The Let's Play Archive

Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind

by Musical_Daredevil

Part 1

Winner SemiOverdose: Youtube



SemiSponge:

(Note: SemiSponge's images were lost when WaffleImages closed a while back, and there were no successful attempts to reupload them. I'm leaving what remains of the entry here. -MD)

All right, I was going to be lazy and not show how I break play the game but since Steam does screenshots for me now I might as well. I'm playing vanilla Morrowind with only the unofficial patch, no graphics mods or anything.

First thing I did was open up the console and set FillMap so I could see all the points of interest. Just a thing I like to do.

Right now I've gotten through about half of the main plot and am pretty much invincible, and all from looting or alchemy. The only way I've died this playthrough is from falling off of things...

The attributes in white are boosts from items, I didn't bother drinking any potions. Though I could have.
Carrying 100+ pounds of potions and alchemical supplies is totally worth it

112978 to be precise

Absurd amounts of money.

Chrysamere

Arguably the best long sword in the game, and I wasn't even looking for it! I also have the best one-handed longsword, Goldbrand, though of course that takes a lot more effort to get.

Ebony Mail
This is the one item I cheated in via console, since I didn't realize that there aren't any other good medium armors and it's a quest reward for a different faction.

I also have a whole bunch of other awesome loot but I didn't think the same shot of inventory screen over and over would be very interesting.

I'M SNEAKING!

Ahhh, collecting. I love it.

I just can't help myself.

So I decided to take every fortify potion I had, plus some other stuff, just to see what would happen.

look at the size of those numbers!


Predictable results:

FYI if you get your speed up that high you also should turn off clipping so you don't die when you run into something.



ulmont:

And now: How To Break* Morrowind.

*Well, two ways to break morrowind, anyway. There are a lot more.

The two ways: Alchemy (but just as a cheap early gold source) and Drain-Skill for next-to-free training.

1) Create your character. Nothing special here, although a few items of note:

A) Bretons will make this more expensive and annoying due to 50% magic resistance. Atronach will (I believe, I never play them) make this impossible. High Elves should find it cheaper. The reason is resistance or weakness to magic; the Bretons will only take a 50% skill drop from a 100% drain skill spell, while I believe the High Elves will take a 100% skill drop from a 50% drain skill spell.
B) Don't pick destruction or alchemy as major/minor skills.
C) I suggest picking major/minor skills that cover all the attributes.

(sample guy here)


2) Take the silt strider to Balmora and the Mage Guild transport to Caldera. At the top of a tower in Caldera you'll find a free set of alchemy equipment, which will make this next part possible.



3) At the east (right, anyway) end of Caldera you'll find Ghorak Manor. At the top of Ghorak Manor is a scamp named Creeper. Creeper is great because he:

A) Ignores your mercantile skill for bartering, meaning your prices aren't artificially deflated for a while.
B) Has 5000 gold. This regenerates every 24 hours.







4) Sell off all your junk collected through the opening sequence to Creeper that you can, and go back to the mage's guild now that you have a little cash.



Look for Ernand Thierry.



Ernand sells alchemy ingredients.



Specifically, Ernand is a restocking alchemy vendor, so those 10 Violet Coprinus and Ampoule Pod will be there every time. Violet Coprinus + Ampoule Pod makes a water walking potion.

But we can do better...if you buy 10 Violet Coprinus, then close the barter window, then barter again and sell the 10 Violet Coprinus, then close - the next time, Ernand will have 20 Violet Coprinus restocking. And so on. Getting him up to about 80 each will make the next part easier.

5) Buy a balanced amount of as much Violet Coprinus + Ampoule Pod as you can afford / carry. Head back to Creeper.

6) Make a truckload of Water Walking potions.



7) Sell the Water Walking potions to Creeper, thanking Vivec that Creeper doesn't use the Mercantile skill.



8) Run back to Ernand, buy more potion ingredients, etc. If you need to, rest for 24 hours in the manor to restock Creeper's gold.



9) Repeat until you have about 5000 gold, which happens surprisingly quickly.



10) Take the Mage's guild travel to Sadrith Mora, leave wolverine hall, and head to Dirty Muriel's Cornerclub.



Look for Erer Darothril.



11) Buy the Scourge Blade spell from Erer Darothril. This spell is pretty useless by itself, but it gives us the crucial "Drain Skill" effect.



12) Buy a custom-designed spell to drain destruction for 100 points on self for 1 second. You'll ultimately need one of these spells for each skill, but in the beginning you can get by with Destruction and 2 other skills (I suggest an Endurance and an Intelligence skill, with one of those skills being major/minor). If you're a High Elf, you should be able to get away with a 50 point drain.



13) Cast the self-draining skill spell, and as soon as it fires (listen for the Destruction "bam" sound effect), activate Erer and ask for training.



Because your destruction skill is depressed to a 0, training is 1 gold per level now. You can repeat this to get to 100 destruction for the price of 100 gold (after the initial approximately 800 gold setup fee). Each additional skill will cost about 170 gold. As a side effect, because your skill is always an effective 0 when you request training, any trainer of a skill will do (no need to go find those elusive master trainers). Bretons will end up having to pay for training as their skill ranges from 51-100, and will have to seek out trainers that have a 50 skill level to finish training, so this will cost substantially more for them. No big deal; teleport back to Caldera and make more water walking potions for Creeper as needed.

17) I suggest training 10 levels of Destruction, 10 total levels of alchemy (i.e., 10 less whatever you gained from making the water walking potions earlier), and 10 of something linked to endurance (spear, medium armor, etc.). Then rest,* and bask in the 5x3 modifiers.



18) It won't take very long at all to end up like this (screenshot from a different game, but this was the model):



19) Go forth and kick righteous ass.

* Watch out for dark brotherhood assassins. If you rest in the fighter's guild in Balmora, a lot of times they will get stuck in the bed and be helpless.