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United States24637 Posts
This blog is about Elder Scrolls 3 - Morrowind (including Tribunal Expansion plus Bloodmoon Expansion); for reference Skyrim is Elder Scrolls 5.
I'm a little late to the party here considering Morrowind came out in 2002. Back then I didn't really play computer games for various reasons (if I gamed, it was using a ps1/ps2). A certain TL user who sometimes messages me on steam when he sees good deals on games/computer products sent me a message a few weeks ago saying you can get Elder Scrolls 3-5 for like $20 for pc from some online store in the UK. I figured what the heck; I had planned to play Skyrim at some point anyway, since it had gotten so much attention recently.
A few weeks went by with me busy with other things; then I had a few days with nothing planned, and decided to play on of the games (I had originally put the code into steam, so I just needed to download the game which only takes a few minutes). I decided to start with Morrowind since it was the earliest of the games I had available (not that this was necessary). Shortly thereafter someone on IRC told me it was arguably the best Elder Scrolls, so I was happy with the decision.
I got to character creation. I'm used to character creation being 90% cosmetic 10% gameplay-oriented. This was new to me. I spent like 15 minutes reading through everything, making changes, and trying to come up with a character I would like. I did not really read anything online about this process, which ultimately made my life difficult. I made a wood elf with stealth specialization, but with a fair amount of emphasis on combat skills as well, and nothing magic oriented.
I found the initial gameplay interesting, and different from the type of games I usually play (not that I play many games anymore; I'm thinking back a few years here). I got to my first enemy: a rat. This rat was a ninja. I tried to hit it with my bow, and it missed. I tried to hit it with my longsword, and it missed. Meanwhile I was taking hit after hit. I wondered if maybe I was going somewhere I wasn't supposed to (they do suggest you use the silt strider to travel to Balmora instead of hoofing it; I promptly ignored that suggestion) and this was the mouse king rather than just a random mob. Soon after I realized I was quite wrong; this was one zergling among a world of Korean-controlled broodwar mutalisks.
Next I attempted a fighter's guild quest where you have to fight... two rats at once. Let's just say I really enjoy the fact that you can save/load wherever and whenever in this game. I started reading up a bit online about how the game works, what the stats do, etc, and slowly progressed both with my character's skills and my own.
It's been about 2 weeks and I have 120 hours played (between my first character and a second one I made, a dark elf (dunmer) mage with a nasty short-sword skill). The amazing thing about this game is how there are so many things to suck you in. At first I was sucked in by trying to figure out how the combat system and leveling system works. Then I was sucked into the plot quests. Then I was sucked into the guilds and other sidequests. Then I started focusing on destruction magic and conjured weapons. Eventually I got into alchemy and learned how you can repeatedly make/eat intelligence potions to temporarily crank up your intelligence. This proved very useful when I transitioned into enchanting where high intelligence is a must to succeed in any high-level enchantments.
I'd say the last 20 hours or so have been spent going back and forth between my stronghold (thank god for recall/interventions; telvanni is so tough to get to otherwise), locations to find exquisite clothing, locations to find armor/weapons with higher enchantment capacities, mudcrab/creeper to sell expensive stuff (quite an interesting math problem this creates), etc.
Enchanting is incredibly addictive, and makes your character super powerful. I've been summoning gold saints, capturing their souls into the Azura's Star soul gem, and then making constant-effect items. I have an entire set of clothing with chameleon which now allows me to get 100% translucence which, combined with sneaking which I can now easily afford to train (I have hundreds of thousands of gold) allows me to steal almost anything, despite not being a thief specialization. I just finished putting together a full set of healing clothing with constant affect restore health (and a bit of restore stamina). I just tested it out today; three solders are attacking my character at once; the health bar jumps down a bit, then races back up! This seems somewhat overpowered, but still rewarding nevertheless.
The biggest problem has been the buginess, and at times poor design of the game. The console lets you edit virtually anything about the game; I reserve its use for remedying bugs, or if I disposed of some item I need for a quest and will have no way of acquiring it again. The console makes up for the technical problems, for sure. The web also has sites that are extremely useful for warning you about where the game will bug, and how to counteract it.
The game used to crash often, but I switched it to xp compatibility mode and it seems much more stable (I've avoided the alchemy bug this way as well, where the game doesn't let you make potions unless the custom name takes up the full entry bar).
I'm maybe 2/3 of the way done with the plot despite all this.
This is yet more proof that buying old games can be a great thing (not that a community with many broodwar players will argue much about old games): you save money and probably have more fun than if you bought some new game, not knowing fully what to expect.
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Morrowind is amazing. There are also some awesome mods available for it; I suggest the HD Morrowind mod, and Tamriel Rebuilt. There's also some combat mods and other interesting stuff around.
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United States24637 Posts
On February 25 2013 05:41 Birdie wrote:
Morrowind is amazing. There are also some awesome mods available for it; I suggest the HD Morrowind mod, and Tamriel Rebuilt. There's also some combat mods and other interesting stuff around.
I'm going to look into mods after I beat the game. How do they work?
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On February 25 2013 05:44 micronesia wrote:Show nested quote +On February 25 2013 05:41 Birdie wrote:
Morrowind is amazing. There are also some awesome mods available for it; I suggest the HD Morrowind mod, and Tamriel Rebuilt. There's also some combat mods and other interesting stuff around. I'm going to look into mods after I beat the game. How do they work?
Well, the HD Morrowind mod just upgrades the graphics. Tamriel Rebuilt adds the rest of Tamriel (well the mod is still a work in progress, but it adds a lot of it) to the game. Tamriel's the province that includes the island of Hammerfell, aka the Morrowind island. I think it ends up tripling the size of the game? It has quests and everything too, so it's pretty sick. Combat mods I don't know exactly how they work. But over at nexusmods it explains how to install them and stuff so it's pretty straight forward; you only run into problems if you start installing a lot of mods.
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the game is cool but levitation and waterwalking break a lot of the combat, because you can just hover out of reach and throw fireballs at stuff. bethesda great at making cool 3d environment though, even if they can't write quests very well
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United States24637 Posts
Thanks.
Ah I just hit another hilarious inconsistency/irony. I'm the arch-magister of the Telvanni, and a fighter's guild quest just told me to go kill four Telvanni operatives that are disrupting mining operations. What!?
On February 25 2013 06:03 sam!zdat wrote:
the game is cool but levitation and waterwalking break a lot of the combat, because you can just hover out of reach and throw fireballs at stuff. bethesda great at making cool 3d environment though, even if they can't write quests very well
I find this doesn't come in handy that often... like by the time you have the ability to get proper access to abilities like those, you can be incredibly overpowered anyway. I guess depending on what order you do quests in you can get an item early in the game which allows you to cast those spells, but it's still a bit of a pain to do considering the reward.
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I played Morrowind on the Xbox a long time ago. It is an amazing game. Enjoy it 
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In case you haven't already I'd make a set of Fortify Strength clothes/rings. It does a lot to increase the amount of junk you can carry around. Also, be glad you're on the PC. I first played Morrowind on the Xbox and the memory strain broke the game once I was head of House Hlauu and about to kill Dagoth Ur.
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I remember originally playing morrowind on the xbox, i loved that shit even though it was like a 3 minute load time from the menu to actually start your game. i think morrowind is one of the best games i've ever played, it sucked me in just like it did to you, it's amazing. i remember bringing the manual with me to go take a shit and just planning my next character and it's skills and stuff haha.
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I absolutely love Morrowind. Its one of my favorite games of all time.
On February 25 2013 06:03 micronesia wrote:
Ah I just hit another hilarious inconsistency/irony. I'm the arch-magister of the Telvanni, and a fighter's guild quest just told me to go kill four Telvanni operatives that are disrupting mining operations. What!?
Its not that much of an inconsistency, from a lore standpoint ambition Telvanni wizards are pretty well known for murdering each other 
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United States24637 Posts
On February 25 2013 08:09 Thingdo wrote:I absolutely love Morrowind. Its one of my favorite games of all time. Show nested quote +On February 25 2013 06:03 micronesia wrote:
Ah I just hit another hilarious inconsistency/irony. I'm the arch-magister of the Telvanni, and a fighter's guild quest just told me to go kill four Telvanni operatives that are disrupting mining operations. What!?
Its not that much of an inconsistency, from a lore standpoint ambition Telvanni wizards are pretty well known for murdering each other
Yes, but I'm thinking about it from the perspective of the fighter's guild. It should be well known that I'm the arch-magister of the Telvanni. They wouldn't ask me to go kill Telvanni who were ostensibly following orders, when they know the orders ultimately originated from me!
A similar example is if you are the Arch-Magister of the Telvanni and Arch-Mage of the mage's guild, and you ask around about a Telvanni spy in the mage's guild. Helloooo?? :p
edit: Similarly, I'm the arch-mage of the mage's guild and I was going to do a mission where you sneak into the Ald-ruhn Mage's Guild to steal something while everyone is away. Some recruit sees you come in, calls you a thief, and attacks you. He would really attack the head of the mage's guild unquestioned? lol
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Oh man morrowind.... Best game of the series really (don't listen to the naysayers who like daggerrfall, they're wrong). The game is incredibly imbalanced (I mean if you know what you're doing you can become a god at level 1) but to be honest thats a lot of the charm for me. Finding new ways of breaking the game is just really entertaining.
My personal favorite was probably the make fortify intelligence potions to make even better fortify intelligence potions until eventually you have 129312312312 intelligence that lasts for days. Oh and fortify strength of course, 200+ strength anyone?
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United States24637 Posts
On February 25 2013 10:18 Coriolis wrote:
Oh man morrowind.... Best game of the series really (don't listen to the naysayers who like daggerrfall, they're wrong). The game is incredibly imbalanced (I mean if you know what you're doing you can become a god at level 1) but to be honest thats a lot of the charm for me. Finding new ways of breaking the game is just really entertaining.
My personal favorite was probably the make fortify intelligence potions to make even better fortify intelligence potions until eventually you have 129312312312 intelligence that lasts for days. Oh and fortify strength of course, 200+ strength anyone?
As I mentioned in the OP, I used the same intelligence trick to make my enchanting work. However, I raised it up to ~5k which is all I need, and never use the boost for combat. In fact, I've read over-doing it with intelligence can bug the game.
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