Skyrim

[DANGERMAN]

still just sounds like basic common sense to me. And you've used too many come backs there

Does the PC version have hotkeys for magic spells? Hotkeys would be nice.

I want to say yes but I honestly can't remember. I know you can stick the shout to something else because I had that on an extra mouse button

the more I think about it the more I think you can. I think I had a defence spell hotkeyed (oak skin/iron skin/whatever) a heal spell somewhere, and an attack spell on my right mouse

[Sambob]

You may be able to beat the giant by kiting him, but the trolls are invincible.

[Sly Reflex]

This just ate 6 straight hours of my time.

The PC versions like a completely different game. It looks amazing. It loads in the blink of an eye. There's no slow down. There's no awful pop in. Mechanically it all works as it should, baring one incident where I walked over some bones and they started spazzing out and hurting me.

I'm not sure about the gameplay, it's a lovely tourist game, but often the adventuring part of it is the shittest part. I set myself some rules about roleplaying this time around, I'm hoping pretending to be a cat version of Liam Neeson that punches stuff to death and hopefully contracts full blown aids will hold my attention. I'm also doing the whole eating and sleeping stuff this time as well, as mundane as it sounds it gives the game some structure. I think Fallout New Vegas did the whole realism mode as well, except it was part of the actual game instead of having to enforce that stuff on yourself.

I don't know how far the whole punch the fuck out of everything will get me, I might struggle on some of it. Saying that, I paid less than £5 for the game, so if I get 20 hours out of it then I'm good, I can sack it off after that.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=207706438

[Sly Reflex]

I know I can bank on this being in the last Raptr chart of the year.

[halfagogo]

thanks sly, im totally never gwtting this on console now.

[Sly Reflex]

As a game it's not very good. The combat is dire. The missions are basically fetch quests with maybe a bit of optional stuff and the dungeons are mostly funnels that you bash your way through. There are rare instances where you have to solve puzzles, I really like those as they are more focused on avoiding traps and working out solutions rather than making you fight 1001 Draugr, it takes the spotlight off of the shitty combat. We've come too far with games like Demon's Souls to even tolerate shitty combat like this. I know Skyrim and Demon's Souls are very different games, there has to be a way of making the combat better than press the button over and over until everything is dead.

The soul gem stuff is still bollocks. Hopefully whoever is in charge of designing the magic system and all it encompasses sorts that shit right out for TESVI. It fucks up a lot of things to do with magic, magic weapons and playing as a mage. I've played all the TES games and anything that has you using gems is such a ball ache. Don't make us recharge weapons, just make it so that the magic on the weapon is balanced for general use. Make the gems the equivalent of ingots for upgrading and making stuff better or something. It's proper crap the way it is now. It's a proper fuck about concerning the jobs system as well. You can't really enchant without having filled gems, and to get filled gems you either need to be lucky as fuck and find one, you need to buy one (which is also lucky to find them in shops) which is waaaaaay expensive, or you have to be trained to do that shit yourself. It's a pretty shitty loop.

The PC version's really blown my socks off with how it looks and runs, the light sources near the water are absolutely stunning. Yeah, silly glitches still happen, I've taken pictures of several of them and uploaded them to the steam activity thing if you want to take a look. I actually had one where a fugitive ran up to me to offer me a quest, then he got killed before he could finish his line by a wolf that was chasing him, stuff like that makes me laugh. It's sort of the perfect game to play while you're watching tv, not much goes on when you're walking from place to place. I find that weird as in the 360 version you seemed to get attacked every 50ft. The hiking about actually reminds me a lot of Dear Esther, I often find myself just taking the sights in while I pick flowers, catch butterflies and mine ore.

Beautiful music too. The theme that plays while you're wandering outside Whiterun is really relaxing.

[DANGERMAN]

Does the PC version have hotkeys for magic spells? Hotkeys would be nice.

I put this on before, it doesn't have a hotkey setup as such, instead you have a favourites list set (I've got it on Q), which pauses the game till you let it go. So you activate it to cast your protection spell, then again to go back to your sword, fire, whatever

[Sly Reflex]

Or if you're playing with a pad, you press up or down on the dpad and then assign with LT and RT. You can assign potions and stuff as well.

I was speaking to a mate about the whole punching build and he said he tried that, but apparently it got brutally difficult at the end. I'll probably carry it on at some point, but he did warn me that eventually I'm going to have to alter how I play if I want to get any further.

I rolled another playthrough with the intention of doing all the stuff the punching guy will never be able to do. Normally I go Dark Elf with stealth focused bow play with knife and magic support if I need it. This time I've gone full mage as you can get around the whole squishy part of playing one once you get up the enchanting. That's sort of the problem I'm having with this playthrough though, if something decides to ignore Lydia or my summon, I get fucked. The mana pool at the start isn't really ideal either, if more than 2 things show up I'm having to watch the fight helplessly as my mana pool fills back up. Maybe I should just swallow my pride and equip a knife for those situations and just prey that I don't aggro whatever I'm trying to punch full of holes.

I'm really enjoying this now, I'm still finding stuff I hate about it, but I can sort of overlook it for the most part.

[Sly Reflex]

I had a few problems tonight with bugs and glitches, one of which broke the way I play the game.

Basically when I fight starts I throw my Atronach down and let it and Lydia tank whatever I'm fighting while taking potshots with spells when I see an opening. I don't know if this is specific, but when a Draugr busts out of a coffin and I have a summons present it freezes the game. I'm hoping that it was just the Labyrinthian or whatever that level was called, otherwise I might have a lot of trouble playing the game if it starts happening a lot.

I had another problem the an enemy that locked up at the end of the College where he's meant to talk for a bit then go active, whereas he just talked for a bit then carried on what he was doing. I was running around like an idiot trying to trigger whatever makes him go, turns out I just needed to reboot the game.

I've noticed something odd regarding the mana too. The bigger the pool gets, the quicker it charges. I had a quick look around the internet and couldn't find any info on how the mana regen works, I was assuming it worked on the basis of x amount of points per second * whatever equipment you are wearing. If it did work like that the bigger the bar got, the slower it'd appear to recharge as the bar is accommodating more points but not taking up more space. I think it might be x% per second * equipment or maybe something related to current level, I'd like to see some formulas so I can get an understanding of how it works. The reason being is that eventually there's going to be a point where speccing into Magicka is going to have diminishing returns.

I've started dabbling in enchanting. How do you make a lot of money in Skyrim? Slap a fucking enchant on whatever shit you find. A dagger worth 10g and a petty stone worth 40g suddenly become worth 414. You've to piss about filling soul gems up, but the profit margin for time spent casting soul trap on something like a wolf before killing it is insane. As it stands now I'm making a x2 profit on anything I enchant due to my speechcraft being low, if I keep selling them it's going to hit x10 eventually. It might go beyond that, I'm not sure why they took out the mercantile or altered it into speechcraft so I've no idea how it works in Skyrim.

I think I'm going to try and do the thieves guild stuff next. Then I can get out the cloth and into some heavier stuff for more protection. I only did a tiny bit of the thieves guild on the 360, I don't remember it being combat heavy so hopefully it'll be an easy ride.

[Sly Reflex]

I'm nearly done with the missions from the thieves guild now, although I understand to really finish I need to do the jobs that those two dicksheads out front keep asking me to do. The armour you're gifted is really bloody good, I've been wearing the Arch Mage robes for completing the College of Winterhold, but now I'm in two minds whether I should be wearing the robes or this set. I'll probably rock it until I've completed all the thieves guild stuff then go back to my robes for super mana regeneration.

I'm not sure what I should do after that is over though, maybe I should go back to doing the main questline or something. The whole dragons and red vs blue or whatever they're banging on about doesn't really interest me, unless there's a good reason for doing that part of the game you guys can tell me about?

I really wish they'd have thought out item management and related things a bit better. How hard would it have been to put in something that showed that you'd read a book while hovering over it? Why did they make it so that stolen items are only legible in your inventory by putting a tiny 'stolen' in the title box, in the previous game they put a red hand on the icon, surely translating that across would just mean changing the text colour in the inventory to red like when you're actually stealing things? Consumables as well, why would you use the stuff you bought over the stuff you stole? I could understand if the stolen items were categorically separate from the legit items, but it throws them all in the same title card so you don't know how many you have of each acquirement.

If I was a head in bethesda, I'd get them to sort all this fucking bullshit instead of getting them to add touches like salmon jumping in rivers and bugs flying about. It might make the game looks and play more interesting, but you soon forget about them. You don't forget about wrestling with the inventory system or sliding all over the fucking constellations trying to add skill points.

[Sly Reflex]

I went back to the main questline because I didn't want to finish the thieves guild stuff and lose the awesome lockpick they give you. It's pretty cool you get the pick from the same Daedric deity as you claim it from Oblivion.

I'm off to some place named after the big dragon now, I think it's time to make a set of armour and enchant it, it's making the game incredibly hard, the cloth is doing me no favours now, outside of giving me loads of mana regen.

[Sly Reflex]

I've been chipping away at the main questline. It's gone from humdrum to batshit mental in the space of a few quests. Why wasn't it this interesting from the off? Cut the errand boy bullshit, send me to go shout some fucking dragons to death.

I got a bit of a kick in the nuts early on in the session. I went to disenchant the Arch Mage robes and it wouldn't let me, so now I'm going to have to find some more of the good robes I sold on to disenchant so I can put that knowledge into making some heavy armour usable. I have +133% regen as it stands now, but I really need to drop the light armour mask thats giving me 100% I really need to go grand soul hunting so I can get the best bang for my book on the enchanting table.

[Sly Reflex]

The end of the main questline is really tough. I actually had to use potions, which is something I rarely do in games.

It really didn't help that I only started wearing heavy armour until the last few sessions, even then it was a combo of lower tiered stuff, the highest rated bit i had were some dwarven bracers. I did get one of those masks which had heavy armour and stats that go towards the way I've built, so that was nice.

Time to crack on with the rest of the game now.

[illdog]

Ive been playing this during my week of freedom. In fact its all I played.

Ive been an achievement whore for many years and playing this game utterly free of caring about an achievement pop is very satisfying. Its almost like I'm appreciating the game for the first time. Instead of heading on with the main quests or obvious side quests I'm just doing whatever the fuck I want and I'm loving it. Although for some reason I can get a little down whilst playing it, it can put me in a funny mood.

Anyways, whilst playing it I inadvertantly started a DLC pack which took me to the Island of Solstheim. Ive spent about 10 hours doing the main quest there which was wasn't too bad actually. I wont spoil the details but it involves you battling another Dragonborn who is powerful as fuck. I felt kind of underpowered through the whole thing but made it through with a combination of patience and cowardice.

My character is predominantly a magic user and ive been caning my Destruction casting perks. I was kitted up in full armour but the it makes so much sense to wear Archmages Robes just because of the increased Magika regeneration. I can make almost every enemy I encounter stumble if I dual cast Firebolts, then I can follow that up with a good shout. I use the force one or Ice Form which makes them freeze and fall over, then when they're on the floor I give them a good fucking with my axe. Then i run until my magika has restored and repeat the process.

Big shout out to my wife and companion Lydia, I couldn't do half the things I do without you baby and I love you. You're my everything, sorry I make you carry so much shit.

[DANGERMAN]

I'm taking the opposite approach to you but I wish I wasn't. I just used to play Skyrim whilst watching football, listening to podcasts, or sticking a few albums on, then I'd wander around letting random missions happen.

The last couple of times I've gone back I've been trying to get the main quest done. Problem is it's been a year or so since I played it properly, so I've no idea what's going on and I don't care enough, it's a lot less fun than it used to be.

I'm not a million miles away from the end, and I'm sure there's a shout that summons a dragon, I'm going to get that before I move on I think

[Sly Reflex]

There's a shout that summons a dragon, but you don't get to use it in the main questline which is majorly stupid. At least I couldn't call him in, I don't think you get the shout until you've finished up. I'd advise that you stock up on potions and sundries as well, Ben. There's a point of no return that I could see people getting painted into a corner with no way of getting out.

I played the same way as you ill, although I swapped from fire to electric because the least amount of hard enemies are resistant to electric. You can spec it so that enemies disintegrate randomly too, which means necromancer groups become more manageable because they can't revive shit you just killed.

I want to get the DLC for this, I'll probably pick it up in a sale and go back to playing it then. You could play the base game for hundreds of hours though just off one playstyle, it's pretty content heavy.

[DANGERMAN]

yeah, I gamefaqed to see how to get that shout and it's pretty much the next thing I do, then the game ends. Still, there's plenty to do after that, people keep talking to me about vampires so I should probably go and sort that out after I've saved the world

and you're right about health, I feel like I've rarely used potions, yet when I did in boss fight I didn't exactly have an abundance of them in my inventory

[illdog]

I have a health regen spell with the mindbending name of 'Healing' that i use instead of potions. Tell me it will always be this way?

[DANGERMAN]

I have 'Fast Healing', but I tend not to get enough time to switch to it in some of the tougher fights. I'm playing it as a balls out heavy armoured 2 handed swordsman, so while I stare danger in the face, it repeatedly punches me in mine

[Sly Reflex]

I have a health regen spell with the mindbending name of 'Healing' that i use instead of potions. Tell me it will always be this way?

Stock up still. Also, where you're going, Lydia won't be able to. Without a doubt as a magic user the hardest part of the game. If I'd have known then what I know now I'd have crafted a set of heavy armour enchanted with grand soul gems to do that part of the game as I was constantly healing myself while running away so my mana had time to recharge. There's going to be time ahead when you're going to need to swig both health and mana potions.

illdog...

I assume you did the mages guild since you had the Arch Mage Robes? You know that mask you got off Morokei? It was from a ruin you did where you face off against a boss that was quite hard to get the staff of whatever it was fucking called.

Well you've to face off against another one of those in the main quest line, instead of giving you magic regen it gives you a mana boost and discounts your destruction spells cost, as well as giving you more protection due to it being heavy armour. As long as you're not holding spells (hampers regen) you should be grand for everything that's not a dragon or boss.

Really I found the quickest easiest way to kill stuff with magic was to spam spells when I knew they'd hit. Throw a conjured monster down and while enemies are paying attention to it keep hitting them in rapid succession until they don't get back up. I found that if I held spells during long and drawn out fights I'd end up out of mana more often than not. If you're going to open a fight, then charge, otherwise you're wating regeneration time and eventually that shit will get you killed.

Ben, I wouldn't bother with healing mid-fight. Maybe something like Oakflesh would mitigate having to heal? Making some armour that reflects damage back or adds more protection would be the way forward. I dunno, I've not really thought about how I'd handle those situations. You'd probably need some magic resistance for all the mage fights.