With the newly released free download of The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall, many of us finally get to experience for the first time what we have often heard is the best game in the series so far. With that, many of us could use a little bit of help getting our feet off the ground. Here is a thread where Daggerfall veterans can post tips and advice for the new Daggerfall players, like things to do, things not to do, character creation tips, etc. and new Daggerfall players can post questions pertaining to early gameplay. This thread is specifically for gameplay issues so please, no technical "how do I install?" etc. questions and PLEASE no spoilers.

So Vets, any tips?

Nvm

Sure thing.

#1 rule of Daggerfall: save often!
#2 rule for Daggerfall: use multiple slots for one character!

First is because the game can crash randomly. It doesn't happen nearly a often as people like to say, but it happens.
Second is because saves can get corrupted. You'll be glad you had a backup if this happens.

Mouse Freelook: Yes, Daggerfall can be configured to use mouselook so it plays similar to Morrowind. Hit ESC -> Controls -> Mouse and switch it to View.

Now with the rest of the controls, look for "activate center object." This is what you use to 'click' on whatever you're looking at. However, there is no crosshair to help you point at something; luckily you can always "activate cursor" to get your pointer back when you need it. Helpful for when you have to pull a lever or pick up a small vial from the floor.

Horse And Wagon: General Stores sell horses and wagons, in addition to the usual stuff. Horses can be ridden by pressing T, and also really speed up your fast-travel time. Wagons help you carry a ton more stuff--however, they cannot be accessed while you are in a dungeon. Clicking on the dungeon exit while inside a dungeon will ask you to either exit the dungeon or access your wagon without leaving. It is nice that you can access your wagon without leaving, because if you leave the dungeon will reset!

NEVER BUY MORE THAN ONE HORSE OR ONE WAGON. The game will glitch. besides, you can never sell them back, so you'll be stuck with them forever.

Daedric, orcish, impish, etc. are languages not armor skills. There is no armor skill. Language skills are largely regarded as useless. The speechcraft skills are etiquette and streetwise.

There are also good guides around at the UESP, http://www.izhtex.com/tes2/, and I also have a guide on http://www.gamefaqs.com/computer/doswin/file/29065/50211, to name a few.

My tips to start a good game are:

1) Install the game and the 213 patch
2) Extract the http://www.uesp.net/file.shtml?dagger/files/addquest.zip in the ARENA2 folder (they are official but were released with a special CompUSA edition back in 1996)
3) Extract http://uesp.net/wiki/File%3a%44FQFIX.ZIP in the ARENA2 folder (to keep Morrowind and Oblivion players terms, it's a kind of 'Unofficial Daggerfall Patch' however it fixes only quests)
4) Open your z.cfg file and change the following lines:
pathcd d:\dagger\arena2\
...
controls betaplyr.dat
to:
pathcd c:\dagger\arena2\
...
controls viewplyr.dat
This will make the exe point to your Daggerfall installation directory instead of your CD (of course change the D and C letters according to your own configuration). The second modification will toggle mouse look mode with WASD controls already set like in any modern first person game.
5) Run DOSBox and setup your sound to use MPU401 for MIDI music and Sound Blaster Pro for sound sfx.
6) Start the game, make a new character (say 'yes' when asked if you want to use the tutorial) and once in the game, switch to full screen mode to get rid of the bottom menu (which is unused in mouse look mode). You will then see the same life, mana and fatigue bars on the bottom left as in Morrowind and Oblivion, and a direction compass on the bottom right.
7) Once you're done with the tutorial (your character should have exited the dungeon and be in the Daggerfall city at that time), look at MarStinson's excellent http://www.tesguides.com/tes2/index.htm to get some nice playing tips.

My tip is to make use of your savegame folder. In the game, you only have a very limited amount of saves - 10 iirc? So if you want to make a new char and naturally use all your available save slots without losing your other chars, swap out the desired saves to a backup folder. Your save slots in-game will be freed up for more use.

6, shame on you

Do you know where I could find my saves on my Mac?

The file is where ever ya mounted the folder (dosgames I assume)/DAGGER/ and ya should see like SAVE#. Copy and paste it somewhere where ya keep ya extra save and rename it if ya have to. I always do this myself and end up with a lot of saves.

My advice is to use the premade class for experiment and ya own custom-made class in ya final game.

1.) Start with a pre-made class to understand how the game works, then try out making your own (classes you make yourself are far better, if done right)

2.) You can't sleep in town (it's actually a crime) so if you have to wait for a store to open or anything like that, only use loiter.

3.) If you commit a crime and the guards are called, your reputation is only effected if they hit you and the "do you surrender to the city guards?" message pops up.

4.) Always use recall before entering a dungeon, many of the dungeons are just ridiculously large and winding, and if you find your quest objective you may not be able to find your way out.

5.) A good way to train yourself fighting things is to go off into the wilderness and sleep (for awhile: 99 hours) until you are awoken by an enemy.

probably not, but ill ask anyway - any way to set or hack in 'wasd' movement options in the game instead of the old style underworld 2 mouse arrow movement controls?

Just go to options and change controls.

http://www.svatopluk.com/daggerfall/secrets/rusty.stm

my tip make sure to check the name of the place your supose to go so you won't make a unessisary trip to someplace.....I just did this got singing star mixed up with singing seer...

Tips for surviving the void:

First off, someone is going to tell you you need to enable cheat mode to use this trick. They are wrong. Whether cheat mode is on or off, you can always hit "Alt-F11", which will return you to the previous spot you were standing. This is of particular value if you fall into the void: it will get you out. (If you've just reloaded a save and have no walking/jumping/falling history, it will take you back to the dungeon entrance, which is really useful if you've gotten impossibly lost, which can happen in this game.) However, when it gets you out, you will "impact" taking the accumulated falling damage. So you want to do one of three things: hit it quickly, to minimize falling damage. If you can cast slowfall, that can save you from the damage as well. (Don't use levitation: when it goes active, you "impact" meaning if you're falling and try to use levitate to save yourself, you may die.)

But there's a third option, a little cheat you can do in return for the game cheating you. If you fall in the void for a really long time (go get a snack or something, or spend some time writing your travels in this thread), eventually, the falling damage will turn negative. What this means is that when you hit Alt-F11, you will take falling damage... which will ADD to your hit point total! For the computer-science savvy, what is happening here is that the damage is stored as a signed integer, and there is no upper bound testing. So the damage will increment past the point where the sign-bit is flipped.

Finally, for those of you playing mages who can levitate at will, don't be afraid to use the void to your advantage. If you levitate up to a downward sloping ceiling (like in a stairway), crouch, and levitate up, you can easily get into the void on purpose. Now you can run along the tops of passages in complete safety, as the monsters cannot get to you. Just be sure you can levitate again, to get back into realspace the same way you got out (come up through the stairs). Call it a cheat if you want; I call it "voidwalking", a special technique for mages. I sometimes use this to get past tough monsters I don't want to have to deal with, particularly those occasional level-inappropriate encounters.

There are great guides on the net explaining everything about Daggerfall. This hint i haven't seen anywhere so i will post it here. Use the mini map that shows to the left of the 3D map view to orient yourself inside a big dungeon. This is still the best way besides dropping worthless loot to mark corridors. The minimap is a yellow patch of squares with a small red dot and a black dot indicating the player position and the exit. Privateers Hold has a mini map like this:

This is a yellow square represented with four chars either As or Bs if it's border squares:

X is to mark the exit and a P to mark the player position. In Privateers Hold the minimap is something like this:

__BB____BB__BBAXBBBBPABB__BB____BB__

As you can see there are five yellow squares and the player starts in the middle square and the exit is also in the middle but much above. Each yellow square is a dungeon block which i guess is twice taller than long. The four exterior blocks (the Bs) around the central one (the As) are composed of one or two long corridors and possible a room (with a tiger inside lol) that are used to close or connect the exits in each side of the middle block. That's why i made a distinction about those.

So my hint is, when you are exploring a big dungeon mark the passages that lead from on block to another with junk dropped in the floor and never explore another block before fully exploring the one you are in.

Huge dungeons have around 4-5 central blocks and i think the lair of the of the Wormgod (The Rift) has more. Each central block being the size of Privateers Hold. When you look at the minimap you will see something like this:

__BBBB__BBBBBBAAAABBBBAAAABBBBAAAAAABBBBPAAAAABB__BBBBBB__BBBBBB

This is the biggest dungeon you will find in the game and it will take maybe 8 hours of your time if you are new to the game to explore a dungeon like this. So always use the minimap for orientation.

Fortunately most dungeons only 2 or 3 times bigger than Privateers Hold. But there are a few that are a royal pain in the ass. If you find yourself in a dungeon that looks like you are navigating inside someone's intestines don't bother completing the quest and get out there. Those are a real pain.

Guild and merchant quests are not main quest related. So you can reject them without breaking the main quest flow. Also rejecting a quest does not lower your reputation with the related faction, but accepting and then failing does.

Be careful when speaking with royalty. Their quests may be related to Nobility faction OR the main quest. If it is part of the main quest and you reject it, there may be no turning back. If you get confused about main quests, consult the walkthrough at http://www.izhtex.com/tes2/

Also do not forget that there will be time limits on quests. Do one quest at a time. If you know a teleport spell, it will be wise to cast it and put an anchor near the quest giver. It will save you time when returning.

The first main quest, 'Meeting With Lady Brisienna' will be activated without prompting your acceptance, some time after you get out of Privateer's Hold. You will be notified by a letter. If you ignore it and it expires, you will not be able to advance in the main quest. You may feel a little constricted at first but it feels quite realistic if a bit unforgiving.

After that meeting, you will be totally free. Time limited quests will not be self activated.

Some main quests will have level limits. You may not get them before reaching a certain level.

Though my advice is to ignore the main quest until you get a hold of the game, I wouldn't ignore 'Meeting With Lady Brisienna'.

Unlike in Arena, Morrowind and Oblivion, money in Daggerfall is not weightless! So remember to put your gold in the bank!

When getting "Letter of Credit" from the bank (basically a check), the bank wants a share of the gold (11%). So if you want a letter of credit which is worth 100.000 gold, then you have to pay up 111.000. That also means that you need to have some spare money in your bank/inventory to get your letters of credit.

When you enter a store, a message is displayed. If the message about "rusty relics laying around and mice running over you feet", then you will get a lot of money by selling there, however the store got very poor weapons and other stuff. So make sure to read the message that appears to check the quality of the items, and how easy it is to sell things there.

Remember that guild reputation and your standing with the law will slowly go towards "0" with one reputation point every month. Quests that you complete will award 5 reputation points (there are a few quests that will raise it by 10) and failure will reduce it by 2 points. (Yes, it's possible to get kicked out of the guild if your reputation gets low enough)

Get the spell "Recall" early in the game, "levitation", "water breathing" and "open" are all spells that is almost required to get through dungeons. If your character can't cast magic, try to get a enchanted piece of clothing or something similar with the same effect.

"Fenrick's Door Jam" is a spell that locks the door, it does not "unlock" it.

And one last thing, failing on a quest is not the end of the world! If you can't find the quest object/person in a dungeon and have searched a while, then you can just wait until the deadline and get a new quest, you won't get kicked out of the guild because you failed one quest!

Dungeon Exploration

These dungeons are ridiculously huge and difficult to navigate, if you don't know the trick. Pick a wall (I use the left). Follow it, unceasingly. Make sure to find any secret doors on that wall (they show up on the map screen). Keep following it until you find the entrance on the left wall once again (go full circle). If you haven't found your goal yet, follow the left wall again, but check the map at intersections to see if you've been down them before. If so, keep following the left wall, until you do find a corridor you haven't been down or a room you haven't entered. At that point, drop something on the ground, and go down that corridor or enter that room, following your new left wall. Keep going until you go full circle again, finding your little pile of treasure. Follow the left wall a second time, looking again for corridors you haven't found. Keep doing this recursively until you are finding no more unexplored corridors, then return to the original treasure pile... and resume searching the left wall again. If this is confusing, here's some pseudocode:

explore(x)	follow left wall full circle	follow left wall, check for unexplored intersection	if unexplored intersection: turn around, explore(intersection)

Grr... my command of English is insufficient to the task... and I am a well read native speaker.

Some excellent advice here, just wanted to say thanks.


This game is *******HUGE********. The size of towns and the dialogue options with npcs alone are almost overwhelming!! It blows Morrowind and Oblivion away as far as depth and scope. Much more realistic and immersive, but can also be a bit frustrating without patience.

Patience is a virtue rarely tested in computer games. Getting used to this game is a challenge all in its own, one I deeply appreciated once I'd successfully mastered it.

Since all of the tips so far have mostly been for people who approach the game right, I think it's time I gave one for the cheaters and power gamers out there: if you want to advance fast, go outside of a town and spam rest. Out by Daggerfall (the city) is a good place to do this, since you'll generally be heading out there anyways and it's very easy to see where the town ends and the wilderness begins (basically, the bumps start where the wilderness starts - this is pretty important, since resting in town is illegal and the game won't give you any warning before sending the guards out for you if you try it).

So, stand just a little ways out into the wilderness with enough room to back up a fair distance (but still within sight of the flat land around the city), face away from the city, and rest for 99 hours. Eventually an enemy will interrupt your rest. If it's weak (rats, bears, bats, most humanoids for example) then kill it. If, on the other hand, it's something like a spriggan or zombie (at lower levels, at least) and you aren't feeling particularly brave, turn tail and run back over to the flat part around the city - when you reach it, it'll load in the city and the enemy that's chasing you will vanish. Then get back onto the hilly bits, rest again, and repeat. Your skills and level will shoot up pretty quickly thanks to the fact that the enemies that pop up are scaled to your character, and you'll be able to find some amazing loot since drops don't seem to be limited to you if you're at a low level (expect to have at least one piece of elven or dwarven equipment before you hit level 2 or 3). And yes, this is basically cheating, but if you're finding the game hard it's a good way to tilt the scales a bit more in your favor without having to put a lot of effort into it.

Also, for combat, there's a trick that has worked in every single game in this series, and it probably works better in Daggerfall than in any of the other games. When fighting an enemy, move backwards constantly when you aren't attacking. When you are attacking, do the motion for the attack FIRST, and then move in when you reach the point in the animation where it hits the enemy (usually just about where the weapon is fully extended out), then quickly start backing away again. If you can get the timing down right and you have enough space to move, you should be able to make it virtually impossible for enemies to hit you (especially since enemies that use ranged attacks don't generally use them when you're that close in).

One other thing worth noting, and this one's a bit less cheap: weapons don't have a "best" way to be swung, but the direction you swing your weapon can actually be really, really important. It affects both accuracy and damage, and as a rule the more downwards you're doing an attack the more damage it'll do and the less accurate it'll be. That means that you should match the swing you use to the enemy you're fighting. Enemies like spriggans are ridiculously hard to hit but don't have all that much health, so stabbing is best with them. Enemies like giants, which can't dodge nearly as well but can take a decent amount of hits, should usually be approached with a solid downward swing. But in general, figuring out what to use with each enemy is going to be a matter of personal experience - your character's stats are going to have an effect on how easy or hard it is to hit enemies, and your approach should be to figure out just how inaccurate of a swing you can use to still get in a reasonable number of hits but do as much damage as possible.

Ok I installed the game and now I am wonder what kinda character should I make.

Is there one the is easily playable for newbies I am leaning towards a warrior type class.

Just because I've seen it asked before, you swing the weapon by holding down the right mouse button and moving the cursor around on screen.

When you buy houses, I think that the location is more important that size. Save before you buy it and make sure it's in a good part of town that you frequent often. I tend to like the medium sized house in Daggerfall in between the merchant's circle and the Knights of the Dragon for fighting characters. It's also next door to the fighter's guild, a couple armor stores, and the Odd Blades.

A battlemage is probably easiest for a new character. Anchor/Recall makes the game much easier, Open can keep you on the right side of the law (So you don't have to bash down doors in town when clients won't let you in), maybe some Banish Daedra and healing for the day to day operations. Levitate.

Also casting spells will let you advance in the mages guild enough to buy magical items from their merchant, that's a quick way to get quality enchanted armor. And the Mages guild has some good traffic with the daedra, so daedric items and daedric summoning let you have access to cool stuff most fighters have to work harder for.

*Here one. Have a pad and pencil beside ya. Ya will never know when ya encounter a map of a loot that lead to a dungeon with a hard-to-remember name!

*Remember that sleeping in town is against the rule. Loiter Around if ya have to wait in town. If ya want to rest in town, find an inn.