Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

[Ironwood]

Yeah mostly in mountains.  Because, you know, dwarves.


They're not as exciting as is made out though.  The traps are more fiendish, I find.

[CmdrSlack]

It's not so much the excitement, rather that my daughter is all on about seeing the spider robots on the loading screen. At least now I know the icon. Thanks!

[Lucas]

Give me a fuckin' amen! (especially for the last sentence; looks like next week I'll finally resume playing :D) 

http://forums.bethsoft.com/index.php?/topic/1308295-update-13-now-on-steam/

Update 1.3 for Skyrim is now available on Steam and is being submitted to Sony and Microsoft. As soon as we have more information on the update hitting PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, we'll let everyone know. Below are the release notes for the update:

Update 1.3 Notes (all platforms unless specified)

General stability improvements
Optimize performance for Core 2 Duo CPUs (PC)
Fixed Radiant Story incorrectly filling certain roles
Fixed magic resistances not calculating properly
Fixed issue with placing books on bookshelves inside player purchased homes
Fixed dragon animation issues with saving and loading
Fixed Y-look input to scale correctly with framerate

We’re also planning on rolling out support for 4-Gigabyte Tuning (Large Address Aware) next week for our PC users. Stay tuned!

[Miasma]

The general idea is that the higher altitude the higher the higher the difficulty so dwemer ruins are in hard to reach mountain ranges.

[Ironwood]

So now Steam launches the Skyrim Launcher and the Play button on the Skyrim launcher launches the Skyrim launcher.

Fucking awesome.

Cunts.

 

[tmp]

Could be worse. Like, Skyrim Launcher launching Steam.

[Ironwood]

The fucking game won't launch. That's bad enough.

[Ironwood]

Oh, Hai, Patch.

[Sheepherder]

It seems painfully obvious that the game shipped with fairly significant memory leaks as well as save game bloat, seeing as how the game destabilizes and the shader/texture loader shits the bed after extended play sessions but immediately gets better if you save, exit, and then re-launch the game.

This seems more related to how many times I alt-tab in and out of a skyrim game, and it still takes a few hours between each time I "had" to restart it. The CTD's don't seem to have been because the game hits the 2GB mark either, so I don't know, but we can at least agree that there is at least room for improvement.

A hard cap on items of similar type is likely to have unintended consequences.  A better solution is to flag them in such a way as their data is culled from the save early (I.E. test if the player is in the same cell while saving, if he isn't, remove the items from the save), and then attach a script that disables the flag should the player happen to pick the item up.

On consoles, sure. They're much more limited in resources after all, but I've roamed around most of skyrim by now and dropped items here and there, and loading and saving is still quick as all hell for me. Leave the PC alone.

Except I don't alt-tab, because if I do it immediately crashes to desktop (I'm glad Bethesda built a totally new engine for this game).  It's a memory leak, which is why the large access aware patch used to alleviate it.

See my response to Sky as to why your second point is needless hand-wringing.  You can track whether it can be reset with minimal risk of the player noticing or caring based on whether it was the player that fucked with it.  However, you are wrong that it would primarily be a console fix: the point would be to conserve FormID's, which is more a PC problem due to higher framerates and modding, but would eventually hit everyone since cells no longer reset every three days.  Smaller saves is just a perk.

[Ingmar]

I had lots of CTD problems with FO3 when alt-tabbing, none with New Vegas or Skyrim.

EDIT: Also I think it would be an enormous *plus* if shit I randomly knocked off of tables got put back on the tables after I left.

[Sheepherder]

The game now crashes to desktop as soon as I hit play.  Fucking with the saves and .ini does nothing.

EDIT:  Fixed.  Verified integrity of game cache.  Apparently integrity was not good.

[Ironwood]

Have you patched ?  Sorry, I'm not being an arsehole here, but that was my problem above.  Steam knew there was a patch, but hadn't made it available to me yet.

[Sheepherder]

Have you patched ?  Sorry, I'm not being an arsehole here, but that was my problem above.  Steam knew there was a patch, but hadn't made it available to me yet.

The crash report says v1.3.7.  Fixed now, was just a corrupt executable.

EDIT: Also I think it would be an enormous *plus* if shit I randomly knocked off of tables got put back on the tables after I left.

That was where I originally got the idea from.  I discovered the DontSaveObject function while fucking around with Morrowind, immediately saw implications for Oblivion, but was thwarted because that function had been removed when they overhauled the scripting language for Oblivion.

[stray]

Heavy armor can be really good as well, but it takes a goodly bit longer (and a lot more invested Stamina) before it comes into its own.

It also pretty much requires you to take the Steed stone early on.

But yeah, if you're a sword-and-board fighter, Light armor is, oddly, probably the best choice. Which I wish I knew before I sunk 20 hours into mine.

huh... just to add (and this might be old news), but I found out werewolf strengthens from the light armor skill (and one handed). I guess you could call this another perk.

Too bad you can't upgrade Fur armor very high though. And that scaled armor looks lame. I'm gonna have to find Forsworn. There should be more barbaric options, like this. That's my only complaint.

[K9]

Fun discovery of the day: If you cast the magelight spell on a companion, NPC or monster it sticks to them and floats over their head until it expires.

Started a new playthrough as a mage, level 6 with a Flame Atronach is pretty cheesy. When the pet goes down though I'm so so squishy

[Murgos]

I loved that there were, what four? Different models for Fur armor.  I was very disappointed to find out that for everything else there is only 1 model.  I know that armor styles is one thing that will get modded to hell and back, but that's still months away and I probably won't be playing then.

This new patch seems to have reset all my help tips.  Every time I do something I get the help pop-up again, fortunately it only seems to want to tell me once and then goes away on subsequent uses.

[cironian]

This new patch seems to have reset all my help tips.  Every time I do something I get the help pop-up again, fortunately it only seems to want to tell me once and then goes away on subsequent uses.

Oh, how I love games without an option to turn those things off.

[Sheepherder]

I loved that there were, what four? Different models for Fur armor.  I was very disappointed to find out that for everything else there is only 1 model.  I know that armor styles is one thing that will get modded to hell and back, but that's still months away and I probably won't be playing then.

Fortify smithing.  You can thank me when you're wearing fur with a higher AC than normal Daedric.

[stray]

I loved that there were, what four? Different models for Fur armor.  I was very disappointed to find out that for everything else there is only 1 model.  I know that armor styles is one thing that will get modded to hell and back, but that's still months away and I probably won't be playing then.

Fortify smithing.  You can thank me when you're wearing fur with a higher AC than normal Daedric.

What is fortifying? Is it with those potions? I thought some armors had limits.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Using a grinding stone for weapons or workbench for armor to increase the base dmg and armor respectively.

[stray]

Using a grinding stone for weapons or workbench for armor to increase the base dmg and armor respectively.

Oh.. yeah, I do that, but there are no perks for Fur. I think it's limit is superior (err...or exquisite). Definitely not legendary.

[Reg]

I think that by "fortify" he meant drink a potion and/or wear armour that improves your smithing.  The stuff I improve at the grindstone when I'm wearing all my smithing stuff comes out much better.

[Sheepherder]

What is fortifying? Is it with those potions? I thought some armors had limits.

The magic effect: Fortify Smithing.  Combine it with the grindstone/workbench.  A quick test with the console reveals it runs out of new adjectives after Legendary, but the bonus keeps going up.


That's with ~20ish skill in unperked light armour and 30 000 Smithing by the way.  I'll see if I can create a realistic test.

[K9]

Using a grinding stone for weapons or workbench for armor to increase the base dmg and armor respectively.

Oh.. yeah, I do that, but there are no perks for Fur. I think it's limit is superior (err...or exquisite). Definitely not legendary.

I think it is possible, you need 196 skill to hit legendary without the relevant armour perk, but only 91 with. However, with potions and enchants you can get something like +160% or so to your smithing skill, so at 100 base skill you should be able to reach effective skills way over the limit for 'legendary'.

[stray]

Awesome, I'll check it out later. I need legendary Fur. 

[Sheepherder]

Use potions to buff enchant, use enchant to buff alchemy, use both to buff smithing, make your preferred set of armour.

[Sheepherder]

Okay, so 250 smiting and light armour, with full perks on light armour.  Yields a combined total of 507 AR in leather without shield.

So the armour cap is probably slightly out of reach for fur without potion/enchant cheese.

[stray]

I don't need to hit the cap. Just needed it to be viable. Thanks for the info.

[Sheepherder]

They did a really good job with the skills this time around, except those retarded perk trees.

[Ironwood]

The perk trees aren't all that bad, but not having a respec function (even if it's in the most obscure and hard quest) is the retarded bit.  I could live with weak perks unless I have to really, really live with them.

I have points in destruction that I simply don't use anymore.  It's so fucking annoying.

[Tebonas]

I'm wavering between restarting with a new character or saying "Fuck it, his unjustified imprisonment broke my Paladin and now he is a Daedra-worshipping assassinating psycho" and doing everything with one character.

The restart without touching either smithing or enchanting is tempting, though. Only using found weapons and armor might increase the difficulty as well as making drops more interesting.

[Sheepherder]

They're a pain in the ass to navigate.  There's a bunch of questionable picks.  Some, like Fists of Steel, make no goddamn sense to be in the tree they are in.  Some you have to pick anyways even though they're tits on a boar useless.  Balance, even amongst similar trees and effects, is shitty.  The perks are all organized and linked into retarded constellation shapes, sometimes with little apparent thought being given to the process, which contributes to the problem of questionable picks.

In general, the only skills I question are the numerous thief non-combat ones.  Sure, someone who invests heavily in smithing also wouldn't have the combat skills, but he does have a big fuck off sword.

[stray]

I'm wavering between restarting with a new character or saying "Fuck it, his unjustified imprisonment broke my Paladin and now he is a Daedra-worshipping assassinating psycho" and doing everything with one character.

The restart without touching either smithing or enchanting is tempting, though. Only using found weapons and armor might increase the difficulty as well as making drops more interesting.

I think some of the best weapons are drops.. or at least, fairly equal to best craftable stuff. Ysgramor's shield, Wuuthrad, Dragonbane, Chillrend..

Not exactly best, but some of the cooler looking shit are drops (Forsworn and Falmer armor).

edit: This game is relatively easy anyways. We don't need the best. It's partly why I want to play with Fur armor.

[Murgos]

edit: This game is relatively easy anyways. We don't need the best. It's partly why I want to play with Fur armor.

I absolutely agree.  People who at level 1 game the system by locking zones or maxxing out crafting skills to make armor at the cap and weapons that 1 hit kill deadra by lvl 10 are really ruining the game for themselves.  It's such a pity because just actually playing the game as it comes seems pretty well balanced and a lot of fun.

For example I was thinking that I was falling behind the power curve and that I would have to grind up smithing via iron daggers (and also grinding up cash to buy the materials) to get caught up but I went into my first Dwemer dungeon (Nchaund-Zel) and now I have enough Dwemer scrap and soul gems to make banging out a bunch of enchanted dwarven weapons and armor a natural and profitable part of the game.  Sure a couple of the fights were really hard but next time I go dungeon delving I will be much better equipped.

[koro]

In general, the only skills I question are the numerous thief non-combat ones.  Sure, someone who invests heavily in smithing also wouldn't have the combat skills, but he does have a big fuck off sword.

I've seen people who've played the game as a hardcore thief early on with a bit of sneaking around (which is, oddly enough, the slowest way to level Sneak by an order of magnitude), pickpocketing, and lockpicking for things like shop doors. When they tire of doing that and want to get on with the rest of the game, they suddenly find themselves at level 18 with jacksquat for combat skills, no armor, no magic, sub-50 sneak, but 90-100 pickpocket and 60-80 lockpicking, with perks invested into them;  shit then proceeds to crush them because even the limited level scaling can produce much tougher enemies if you don't have any combat skills to speak of. When they realize the perks they've sunk into their character for the past 15+ hours are largely irrelevant to most of the game, they get annoyed or pissed, and try to find some ways to compensate, which usually means turning to smithing, enchanting, alchemy, or a combination of the three.

And then the game becomes trivially easy and they give up after doing the MQ once on one character because they're damned if they do, damned if they don't.