"The region inside the Ghostfence is dangerous, and the Nerevarine will need to be familiar with its particular challenges. After measuring skills and resources against Dagoth Ur's defenses, the Nerevarine will know better how to pace a campaign, alternating raids with improving skills, getting better equipment, and stockpiling resources... Dagoth Ur's kin have become markedly more powerful in recent decades, after remaining stable for thousands of years. If they can be individually isolated and destroyed, they will not be able to support Dagoth Ur in later stages of the war."
- Vivec, "Plan to Defeat Dagoth Ur"

I never felt like the assault on the Sixth House citadels was much of a "campaign"; it was more the case that I was able to make a single trip up Red Mountain, grab the necessary artifacts and take out Dagoth Ur with ease. Dagoth Ur's "kin" certainly never presented much of a challenge. I wanted to make the idea of this campaign more of a reality, so that each Ash Vampire slain felt like an accomplishment, and progress towards the ultimate goal of killing Dagoth Ur.

This mod gives every one of Dagoth Ur's kin one or more special properties, based on the properties of the randomly-found unique monsters in Diablo II. These "properties" can come in the form of new abilities, spells, or both. My aim was to make every Dagoth creature feel like a boss fight, each requiring different tactics and preparation. This makes them a lot more challenging, but hopefully also more satisfying. Only the named "Dagoths" have been changed, generic Sixth House creatures (i.e. "Ascended Sleeper", "Ash Ghoul") are unaffected.

Vivec's "Plan to Defeat Dagoth Ur" mentions the need to alternate raids with "improving skills, getting better equipment, and stockpiling resources". That should now be much more apparent; health, magicka and fatigue potions are obviously very useful, but now also you might consider a healthy supply of potions that allow you to resist magicka, or more specifically fire, frost, poison and shock. A good spell will also come in handy where a weapon just won't do the job, and vice versa.

This mod has been designed to interfere with the original game as little as possible; killing the seven Ash Vampires will still weaken Dagoth Ur in the normal way, Dagoth Gares will still greet you, and all new spells have been scripted, so the actual behaviour of the Dagoth creatures has not been affected. However, this may conflict with other mods that alter these creatures.

When a Dagoth comes in sight, a message box will appear telling you of their properties. The properties you might encounter are listed below; "Abilities" permenantly affect the creatures, "Auras" affect you whenever you come close to the creatures and "On Death" spells will be cast in your direction when the creatures die, so get out of there quick!

BLINDING
Aura: Blind (Note: a Fortify Attack effect is also applied to make up for the severity of the blindness)

CORRUPTING
Aura: Drain Health, Drain Fatigue

CURSED
Aura: Drain Attributes

EXTRA FAST
Ability: Fortify Speed

EXTRA STRONG
Ability: Fortify Strength, Fortify Endurance, Fortify Health

FIRE ENCHANTED
Ability: Immune to Fire
Aura: Fire Damage
On Death: Fire Nova

FROST ENCHANTED
Ability: Immune to Frost
Aura: Frost Damage, Drain Speed
On Death: Frost Nova

GHOSTLY
These creatures are slow but deadly.
Ability: Chameleon, Drain Speed, Fortify Strength (and enhanced damage)

IMMUNE TO MAGIC
Ability: Immune to Magic (ALL harmful magic)

IMMUNE TO PHYSICAL
Ability: Immune to Physical (ALL weapons)

MAGIC RESISTANT
Ability: Resist Magic (ALL harmful magic)

MAGICKA BURN
Aura: Drain Magicka

POISON ENCHANTED
Ability: Immune to Poison
Aura: Poison Damage
On Death: Poison Nova

REGENERATION
Ability: Restore Health

SHOCK ENCHANTED
Ability: Immune to Shock
Aura: Shock Damage

STONE SKIN
Ability: Resist Physical (ALL weapons)

THORNS
Any physical damage you deal to these creatures will be dealt back to you.
Ability: Thorns

I tried to give each Dagoth abilities that fitted with their location; for instance, several of those near lava have been made Fire Enchanted, and many of those in Dagoth Ur's citadel are somewhat more powerful than the others. See the readme for a full list of the Dagoths and their new properties.

This is a great idea and I like your implementation.

Have you thought much on how the Ash Vampires tend to attack immediately rather than allow the player to view their dialogue? This is kind of sad because the dialogue obviously gives them all more character, but I guess it's important so that the player doesn't go around looting everything and then just calmly strolling out? Here is a page with Dagoth Odros' dialogue that I've never seen in-game:
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Morrowind:Dagoth_Odros
Also, the page mentions something about how killing each minor Dagoth is supposed to weaken Dagoth Ur: "However, extensive testing in the community suggests that this has no effect on your final battle with Dagoth Ur." Have you looked into this at all?

I'm definitely going to try this.

I have a little suggestion, too. I believe it is supposed to be especially dangerous to rest inside Ghostgate. That always made me *expect* Dark Brotherhood-like attacks or at least those terrible nightmares given to the player by Dagoth Ur in the beginning, but nothing really seems to happen if you're away from the standard spawn points. I certainly agree that the atmosphere of Red Mountain certainly isn't as foreboding as it seems it should be. Do you think adding such things to keep the PC from resting comfortably inside the Ghostgate would work in your mod?

I'm not sure why the "weakening" doesn't actually work, but it's possible that it wasn't an oversight and the devs just decided that they couldn't do it the way they wanted so they disabled it.

That's a good point, I never really knew that dialogue existed... Maybe I could make them greet the player before attacking, just like Dagoth Gares. It would definitely make them seem more significant, and much cooler plot-wise I think, as Vivec's "Plan to Defeat Dagoth Ur" mentions that they'll probably think you've come to challenge them in order to ascend in House Dagoth.

I already use Sleeper's Awake, but I'm not too fond of not being able to sleep in inclement weather *at all*. I've slept out in the rain plenty of times, so I don't see why it should be impossible for the PC, even without a tent. I prefer the idea that something is actually keeping the player awake rather than the idea that the PC is just too dumb to cover her head with an animal skin or even a broad leaf.

Not that I think there's anything wrong with the mod or how others rp; I just see my character as at least being able to do what I have done.

I have to assume this is not compatible with Darknut's Greater Dwemer Ruins volume 1.

If that's the case, any chance for a patch?

I feel the same way. I just assume that my character has an invisible backpack that contains a tent, bedroll, food, water and he manages all that stuff on his own when I'm not looking at the screen. For coinage, I assume that there are various types of coins so when I'm carrying around 10000 gold I'm carrying just ten 1000 gold pieces rather than dragging around an enormous, heavy sack of gold.