Elder Scrolls : Skyrim

[Felon]

Oh, yeah, I get that. But they are the only potential enemies that might not attack you for some reason. All other creatures attack you on sight. Humans may give you a warning to back off and then attack if you don't. If I shoot at a human and miss, they respond. They dragon won't unless he's already in attack mode.

If it's intentional that dragons don't always attack and sometimes just want to fly around and roar, they probably shouldn't state they are fixing that in the patch...

Well, quite a few mobs don't attack on sight. Pretty much all animals have a safe distance. And of course, the giants make it clear when you're invading their personal space.

Dragons are different from other creatures--and in this respect, easier to fight--in that they relent even when they're still healthy. Any other creature in aggressive mode never stops advancing until its near death, and maybe not even then. Dragons will fly off and come back, which is generally a losing proposition for them, and quite possibly the source of some dragon-specific behavioral bugs.

 

[Agamon]

Well, quite a few mobs don't attack on sight. Pretty much all animals have a safe distance. And of course, the giants make it clear when you're invading their personal space.

Yeah, I meant the more aggressive ones. Wolves and bears pretty much attack as soon as they spot you. You can walk right past a horsker though. And giants are obviously in the game as obstacles to sneak around, not fight. But if you fire an arrow at anything, it will defend itself. Maybe the dragon just knows that it's hard to attack because it can fly and screw the little peon down there, but I'm more inclined to it being a bug.

Dragons are different from other creatures--and in this respect, easier to fight--in that they relent even when they're still healthy. Any other creature in aggressive mode never stops advancing until its near death, and maybe not even then. Dragons will fly off and come back, which is generally a losing proposition for them, and quite possibly the source of some dragon-specific behavioral bugs.

Maybe, but I think it would be next to impossible to kill one if they just took off at 1/3 health, which would go against the idea of the game. Obviously they lose the abilty to fly once they take a certain amount of damage, so they pretty much need to fight to the death at that point anyway. And given how much damage a bite can do, it's a pretty good plan.

 

[Felon]

Yeah, I meant the more aggressive ones. Wolves and bears pretty much attack as soon as they spot you. You can walk right past a horsker though. And giants are obviously in the game as obstacles to sneak around, not fight.

I've had bears just sit and growl at me, but it does require a good deal of safe distance. As to giants--well, I've seen quests to slay them. They drop those ridiculous toes.

 

[Banshee16]

I haven't found giants that difficult to kill. They move relatively slowly, and I just back away and keep nailing them with spells. I find mammoths more difficult to kill because they move fast enough I can't get space to work.


I did see a flying mammoth the other day. I was sneaking up on it and all of a sudden it lifted off like a rocket, shot into the sky, then fell back to earth and died. I then looted the body.

Banshee

 

[Krug]

Finished the Stormcloak vs Imperial questline. It was kind of fun storming forts with a group, which made a nice change from dungeon crawling.

Been getting Words of Power quests from the Greybeards. The Dungeon crawls do get kind of tedious, especially when I can only find time to play during the weekend.

Still, kudos to Bethesda on creating such a deep world. Well thought out, with every city having its own unique qualities.

 

[frankthedm]

Finished the Stormcloak vs Imperial questline. It was kind of fun storming forts with a group, which made a nice change from dungeon crawling.

Yes, was fun, though the fight for the last fort managed to lag my 360 something fierce.

 

[Janx]

Finished the Stormcloak vs Imperial questline. It was kind of fun storming forts with a group, which made a nice change from dungeon crawling.

Been getting Words of Power quests from the Greybeards. The Dungeon crawls do get kind of tedious, especially when I can only find time to play during the weekend.

Still, kudos to Bethesda on creating such a deep world. Well thought out, with every city having its own unique qualities.

Which side did you fight for? The Imperials? Or Ulfric ElfHater?

 

[TarionzCousin]

The very last scenario in Act I has you interrupt Alduin resurrecting a dragon. You're supposed to arrive in Kyneshold (?) with an NPC. Another NPC runs out and says "Don't go there. There's a dragon attacking." You are supposed to follow your NPC ally up the hill and do battle.

First, my NPC wasn't there when I arrived.

Second, it was snowing so hard I couldn't tell where to go and I overshot the pathway. I ran around for five minutes, hearing the dragon talking, attacking, mocking me, etc. I couldn't find it. I finally stumbled across my NPC, knocked down (she would have been dead but she is unkillable) and locate the new dragon. I killed it easily.

But for a long time I thought I would fail due to extreme weather conditions.

The Dovhakin can slay many dragons, but he is as a newborn babe against the mightiest foe of all: snow.

 

[Krug]

Which side did you fight for? The Imperials? Or Ulfric ElfHater?

Stormcloaks. Ironic since I'm an Argonian.

 

[Banshee16]

I have a question...

Given the open world nature of the game, in theory anything can happen.

But I had an odd event the other day. I was on the A Night to Remember storyline, and woke up in Morgaz or whatever that city is in the far west side of the map. Anyways, after picking up some quests, I walked out of the city to go home. I set my feet on the road, and decided to walk back to Whiterun, instead of fast traveling, as I figured I may as well walk it the long way so I can see what there is to see in this wide world.

Anyways, on my way through the outskirts of the city, I passed a farm, and stopped to chat up the farmer. Turns out, he was very disappointed in his son, who had moved away to another town, and never visited anymore. He gave me a letter to bring to him, in which he said how disappointed he was in his son. I was thinking, "harsh, but ok...maybe they'll have a reconciliation if I bring the letter".

Interesting premise for a quest. So I got to walking again (apparently I didn't bring my horse with me on my drunken night of debauchery, but I *did* bring Lydia).

I crossed the bridge outside the city, and am climbing the foothills when I hear a roar echo off the mountains. I turn around, and see a dragon flying in. It blows a jet of flame with me, and I drive it off with some lightning bolt spells. And the dragon flies at the city.....right at the farm.

And all the guards swarm in to fight him off, and I'm on foot running back across the valley while the dragon is torching the farm and everything else it can see.

I get there and finish killing the dragon, and while looting the body, I find the crispy fried corpse of the farmer who just gave me the quest.

In the end I did give the letter to the son....but now it's a letter from a dead father, saying how disappointed he is that his son doesn't visit more often. But the dad's now dead....which the game doesn't seem smart enough to recognize.

This leads me to the question.....what if this had happened with a main quest line? Where I was supposed to bring something *back* to someone? And they got torched? Does that cause a bug? Does the quest just automatically fail? Or are NPCs in such a position unkillable?

Also, if my horse, my wardog, or my retainer Lydia die, are any of them replaceable? So far my horse is the only one who hasn't died, and he's taken on dragons. I've traditionally had those instances as the only places that I load a saved game, as I'm not sure if they can be replaced.

Banshee