingredients | | Journeyman | Recognizes the first three of four ingredients | | Expert | Recognizes all four ingredients | | Master | Can make potions from a single ingredient | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Alteration | Governing Attribute: Willpower | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Armorer | Governing Attribute: Endurance | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Cannot repair magic items | | Apprentice | Repair hammers last twice as long | | Journeyman | Repair magic items | | Expert | Repair items beyond 100% to 125% | | Master | Cannot break repair hammers | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Athletics | Governing Attribute: Speed | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Restore fatigue while running | | Apprentice | Restore fatigue 25% faster while running | | Journeyman | Restore fatigue 50% faster while running | | Expert | Restore fatigue 75% faster while running | | Master | Restore fatigue at 100% while running | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Blade | Governing Attribute: Strength | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Basic power attack | | Apprentice | Damage bonus to power attack | | Journeyman | Disarming side power attack | | Expert | Knockback backward power attack | | Master | Paralyzing forward attack | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Block | Governing Attribute: Agility | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Fatigued by blocking, H2H block against weapons bad | | Apprentice | No longer fatigued by blocking | | Journeyman | Blocking weapon not damaged, H2H block gives recoil | | Expert | Counterattack with shield | | Master | Disarm with shield | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Blunt | Governing Attribute: Strength | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Basic power attack | | Apprentice | Damage bonus to power attack | | Journeyman | Disarming side power attack | | Expert | Knockback backward power attack | | Master | Paralyzing forward attack | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Conjuration | Governing Attribute: Intelligence | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Destruction | Governing Attribute: Willpower | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Hand-to-Hand | Governing Attribute: Strength | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Basic power attack | | Apprentice | Damage bonus to power attack | | Journeyman | Disarming side power attack | | Expert | Knockback backward power attack, block knockback | | Master | Paralyzing forward attack, block knockback | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Heavy Armor | Governing Attribute: Endurance | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Heavy armor degrades rapidly | | Apprentice | Heavy armor degrades at normal rate | | Journeyman | Heavy armor degrades slower | | Expert | Heavy armor encumbers only 50% | | Master | Heavy armor does not encumber | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Illusion | Governing Attribute: Personality | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Light Armor | Governing Attribute: Speed | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Light armor degrades rapidly | | Apprentice | Light armor degrades at normal rate | | Journeyman | Light armor degrades slower | | Expert | Light armor does not encumber | | Master | Light armor gets 50% armor bonus | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Marksman | Governing Attribute: Agility | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Pulling bow fatigues | | Apprentice | No bow fatigue penalty | | Journeyman | Can zoom with bow using block button | | Expert | Arrows can knock down target | | Master | Arrows can paralyze | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Mercantile | Governing Attribute: Personality | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Worn items sell for less | | Apprentice | Worn items sell for same value | | Journeyman | Sell any types of items to any vendor | | Expert | Can invest in shop to give 500 more gold | | Master | All shops have 500 more gold | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Mysticism | Governing Attribute: Intelligence | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Restoration | Governing Attribute: Willpower | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Security | Governing Attribute: Agility | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Four tumblers fall on broken pick | | Apprentice | Three tumblers fall on broken pick | | Journeyman | Two tumblers fall on broken pick | | Expert | One tumbler falls on broken pick | | Master | No tumblers fall on broken pick | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Sneak | Governing Attribute: Agility | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | 4x/2x melee/ranged damage bonuses | | Apprentice | 6x/3x melee/ranged damage bonuses | | Journeyman | Boots make no difference while sneaking | | Expert | Moving makes no difference while sneaking | | Master | Sneak attack ignores armor rating | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Speechcraft | Governing Attribute: Personality | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o | Novice | Can bribe to increase disposition | | Apprentice | Can rotate the persuasion wedge once for free | | Journeyman | Disposition counter decreases 50% slower | | Expert | Disposition does not decrease much with bad option | | Master | Bribes cost half the price | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o ______________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 05.00 || Character Creation || 05.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ) ___ (__/_____) / / +-- (______) HOOSING THE RIGHT CHARACTER --------------------------- 05.01 --+ Oblivion allows you to build the character you want almost from the ground up. While it does offer a large amount of freedom there are still three "base" types for which each customization is a slight variation from. Those three types are a warrior (combatant), mage (magic user) and stealth (typically a ranged attacker.) unless you plan on trying to specialize a hybrid of any two it's usually best to decide which of these three types you would like to focus on and then build your character from there. Each of these three main types is discussed in the following sections followed along with many more other tips regarding the build of a new character. It is recommended that you read everything before you begin, once you have completed the initial dungeon there is no way to go back and edit any of your characters attributes. ______________________________________________________________________________ _____ (, / ) /__ / ) / _ +-- (_/ ACE & APPEARANCE ------------------------------------- 05.02 --+ The very first screen you see after the game's cinematic opening sequence is the interface to design the appearance and select the race of your character. Of your numerous options here, choosing your race is the most important so we will begin with that one. Along with race is an option to select the gender of your character. Obviously the majority of players will select their own gender, however there are subtle differences between the two. Put in general terms the male is typically the better choice in for most races, though the advantage is marginal at best. Males excel a little more in combat roles while females often excel in magic roles. Race is where the differences begin to get a little more pronounced. Again you may wish to play a race solely based on how much you like their physical appearances, just keep in mind that a High Elf really does make a poor physical fighter and it's in your best interests to choose your race based on the type of character you wish to play. (Again I will remind you that despite these recommendations, you should feel free to play any character of any race you choose for any reason you wish. You've got that kind of freedom.) The following is a list of each race along with the skill bonuses they receive and the special abilities they will start with at the beginning. o=====================o==========o==========o==========o==========o==========o | Skill | Argonian | Breton | Dark Elf | High Elf | Imperial | o=====================o==========o==========o==========o==========o==========o | Acrobatics | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Alchemy | +5 | +5 | -- | +5 | -- | | Alteration | -- | +5 | -- | +10 | -- | | Armorer | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Athletics | +10 | -- | +5 | -- | -- | | Blade | +5 | -- | +10 | -- | +5 | | Block | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Blunt | -- | -- | +5 | -- | +5 | | Conjuration | -- | +10 | -- | +5 | -- | | Destruction | -- | +10 | +10 | +10 | -- | | Hand-to-Hand | +5 | -- | -- | -- | +5 | | Heavy Armor | -- | -- | -- | -- | +10 | | Illusion | +5 | +5 | -- | +5 | -- | | Light Armor | -- | -- | +5 | -- | -- | | Marksman | -- | -- | +5 | -- | -- | | Mercantile | -- | -- | -- | -- | +10 | | Mysticism | +5 | +10 | +5 | +10 | -- | | Restoration | -- | +10 | -- | -- | -- | | Security | +10 | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Sneak | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Speechcraft | -- | -- | -- | -- | +10 | o=====================o==========o==========o==========o==========o==========o | Skill | Khajiit | Nord | Orc | Redguard | Wood Elf | o=====================o==========o==========o==========o==========o==========o | Acrobatics | +10 | -- | -- | -- | +5 | | Alchemy | -- | -- | -- | -- | +10 | | Alteration | -- | -- | -- | -- | +5 | | Armorer | -- | +5 | +10 | -- | -- | | Athletics | +5 | -- | -- | +10 | -- | | Blade | +5 | +10 | -- | +10 | -- | | Block | -- | +5 | +10 | -- | -- | | Blunt | -- | +10 | +10 | +10 | -- | | Conjuration | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Destruction | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Hand-to-Hand | +10 | -- | +5 | -- | -- | | Heavy Armor | -- | +10 | +10 | +5 | -- | | Illusion | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Light Armor | +5 | -- | -- | +5 | +5 | | Marksman | -- | -- | -- | -- | +10 | | Mercantile | -- | -- | -- | +5 | -- | | Mysticism | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Restoration | -- | +5 | -- | -- | -- | | Security | +5 | -- | -- | -- | -- | | Sneak | +5 | -- | -- | -- | +10 | | Speechcraft | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | o---------------------o----------o----------o----------o----------o----------o o=====================o======================================================o | Race | Special Abilities | o=====================o======================================================o | Argonian | Water breathing, Resist Disease, Resist Poison | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Breton | Fortified Maximum Magicka, Shield, Resist Magicka | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Dark Elf | Summon Ghost, Resist Fire | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | High Elf | Fortified Max Magicka, Resist Disease, Magic Weaknes | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Imperial | Charm, Absorb Fatigue | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Khajiit | Demoralize, Night-Eye | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Nord | Frost Damage, Resist Frost, Shield | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Orc | Drain Agility, Fortify Str, Fortify Fatigue, Berserk | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Redguard | Adrenaline, Fort. Health/Strength/Endurance, Resist | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Wood Elf | Command Creature, Resist Disease | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o As you can see there are some classes that just seem naturally suited to their roles. For example, those looking for a powerful melee fighting class would be best to select the Redguard based on the above values. One wishing to be a stealthy character would likely choose the Wood Elf and a Mage would best be played as a Breton or High Elf. Keep these statistics in mind when selecting your character, they aren't quite as important as the skills you actually select, but they still factor in quite heavily. We now move onto the less important physical characteristics of your character. I'm referring specifically to their appearance. before altering this you will first want to enter their name by clicking "Enter character name" at the top of the window. Obviously this can be whatever you wish. You can choose which order to alter the features of your character but I'll outline them in a top to bottom fashion. The top and most complex option is the face. Given that there are more options that you could ever possibly want, the game does give you a "Random" option which will screw around with all the settings and spit out a randomly generated face for your character. This face can then be modified to your liking. Sometimes the random face is actually good enough to use without any modification at all. The shape allows you to alter the, well, the shape of the face while the tone is more focused on minor adjustments, colours and whatnot. Outside of this detailed menu back at the main character creation window is also an option to change both your hairstyle, hair colour and hair length. Finally the age and complexion bars both do exactly what you would imagine they do when you slide them from left to right. Age your character with ease! Upon completing the final design of your character, proceed when you are ready. Note that this is not a finalization stage and you will have one more chance to alter everything you just did. The very first area in the game is like a training dungeon which allows you to get a little experience in combat and exploring and judge whether you like the character or not. Following that you will have another chance to edit your attributes and then after that, you're stick with it. ______________________________________________________________________________ ______ (, / ) /---( ) / ____) +-- (_/ ( IRTHSIGNS ------------------------------------------- 05.03 --+ When you reach the Imperial Subterrane and find the emperor again, one of the first things he will do is ask you your birthsign. The following is a quick and easily accessible list that shows each birthsign bonus, and below the list an explanation of which birthsign you might want for your character. o=====================o======================================================o | Birthsign | Bonuses | o=====================o======================================================o | The Apprentice | Magicka + 100, 100% Magicka Weakness | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Lady | Willpower + 10, Endurance + 10 | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Mage | Magicka + 50 | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Thief | Agility + 10, Speed + 10, Luck + 10 | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Atronach | Magicka + 150, Spell Absorption 50%, no Magicka Reg. | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Lord | Restore Health, 25% Fire Weakness | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Lover | Paralyze Touch 120 Fatigue Cost | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Ritual | Restore Health, Turn Undead | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Serpent | Damage Health, Dispel, Cure Poison, Damage Fatigue | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Shadow | Invisibility | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Steed | Speed + 20 | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Tower | Open Lock, Reflect Damage | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | The Warrior | Strength + 10, Endurance + 10 | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o Some of them are pretty obvious that you would want to choose for your type of character. For example, someone playing a powerful melee fighter would most certainly choose to be born under The Warrior birthsign. For a mage he/she would either choose The Mage birthsign, or if he/she was willing to choose the more aggressive option, go for The Apprentice which despite the weakness is worth it for the extra bonus. I would not personally recommend The Atronach for a mage but it's your decision. For a stealthy thief character you have a couple of options. The best one is of course The Thief which comes with a few great bonuses, however The Shadow also has its merits. Being able to turn invisible will really come in handy despite only being able to do it once a day. The rest of them can just be chosen for special interest, or if you see some great advantage to them which I have overlooked. ______________________________________________________________________________ ) ___ (__/_____) / / +-- (______) HARACTER CLASS ---------------------------------------- 05.04 --+ Upon speaking to the guard after you acquire the Amulet of Kings, that is when you will be able to choose your character class. There are a fair number of pre-made classes available to you, so if you wish to just select something that sounds like it would apply then that is always an option. The best option of course is to choose the "Custom Class" option and build a class specifically tailored to the kind of character that you want. Let's begin by looking at the three options you have for a primary character type. Each character type comes with seven skills that you don't have to choose, but if you do select they will get a "+5" bonus at the beginning and increase faster throughout, the game. I put this value in quotes because it was kindly pointed out to me by PapaGamer (author of the character build guide on GameFAQs) that in fact both the insctruction manual and game are incorrect, you actually only get a +5 bonus to these skills and not a +10 bonus as it says you receive. Anyway, the Combat character is a warrior, a melee fighter who specializes in the skills Armorer, Athletics, Blade, Block, Blunt, Hand- to-Hand, and Heavy Armor. The Magic type is obviously more of a mage character which specializes in Alchemy, Alteration, Conjuration, Mysticism, Destruction, Illusion, Mysticism and Restoration. Finally the Stealth character, a thief or ranged attacker, specializes in Acrobatics, Light Armor, Marksman, Mercantile, Security, Sneak and Speechcraft. Choose whichever of the three you think best fits the character you wish to create here. Next we will have to two of the eight primary attributes for a character. These are different that skills in that they sort of "govern" you use of skills among other things. Your magic power for example, or your physical strength. It's all outlined below in the chart to help you decide. o=====================o======================================================o | Attribute | Affects: | o=====================o======================================================o | Strength | Maximum Weight, Fatigue, Melee Damage | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Intelligence | Total Magicka and Magic Use | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Willpower | Magicka Regeneration, Fatigue | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Agility | Maneuverability, Fatigue, Bow Damage | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Speed | Movement Speed | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Endurance | Fatigue, Max Health, Health Bonus | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Personality | How Much People Like You | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Luck | Everything You Do | o=====================o======================================================o | Attribute | Governs the Skills: | o=====================o======================================================o | Strength | Blunt, Blade, Hand-to-Hand | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Intelligence | Alchemy, Conjuration, Mysticism | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Willpower | Destruction, Alteration, Restoration | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Agility | Security, Sneak, Marksman | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Speed | Athletics, Light Armor, Acrobatics | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Endurance | Block, Armoror, Heavy Armor | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Personality | Speechcraft, Mercantile, Illusion | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Luck | None | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o There are some that are obvious choices for each class, and some that are next to worthless. If you're playing a combatant melee character you should choose Strength and Endurance. A Mage is designed to use both Intelligence and Willpower. A Stealth character definitely needs Agility and to a lesser extent, Speed. The other characteristic Personality is next to useless (in comparison) while Luck should be used more for fun than anything else. Now we move on to the seven major skills. As was said before, every time you choose a skill that applies to your class you get a big bonus in that skill. You can choose a total of seven and each class has seven class-specific skills. Those skills along with the skills themselves in the tables below: o=====================o======================================================o | Specialization | Skills that Yield Bonuses: | o=====================o======================================================o | Combat | Armorer, Athletics, Blade, Block, Blunt | | | Hand-to-Hand, Heavy Armor | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Mage | Alchemy, Alteration, Conjuration, Destruction, | | | Illusion, Mysticism, Restoration | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Stealth | Acrobatics, Light Armor, Marksman, Mercantile, | | | Security, Sneak, Speechcraft | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o o=====================o======================================================o | Skill | Effect | o=====================o======================================================o | Acrobatics | Jump long distances and avoid fall damage | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Alchemy | Create potions and gain benefits from alchemy items | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Alteration | Cast magic to altar physical properties | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Armorer | Maintain weapons and armor at top efficiency | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Athletics | Run and swim faster, regenerate fatigue faster | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Blade | Swords and sharp weapons more effective | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Block | Reduce damage while blocking | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Blunt | Blunt weapons do more damage | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Conjuration | Magic to summon creatures and equipment | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Destruction | Cast powerful damage or resistance magic | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Hand-to-Hand | Both damage and fatigue enemies with fists | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Heavy Armor | Use Iron, Steel, Dwarven, Orcish, etc. Armor | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Illusion | Magic to charm, create light, hide, etc. | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Light Armor | Use Fur, Leather, Chainmail, Mithril, Elven Armor | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Marksman | More powerful attacks with a bow | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Mercantile | Get better deals when buying / selling | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Mysticism | Magic to absorb, reflect, dispel, sense etc. | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Restoration | Magic to heal damage, cure disease etc. | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Security | Use lockpicks to unlock doors and chests | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Sneak | Pickpocketing and move unseen | |---------------------+------------------------------------------------------| | Speechcraft | Persuade people to like and trust you | o---------------------o------------------------------------------------------o You might just want to choose the seven skills that apply to your character as listed above however do note that while most are useful, not all of them are really necessary. For example, if you are using a melee character you will probably wish to specialize in one type of attacking. That may be Blade weapons, Blunt weapons or Hand-to-Hand. Whichever one you choose you really don't need to specialize in the other two which leaves you open to two skills from other fields. Mages would probably be best to select every skill from their field. Stealth characters have little use for Acrobatics, and even less use for Mercantile and Speechcraft. You may want to select them anyway for the bonuses, but if you have your eye on something else then these three skills are probably the ones to drop before any others. Actually the Illusion magic ability might come in handy for a stealth character. It might probably be worth sacrificing the Mercantile skill to specialize in that. Finally we get to name the custom class. Choose something appropriate to the kind of character you wish to be. The name will not affect any aspects of the game. ______________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 06.00 || Introduction: The Prison || 06.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ______) (, / / ) / +-- (_/ HE PRISON -------------------------------------------------- 06.01 --+ After you have created your character, you will find yourself inside of a jail cell. How you arrived in such a place is anyone's guess, however as you will soon learn that question is somewhat irrelevant in the big scheme of things. Take a couple of moments to familiarize yourself with the surroundings. Using the left mouse button you can attack with your fists, and holding the right mouse button allows you to block. Blocking will reduce but not eliminate some of the damage you take. The mouse wheel lets you zoom out and cycle from first to third person mode. How you choose to play is up to you, but do note that the game was designed specifically with the first person perspective in mind. The next button you will want to get familiar with is the Z button. Target some of the objects on the ground or the table and hold the Z button, then move your mouse. You can see that you have the ability to carry and move objects around. Try this on those chains hanging from the ceiling to really get a good impression of the game's fancy physics. Using the space bar while targeting objects in a similar way allows you to actually place them into your inventory directly. Feel free to take the objects you see here in the cell even if they are of little value (you will find many items of little value to you on your quests.) For the most part just about any item in the world of Cyrodiil can be taken but beware! Many items are the property of others, this is indicated by a red hand symbol when you target an object. If you pick up one of these objects and are caught doing it, your crime will most likely be reported. You can learn more about crimes elsewhere in this guide, but we're still getting used to the controls. The tab button is an important one which allows you to open up the game's main menu. Click on the various buttons along the bottom to cycle between various stats and item menus for your character. Make sure you know where to go to find your items, magic etc. Now onto the more minor things. The T button allows you to wait for a certain amount of time assuming you are not in a dangerous area (Oblivion like Morrowind runs in real time so this feature will come in handy) The C button lets you cast spells while holding the shift button allows you to run. Press caps lock to cycle between walk and auto-run. Hold down the left mouse button to execute a more powerful melee attack. This attack uses fatigue which is the green bar at the bottom of the screen. The more fatigue you have the more active you are, and the more damage your melee attacks will do. Stop for a moment to rest and it will recover quickly. That just about covers the basics, anything else I'm sure you will pick up as you go. What you want to do now is proceed forward to the gate of your cell and listen in to the conversation. Once again I'm sure you will be thrilled as I was to hear the voice of Patrick Stewart who plays Emperor Uriel. When you are told to stand back and wait by the window, that is exactly what you should do. When Emperor Uriel begins talking to you, you will have a number of options for things to ask him. The order in which you select them makes no difference. Upon gaining control of your character again you may be overcome by the urge to attack these people simply because you have the freedom to do so. Try to resist this urge, it is possible of course though they will not hesitate to retaliate and the guards are much stronger than you. ______________________________________________________________________________ ______) (, / / ) / +-- (_/ HE IMPERIAL SUBSTRUCTURE ----------------------------------- 06.02 --+ As you proceed down into the catacombs, do your best to stay close to the Emperor and his guards. At your current level and abilities you could easily find yourself overwhelmed (and killed) by some of the assassins that you find along the way. Feel free to jump in and help if you wish, but for the most part the guards are perfectly capable of taking care of things themselves. When the first battle comes around, things will pretty much occur under a set script. No matter what you do one of the guards (Captain Renault) will be killed. Her body along with the bodies of the assassins can be looted by pressing the space bar. Feel free to take everything you see. Also make sure to pick up Renault's Akaviri Katana which should fall down somewhere near her body. Equip the katana for now regardless of your class to better protect yourself. You can also put on the robes that you rook from the assassins. Just up ahead you'll find the first enemies you need to defeat yourself: a couple of rats. Simply swing your katana or whatever else you have equipped to make quick rat meat out of them. The door up ahead is locked so turn right and proceed through the crack in the wall. There's at least one rat in this room you'll have to clear out. Make sure to explore every inch. First locate the chest in the light beside the skeleton corpse. The chest is locked, but if you examine the skeleton you should be able to find a lockpick. Also collect the quiver (arrows) and the bow off of the skeleton. Now if you are planning on being a ranged Marksman you can start to get some practice with the bow. In order to use the bow equip both the bow and the arrows in your inventory. As for that locked chest, it's your first chance to use a lockpick. While the chest is locked with a "very easy" lock you might still want to quicksave your game (F5) before trying. The lockpick system works as follows: you can press the auto attempt button to try and open it automatically based on your lockpicking ability or you can try it manually which is usually the best choice. What you need to do is position your lockpick under one of the locks that is hanging down and move the mouse up to knock it in the air. Click the left mouse button to unlock the lock before it falls back down again. You can find more information on lockpicking elsewhere in the guide but that's pretty much all there is to it. If you keep screwing up then simply reload your game. Take whatever you find in the chest and move on. There should be a barrel somewhat hidden in the dark nearby with some decent items inside. Look around you to try and find a locked door. If you have any lockpicks this door can be picked as well, but there is a better method. Just a few steps from the door is the body of a goblin shaman who not only has the key, but also quite a few other items worth taking as well. Get the key and unlock the door automatically. There is a chest on your right when you enter this room with a number of good items and pieces of equipment inside. As the game suggests, try setting a magic spell in your inventory and using it with the C button. If you are planning on making your character a Mage then there is no better time to start practicing. If you want you can hotkey your magic (or items) by holding the numbers 1 to 8 and clocking on a spell. Very helpful stuff. Head down the slope and eliminate your first non-rat enemy (the zombie.) Continue onward and open the chest on your right. Soon you will reach a lighted room with pillars (and rats) aplenty. There's some decent stuff on the floor in the middle of the room but at this point you might have to start watching what you carry. If you become over-encumbered simply hold shift and click on an item in your inventory to drop it. The number under the feather symbol indicates its weight. Continue now onward further through the dungeon. Before entering the tunnel in the wall down the hall take a look around for a cracked wall in this room to find a barrel filled with Ale. Proceed on through the door at the end of the tunnel near the hanging skulls. At the bottom of the slope there are some items in the box and barrel on your right, a pickaxe among other things. As you go around the corner the game gives you a brief tutorial on sneaking. Press the Ctrl button to go into sneaking mode, you can tell you are in sneaking mode because you move slower and the crosshair changes to an eye. If the eye is dark then you have not been detected, if it turns yellow it means you are detectable. While sneaking, if you can manage to attack an enemy without being detected (sneak up behind) then you will get a 4x damage bonus. Sneak up behind the goblin near the fire and hold the left mouse button to do an extremely powerful charge attack. This should almost kill the enemy in a single hit. Now save your game and head around the corner. Contrary to what you just learned, there will be no sneaking here. You're going to rush this guy (make sure to save first.) The reason for this is as follows: he is standing near a wire trap. Run up to the goblin just out of the tunnel so you hit the wire, and then stop. Some large swinging spike traps will come down and ideally pound the goblin from behind for a one hit kill. No problem. Make a left turn down the next hall at the fork and look for a well hidden chest in the darkness. Break the lock and take the items from inside. Now here's another fun part. You should see a large pile of logs at the top of the hill and two goblins at the bottom. You know what to do. Push the logs with the space bar and take those goblins out without any effort at all. Don't forget to loot their corpses for lockpicks aplenty. You can never have enough of those. Two chests to open at the bottom of the hill, one unlocked and one with an easy lock to pick. Heal up and proceed. You might want to try sneaking into the next room and attacking the goblin from behind, that usually works quite well but it may well alert some of the other goblins in the room. Just because one of them sees you however doesn't mean they all do, try to sneak up on any other enemies that don't seem to notice your presence. There is a goblin shaman in here carrying a neat staff so if you're a magic user that might be something worth picking up. Up the slope at the end here is a treasure chest with a few lockpicks in it as well as a door that leads up into the Imperial Subterrane. ______________________________________________________________________________ ______) (, / / ) / +-- (_/ HE IMPERIAL SUBTERRANE ------------------------------------- 06.03 --+ Hop down through the hole in the wall to find Emperor Uriel Septim once again with his guards. Allow them to defeat the assassins that appear and then loot their bodies for whatever they have on them. The emperor will speak to you and ask about your birthsign. At this point you will be able to select one from a number of different birthsigns. Scroll up in the guide a little and look in the character creation section for more information. One of the guards will give you a torch, something which you probably already have but it might be a good idea to equip one anyway. Follow them through the door and turn right to find an unlocked treasure chest with some iron arrows and lockpicks inside of it. Keep following the guards to reach The Sanctum. Stay behind them until you come to what seems like a dead end and you are told to protect the emperor while they run off and start fighting. Emperor Uriel will turn to you and give you the Amulet of Kings the next scene unfolds you will finally learn of what you are to do when you leave this place. Your destination is a place called Weynon Priory where you must seek out a man named Jauffre. The guard gives you the key to the sewers so you may escape. Now you finally get to choose the class for your character which is the meat and potatoes of determining how your character will act and what they will specialize in. I highly recommend you scroll up to read about classes in the section above on character creation. There's a fair bit you need to take into consideration. After you have completed this you will finally be given your first quest, the quest to "Deliver the Amulet." At this point the tutorial is just about over and you should know the ropes by now. In case you can't figure out where to see your active quests, open the menu and click one the map tab at the lower right. Quests are under that heading. ______________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 07.00 || The Main Quest || 07.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ______ (, / ) / / _/___ /_ +-- (_/___ / ELIVER THE AMULET ----------------------------------- 07.01 --+ Our first real quest is well underway, yet we find ourselves still stuck in these underground catacombs. The first goal of this quest is to escape to the outside world. Proceed down the tunnel which opened up to reveal Emperor Uriel's assassin. When you reach the door turn left to find a treasure chest sitting just inside the wall. Unlock the chest and take all of the potions. Through the door is the entrance to the sewers. Make sure you are still holding that torch, it can get pretty dark in here. As you head into the main room you'll be attacked by two rats, followed by two very dangerous Goblin Berserkers. Now that you've finally specialized to a specific class perhaps those talents will come in handy here. There are two exits to this room on the northeast wall, one on the left and one on the right. Take the left tunnel first to find a treasure chest at the end with some lockpicks and arrows inside. Turn around and take the other tunnel, it leads to a set of stairs going up. This then leads to a bridge and a gate you can open. The final stretch of the sewer is relatively short. It leads into a cylindrical tunnel and a "Gate to the City Isle." Before you open this gate what you want to do is press F5 to quicksave your game, then open the Esc menu and do a main save, then open it up and make another main save on a separate file. The reason for this is as follows: when you examine the gate you will have the option to customize everything about your character's appearance and race again, his/her birthsign and his/her class. Now that you have been through the initial training dungeon the game gives you the option of making corrections, or changing something that you don't like. Note that after this point you will NEVER be able to change these things about your character again. The reason I suggest you make so many saves is so that every time you want to start a new character you just load this file, build your new character from the menu when you open the gate, and then go from there without having to play through the whole introduction sequence again. When you're ready, and everything's okay, open the gate and proceed out into the world. Now that you're outside on the map, one of the first things you might want to do is adjust your graphics settings (unless you're playing the Xbox 360 version). Indoors was a different story but now in the enormous outside world things might get a little choppy depending on your hardware. If you're having problems deciding what to change and what not to, or just looking for general tips on how to improve performance, check out the computer hardware and recommendations section of this guide for more information. There are two primary ways of traveling in this game, you can do it manually on foot or you can do it automatically via your map. There are advantages to both, and disadvantages. Running too your destination allows you to increase your skills along the way, Athletics, Acrobatics and combat skills. Anything that you would use along the way. It allows you to better experience the beautiful world of Cyrodiil without just skipping past it. The advantages of fast travel are primarily just that you will be able to progress through the game and complete it faster, which isn't necessarily a good thing. Personally I would say that if it's your first character then it's recommended that you make the trip yourself. After you've experienced the world and are ready to play a new character, you might opt to simply skip the trip to save time. Once again, the decision is yours. If you decide to use fast travel, open up the tab menu and select the world map. You can click on any destination to warp there automatically (though time will still pass.) Your destination is the Weynon Priory to the west. If you choose to walk / run there yourself, use the red flag on your compass to indicate the direction you need to go (in this case that direction is west.) Remember also that not every location is available to your with fast travel, often you must first find it yourself before you can warp there. For this reason the use of slow travel now will actually make fast travel a more viable option later. When you arrive at your destination you want to look for a large building called the Weynon House. That will be the location of Jauffre the vast majority of the time, but keep in mind that characters in this game unlike most games, do not always remain in one place. Much of it is based on the time of the day so in a case like this if you know he is supposed to be here and he isn't, you can either go searching for him elsewhere in the area or simply use the wait command (T button) for a time when he has returned. Enter the house and speak to Maborel. Ask him about all of the options you have and listen to what he has to say. If this is your first visit to someone else's house there are a few ground rules to set down. Obviously do not attack any of these people, doing so will put a bounty on your head and you'll likely be thrown into jail and perhaps not welcomed back. The same applies for stealing anything in the house, you will note that when you hover the crosshairs over an item in here the hand is red. That means don't touch. If you're a stealth character you can try to sneak around and take things, but there's always risk involved. Never do anything risky without first saving. Note that a few items such as the documents on the take have a different icon, a red book.. This means the items don't belong to you, but if you press Space you can read them without getting in trouble. If you choose the "take" option while reading that's where the trouble begins. You can open the cupboards, but if you take anything they'll come after you. Note that sometimes people don't even like you looking inside their drawers even if you take nothing. You can pick up items using the Z button without getting in too much trouble, but if you start hanging onto them, taking them away, or even throwing them around it might anger the people around you. Anyway, enough of this aside. What you want to do now is go upstairs and see if you can find Jauffre. He should be sitting at his desk, minding his own business. Speak to him and tell him about the Amulet. When he asks for it make sure you give it to him. Here you will learn a little more about the world known as Oblivion, and the gates which have appeared around this world. Jauffre will tell you about the Emperor's only living son, whose name is Martin. You are told that he serves Akatosh in the Chapel in the city of Kvatch. After he is done talking to you, and your quests have been updated, ask him about assistance. He will offer you the items that he has stored in the chest. There are quite a few nice items in there, possibly more than you can carry depending on your class. If you need to unload some of the items that you're carrying for money rather than just throwing them on the ground, you might have to look elsewhere. I'm not certain there are any merchants in this small area here. You will notice now that your first quest, Deliver the Amulet, has been completed. You now have a new quest to "Find the Heir." Most of this guide works on a simple quest-based system. Simply look up the section based on the quest you are currently working on. At times you might find a quest that is not part of the "main quest" line at which point you would need to deviate elsewhere in the guide to find it. It's not entirely linear (much like the game) but it should not be difficult at any point to find what you need. ______________________________________________________________________________ ________) (, / /___, ) / +-- (_/ IND THE HEIR --------------------------------------------- 07.02 --+ After leaving the Weynon Priory and giving Jauffre the Amulet, your new quest is to locate Martin, the son of the late Emperor Uriel. From what you are told he is working as a priest in Kvatch which is south of here, so turn your compass to face south and move toward the red flag icon. You've got an option aside from walking there and fast travel. Speak to Maborel downstairs in the house and he will offer you the use of his horse. Around back there is a stable with three horses, get on the one which reads as Maborel's horse when you hover your crosshairs over it. You travel quite a bit faster on horseback than you do on foot so not only will you be able to make it there much quicker, you will also now have a horse you can use whenever you want. Kvatch is the large city located quite far away up on the top of a hill. You may have to run around the large hill almost entirely until you find a way up. If you take the proper way up you will find a camp of refugees along the way and realize that things are pretty bad up there. If you cannot find the camp then simply use fast travel to Kvatch and you will be brought there automatically. Make sure you speak to Hirtel (although it's pretty much impossible to avoid.) After you've done what you need to and perhaps rested in the beds here then you need to start making tracks for Kvatch up the hill. Speak to Savlian Matius when you reach the gate of Oblivion in front of the city of Kvatch and ask him what's going on. He tells you that there are still survivors of the massacre up in the Chapel, and others in the castle. Ask about Martin to get an update on your quest to find him and then choose the option to help. This will give you a new quest "Breaking the Siege of Kvatch" which doesn't actually end your quest to find Martin. There will be times of course when you are working on more than one quest at a time. If you want information relevant to each specific quest, then just go to that section in the guide. For example, despite not having completed this quest it may be a good idea to skip ahead to the section on "Breaking the Siege at Kvatch" because as of this moment, that's what you're going to do next. The next time you make any progress in this quest is after you've gone through the gates of Oblivion for the quest "Breaking the Siege at Kvatch." You will find Martin inside the Chapel in Kvatch and this quest will be updated when you speak to him. Leave the chapel and exit the city along with Martin. Speak to him when you get outside and ask him to accompany you to Weynon Priory. This is a good time to use fast travel just to simplify things. You've already been there and Martin will still be with you when you do that. Just as a quick warning however, make sure you are well equipped and well rested before you make the trip. Be ready for combat almost immediately. Upon arrival you will find a group of mysterious assassins killing everyone they can at Weynon Priory. You can get most of the information you need from the first person you see. After speaking to him you will get a new quest, "Weynon Priory." Just like before this quest takes immediate priority over the one you are currently working on. Scroll down to the "Weynon Priory" quest for more information on how to proceed from this point on. This quest will automatically be completed as you progress through the next quest "Weynon Priory." You can essentially consider it done at this point. ______________________________________________________________________________ ______ (, / ) /---( ) / ____) +-- (_/ ( REAKING THE SIEGE AT KVATCH ------------------------- 07.03 --+ Your goal is to enter the portal of Oblivion and see what you can do to help hold off the forces of evil. As you approach the portal, you and the guards following you will be attacked by a number of enemies that should not be difficult to eliminate (you'll be fighting a lot more inside the portal.) When you're ready, approach the portal and use the door icon to go inside. When you enter the gate there will be two enemies off in the distance directly in front of you that charge and attack. Use the guards to help you fend off these enemies. Approach the large gate directly ahead and try to open it. You can't, but this will trigger the appearance of another guard who is willing to help. You can either have him follow you or send him back to the camp. Head back a little bit and then turn and proceed northeast across the bridge. Look for some kind of "fleshy pod" hanging down from above and examine it to find some valuable items. Turn around again and this time proceed in the west direction. The bridge is broken so make a right at the fork and follow the ground. Turn right at the end of this path and head north. Another fleshy pod hangs down here just before a trap of falling rocks, so make sure you slow your progress just a little bit. Watch out for the falling rocks on the bridge as well. When you come to another turn make sure to open the fleshy pods on the ground on your left for some more valuable items. East is your direction of choice this time as you proceed further into Oblivion. Make a quick right turn and head down the south path where you'll encounter a few more enemies. Watch out for the traps in the ground at the end of the path. Turn left and go northeast through the arch and then left again to reach the doors of a large tower called the Tower Portal to Blood Feast. This place can get complicated, I won't try and direct you through every specific room one by one, just know that it is your goal to get to the top of the tower. Make your way into one of the reading halls and then up from there into the Citadel Hall where two enemies will be waiting. Examine the Blood Fountain to restore a large portion of your health (but it only works once and then it needs to recharge.) Take the door to the Blood Feast and then up the slope to the Corridors of Salvation. Keep going up and you should find a room with a couple of enemies and a bunch of locked doors. One door is not locked and it leads to another tower. When you enter the next tower be careful not to fall down the middle. Proceed up the slope to find a man in a cage. After speaking to him a more difficult enemy attacks. Eliminate this creature and then examine his body to get the Sigil Keep Key. Once you have this key go back through the door and across to the previous tower. Use the key on the locked door on your left. As you head up the hallway watch out for spike traps in the wall that will kill you in almost a single strike. Take the door to the Blood Feast and go up the ramp. Kill the demon here before he runs away and loot his corpse for some nice items. The device beside his is a warp portal, examine it to use it. Take one of the doors at the top and use both the Blood Fountain and Magicka Essence fountains if you need them. Be careful because there are some difficult enemies in this area. Keep making your way up and eventually you will find what is known as a Sigil Stone at the very top of the tower. The instant you take the Sigil Stone there will be a bright flash of light and suddenly you will find yourself outside of the gate, which is now closed. This is how portals of Oblivion are closed, the taking of the Sigil Stone. Now head back to the guards who are waiting to talk to you and speak with Matius. If you are ready to begin the attack tell him so, however if you're anything like me you probably gained a level while fighting through Oblivion. Remember that there are beds you can use to rest and level up back at the camp so it might be a good idea to stop there first. When you're ready to proceed with the quest, speak to Matius. Your quest will be updated and the guards will begin their attack. Enter the city with them and get ready to fight. Do everything you can to help out the guards. If you don't help them enough, at least one or two of them are sure to die, but they don't have to. If you want to keep them alive it might be a good idea to save before the battle (well it's a good idea anyway) just to make sure. Once every single enemy has been defeated you will get a message on the screen saying so. With all of the enemies dead take a moment to check inside some of the various boxes and barrels in the area. Be sure to check the ruined buildings on your left, the first one has a locked chest with an Iron Longsword and some arrows inside of it. In the neighboring building drop down into the small little hut to the north for another treasure chest. Approach the door to the Chapel of Akatosh and go inside. Speak to Martin and tell him everything you know, about how he is the son of Uriel Septim. You'll get an update on your prior quest after you talk to him, but he says that he refuses to go anywhere until the entire group can leave together. If you haven't talked to Matius outside, do so and he will say it's time to bring everyone out. Now talk to Matius one more time to complete this quest. This quest actually transforms into a new quest called "The Battle for Castle Kvatch." That quest is actually not part of the main quest line, it's one of the game's many optional quests. You may do it now, later, or even never, it's up to you. You need to decide now whether you want to start this new quest, or focus your energy on helping to rescue Martin. If you choose the latter please scroll back up and continue the quest "Find the Heir." ______________________________________________________________________________ __ __) (, ) | / | /| / |/ |/ +-- / | EYNON PRIORY ---------------------------------------------- 07.04 --+ Defeat the assassins that you find outside before anything else, and then enter Weynon Priory (the church-looking building, not Jauffre's house.) You must be ready to fight two more when you go in there at close range to keep Jauffre alive. Agree to go and check on the Amulet, and Jauffre will go with you. Return to his house and check upstairs along with him. Alas, the worst has happened and the Amulet of Kings has been stolen. Tell Jauffre that at the very least you have found and brought Martin back with you. Jauffre explains that the only place even remotely safe right now for Martin would be Cloud Ruler Temple up in the mountains. With this, the quest "Find the Heir" is complete. You now only have this quest on the main line to worry about. Martin and Jauffre will go around behind the house and get on the horses. You do the same and climb onto the back of the one that remains unoccupied. Now this is very important, make sure to set Weynon Priory as your active quest in the journal so that the flag on your compass is pointing to Cloud Ruler Temple and not Kvatch again. Start riding your horse toward the flag icon on the compass, and the two of them will follow. Note that you had might as well stop to fight any wolves or other enemies you see along the way, because if you don't the other two probably will anyway. Also note that at this point in the game, gates of Oblivion will start popping up randomly all over the world. Keep in mind that you can get some nice items and such while fighting through them, you are under no obligation to go through it every time you see one. Make sure you stop for a moment every once in awhile just to wait for the two of them, they don't exactly keep up all that well but they'll usually catch up if you give them a chance. Either way whether you take the horses or use fast travel you will get there eventually. Proceed through the large doors of the Cloud Ruler Temple and follow your group up the stairs. Speak to Martin at the top of the stairs and choose every option you have to talk to him. After this speak to Jauffre and he will offer you the chance to become one of the Blades. It's a good offer, and one you should accept. Doing so will get you an Akaviri Katana as well as free looting privileges over the equipment room in the temple. This also brings an end to this particular quest and gives you the next one "The path of Dawn." ______________________________________________________________________________ ______) (, / / ) / +-- (_/ HE PATH OF DAWN -------------------------------------------- 07.05 --+ If you enter the east wing (door to the right of the main front door) and make an immediate left you'll find the armory. There is tons of great stuff in here for a melee warrior character, and even some great bows for a stealth character. Take what you need and be off. Your destination now is the large Imperial City which is marked on your map. As always you can either make your way there manually or fast travel there. When you reach the city feel more than free to explore around and talk to the citizens. In regards to the quest, your destination is to the west through the door that says Imperial Elven Gardens District. Look around for a door that says it leads into Luther Broad's Boarding House. That is where you'll find the man you're looking for. Before speaking to Baurus make sure to speak with Astav Wirich, the reason for this will become clear soon. Talk to Baurus now and sit down on the stool behind him. Baurus says that the man in the corner (who I told you to talk to) is following him, and now he wants you to follow the man. Wait until he gets up and follow him through the door, you don't have to worry about keeping your distance or anything. Suddenly, when Baurus turns to attack you have to help out. Kill the man who was following Baurus and loot his corpse to get a book. Speak to Baurus and he'll tell you what he knows about the assassination of Uriel Septim. He says that the assassins were part of a daedric cult known as the Mythic Dawn. Tell him as well about the Amulet and about Septim's son. Baurus tells you about a scholar at the university named Tar-Meena who might be able to help out. Your journal will be updated. The next task is to seek out this person at the arcane university. Your map has been updated with the new location so all your need to do is follow the red flag on your compass. Right when you get into the university you should be able to find Tar-Meena sitting on the bench right at the entrance. Ask about the Mythic Dawn and Tar-Meena will tell you about their Master, Mankar Camoran. Tar-Meena believes that clues to the location of the Master can be found in his writings, however not all of the volumes are available. You will be directed to "First Edition" a rare bookstore in the Market District with a proprietor who might have an idea where the other two volumes of the book can be found. Off we go again to our next destination, the Market District. You should have no difficulty locating the bookstore in the Market District. Speak to Phintias and ask him about the books. He says that volumes one and two are rare, but they appear from time to time. Volumes three and four are impossible to find. His does however mention that he has one copy of volume three, but it's on reserve for a customer. Don't worry, all you have to do is stand and wait for about two minutes or so. Before long the man will come into the bookstore and pick up his book. Speak to him as he's leaving and ask about the cult, then tell him that he's in way over his head. When you finally blurt out that the cult was responsible for the assassination of the emperor, he's more than happy to give you the third volume out of fear. Finally, tell him that you need volume four as well. He will give you a note that he was given regarding a meeting with one of the members of the Mythic Dawn; the only way to actually get a copy of the fourth volume. If you happen to miss Gwinas when he comes to pick up the book, then you'll have to go and find him at the Tiber Septim Hotel. This information can be acquired from Phintias but only if you bribe him (you can learn a couple of other things by bribing him as well.) Regardless of how you do it, once you have the note from Gwinas make sure to read it. Return to the Elven Gardens District and speak once again, locate him by following the red flag, he won't necessarily be in the boarding house. Tell Baurus about the Mythic Dawn meeting and he'll say it's just what you need. He knows where they are so follow him. He'll go through the grate down into the sewers, follow him down there as well. Might be a good time to whip out another torch. There are enemies in here of course, so make sure that you protect Baurus as well as follow him. There aren't a lot of noteworthy chests and items in here but they do pop up periodically, so keep your eyes peeled. The dungeon isn't all that long and it's pretty uneventful. Follow Baurus through a tunnel and a sewer, kill a couple of weak enemies, repeat. Eventually you will reach a point where Baurus stops and says this is the door to the meeting room. He tells you that if you go up the nearby stairs you can actually get a vantage point looking down on the room. His job will be to handle the meeting, you go up the stairs and keep a lookout. Tell Baurus when you are ready to go. (You can actually opt to do the meeting yourself, but it doesn't really change much.) Here's what you should do. Baurus will be talking to the cultist now, press the Ctrl key to enter sneak mode and then sneak out a little bit onto the overpass, and drop down to the right so you are still hidden from view. The reason for this is that another two cultists come out of the gate directly across on the other side of the overpass, and this way you can stay hidden from the ones on the ground as well as those ones. Assuming you stay here until the end, even without being seen the cultist will recognize Baurus and you have to go out and save him. I would point out that while in sneak mode and listening to the conversations, you should try to sort of move back and forth or around in small circles, you can level your sneak skill this way. Anyway, regardless of what you do you'll eventually have to fight the cultists. Baurus has a very high chance of dying here but not if you move quick and attack quickly. Try to battle the same enemies that Baurus is fighting to distract them toward yourself. Check all the corpses to find a Sunken Sewers Key and the fourth volume of the book (and perhaps even a very valuable ring.) If you head down the hall beside the bale and up the stairs, you can actually find a bed you can use to rest. The exit door is just down the hall from here, you can get through it using the key. Past the numerous enemies there is a large wheel here you need to turn in order to open the gate. Continue through here and up the stairs to get out of the sewers via the ladder at the top. Now make your way back to the university and speak with Tar-Meena once again. You will be told that it takes time to study the volumes so you may have to use the wait command and wait 12 to 24 hours at a time to learn more. Keep speaking to Tar-Meena. You will learn that there is something significant about the first word of each paragraph. To be more specific, after a couple of days you will learn there is something specific about the first letter of each paragraph. When you use all four volumes and put them together it reads "Green Emperor Way Where Tower Touches Midday Sun." You can keep bothering Tar-Meena for the answer or you can just forget it and go there yourself. The solution is that Green Emperor Way is a street in the city, and midday sun specifically refers to noon. Leave the university and head back north toward the gardens. What you're looking for is the large grave on the northwest side that is called Tomb of Prince Camarrill. Getting the answer from Tar-Meena means that it appears on your map as a flag so it's pretty easy to find. Use the wait command to wait until as close to noon (but not past) as possible and then simply wait out the minutes (which shouldn't take very long.) You don't even need to wait until exactly noon, when it gets close some markings appear on the grave. These will put a new destination on your map so once again head toward the red flag. Your destination is a fair distance away from the city but still within reasonable walking time. Get there however you wish. ______________________________________________________________________________ ______ (, / ) / / _/___ /_ +-- (_/___ / AGON SHRINE ----------------------------------------- 07.06 --+ The cavern is located on the side of a steep hill, somewhat hard to find but the flag should help out quite a bit. There are a couple of ways you can proceed here. Note the guard standing in front of the door inside. When you approach him he will greet you as if you were someone interested in joining the clan who followed the direction of the books and found this place. This allows you to follow along and gain access to the inner sanctum without too much violence (though inevitably there is going to be violence, you're just delaying it.) Personally I recommend following along for the time being. When you go through the door you will be greeted by another man who says you must relinquish all of your possessions. If you reject his request twice the man will attack you so you don't have any choice in the matter. You can get your stuff back after this section however you are still free to drop any pieces of equipment before talking to him so that you don't have to give them up. Eventually you'll be forced to agree and then you'll be equipped with nothing but your robe. Follow the man through the door and down the corridor. He will lead you to another door which brings you to the inner sanctum. Mankar Camoran is there speaking. It is in your best interest to wait for him to finish. He gives his speech and then says he is going off to paradise. With that the Master disappears into some kind of portal, but does not take the book with him. The instant you pick up the book everyone will turn against you so just hold off for now. You should however pick up the Silver Dagger sitting on the podium, no one will get angry about that (in fact they encourage it.) After he is gone Ruma Camoran will speak with you. She says that in order to join the cult, red-drink must be spilled (blood). There is a sacrifice lying there in front of you and you have one of two options. You can let him live, or let him die. Of course "letting" him die means killing him yourself, it takes only one swing. The difference is minimal in terms of quest simplicity. What I mean is that if you don't kill him you'll have everyone after you. If you do kill him people will disperse a bit but still come after you when you take the book. The best solution? Make it a truly cinematic moment, as you are about to strike the innocent man down, instead use the space bar and choose to free him from the shackles. In that moment as everyone suddenly realizes that you are the enemy, grab the book and bolt for the door! (You still by the way, have to say that you will kill him even though you don't.) Make sure you're ready before you free him. Now this part is arguably the most difficult part of your quest thus far unless you've deviated and done a number of other things. Make a quick save before freeing the man and get ready to follow my instructions to the letter quicksaving often to make sure you don't get lost (it's easy to get lost, you won't be going back the way you came.) One thing you do want to keep in mind though is that the red flag will guide you. I'll tell you exactly where to go in the following paragraphs and exactly how to get out, so listen close. Grab the book after saving the prisoner and start jumping to avoid enemy attacks. When you take the book the large statue behind you falls down and there's a good chance it'll fall on the prisoner. Obviously you don't want this to happen so turn around just to make sure that he isn't dead. There are simply far too many of them to try and fight at once, almost regardless of level, so if I were you I'd set your magic to some kind of healing spell and keep casting it every time you are hit. Run up the nearby stairs and turn right at the top, not left toward the door where you came from, there is now a locked gate in front of it. After turning right get ready to make a quick left and go through the door into the living quarters. First part complete, quick save your game now if you've got good health. Start running forward down the tunnel. Fortunately going through doors gives you a little bit of a head start on the enemies. When you come to a dead-end fork in the road, make a right turn. The path will curve around to the left in a tunnel and when you find yourself in another room there is actually a fork in the path, but both exists might be hard to spot. The first exit is on the wall ahead of you (southwest) on the left side that keeps going in the same direction, this is not the door you want. Instead run straight when you enter this room and look at the corner on you right, you should find an exit on your right that leads sort of north - northwest out of this room. Save. In this room there should be a rock pillar in the middle and someone asleep on a bed, if so you're in the right place. Curve around to the left in this room and it will take you down a slope through a linear tunnel. This tunnel eventually pops out in a large sort of sanctuary altar room. You're still going in the right direction. Turn right immediately and go up the stairs. Make a right at the top of the stairs and follow this upper path around to the right again and again until you're on the other side of the room where the only exit is located. Quick save your game if you have decent health. This next tunnel leads you on a linear path around the corner into a room with picnic tables, barrels, and a lot of torches. The exit to this room is on the right (south) so take it. At the end of this path there is another fork, although the path to the right is shadowed and kind of hard to see. On your left is a door that leads to the antechamber. You should know that this is a dead end path, DO NOT TAKE IT. You want to go right at the fork instead and up the hill. If you went through the door you'll find a lever and a large gate. Turn around and go back. The right path leads west up a hill. At the top of the hill the path curves left and then right. Here you should find a guard holding a torch beside a door leading approximately southeast. This is the door you want to go through. You're almost done. If you don't go through this door you'll end up in a dead end room. Through the door is a small dark room with a rock pillar in the middle. There is a path on your left that slopes downward. Before going down the sloping path make sure to pull the lever on your left at the top of the slope, this will open up the rock wall and allow you to reach the very first room again. Remember that if you reach a rock wall and it says that it won't shift, it's because you forgot to pull the nearby lever on the wall at the top of the slope. Now that you're back in the first room again, all you need to do is take the exit to get outside. If you go the wrong way you'll be stopped by a locked door so don't worry too much about getting lost. Once you're outside make sure to save your game! That was probably pretty difficult. Now you have the book and you know what you need to do with it. Fast travel to Cloud Ruler Temple and bring it to Martin. There is however one problem. Not only is all of your stuff still in that cave, but tons of other stuff as well. If you want to keep going that's fine, skip the next indented section. This next section will detail a trip back through the cave to get all your stuff (and more) and probably kill every single clansman doing it. Fun! ____________________________________________________________________________ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Re-enter the cave and head back toward the secret exit. This time when we see anyone, instead of running in fear we're going to be trashing them using whatever combative, magical or stealthical (no that's not a real word) techniques we may have at our disposal. Hopefully you won't be so overwhelmed as you were in the Dagon Shrine. At the top of the slope there are a couple of boxes on your right and a chest nearby with an average lock. Unfortunately if you're anything like me, you don't have any lockpicks due to all your crap being taken. We'll have to pass. When you exit this room that's when you need to be ready for the most intense fight yet. Anywhere from three to none or ten guards could be waiting for you there, or in nearby rooms. What I suggest is doing what you can when you get out of this room, then sort of fighting while backing off to the left into that dead-end room. Try to lure them in there one at a time so that you aren't overwhelmed, and at any time if they stop chasing you, use that as a chance to heal and recover Magicka and fatigue. When you go around the corner and down the hill, this time you're going to want to go through the door into the antechamber. Examine the lever on the ground on your left to open up the gate here. One thing I would like to mention before you continue is how you can use the enemy attacks to your advantage. You'll note that their shock spell is relatively powerful. Well if you can group a bunch of them together and lure enemies toward you, their shock spell will very likely hit and kill their own comrades making your job easier. It's worth keeping in mind. Make a systematic search of every room, eliminating all of the cultists in each one. You can find a few copies of the Master's commentaries as well. There's one door with a Hard lock to unlock, and since there's still a good chance you don't have any lockpicks you had might as well go back for now. Head back through the door just before you hit the gate with the lever. Now proceed back through the long path toward the Dagon Shrine. Feel free to swipe anything in the room with all the barrels and tables. The next group of enemies you'll find is in the altar room, though they often come one at a time. Eliminate all of them and keep moving back through the halls. When you reach the room where the cultist was sleeping on the bed before, check out the various boxes and unlocked chest for a few half decent items. Continue on into the next room. Make sure to check the boxes in this room, in the one beside the desk I found a Necklace of the Sea which gives infinite water breathing and a value of over 2000 Gold. Grab the soul gems off the shelf and proceed down the hall to the southwest. Grab whatever you need here and go back through the hall and continue northeast. Now I can't speak for everyone, but here just before the Dagon Shrine is where I found three more cultists, one of them being Harrow. You'll remember Harrow as the man who took all your stuff so all you need to do is kill him and loot his corpse to get it all back. Also check the corpses of these cultists to see if any of them hold the Storeroom Key (one should). It'll come in handy. In the Dagon Shrine, check under the statue wreckage to see if it caught any cultists, and if it did be sure to take their stuff. Unfortunately that gate is still there blocking the door and as far as I know (I've been wrong before) there's no way to open it up from in here so you need to start heading back. This will give you a chance at least to unlock any locked chests you may have passed due to a lack of lockpicks. When you come to the door that leads to the antechamber, take it again. Remember that door with the hard lock? Well the storeroom key unlocks it. Sweet. There's a few half decent weapons and items in this room, and some gold as well. Leave the storeroom and head back through the secret path up toward the exit. Instead of going through the door into the room with the secret rock exit, continue down the path into the dead-end room on the end and open this large treasure chest. That pretty much covers it except for that one last chest in that small dark room before the exit. ______________________________________________________________________________ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ When you arrive back at the temple Jauffre will speak with you automatically. Tell him you were not able to retrieve the amulet but that you do have the Mysterium Xarxes. Take the book inside and speak to Martin who is sitting at the table near the entrance. When you talk to him he will tell you to speak to Jauffre regarding some kind of spies, and in the meantime he will do his best to translate what he can from the book. This marks the end of your current quest and triggers the new quest in your journal "Spies." ______________________________________________________________________________ __ (__/ ) / ) / +-- (_/ PIES ------------------------------------------------------- 07.07 --+ After speaking to Martin about the Mysterium Xarxes he tells you too go and talk to Jauffre. Jauffre can be found just outside of the temple. Ask him about "Spies" to get more information on this quest. Supposedly the guards of Cloud Ruler Temple have seen some mysterious men wandering in the shadows for the past couple of nights, it's going to be your job to identify who these men are (kill them). A green flag appears on your compass indicating the position of guard Steffan. Talk to him and ask about spies, he will tell you where they can be found and it will be marked on your compass with a green flag. Follow this flag to reach the runestone that Steffan was talking about. Stand by this runestone and wait until after 6 P.M. Try to stand back from the runestone a little, you don't want to appear and have the spies right in front of you. If you can manage to watch them, but stay out of sight you will be able to follow the two spies. They show up and sometimes move separately. As I said you can follow them, but it's slow moving an not too interesting. The much better way is to attack the two of them to get both the Basement Key and Jearl's Key. Once you have these items the game will tell you to go back and speak with the guard. Hold off on that for now, there's something else first. You want to make your way to the Bruma Caverns which shouldn't be too difficult to find with proper direction. Open up your map and see that the entire city of Bruma is sort of oval shaped. Well on the west side just outside of the city wall, a little bit couth of centre is where you will find the Bruma Caverns. Another way to look at it is when you look at your map. The word "Bruma" is written on the map. The Bruma Caverns are just south of the lower right tip of the letter "m" in Bruma. That should get you there. When you go inside the cave watch out for rats and other stupid little rodents. The path forks at the bottom of the slope to the right. Turn right (the straight path leads to a dead end with nothing to find.) At the end of the right path you'll come to a door for which you should already have the key (the Basement Key.) Raid their room for everything they've got, most specifically the item called "Jearl's Orders" which is sitting there on the table. Leave the caves and fast-travel to Cloud Ruler Temple. Locate Jauffre and show him the orders that you found in the spies' possession. Speak to Martin now, as he has made some progress with the translation. Supposedly the ritual to open the portal involves four items, but he is only able to decipher one of them and that's "The Blood of a Daedra Lord." Your next task will be to find and recover a daedric artifact. Ask him about the artifact and he'll tell you that daedric cults are the best way to get hold of one of these artifacts, there is a book on the subject in the library here. Completing your conversation with him marks the end of this quest and the beginning of a new quest in your journal: "Blood of the Daedra." ______________________________________________________________________________ ______ (, / ) /---( ) / ____) +-- (_/ ( LOOD OF THE DAEDRA ---------------------------------- 07.08 --+ The book that Martin describes will be found in one of two places depending on the time and date. It will either be on the table in front of Martin, or on one of the shelves in the east wing. Locate the book and read it (the book is titled "Modern Heretics" and should be sitting alone, not hidden among a row of books.) You should be aware that while this does send you to one artifact in particular, any one of the game's numerous daedric artifacts will work in this situation. I will continue under the assumption that you will go where you are told, but as is the case with many quests, you do have some freedom. I would like to stress additionally that the artifact you get from the Daedric quest will disappear when you give it to Martin. The item that you get for the Azura quest (the Azura Star) is a reusable goul gem and overall an extremely useful and rare artifact. There are other much less useful artifacts you can get o you may wish to to a different Daedric quest. I will continue with this one solely because that's how the game directs you. The flag on your compass shows you the way to Azura's Shrine, however you can't fast travel there unless you've been there before so get those feet moving (or that horse) and head across the great mountains toward the shrine. When you arrive you should find a large statue and a number of people praying out front of it. Look for a man named Mels Maryon. His disposition will probably be low so try to persuade him to get him to like you (techniques for getting people's disposition up are covered in the persuasion and Speechcraft section of this guide.) Once he's happy, speak to him again and he'll tell you to make an offering of Glow Dust at either dusk or dawn to the statue. Glow Dust can be acquired from the Will-o-the-Wisps which are the yellow floating balls of energy you see hovering around the area. After you defeat one of them (using either magic or a magical item) then follow their trail until it settles on the ground. Examine the glowing yellow and you should be able to find Glow Dust when you loot them. Now simply wait until either dawn or dusk (after 6 .m. should be a fine time.) Offer the dust to Azura The spirit in the statue begins to speak. She speaks of warriors who many years ago, slew an evil vampire and his kin, however all were infected by the vampire curse. She tells you to visit the Gutted Mine where they trapped themselves and give them the freedom of death. Only in doing so will you earn her gratitude. At this point you will get a new quest called "Azura." This quest is not located below here because it is not actually part of the main quest line. You are choosing to do Azura now but you could have just as easily selected one of the other daedric quests. Look for the quest "Azura" under the daedric quests section and learn how to accomplish it there. Once you have completed it return here and continue reading for more information. If you're reading this, it means that you have completed a quest for a daedric artifact. Keep in mind that the ritual will consume the artifact, so if it's something you really want to hang onto you might want to do a different quest for a different artifact. Give it to Martin when you are ready. Doing so will bring an end to this quest and start the new quest: "Bruma Gate." ______________________________________________________________________________ ______ (, / ) /---( ) / ____) +-- (_/ ( RUMA GATE ------------------------------------------- 07.09 --+ Speak to Jauffre to learn that the problem now is that gates of Oblivion are being opened, presumably to attack the city of Bruma. He wants you to head now to the city of Bruma and show them how the Oblivion gates are closed (you've done it before, it should be no problem again.) Travel to the Bruma east gate and look for a guard named Burd (he should approach you automatically.) Let him know when you are ready to go and they'll follow you into the gate. The makeup of this gate is obviously different from the first one you entered, but it's not randomly generated so you can follow these directions to reach the citadel hopefully without too much trouble. The general shape of the area is kind of like a crescent, you'll spend most of your time at the beginning following the path as it curves around to the left. With the help of the Bruma guards you must eliminate the enemies as you see them and gradually make your way around the curve. When you have come to a point where you have effectively done one big wide U turn, you should find yourself in a small area with two Magicka Essence fountains and a Blood Fountain. This means you have gone the right way. Locate the two fleshy pods in he area and take whatever items you can get from them. Press F4 and open up your map. Not the world map, but rather the smaller detailed map that shows the area in Oblivion. Notice that to the east you can see a lot of rocks and junk piled up, but just a little bit further east there is an opening leading south. You want to take that southern path. Before long you should be able to locate the enormous tower that you have to enter. One thing you want to watch out for here is pillars with devices on top of them that launch fireballs at your character. Take cover whenever you see one of these traps and quickly make tracks for the tower's entrance. Take one of the doors that leads up to the next floor after you and the guards have eliminated all the enemies. Look for another door that takes you to a place called the Fury Spike. There's nothing of interest in here except for a fountain and an item pod, so go back and take the Citadel Hall Door. Keep moving quickly up here in the next hallway as some kind of large death sickle is going to drop down from the roof. After killing any enemies you see here there is another path, once again leading up. When you reach an area with a dark red colour, check the item pods first and then go through either on either side. Both doors lead to the same room and a ramp to the next floor. Take either path in this room and just keep going up and up. You get the idea. All you really have to keep in mind for this entire tower is "up and up." Regardless, when you hit the top take the door into another Fury Spike. There are two doors up here and both are locked. Use a lockpick to unlock either one of them and proceed forward. From here it's a pretty straight path up to the top where you'll find the sigil. Take it in your hand and close the gate of Oblivion. After speaking to the captain of the guards, travel back once again to Cloud Ruler Temple and report your success to Jauffre. Now go back inside and talk to Martin about the quest "Blood of the Divines." ______________________________________________________________________________ ______ (, / ) /---( ) / ____) +-- (_/ ( LOOD OF THE DIVINES --------------------------------- 07.10 --+ After speaking with Martin, he tells you about the second item that you're going to need. Head out and speak with Jauffre again about the matter. He tells you that the item you need is in the catacombs below Sancre Tor, a once holy but now evil place. He will give you the key to Sancre Tor and mark its location on your map. If you believe that you are ready to proceed, then equip yourself and rest up. Now make your way to the flagged location If you're following the guide then you might have "Allies for Bruma" as your active quest, which would put a ton of flags on your compass. Make sure you open your journal and set "Blood of the Divines" as the active quest to get the proper location. It's your responsibility to make it there yourself since there is no way to fast travel if you haven't visited the located before. When you arrive, you'll find a large area filled with broken down stones walls and towers. Occupying this area primarily are bow and axe wielding skeleton warriors. The many walls in the area make it a good place to use the sneak ability. I would recommend either sneaking (or Rambo-ing) around the area hunting down all of the skeletons you can find. After doing that make sure to rest before entering the dungeon. Make your way to the location marked by the flag on your radar, and there you will find a door. Go inside. One of the main foes you will encounter in this dungeon is the ghost. Conventional weapons are ineffective against this enemy however Hand-to-Hand combat seems to work fine. The primary weakness of a ghost is magic so if you have any skill in Destruction, now is the time to use it. Make your way down the first couple sets of stairs and through the door at the bottom. Turn left when you come to a statue and a railing overlooking an area below. The path will turn right again (watch out for any enemies) and when it does keep an eye on the statues to your left. You should be able to find a large chest at the foot of one of them. Take the next set of stairs down to the lower level. At the bottom you'll find a branch in the path that leads southwest into a corner. Be careful because there is a dart trap in the wall protecting this path, however if you take just a few steps in that direction you'll find a treasure chest with an easy level lock protecting it. The direction you want to take now is northwest through the door, and down the stairs. Eventually after you fight your way past a couple more enemies you'll find yourself at a dead end blocked by a large gate. Look to your right for a lever that will open this gate. From here the path remains quite linear until you go up another set of stairs. There at the top you will find a undead skeleton warrior equipped with a shield. This enemy is more difficult than the others skeletons you faced previously. Since he has a tendency to stand near the torch and face away from you, it gives you a chance to sneak up behind for a 6x damage power attack before you begin the actual battle. Killing the Undead Blade will automatically trigger a conversation with a ghost who identifies himself as Rielus. The spirit says he, along with three other Blades were sent there by Tiber Septim to investigate what went wrong at Sancre Tor. The evil of an Underking who left long ago still lingers in the dungeon. The ghost says that if you go forward and free the three remaining Blade spirits you may yet be able to lift the curse. Make sure to check the corpse of the Blade after the conversation, there's a good chance that he's holding a pretty valuable amulet. There are a couple of chests here too: The first chest can be found by standing beside the torch and facing northeast. You'll see it down there sitting beside the pillar. You'll find two more if you head down the hall to the northwest, one on the right side and one on the left side. The hall itself is a dead end. The direction you really want to go is southeast, across the overpass and down the stairs to the illuminated door. Take this door to reach the next area. When you pop out of this hallway you'll find yourself in a large room. Immediately make a right and keep your eye on the right wall. When you come across a small little cranny facing north, take a good look in that little area for a somewhat hidden chest. There are plenty of exits to this room each leading to a different area that we will be exploring one at a time, so just follow the guide and you won't get lost (or you can go explore on your own, which is fine too.) Continue in the direction you were moving before you stopped to get the chest and take the northwest hall up through the door. This is called the Hall of Judgment. Make a right when you enter and go up the stairs. It's dark, but there is a door you can open that leads northwest here. Ice the two ghosts right in front of you, and then another one after the path turns left. You'll end up in another open area with some stairs leading down. Take these stairs and eliminate any enemies you find at the bottom. Make a left turn at the fork and this will lead you directly around to the other side where another Undead Blade lies in wait. Not being equipped with a shield should make this one marginally easier to defeat than the first one, but you can still use the difficulty of the first one to gauge whether you want to try and sneak up or not. After defeating the enemy and looting its corpse, make sure that you locate the treasure chests found in the short hallway down there at the bottom. Once is shut with an easy level lock, and the larger of the two is not locked at all. Once you have taken the items then what you need to do is go back up the stairs in the direction you came from (there's a chest at the top of these stairs too,) then around the hallway and up the southeast stairs once again. This time, instead of going back the way you came, take the southeast exit out of the room. Following this hallway will lead you to an overpass that goes above another room to a platform with two chests, one locked and one unlocked (I found that the locked chest had quite a bit of good loot inside.) After you open it, jump down to the room below and kill any enemies you find down there. Take the southwest exit out of this room. At the bottom of the stairs you'll find a treasure chest on your left. After taking its items, open up the door and proceed into the Catacombs. Right when you enter you'll be in a large room with the third of the four Undead Blades. Perhaps it was just bad luck, but I found this one to be more difficult than the previous two. Sneaking up on him might be a good idea. Also, if you happen to be skill in either Blade, Blunt or Hand-to-Hand combat, the sideways power attack works great for disarming the enemy. Pick up his weapon and he'll be near powerless to stop you. Before leaving this room, take over in the northern corner, sort of hidden down in there for a chest with an average level lock. Lots of great stuff in there. Take the southwest stairs up and around the corner. When you come to a glowing stone tablet, look to both its left and right to find not one, but two treasure chests. Turn northwest (right at the fork) to find a room with a whole bunch of natural pillars. The exit out of this room leads southwest. When you reach a dead end at the end of the hallway, turn around to find some stone platforms and steps that you can kind of hop up to reach the level above. Look in the west corner up here for a difficult-to-see treasure chest. Take the overpass across and then go down through the tunnel to the next room. When you pop out, look immediately on your right for another treasure chest with a couple of decent items. Eliminate all the enemies in this room so they don't get in your way, then look for a treasure chest sitting against the southeast wall. Another chest can be found up on top of what appears to be an altar on the northwest side. Head through the southeast tunnel out of this room and then suddenly you'll find yourself back in the Sancre Tor Entry Hall. Fortunately we just went through two areas, so you still only have just one more Undead Blade to take care of. If you're having trouble figuring out how to get out of this tiny little pong, jump up on the stone platform on the right side and then from there onto the nearby stairs. Your next destination is the eastern exit to the Prison. Go down the stairs and kill the ghost before you find yourself stuck in front of another large gate. Once again the lever to open the gate is on your right. Follow the path until it leads you up to a skeleton warrior, not one of the Undead Blades, but rather the prison Warden Kastav. He's extremely easy, just make sure you pick up his key after you defeat him. Before using the key on the door make sure to open the chest on the right. You can always pick the door lock if you want, but there's really no reason at all to do that. Make a right turn at the fork down the stairs to find a treasure chest and a dead end. The path you need to follow is the one leading east. When you come to another fork make a left this time to find yet another treasure chest. Run all the way to the very southern tip ignoring all path branches and you'll end up in a room with a treasure chest and a bed. If you've leveled up once since you started in this dungeon (very likely) then this will give you a chance to distribute your stat points. Go up a little bit north again then take the first right turn you can down the eastern hall. Head all the way to the very far east corner and there, once again, another treasure chest. Take a few steps west and turn right so you're facing north. This path leads you into the final room of the prison. Eliminate the Undead Blade at the bottom of the stairs, which takes care of all four of them. Before going back up check he northern hallway for a large treasure chest, and the southern hall for a locked treasure chest. Now what you need to do is backtrack through the Prison to reach the large Entry Hall again. I'm sure you can manage to get back there again since the only exit out of the Prison is to that room, and if you press F4 you'll find that your map is now filled in. Just note that you can't take the path going north out of the room you're in now, there is a rock cave-in that is blocking the way. Keep reading when you reach the Entry Hall. Proceed to the middle of the room and go down the stairs to the south. In this room there is an enchanted energy field blocking your progress, however now you will find the four ghosts of the Undead Blades. They will use their powers to dispel the enchantment and allow you to proceed. Sitting stop the pedestal is the Armor of Tiber Septim, the item which you came here to acquire. That is all you need. Now it's time to leave this cursed dungeon and travel back to Cloud Ruler Temple where you will present the armor to Martin. He is extremely grateful to you for acquiring the armor and says that Jauffre will be truly pleased when he has the chance to see it. While you were gone Martin was able to translate a little more of the Mysterium Xarxes which says the third item in the ritual is the Great Welkynd Stone. He says that the only place still rumoured to have such a stone is the ruins of the Ayleid City in Miscarcand. Of course as usual, just about everyone who has ever ventured there has died an untimely death, and it just so happens to be your next destination. There's still that "Allies for Bruma" quest that Jauffre gives you, but for now we'll be sticking with Martin's quests. The reason for that will come up later, don't worry. ______________________________________________________________________________ __ __) (, /| /| / | / | +-- (_/ |/ |_ ISCARCAND ------------------------------------------ 07.11 --+ The third object of ritual significance is the Great Welkynd Stone. This quest entails you going and retrieving the stone for Martin. When you select this as your activate quest, you will see Miscarcand located somewhere between Skingrad and Kvatch. If you have not found it yet then you will have to walk there manually. You can save time by fast traveling to Skingrad however. Miscarcand is a very large stretch of beautiful looking ruins found, as I mentioned, between the two cities at the flagged location on your compass. When you arrive there head up into the middle and locate a spiral stone staircase leading downward to a door. Open the door to enter the ruins. This place is pretty dark so depending on the kind of weapons you are using, you might want to whip out a torch. You'll encounter a few enemies right away when you get inside, most likely just goblins and such. Nothing too difficult. Make a right at the corner and head down the stairs. Drop down to the lower level and kill any goblins that attack you here. On the east side you'll find a couple of Welkynd Stones (not great ones) on the ground, and there's also a crate to be opened here as well. Take the hallway leading out of here to the north and go up the stairs then turn and start heading south. You'll come to a branch where you can go right, but the gate is locked. You'll find another path forking left (east) but that just takes you back to the large room. You want to keep moving south by opening the door ahead of you. I will say this only once: watch out for zombies! Actually they're pretty easy compared to enemies who actually have weapons equipped, but still I think the fact that they're zombies means you must be at least somewhat afraid. You can follow this upper walkway to the end, but it will only lead you to a locked gate. Your only option at this point is to jump down (wait!) There are tons of enemies down there. Before you make a leap of faith you should know that the goblins and skeletons don't particularly like each other. Hell, even the goblins and the goblins don't always like each other. They will fight and kill each other one by one if you wait. There are three problems with this: first, it's boring. Second, you don't get to rack up all those nifty skill upgrades for pounding on tons of enemies. Third, you'll miss out on pounding tons of enemies regardless of the skill points involved. Sure I imagine if you're a mage or a ranged attacker you could probably snipe down at them from here, but still jumping right into the fray is where it's at. Use some scrolls that fortify your attributes, or character specific abilities (Adrenaline Rush Mr. Redguard?" and NOW jump on down there. Once your taste for bloody murder has been satisfied, pick up your loot and look up. Assuming you're on the more open eastern side of this lower area, there are four stone pillars and on top of each one is a Welkynd Stone. Not too shabby. After you've got those run around to the west side and you'll find two treasure chests. Now take the west exit hallway. Kill (perhaps by sneaking up on?) any goblins that you find there at the top of the stairs, then pick up the Welkynd Stone off the ground. There's a useless crate and a treasure chest with an average lock beside it as well. You'll find another chest on the other side of the room, this one isn't locked. Note the shiny object sticking out of some kind of panel in the wall. Examine it to press the button and activate... something. You'll see in just a minute. Go up the stairs and step on the button to lower the gate that was locked before. Now make a right and head south again. Suddenly you'll find yourself in familiar territory, up above that large room. This time, when you follow the walkway to the end, the gate is no longer locked (it's not even closed.) Open up the door and proceed further, down into Sel Vanua. There are plenty of enemies down the stairs in that first room, so make sure that you are prepared. After defeating them all, take note of the object in the middle of the room called the Varla Stone Cage. Over in the northeastern corner you'll find a button on the wall that can be pressed, so press it. Now you can go back to the middle of the room where the cage has been lifted and take the Varla Stone. The Varla Stone has the power to restore the charge of all your enchanted items. Use it once, and it's gone (it's also got a pretty decent selling price.) You will also want to grab the Welkynd Stone off of the southern wall. Take the exit on the southeast side leading south. You'll end up in another large room with another lower section filled to the brim with enemies. This time however, we're not going to drop down. Grab the Welkynd Stone just on your left when you enter, and then take a few more steps north to find another one on your left. Turn right down the walkway heading east and grab a third Welkynd Stone when you pass it on the right. Beside the Welkynd Stone is an Ayleid Treasure chest (just a typical chest with a different look) that has an average level lock. Keep moving east through the door and get ready to 9ake on a number of enemies in this area. When you get into this next room, which if you look closely should have a whole bunch of short paths that leads to dead ends with two deep indentations in the walls. Go to the south end of this room (but don't leave the room) and turn left (east) to find a chest in one of these indentations (average level lock.) Head south through the door and immediately right away you'll see one of those odd chests sitting on an edge in the wall. Take whatever's inside and then go down the stairs. In this hallway here you'll need to locate a button on the south wall. Pressing this button opens up a door that you will reach soon. Leave this hallway to the north and you'll find yourself back in that large room, but in the lower area this time. If there are any enemies left alive down here make sure to do away with them. Up at the north end you'll find another four stone pillars each with Welkynd Stones atop of them. Also just south of these pillars is an Ayleid treasure chest. When you're ready to continue, take the north door. There are a couple of nasty zombies in here. Try to lure them out one at a time if you possibly can. They're not much for defense, but their attacks are powerful. Continue north into Morimath. Watch the hell out for zombie mania down here. There are a lot of zombies, and lots of zombies is never a good thing. Kill them off one at a time as stealthily as possible (a good trick for fighting zombies since they are so slow is to wait for them to swing, then move it for a quick couple attacks before backing off. Play it patiently and you'll never get hit.) Turn left at the bottom of the stairs and go west through the room similar to the one I described in the previous area. Immediately when you go through the gate take a look on your right to find an Ayleid chest. Same thing on your left as well. Proceed forward and go south, you'll see something shiny ahead. The Great Welkynd Stone sits atop its platform here right in front of you. You can take the stone anytime you please, but don't be hasty. When you take the stone it will spawn two zombies and a boss. Make sure you are fully healed and have all the fortify magic you need cast before you take the item. Grab the stone and suddenly the King of Miscarcand will appear behind you. He's primarily a magic caster so a strong melee character should be able to pound him down without too much difficulty (his defenses are pathetically weak.) Try to do it quickly before you are overwhelmed by zombies. Unfortunately I cannot comment on the difficulty / simplicity of this boss for magic or ranged attackers, but I'm sure again it's just a war of attrition. Once the boss is dead the wall leading north has been opened up. Open up the Ayleid cask with the easy lock and then take the Welkynd Stone off the wall behind it. Down that short dead-end hall to the east are a couple more chest with some decent items inside them. Make sure you're stepped on the button in the middle and then proceed down the western hall. If you can't get through this door then it means you didn't take the Miscarcand Key off of the king's body, go back and get it. Watch out for zombies at the top of the stairs, you're not entirely in the clear yet. Don't miss the Ayleid chest on the wall to your right either. Continue down the relatively linear path until you reach a four way split at the top of the stairs, and maybe some zombies. Take the south branch first and open up the one chest, then the north branch to find two more. To get out of this dungeon you'll need to keep moving down the west path. After going through the door take a look on your right for a chest sitting on a platform in the wall. Open up an average lock to get a pile of great items. Stepping on the button in the floor will cause the wall ahead of you to descend into the ground, and suddenly you'll realize that you're right back at the entrance to the dungeon. This means it's time for a quick escape, and a pleasant trip back to Cloud Ruler Temple. When you arrive back at Cloud Ruler Temple, you should find Martin suited up in some nice shiny armor having an argument with Jauffre about whether or not he should do whatever it is he's planning on doing. Jauffre realizes that you have returned and asks Martin to explain everything, to see what you think of his plan. Speak to Martin and give him the Great Welkynd Stone. He'll explain to your that the fourth item is actually the counterpart to the Great Welkynd Stone. You need to find a Great Sigil Stone. Unfortunately Martin explains that there is a terrible downside. Great Sigil Stones are directly connected to Oblivion gates, and in order to get one they are going to have to sit back and allow the Mythic Dawn to open a gate and attack Bruma. Martin has every intention of leading the defense team at Bruma. If he is going to allow to Mythic Dawn to attack, he feels that it is his duty as future Emperor to be there at the front line. He asks you to go and speak with the Countess, to explain the situation and get her to understand Martin's decision. At this point you will get a new quest called "Defense of Bruma." You can skip down to the section of "Defense of Bruma" now if you like. At the beginning of the quest I'll explain why it is necessary for you to first complete the quest "Allies for Bruma" to increase your chances of success. ______________________________________________________________________________ _____ (, / | /---| ) / |_ +-- (_/ LLIES FOR BRUMA ------------------------------------- 07.12--+ This is an "sub-optional" quest that falls in between whatever other ones you have to do, and "Defense of Bruma." Basically it's going to be your responsibility to defend Bruma, but every ally you can get to help you in that task will be a great asset to you and increase your chances of success. You certainly don't have to recruit all of them, just enough so that you can get through it without... well, dying. There's no particular order of cities you have to visit so I'll cover them in the order that I complete it. If you only wish to do a couple of them, don't feel bound to do it in the same order. Note first that you cannot enlist the help of the Imperial City, so don't even bother trying. We'll begin by heading to the city of Chorrol. Fast travel to Castle Chorrol to simplify things. Proceed through the door to the Castle Chorrol Great Hall. Head northwest up into the castle and look for a man named Laythe Waarwick at the bottom of the stairs. He says that the Countess is only in attendance between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. so make sure it is between those two times. If you do so, the countess will be right there in front of you. Speak to her about "Aid for Bruma" and she, like most people you will meet, says that she cannot spare any soldiers while the town is under attack from the nearby Oblivion gate. That is what you must do, leave this town and close the Oblivion gate located just outside of Chorrol. You've closed gates before and there is no need for a point-to-point guide on how to do it. Once the gate is closed go back inside the town and tell her. She will gladly offer you the use of Chorrol's troops as thanks for your help. Next let's have a look at the only quest for help that doesn't involve you having to go into an Oblivion gate and close it. Remember back at Kvatch after you closed the gate and rescued Martin, they were planning an attack on the castle? Well you may have done the quest at that point, but if you didn't then now is the time to do it (as it directly pertains to this one.) Make your way back to the church in Kvatch where you first met Martin. When you arrive at the church, talk to Savlian Matius to trigger the quest "The Battle for Castle Kvatch." Scroll down now to that quest in the section of the guide for optional quests before you continue any further with this one. With Savlian Matius' troops on your side, that's one more ally to help you out in the battle. There are still four more locations with people who will be willing to offer assistance if you give them something in return. These are the towns of Anvil, Skingrad, Leyawiin, and Bravil. Each of them has an Oblivion gate just outside of the town and each one of the leaders wants the gate closed in return for the help of the troops. In the cases of Anvil, Bravil, and Leyawiin you can do just like I described for Chorrol and ask for their assistance, then close the gate. It's a little bit more complicated for the town of Skingrad so I'll skip over the first three and end this quest section with an outline of how to speak to the ruler of Skingrad. Open up the map and warp yourself to Castle Skingrad. Take the door to the Castle Skingrad Courtyard and then the next door into the County Hall. Speak to the man by the table inside named Mercator Hosidus. He says that no one can see the count, not now and not ever. If you try and go find him yourself you will almost certainly fail. What you need to do is instead of asking the count directly for aid, ask Mercator. This is the only topic for which he will go and summon the count. When the count arrives speak to him about the matter and he, like the others, will tell you to close the nearby gate of Oblivion. Doing so and returning will be enough to have him offer troops. If you think you have enough allies, then proceed on to "Defense of Bruma." _____________________________________________________________________________ ______ (, / ) / / _/___ /_ +-- (_/___ / EFENSE OF BRUMA ------------------------------------- 07.13 --+ Travel now to Bruma Castle and speak to Countess Narina Carvain. You must explain to her that while you would be risking the entire city, it is the only way to stop the world of Oblivion from conquering this one. She agrees to meet Martin at the chapel. Follow Narina Carvain outside and down into the chapel where you will find Martin. She and Martin discuss the plan and both realize that this desperate act is the only way they have any chance to stop the evils of Oblivion. When you are ready, then speak to Narina Carvain. Make absolutely sure you make a backup save here. You still have a chance to fall back on the "Allies for Bruma" quest and get more cities to help you. Once you select "Let the Battle Begin" then there is no going back. Leave the chapel with Martin by your side. Everyone will start running when they get outside. The party will meet with all of your allies from your previous quest at the gate to Oblivion. Obviously the more cities your requested help from, the more allies you will have. Martin Septim steps forward and begins to give a speech to all of your allies, speaking about how important this battle will be and how necessary it is that they hold off the enemies until the hero of Kvatch (you) can make it into the Great Gate. Sometime around this time, you'll see one monster pop out of the Oblivion gate. All hell is about to break loose. This battle is unlike most other battles due not only to its size, but your primary task. It makes no difference how many enemies you defeat (although the more you kill, the less likely it is that you'll be killed), what really matters is that you keep Martin Septim alive. Do your best to stay close to him and help out whenever he is battling an enemy. The one thing you do NOT want to do is just run off on your own and try to take on all the enemies by yourself. Inevitably one could get past you and that could be the one that kills Martin Septim. As the battle progresses more Oblivion gate will be opened and even more enemies will come out. It gets to a point where it's just about impossible to keep things under control, there will be more enemies than you know what to do with. Finally by the time approximately three gates have opened, you'll get a message on the screen saying the great gate has opened. The great gate is about ten times bigger than a normal gate, so you really can't miss it. Immediately after you get this message, jump into the gate and all is well. ______________________________________________________________________________ _____) / / / / ) +-- (____ / REAT GATE ------------------------------------------- 07.14 --+ The name of the quest changes to "Great Gate" at this point once you've gone though. You're out of the water temporarily, but there's still that enormous Daedra weapon moving toward the gate. As the gate tells you, if that weapon reaches the gate then it's game over for Cyrodiil. Note that this isn't one of those "fake time limit things" where sure, if you stand around forever you'd eventually lose. You really do have to move quickly. You'll find two enemies ahead of you when you enter and doors on the left and right sides. Kill the enemies or skip them entirely and go through the door on the left. Make sure to utilize the quicksave and quickload buttons a lot in here just in case you do something stupid that ends up wasting a lot of time. Pull the lever on the wall that activates the elevator in the middle and quickly jump on it. When the elevator stops, get off and begin ascending the sloping path. When you reach the top take the door leading north across a bridge in the Plane of Oblivion. Inside the next tower, rather than going up what you want to do is go down the slope and look for a door on the north wall leading out. This will take you back to the Plane of Oblivion and a much wider flat bridge. Before long you will come to a point where the bridge is broken and there is a large gap. You'll need a half decent skill in Acrobatics to get across this gap. I would say you could probably do it with 30, or maybe less depending on how encumbered you are. Obviously I have to take into account that not everyone will be able to make the jump, and yes there is another way. For those who cannot jump across the gap, what you have to do is drop down and start heading northwest (more west than north) along the thing shore between the north wall and the magma. Eventually you should come to a point just past a hanging vine where there are some mid-sized rocks in front of you. Jump on top of these rocks, and then from these rocks onto the larger rocks north of you, and up there hill. Now that you're up here you should be able to make your way back east toward the bridge and be on the other side of that gap. Now assuming you're on that bridge (on the north side of the gap), continue moving north and then turn around. You'll find another similar bridge that runs east and west. To the east there is a large door you cannot open and to the west is another tower. You need to enter this tower. Proceed up... and up, and up and up and up. At the top you'll have to fight a Dremora enemy (who I recommend killing.) After that take a look around for a gate switch and pull it. This is the gate that was closed when you tried to go east across the bridge. Run back down the slope and exit the tower through the door you came in by. The doors should open ahead of you when you come out, so continue moving east. Before long you'll need to make a left and enter the Tower Portal to World Breaker. From here it's pretty similar to what you've done before. Turn right and go through the first door up to the second floor. Open up the south Citadel Hall Door and keep moving up. This room is nothing but a couple of steep paths taking you up further toward the top. If you've got a decent amount of time left and want to stop to kill a couple of the enemies chasing you then that's probably fine. You'll need to break the locks on a couple of Average locked doors. Through here it is exactly the same as any other Oblivion tower. At the top you will find a Great Sigil Stone ripe for the taking. Pick up the stone and suddenly you'll be warped out of there, hopefully well within the time limit. Eliminate any enemies which happen to remain after the gate is closed and then locate Martin Septim. He is eternally grateful for everything you have done, but says it is not yet time to relax. Martin is ready to open the portal and give you the means to recover the Amulet from Mankar Camoran, but since it will close behind you, you will have to make sure you take everything that you need. Open the wait menu and wait an hour, everything should pretty much be back to normal at that point. Your next destination is Cloud Ruler Temple. Remember as I said, you will not be able to return until your mission is complete. Make sure you have everything you need before you enter. Speak to Martin and tell him to open the portal. There is no turning back now. ______________________________________________________________________________ _____ (, / ) _/__ / / ) / +-- (_/ ARADISE ---------------------------------------------------- 07.15 --+ It's certainly more beautiful than the plane of Oblivion, but you're not here to go sightseeing. As you begin moving through the paradise (killing any enemies you happen upon), Mankar Camoran's voice can be heard. Follow the main path wherever it leaps you, and watch out for enemies that are well... really powerful. When you come to a fork in the path, make a right and go down the hill. When you come to another fork again, turn right and a creature named Kathutet will speak to you about the Sigil Tower. Tell him that you seek Mankar Camoran and he will say that it would be both an honour to battle you, as well as an honour to have to serve under him (Klingon anyone?) You have a choice here, to battle him or to do him service. Either is fine. Battling him is difficult because he will automatically be quite a few levels above you, and thus almost certainly more powerful. You'll have to really be up on your skills and equipment to beat this guy. Hopefully you saved your game prior to choosing this option because you'll most likely be killed. The other option is to accept the task of going and rescuing Xivilai Anaxes who has been imprisoned. Choose this option and then head north until you come to a stone structure and what seems to be a dead end. The entrance to the lair of Anaxes is located just down the rocky slope by the shore of the water on the opposite side. Use the red flag on your compass as a guide. Inside you will find a man who begs you not to let Anaxes free as he torments them day and night. Suddenly your task doesn't seem so clear-cut after all. Unfortunately that's the task you have been given, and that's what you must do. It's quite easy to free him, the hardest part is doing so despite all the people in here begging you not to. You know the second he is let loose he's going to murder them all (again.) Press the activate button on the two logs and that's all you need. He should be able to pound the rock out of the way himself. Once this is accomplished start heading back to Kathutet. There's a good chance he will have moved down into the Flooded Grotto. Use the flag on your compass to move down there and find him. Tell him that you will take the key as a reward and he'll give you the Bands of the Chosen." Take the southern door out of this room to reach the Forbidden Grotto. In order to unlock the door you must equip the Bands of the Chosen around your wrists. After killing a couple of enemies you will find a man in here named Eldamil. Tell him you are here to kill Mankar Camoran and that Martin Septim still lives. He tells you all about the raid on Kvatch, and the remorse he feels. He says that no one wearing the bands can ever leave here, however he knows a way to get them off. Unfortunately someone will be coming by to check up on them and you're going to have to act like a prisoner until that someone leaves. Agree to these terms. After trying to explain your situation to the guard, he ends up saying that you're here for questioning. When he tells you to get in the cage you have no other choice. You'll be lowered down, but not far enough to do any damage. He'll let you out on the other side when you get back up to the top and tell you to meet him further down. Proceed down the hall to the east and turn right. get ready to fight off a number of large and dangerous enemies. Take the south door that leaps you further down into the Forbidden Grotto. You'll meet Eldamil here again and he will remove the bands around your arms. When he asks to come along with you make sure that you say yes, you're definitely going to need the help. The path through here is quite linear. You'll come to another magma pit with a guy in a cage and some enemies to kill. Cross over to the other side and continue down the tunnel leading out of this room. Before too long and a couple of rooms later you'll come across an enemy similar to Anaxes who you released earlier. Make sure to let Eldamil help you with this one. Finally at the top you'll reach the door back out to Paradise once again. Make a right at the top of the stairs and speak with both Ruma and Raven Camoran. They will tell you that their father is waiting in the chamber. Go through the door to find yourself standing in front of Mankar Camoran. He will begin speaking, you can attack him of course however you might want to listen to what he has to say. When you're ready to begin, give him a swift punch/cut/whatever in the face. Note that he is particularly strong against magic so mages will probably find this battle more difficult than most other types of characters. If you absolutely have to beat him and just can't, remember that you can turn down the difficulty in the options menu. Don't even bother trying to attack his children, they will just respawn after you kill them. Everything ends once Mankar is dead so he's the one you need to focus all your energy on. He'll cast spells and heal and Eldamil will probably be killed, but all that is irrelevant. What matters most is that you keep attacking unrelentingly until Mankar Camoran goes down. When he does, quickly examine his body and take everything that he has including the Amulet of Kings. Also examine the bodies of Raven and Ruma Camoran because they probably have some great things too. As the building collapses around you, you will automatically be transported back to Cloud Ruler Temple. Speak to Martin Septim and give him the amulet. As was suspected all along, he is able to wear the amulet and prove his lineage. Martin says that until the Dragonfires are lit, he still will not be the true emperor. He says that you must first head to the Imperial City and speak with the Elder Council so that will be your next destination. Off to the Imperial City we go! ______________________________________________________________________________ _ ___/__) (, / / +-- (_____ IGHT THE DRAGONFIRES ------------------------------------ 07.16 --+ Travel to the Imperial City Palace and head inside with Martin Septim. Chancellor Okato says the council has already considered Martin's claim to the throne and will be honoured to serve under him. As he speaks, suddenly one of the guards runs into the room screaming out the chancellor's name. Oblivion gates have opened and the Daedra are attacking the city! It will be your task to successfully escort Martin Septim to the Temple of the One so that he may light the Dragonfires! You'll be attacked almost immediately, but with the help of the guards you should be able to overpower your attackers. Outside of the palace the enemies are even more in number. Attack like crazy and do everything you can to protect Martin Septim, after all, that is your duty. If you think this is a lot of enemies it's nothing compared to what you're about to face when you go through that door. Do not, under any circumstance, run ahead of the guards and try to take on the armies yourself. You will almost surely be killed. What you need to do instead is move with the guards and fight off the enemies' advancing forces. Keep moving around to the west to find that the evil Mehrunes Dagon has stepped out from the planes of Oblivion to lay waste to the city. You'll have no trouble identifying him. When he appears, turn around and go back to find Martin Septim. When you find him he tells you that perhaps the Amulet of Kings is the only way to stop the demons of Oblivion now. He asks you to get him past Mehrunes Dagon to the Temple of the One. Get him to follow you and run up to the giant creature. Let loose whatever powerful blows you can to kind of stagger the creature (not kill it) and run by quickly. The door to the temple is almost immediately on your left after that. Now all you must do is speak to Martin. I will not spoil any more of the game from this point on. Suffice to say you must do nothing more than simply watch the events unfold. The main quest of the game has been completed, but as you may expect, your journey is still in its infancy. Assuming you did not leave the main quest until the end there are still many many more quests out there to take part in, and still an entire world to explore. In fact, there are a number of reasons why these quests are best left until after the main story has been completed. For one, you will no longer have to deal with those annoying Oblivion gates popping up. They are gone forever. Secondly, you are reward a suit of Imperial Dragon Armor for your efforts. A very nice reward indeed. From now on, any trace of linear progression is gone and you are free to proceed however you wish. Feel free to pop around this guide to learn more about all the remaining quest. And lastly, congratulations on completing the main quest in Oblivion! ______________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 08.00 || Daedric Quests || 08.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ _____ (, / | /---| ) / |_ +-- (_/ ZURA ------------------------------------------------ 08.01 --+ You will most likely be doing this quest during the main story arc due to the fact that it is automatically flagged for you when you agree to read the book Martin suggests. Regardless of this it is still an optional quest. To initiate this quest you must locate Azura's Shrine in the cold northeast mountains. Once you have found it you must kill one of the Will-o-the-Wisp enemies and take the Glow Dust from its corpse then offer this dust to the statue at either dusk or dawn. For more information on finding the statue and how to initiate the quest, see the "Blood of the Daedra" quest under the main quest line. The rest of this guide will assume you have already started it. By the way, if you are playing a non-magic character and you can't seem to get hold of the Glow Dust since you can't kill those damn Will-o-the-Wisps, then there is another solution for you. Fast travel to Bruma and locate the very large church. Just a few steps north of the church are the guilds for this town. Locate the Mage Guild and go inside. You can join if you want to make this easier, or you can just sneak in and take it. Go down the stairs on the left and open up the hard difficulty locked door at the bottom. Once you get into the living quarters, take the second door on your left. Now at the back left corner look between a couple of beakers to find some Glow Dust. It was a little out of the way, but now you can fast travel back and use it. The Gutted Mine is automatically noted on your map for you so head off in that direction now. You should have no difficulty finding the mine based on the directions you get from the compass. Once you get inside, whip out a torch or cast a light spell so that you aren't drenched in endless darkness. Watch out for traps as well; no sooner do you walk five steps before a spiky ball on a chain comes down in your direction. Further down you'll encounter your first vampire which I personally found to be a quite a difficult enemy. Make sure you're properly prepared and well equipped for the coming battles. Now there's one thing that's very important to mention. While you're fighting here against vampires you're almost certainly going to contract Polyphyric Hemophilia. This is basically the scientific term for vampirism (in its early stages). When you have it it's just like any other disease, but left untreated for days you will start to manifest symptoms of vampirism and at that point it's not so easy to get rid of. There's tons of information of vampirism, both its advantages and disadvantages but far too much to list here. If you'd like more information check out the vampirism section of the guide, but for now you'll probably just want to make sure you keep some disease curing potions on you to cure the Polyphyric Hemophilia. Try to use the sneak ability in here as much ass possible, even when not playing a stealth character I found it to be immensely helpful. After killing the first vampire go left and down the slope. There shouldn't be any vampires down there but there are a number of coffins you can loot. Return to the first room and proceed down the hall to the west. There should be a couple more vampires in this room. Feel free to leave and rest outside any time you need to. In the room here down this hall there are a couple of paths that branch off, one to a couple of coffins and one to a dead end. The actual exit to this room is a fake rock on the west wall. When you look at it you'll have the option of pressing the activate button. Nothing happens when you do, but note the pull rope hanging down to the left of it. That opens the door. Down at the bottom there are two more vampires. Make sure you're prepared and do your best to sneak up on them. A funny thing happened to me in this case, I was able to defeat the weaker one but I simply couldn't not kill the armored orc. I ended up fleeing out of the mine but still he followed. He followed me as I ran all the way down south to the city of Cheydinhal where some brave castle guards came to my rescue and slayed the orc. So I guess the point of this story, is that if the enemies are too powerful, have them follow you to an ally who's even more powerful! Once you've killed them all (those should be the last two) then you'll get a message saying the quest is complete. Fast travel back to the statue to receive Azura's Star, a special daedric artifact and powerful soul stone. If you're doing this quest as part of the main quest line, then go now and bring it to Martin in the Cloud Ruler Temple. ______________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________ |~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~| | || 09.00 || Optional Quests || 09.00 || | |_||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||_| ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ______) (, / / ) / +-- (_/ HE BATTLE FOR CASTLE KVATCH -------------------------------- 09.01 --+ After rescuing Martin from the church at Kvatch you can begin this quest. Also note that it directly contributes to the later quest "Allies for Bruma." What you need to do is speak to Savlian Matius in the Kvatch church and tell him you are ready to proceed. Immediately after he starts moving, run over and take the same door he does to get outside of the church. Here you will find a number of typical enemies (based on your level) come charging at you. With the help of the other guards make sure you fight them off. Savlian will move ahead and stop, then talk to you. He says that the only way to get through the gate is to go through the gatehouse, but unfortunately it is locked. He tells you to hurry and find a man by the name of Berich Inian. Turn around and run directly back toward the church. There you will find Berich Inian who does have the key. Tell him you need it to enter the castle and he'll tag along with you. After talking to him, follow him down the stairs to the basement of the church and battle your way through hordes of enemies. Make sure to rest before going outside because when you do, you'll be ambushed by what seems like more than a dozen enemies at once. Killing them all is going to be a difficult task so make sure to utilize the help of your allies. Eventually you'll end up in a small room with a hatch in the floor. Inian opens it up for you saying that it is the secret entrance into the castle passageway. Climb down into the tunnel and go from there. At the end of this short tunnel you should be able to find a ladder on your left. Climb up that ladder and run up the next set of stairs you see to find the crank for the gate at the top. A horde of enemies meets a horde of allies here when the gates open, so either jump right into the fray or stand back. Just be careful you're not attacking the wrong person. After they're dead take your team into the front hall of the castle and fight off another swarm of demons. After doing this, speak to Savlian and he will send you off on your own. Make your way toward the back of the castle where the red flag on your compass is leading you. Here you will find a giant monster. What kind of monster depends on your level, but anything 10 and above will send a just hulking Daedroth after you. Either way the monster shouldn't be too difficult. After defeating it, examine the body of Goldwine on the floor of the bedroom and take the signet ring back to Matius. He was dead when you entered the room, there wasn't any way to have him stay alive don't worry. Head back to Savlian and tell him the count did not make it, then give him the ring. You will get a Kvatch Cuirass as a reward. The bigger reward occurs assuming you have the "Allies for Bruma" quest activated, and you ask him for help. He offers the few men he has to assist in your defense. ______________________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________ ~~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~~ || LE.AL || Legal & Copyright || LE.AL || __||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||__ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This guide is copyright (c) 2006 Alex Eagleson, the author. This walkthrough was written solely to be hosted at www.gamefaqs.com. At this stage the guide should not be hosted on any other website. I do by the way, encourage people to send email, feedback is always appreciated in any form, it's always nice to know you've helped someone. For a list of all my work, please visit the following URL: http://www.gamefaqs.com/features/recognition/45802.html ______________________________________________________________________________ ~~/~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~/~~~~~~~/~~ || CR.DS || Credits & Thanks || CR.DS || __||_______||____________________________________________________||_______||__ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Credit goes out to the authors of the various tweak guides out there online to help people get this game running at peak performance on their machine. There are all sorts of them available, the following four stand out in particualar: http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/lofiversion/index.php/t301118.html http://www.elderscrolls.com/forums/lofiversion/index.php/t310936.html http://www.atomicmpc.com.au/article.asp?SCID=27&CIID=36222&p=1 http://ideveloper.pandora-studios.com/files/OblivionSettingsGuide.txt Thanks to CJayC for continuing to keep GameFAQs running smoothly, and the same to Sailor Bacon. Thanks to Sean, Mark and Jeremy here at the University of Guelph, thanks to everyone in the GameFAQs FAQ contributor community for being great people, and thanks to everyone who takes the time to send feedback. PapaGamer pointed out that characters only receive a +5 bonus to skills at the beginning of the game, not a +10 bonus. Many thanks for that. heatonfour for a minor grammitcal correction. Chris for pointing out the misspelling in the title. Mystic Weirdo for Xbox360 controls and Daedric artifact tip. Thanks to Piotr who pointed out a number of errors regarding hardware issues such as a correction with the effect of anti-aliasing, proper use of V. Sync and the effect of self shadows. Thanks to Veritas and Lassie for pointing out that characters who are vital to the progression of the main plot cannot be killed. Thank you very much finally, to anyone and everyone reading this walkthrough. ______________________________________________________________________________ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Embark on an inspiring mission of human connection beyond the UCA. Sam — with companions by his side — sets out on a new journey to save humanity from extinction. Join them as they traverse a world beset by otherworldly enemies, obstacles and a haunting question: should we have connected?
