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Did we miss anything on a quest? Let us know!
Please read these before attempting to follow these side quest walkthroughs.
Saves
The oldest and best advice in computer gaming: save often. Save before doing anything you're not sure of or that's really important or really dangerous. Save before and after accomplishing major tasks. Use named saves and quick saves, but do save.
Specificity
I typically omit detailing the storyline to quests -- you can get that in your dialogues and as you complete the quest. I skip over unnecessary steps to tell you what you need to do, not what you can do to find out more about the storyline to the quest. I will tell you what you need to do in order to complete the quest in the most profitable and satisfying manner possible. I always want to get the most out of quests in terms of reward, reputation, status, and items. I will usually not reference items or other quests unrelated to the quest you're on, even if they are in the area you're in.
Quests
Obviously, you need to talk to your quest-giver before and after the quest in almost every scenario. There is a usually a trigger word, like "duties" or "work" that will start you off, and that word will often also bring up the topics to close the quest. Explore dialogue topics thoroughly, but save first if you aren't sure where they will lead. When dealing with faction quests, you have to join the faction first. Once you're in and doing quests, ask your quest-givers for "promotions" or "advancement" after every couple of quests, and certainly after you've finished all the quests they had to offer you. This is how you'll increase in rank.
Locations
I will not bother giving directions to major map sites. My criteria: If you run a "FillMap" command in your command console, it will mark all these major locations. I will usually try to provide a brief directional reference for locating other sites. Morrowind is huge, so even when I give directions it's hard to be precise. I don't want to spend a paragraph trying to pin down a location. Explore, adventurer.
Playing Style
You need to know how I play in order to get the same results from my walkthrough as I did.
Dispositions
I consider disposition to be the single-most important statistic in all interactions. To this end, I have always, always, always increased an NPC's disposition as high as possible, in any way possible, before taking the conversation any further. I will admire, bribe, and intimidate before attending to any dialogue topics.
Money
I have always looted heavily -- I take everything I can and sell it. I am willing to wait day after day for merchants to replenish their cash. I stash items until I can sell them, and I will travel back and forth between locations carting all the loot I can carry at a time to capitalize completely on available loot. I take everything off of every corpse every time, empty every container completely, and lift every item left out in the open as often as I can. Alright, I'm exaggerating, but you get the point. All this money allows me to bribe NPCs as much as I need to so that I can see their dispositions soar. My character is always charming enough and rich enough to make conversations go my way.
Discretion
You need to be very careful about stealing and killing. With killing, follow this rule: if they don't attack you, don't attack them. If you have to or choose to, you have two options. Taunt them into attacking you first. Or, use your sneaking/chameleon abilities and make sure to hit them as hard as possible, hoping for a single killing blow. With stealing, always use whatever means are at your disposal to make yourself invisible. In Morrowind, people have eyes. If they see you do something bad, you're gonna get in trouble. But if no one sees you, then no one is any the wiser. And with both of these actions, when in doubt, quick-save first.
Critical Attributes and Skills
I believe that having good scores in the following areas will be of tremendous benefit to most adventurers (my characters always do):
Most important attribute: personality
Most important skills: mercantile, security, sneak, speechcraft
Most important abilities: curing, healing, levitating, mark and recall
Persuasion
How people respond to your character will make a world of difference. Having a high personality and speechcraft score will make your life much easier and save you money. Admiring doesn't cost anything, bribes do. But if you're rich, who cares? Experiment with your persuasion skills to see what works best for you.
Stealth
There are thousands of locked containers and doors. A good security score along with lock picks and probes or opening spells will be needed at all times. You will want to be unnoticed when you pick locks, steal, pickpocket, and assassinate people. It goes without saying that a high sneak score or high-level chameleon ability will be very important to your success. Retain all items and learn any spells helpful in opening locks, hiding, and being stealthy in any way.
Transportation
Many locations and items in Morrowind are tough to find and then tough to get to, both indoors and out. Levitation is a great boon to travel over land and also for reaching objects hidden on high ledges and in obscure places. Stock up on all items granting this ability and learn the spell as soon as you can. In this vein, mark and recall spells will allow you to shuttle back and forth between locations instantaneously, which is absolutely HUGE in this game. Naturally, take full advantage of in-game public transportation -- the silt striders, boats, and if you're a mage, the guild teleports. There are also devices called Propylon Chambers at each of the Dunmer Strongholds (except Kogoruhn) that allow you teleport between strongholds.
Healing
Many quests will require you to heal people in some way, especially curing their diseases. And of course, you will always want to keep your character as healthy as possible at all times. Stock up on healing and curing items and learn as many applicable spells as possible.
The Command Console
You may find that there are various unruly bugs in the game will may require the use of the command console to fix. There are also many cheats and such you can employ via the console, but I am limiting this discussion to the bug-fix applications of the console. As you read any of my walkthroughs, you may find mention of bugs and console command specifics for addressing them. To prepare you for them, please review the following directions.
Opening the command console:
The tilde key is the one under your escape key on the top left of your keyboard -- it is represented by the "~" symbol. Pressing this button during the game will open up a field wherein you can enter a variety of commands.
If an NPC does not offer a necessary topic:
Open the console, left-mouse click on the NPC (the NPC's name should now read across the top of the console box), and type in:
AddTopic "name of the topic"
…And then hit enter and then close the console.
Example: AddTopic "Personal Vengeance"
If your journal does not clear after completing a quest:
You need to know the journal heading from TESCS as well as the number associated with it -- I'll provide these for bugs I've encountered. Open the console and type:
Journal "name of journal from TESCS" number associated with completion
…And then hit enter and then close the console.
Example: Journal "HR_RansomMandas" 100
If you cannot find or access a location (called a "cell"):
Open the console and type:
COC "name of the cell from the TESCS"
…And hit enter and then close the console.
Example: COC "Mila-Nipal, Manat's Yurt"
If you want to identify major geographic locations:
This is the closest to a cheat you'll get from me here -- it basically marks locations on the map that I will not give directions to. Please note that these are simply the main cities and sites on the map that I would assume most inhabitants would know anyway. Open the console and type: FillMap …And hit enter and then close the console.
P.S.: the console is not case-sensitive.
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