f13.net

So, I'm doing a playthrough of the main quest plus a little freelance stuff and exploration on the side.  Mods are mostly cosmetic, with the major non-cosmetic mods increasing leveling and movement speed significantly in addition to a few other game settings.  The rest improve the vampire in-game, both in strength and allowing the PC to play as a vampire realistically.  I'm not planning on taking that route.  Also, I'm fagging this up with RP as much as possible, it's not *for* you. :why_so_serious:

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29 Rain's Hand

Murderer.  That is the name they have given me, and so am I bound in chains deep in the labyrinthine tunnels given the illustrious name of Imperial Prison, for the crime of ridding this wretched city of a loathsome vampire who stalked the streets by night.  But they do not see it, they saw an old man beheaded before their eyes by a dark-skinned beast, and so am I am here.  But not for long, I can hear them coming for me.  Perhaps there will be an end to this torment.

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15 Last Seed

It is not the end, but a second chance.  They have taken me from the Imperial prisons, first by carriage, and now by boat, to the east, to Morrowind.  To what end, I am not sure, but I had no choice but to take it.  The news from my ancestral homeland is grim, the Camonna Tong has resurfaced of late, people are disappearing from their homes, blight monsters are streaming forth from Red Mountain, and dark cults have arisen to challenge the temple.  It would seem my services as a witchhunter are needed in Vvardenfell.  Through the storm-wracked inner seas our ship plummets and heaves while I am caged below decks with another Dunmer, his name is a mystery to me.  My dreams have been troubled of late, I see the blasted wastes of the ashlands, and I hear the dark whispers of immortal voices.  Perhaps I am going mad, the alternative is no less dreadful.

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16 Last Seed

Landfall.  Last night I was awoken by the other man to thunderclaps and the sounds of rain on the ship deck.  My dreams have returned, it would seem I am a marked man.  The Imperials have instructed me to carry a coded letter to a man named Caius Cosades in the Hlaalu district, I am unsure what game they play, I fear is bodes ill for me.

Before I set out I purchased a rusted and battered set of iron battle gear from the nearby tradehouse and ransack a nearby smuggler cave.  The rogues and hedge wizard I find within are no match for my broadsword, and tightly nestled in a crate I find a katana, new and obviously of Avakiri steel.  The reach of the Camonna Tong is long indeed if they can afford to smuggle such valuable cargo under the noses of excise men.  This magnificent sword will serve a better purpose now.  To the rear of the cave I find a number of beastfolk slaves, pity drove me to liberate them, what they do with their freedom is not my concern.


I have taken a silt strider to Balmora, finding Caius Cosades proved to be easy.  I was not expecting to find a dishevelled sugar addict.  What came next took me completely by surprise, according to him I am to be inducted into the Blades, the Emperor's agents throughout the land, as per the instructions in the enciphered package I delivered.  I refused, I will not allow myself to be a pawn in the Emperor's game.  The spymaster was visibly upset, I will have to watch my back from here on in.

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17 Last Seed

I have heard a rumor floating around town that the Legion Champion of Fort Moonmoth, Larrius Varro,  seeks a meeting with me.  I suspect a trap, yet if I refuse there can be no safety for me in this world, the Empire will surely deal with a second refusal much more harshly.  In person, he is much more dangerous than I would have ever suspected, subtle, yet with a surprisingly brutal streak for a Champion of the law.  He says he has a job for me, his words:



Were I a spectator to this, I would applaud the effort with which Varro has manipulated me into doing his dirty work.  If I accept I am at the mercy of the guards to protect me from justice and hide my actions from the Camonna Tong, if I turn outlaw and run there are none on Vvardenfell who will lift a finger in my aid, and he made certain I know I am being watched.  Likely I would not make it past Caldera to the north, to the east there is naught but ashlands and blight, to the south is the wide open terrain of a lava chute, and to the west lies hill and coastal swamp.  I am well and truly caught, for now my only option is to go along.

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19 Last Seed

Vadusa Sathryon, Marasa Aren, Medrale Thirith, Sovor Trandrel, Thanelen Velas.  These are the names of those who's blood soil my hands.  Even they, members of the Tong, at the heart of the unrest in Morrowind, trouble my conscience.  Varro, undisturbed by this, has given me an enchanted ring with a concealing enchantment as reward, such a trifling trinket to sell one's soul for.  He has nothing else he requires of me, yet I sense that before long I will be required to offer my services once again.  Between the spymaster and the champion there is no room for me in Balmora, yet if I am to escape the eyes of imperial agents I must risk travel to the west into the coastal swamps.

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End of first post, second post resumes here.

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20 Last Seed

Apparently word spreads quickly in Balmora, not a person spoke about it, but I am certain they all know who was responsible for the dead Tong members in the Council Club.  Being notorious has benefits though, through the thieves guild I was able to get my hands on some Imperial Guards plate, the few pieces I was unable to locate replaced by polished and filigreed steel.  Looking more an Imperial officer than a wandering adventurer I set out on my journey, quickly scaling the hills behind the Morag Tong's guild hall.  I doubt anyone paid too close attention: nobody pries into the affairs of the assassin's guild twice.

As I descend the far slope rain begins to fall, and the grunts of wildlife can be heard in the dead, sweltering air of the swamplands.  Soon the sky is rent with lightning, and peals of thunder nearly drown out the sounds of feral beasts, but not enough that they are unaware of my presence.  Deep in the gloom I can make out an ancestral tomb, apparently fallen into disuse, with a pool of stagnant water collecting at it's entrance.  Reaching the carved stone step, lightning momentarily annihilates the darkness as I throw back the door and dash, blinded, into the entryway, the peal of thunder punctuating the slamming door.


Taking in my surroundings, I bite back the vilest oath that comes to mind.  Torches, lit torches, decorate the stairwell leading down into the tomb proper.  There are three things that leave lit torches within tombs in Vvardenfell, only one will not put my corpse to use after I am done with it, and there were no pack animals by the entrance to carry off pilfered goods.  I study the edge of the blade I carry, a long steel viperblade taken off the corpse of one of the Tong thugs: a malicious venom impregnated into the pores of the metal, perhaps deadly enough that it will dispel the dark gifts that knit undead flesh and bone together and leave lasting wounds upon the abominations.  Perhaps, yet I have no choice, a necromancer would have set magical wards upon the door, and a vampire would have heard the clamour of my entry even in the deep slumber of the damned.  To face either in the dark and rain would be my doom, necessity makes the choice easy.


The doorway to the inner chamber is of stout construction, in the traditional Velothi style.  Prudently I probe the door with a thin metal rod, unsurprisingly, I find the door is magically trapped when the rod turns searing cold to the touch.  A half minute later, after I have managed to peel the frozen probe from my palm, I ease my blade in my sheathe and boot open the door.  Immediately in front of me there is a Redguard woman, behind and to the right a Dunmer man.  Both bear the stigma of vampirism upon their faces, and both lunge as soon as the door swings wide.  Taking one step back, I bring up my tower shield just in time to catch the Redguard's katana, my blade clearing the sheath and taking her in the torso in the same motion.  Stepping forward I slam the wounded vampire aside with my shield and, desperately, turn the motion into a block to catch the claws of the other vampire.  Turning his frenzied assault with shield and armour I score a number of cuts along torso, arms , and legs, until finally he steps back in preparation for a vicious strike with his outstretched hand.  Taking advantage of his foolishness, I lash out with my blade, a wide swing across his neck grinds through trachea and spine, leaving his head attached only by a flap of skin.  He falls limp to the floor.  By now the Redguard has crawled into the centre of the room, as I approach she begins to whimper, sensing her hard-bought immortality at an end.  No remorse, not for her kind, she dies upon my blade with a scream.  That moment, three more vampires burst through the door to the next room.  In a wild melee of blade, claw, fang and shield I dispatch each in turn, too occupied with warding against their blows to take more than momentary notice of the details of this unholy melee.  Battered and drained, I search the tomb, strip valuables off the dead, and rest in the tomb's exit way while the cacophony of thunder outside drums to the beat of my heart.

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End of second post, third post resumes here.

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21 Last Seed

Passing an old Dunmer fortress on the way, I stride into Hla Oad in the twilight of early morning.  My arrival does not go unmarked, however.  A passing Hlaalu guard studies me as I approach the docks, and without warning draws steel and lunges.  I, tired after my long trek, am nearly bested until he is taken off guard by a strong blow from my sword.  Seeing his weakness, I rain down punishing blows upon him until he falls.  A quick look around shows that the locals have decided to take themselves elsewhere, so I search the corpse for a reason for his assault.  Nothing, yet I suspect that he was paid off by the Cammona Tong, who rule over this little flyspeck in truth.  I take the first ship out of town, to Gnaar Mok.

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22 Last Seed

Arriving in Gnaar Mok, another flyspeck fishing village in the West Gash region, I am assailed by another guard of Great House Hlaalu.  Evidently they have a reason to want me dead.  Everyone knows that Orvas Dren, a house member of high standing, also heads the Cammona Tong.  It is apparent where these attacks are coming from, and it will not be long before word of their failure reaches Dren in his villa in the Ascadian Isles.  I take a boat to Khuul, then join a silt strider caravan heading for Ald'Ruhn, the seat of Great House Redoran perched in the blasted ash wastes below Red Mountain.

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End of third post, fourth post resumes here.

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25 Last Seed

I have found my way to the Dren Plantation via Suran.  The reek of sweat, blood, and fear permeates the air around the dwelling of this notorious slaver and crime lord.  The guards barely even mark my arrival, apparently Dren expects his reputation to shield him from those who would seek to do him harm directly.  I begin by first silencing the sellswords in the guardhouse and watchtower, giving me access to their fine arms caches and allowing me to proceed with my wetwork without disturbance.  I barely flinch from the task, I am afraid murder has become all too easy for me since my arrival here in Morrowind.  I move to Dren's villa, and quickly find myself in the basement standing over the bodies of twin assassins and a hapless guard who walked down to inspect the disturbance.  In a locked chest I find this note:
In this room, tucked away carefully inside a chest, I find an ash statue: an artifact normally associated with the missing house, the sixth house, House Dagoth.  This simple sculpture of volcanic ash makes my blood run cold.  House Dagoth was destroyed in the first era, it's founder attainted of treason and black sorcery, it's holdings dissolved, and it's members slaughtered, sworn to other houses under pain of death, or dispersed into the wastelands of Red Mountain, where it is said that they continue to live throughout the centuries, preserved through the black arts which the profane Dwemer invented and which were ultimately their undoing.  To even possess such a statue is to die a screaming death days in coming at the ungentle hands of the temple Ordinators.  Were the sixth house to rise again it would plunge Morrowind into fire and war such as had not been known since the War of the First Council and Sun's Death.  And so it came to pass that, for once, my conscience was not troubled when I felt the impact of sword shearing through mail and bone as it carved it's bloody path through Dren's chest.

(No pictures, they didn't turn out too well)

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End of fourth post, fifth post resumes here.

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5 Hearthfire

I have spent my last weeks training for war against the cultists of the Sixth house, the question of who to turn to is before me: do I seek out the Caius Cosades and the aid of the Imperials, or lay my case before Vivec, the God-king of Vvardenfell?

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8 Hearthfire

I have travelled to the holy city of Vivec, which shares the same name as the God himself.  Yet I could not gain an audience.  Desperate, I have broken into his palace and plead to be heard, only to be dismissed out of hand before he resumed his meditation.  I made as if to leave, and took some documents and a strange Dwemer artifact from a stand behind him.  Perhaps with these I can command the attention of someone with the power to fight the Sixth house.

(Note: I don't actually have the artifact, I tried to pickpocket it for reals, but apparently you can't pick Vivec's pockets.  I think I'll just cheat it into my inventory)

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9 Hearthfire

These documents are troubling.  It would seem that the Tribunal gained their powers from the same source as the Dwemer and Dagoth Ur – the heart of Lorkhan, the fallen God, and in doing so brought upon themselves the wrath of the Daedroth Azura.  The Tribunal itself is was empowered by the same dark arts which wiped out the Dwemer and drove Dagoth Ur insane, perhaps they too are being corrupted by their blasphemy.  Worse, Dagoth Ur has arisen once again, the Ghostgate holding him within Red Mountain is failing, and the Tribunal are weakening even as Dagoth Ur gains power.  I set out for Ghostgate on the morrow.

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10 Hearthfire

My first sojourn into the Ghostgate has gone well.  I have matched blades against Dagoth Endus in the halls of Kagrenac's study and slain him.  From his corpse I have recovered an amulet imbued with the power of the heart of Lorkhan.  It is my hope to venture forth upon the seared slopes of this desolate mountain once again soon, that I may recover the artifacts used to perform the rituals that bind one to the heart, Keening and Sunder, to deprive Dagoth Ur of their use.

Nice, thanks!

This sub-forum's throwing up some cool stuff, nice work. Oh man I've got some really nice memories of Morrowind. Damnit I don't have time to start digging up all my old RPGs!

How is Morrowind in comparison to Oblivion?

For me Morrowind had far more character. I liked Oblivion and played the shit out of it, but Morrowind had more heart and cool RP elements like the guards hissing out "Sssscum" whenever I walked by. I felt more attached to that world than I did Oblivion.

I'll definitely be reading this story, btw. Good stuff so far!

I agree completely.  Morrowind felt more like a world.  Oblivion felt more like a game.  Having played both, Oblivion couldn't hold my attention anywhere near as well as Morrowind.

Morrowind was also somewhat more complex.  For example, there was also a Medium Armor.  There was simply more depth to the world.

Now ask me how Morrowind compares to Daggerfall. :oh_i_see:

Daggerfall was more complex than Morrowind.
Morrowind was more complex than Oblivion.

Daggerfall had more freedom than Morrowind.
Morrowind has more freedom than Oblivion.

Oblivion looks better than Morrowind.
Morrowind looks better than Daggerfall.

Every character in all 3 are some of the ugliest characters in gaming.

I don't think I need to go any further.

Nope, that was an excellent summary.

Uncanny, I just reinstalled Morrowind on friday. Was going to write a retrospective BiiF about my experiences though.

A BiiF of Morrowind is largely unnecessary.

Probably

I'm having fun playing it through again, so no loss either way.

Morrowind is one of the dullest looking games around, the whole thing is brown but god damn it's an awesome world. I still remember one of the first times I got caught in a sand storm, being attacked by cliff racers with no idea where I was and suddenly an Imperial Fort appearing through the dense sand all around me, torches signalling safety. It was one of those moments that comes about by everything just coming together, including the fact I'd been playing for about 4 hours straight at that point and the room was pitch black, etc. but it was absolutely awesome.

I had moments like that in Morrowind too. It's a pity they failed to bring that same sense of "being there" to Oblivion.

From the descriptions of Darkfall, I'd have to say they're similar, except Morrowind is single-player. :why_so_serious:

The difference is, underneath the grind and plodding pace, the shoddy stat systems, the terrible AI, and the horrific collision detection there is days of exploration, epic scenery, and lore which puts every other RPG I have ever seen to shame.  Also, the in-game books are often really fucking good (http://www.imperial-library.info/mwbooks/mirror.shtml) short stories.  Add to that a mod library much larger than Oblivion's, a still active modding community, and an editor tool that isn't significantly harder than Warcraft III's once you get used to it and you pretty much left with a game that's bearably playable and immensely deep.

Also, the Morrowind Graphics Extender, which hooks DirectX 9+ shaders and a distant land feature into the game is probably the most awesome feat of modding I have ever seen.  I'll see if I can get some "OMGWTF" Screenshots.

I liked the look of Morrowind. Hard game to get into, but rewarding like no other.

Not for you, but you play goddamn everything anyway.  I never played it and wouldn't mind knowing whether it's worth picking up from the bargain bin.

Its basically Oblivion, with a more interesting setting and more fine detail in the world/lore, but the same obtuse and counterintuitive leveling system, clicky combat, and the worst character models since the Dire Straits Money for Nothing video.

Of course if you didn't play Oblivion that is probably not helpful.


Maybe the ones that aren't furry porn.

Guilty.   :why_so_serious:

Although "clicky combat" is probably enough to tell me to avoid it.  Thanks!  Best BiiF ever.

Hmm, so, game play is still very similar to Oblivion?  The awesomeness that is Fallout 3 has me wanting to try a "better" version of Oblivion, was  hoping this was it.  Still, I loved the exploration in Oblivion, so maybe I'll grab this just to screw around with.  Is there a best/recommended mod pack that makes the game much more awesome, or is playing vanilla just fine?

Yah, for you Sam, I'd say avoid.

The combat is clunky and poorly balanced (first person melee done awful).  The game looks pretty bad in that the character models are terrible and the world has more brown than Quake.  The voice acting isn't great, but almost everyone needs a lozenge.  Travel for the most part is tedious unless you manage to make a hack-y item to assist in this. The main quest is best avoided and any time I attempt to complete it, I'm to the point where I want to uninstall.

Still, this is a game when I play it, I'm drawn in.  I generally gravitate toward a thief character and have lot of fun messing with the dark elven houses, doing thief guild quests, doing odd quests here and there, and just exploring the world getting into trouble. I'm somewhat of a sucker for the BethSoft open world stuff as I've also played a good deal of Oblivion and Fallout 3, having completed the both (although never finishing Morrowind).

I tend to play vanilla and never have many issues with it.  I do look for cliff racer removal mods most of the time.

Convert that shit into a Radicalthon.

While it is true that combat is one of the few things TESIV does better than III, I feel that mostly applied to melee and only chumps melee. :oh_i_see:  The thing about TESIII is that you can do things that you simply could not do in IV, like pump your Acrobatics to such a level that you leap halfway across the game world in one jump (the best thing about those scrolls is that the duration expires while you are at apex... splat) and the fact that you can levitate.  TESIV pissed me off so hard by taking out the levitate spell.  Also, if you think it was possible to make game-breaking equipment and spells in IV... hoo boy!

Heh, I remember dropping loads of gold to enchant a magic ring that basically made me invincible (It regenerated 2 hp a second permanently or something) and a set of armour that gave me 100% invis. That was without getting into building my own spells at all. Of course I never played the expansions to Morrowind and I've got them lying about somewhere... Maybe after I've completed BG2.

I love Morrowind. My only problem with it is that it's so ludicrously EASY to exploit that I feel like I'm doing it wrong if I don't. If I recall, there's one place where you can literally run back and forth across an alley between Shop A and Shop B, selling the wares from one to the other for a profit until you basically have infinite money. That makes it a little hard to want to invest in the Mercantilism skill and get a couple extra gold per sale that DOESN'T involve the giant free money spigot that's just left sitting there without even the need to exploit any actual bug.

But that's a minor gripe. It's a brilliant game.

I didn't want to steal Sheepherder's thunder.

Don't forget the Creeper and...


Both of which are creatures and as such ignore all disposition and mercantile modifiers and buy/sell at the wildly inflated base value +/- a few gold, which can then be turned into profit by buying and selling back items to the same NPC.


Go ahead and do your thing.  I'm going to do one of the more "unconventional" approaches to the main quest, I think.  I'm probably not going to be doing significant numbers of side-quests or faction stuff on this character, lest it unintentionally turn out like a Dos Equis (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2SSZA0CjdQ) commercial.

EDIT: Anyone looking to pick this up, mod the fuck out of it.  Knowing I was going to be making a pretty-much throwaway character I wildly inflated the skill advancement rate (4x normal).  I also removed the two creature merchants gold, to limit temptation.

The one I liked was the Alchemy exploit.  The potency of your alchemy potions is determined by your intelligence.  So, you just head over to that one merchant in, I think it's Wolverine Hall or something, who sells the reagents for a +intelligence potion and restocks his inventory every time you talk to him.  You buy the reagents, brew a few potions,  sell one cover your material costs, drink the rest, buy more reagents, repeat.  You start getting this exponential increase of potion efficiency, so that after about five or ten minutes of doing this, you're sitting on stacks of potions that give something like five thousand intelligence for a couple hundred thousand seconds.  Even one of these potions sells for, like, hundreds of thousands of gold.  So you can brew up a stack of like, a couple hundred of these, sell a few off to cover training every skill you'll ever need, and still have enough left to boost your intel into the stratosphere in case you ever need to brew, say, a potion which will give you enough strength to one-shot Vivec.

That's nice, I never did that one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m1IRxTN-_kU

I updated the first post with a continuation.  If I ever discover this forum's post size limit I'll post a link at the bottom for the new one.  I also put a big red warning of where I left off, more to come soon-ish.

Also, Schild, I question the validity of that speedrun.  He should be taking a shitton more damage than he is from equipping Sunder/Keening without Wraithguard.  To the effect of 51-150 health a second lost through unresistable damage.  That should be enough to three-shot him at the most, even with stacked endurance and health bonuses.

If you do train up your mecantilism, and speechcraft, you don't even need a second merchant. Just buy out a merchant's wares and then immediately sell it all back to them at a higher price. Repeat, if necessary. I found that on my first playthrough without even trying to break anything. I think I stopped playing shortly after that - "Why should I bother exploring dungeons? I'm RICH!"

This guy should hang out with Nythrax. They'd be like The Odd Couple.

Got a third post up, I need to update more frequently, right?  Fuck, I knew I shouldn't have posted. :awesome_for_real:

Am I the only one seeing really, really, dark screenies?

That's pretty much the entirety of Morrowind.

I tried to bump up the gamma for a few, it doesn't take for screenshots.

EDIT: I screwed around a little more with GIMP, not a whole lot, but they should be a little better now.  Morrowind doesn't screenshot well when it's dark or foggy.

Ah, it's probably the calibration on my monitor. I'm used to the 'dark' (i.e. brown and grey) look of Morrowind, not black. I'll just save your screenies and lookit them myself  :oh_i_see:.

I have a Dell monitor that is capable of "sear your eyes out of your head" levels of contrast and brightness, which ameliorates the insane realism ( :why_so_serious: ) of Morrowind.

Also, Monty Haul incoming soon.

Update: So I turned my Monty Haul into a segue back into the main story arc.

It's an enjoyable read man, brings back some good memories. I'm looking forward to the next installment.

Another update.  Fuck this game and it's horrible fucking encumbrance system has me pissed at the moment.  Wearing good gear should not limit your ability to make money by looting things.

"Everything better is heavier -- it's Soviet thinking!"
- coworker playing Oblivion

So, I'm getting into some serious love/hate shit right now in respects to this game.  Mostly due to the fact that I'm effectively forced to wear no gear but a two-hander and cuirass if I want to actually be able to loot the things I kill, which is the only option if you like money and aren't abusing a retarded economy.  I'm actually contemplating putting together a rebalance mod, because the only ones I can find perpetuate this kind of fucking retarded thinking.

The problem is I would have to basically modify every item entry in the game, because it's all shortbus.

The other problem is how to work the numbers to create something that isn't a total wall of Grunk style retardation.

The third is whether I should copy a mod I've previously built and make all the chop/slash/thrust values the same, so that the game doesn't beat you over the head for walking sideways while fighting with a spear, yet doesn't have the same fuckstupid appearance as combat with the "always use best attack" option on.

Fuck it, I'll slam my way through this playthrough and then tinker.

I loaded this up and tried to play again. The world is much better and more in-depth, but man is the travel ridiculously tedious. Also, the melee missing system is one of the most retarded things ever. They fixed both those with Oblivion.

However, I don't like you couldn't join the Legion in Oblivion. That questline is one of my favorite parts of Morrowind.

Two weeks later and I hate fish. HATE SLAUGHTERFISH! Also Cliff Racers.

However, the sheer amount of quests in Morrowind makes Oblivion look like total shit. If they had put the same amount of effort into the faction system and quest lines, it would unquestionably be my favorite game of all time.