I'll give it a think about joining in officially....when would I have to announce participation by?

been giving a practice run a go for a couple hours on adept and seem to be managing pretty well as a heavily armoured breton male (I also very rarely play male characters since moving to pc)

Rick, IIRC forges only apply a very small amount of damage and also a minuscule amount of destruction experience.....as far as I know, not worth it.

I had forgotten about the magic pillar thing, but tbh it's not something I would have been likely to exploit if i'm adhering to competition rules. Regardless, mod is disabled now just to make sure I don't accidentally catch a fire and heal with spells where I wouldn't have to vanilla

edit; freewitch, i think that may have been aimed at me, not you....just a name mix-up

Who am I? Brambleberry

Who are you? Tal

What are you? Breton

Tiara or Crown Jewels? Male

You being difficult? Legendary

AccidentalNinja....FreeWitch ..yep sorry.... ..


To anewer the question. ..you can enter any time before the end of the round. .. before the last week might be the best time thoufg.

Personally, I agree with Rick regarding spamming a skill. I don't really see it as a cheat. Given a limited amount of time, you have to know that people will have to spam skills like smithing and destruction and/or pay for training. Some skills raise so slowly that in a hundred hours you'd be doing good to hit 50...

My test character for instance is now at level 31, has just under 50 hours in, and his skills are scattered all over the place. He just hit 60 in smithing a couple of hours ago, his heavy armor is about 32 give or take. Block is at 45, Destruction is barely 30... one-handed is 85, and it's still almost impossible for me to win (or even survive) in a heads up melee. If people on consoles couldn't spam skills, then it would be a cheat, but as it stands anyone has the opportunity. Given the skill restrictions nobody is going to survive Dimhollow on any difficulty above adept without grinding those skills. I just made it to the Soul Cairn, and I have to say that my skill levels were barely enough to allow me to survive on legendary... and at that level, there are things in that castle that are not beatable at all with more normal means.

Anyway, you folks will just have to do what you think is right on a personal level, but I won't be holding skill grinding against anybody 'cuz I know I'm going to be doing some of that myself... and I expect anybody else playing on Legendary to do the same. There just isn't enough time to do anything else.

was going to be a good Vampire and sit this round out .................But look at all the MENU.............. YUM YUM YUM

Sah

Sah

Female

Nord

Legendary

will post first scores tonight ............might as well do it now ..........it will be level 20 .................this is a no mercy round "will svck your Blood"............ YUM YUM YUM ..............

PS ..............the ENB did not work ...........

SAH.....Don't fret honey......it just means the ENB did not work...YET.


The secret of happiness is to enjoy the best looking Skyrim you can on one profile......whilst gradually ironing out the ENB thing overtime on another profile.


Words of wisdom for life follow.....

"Be content with what you have whilst working towards what you want"


It warms my heart (amongst other things) to see a lavish splash of pink once more


You better make a quick start on that "menu" cos the Contessa is already sharpening her canines with her nail file

Yus.


Month in Sweden then moving East with mom in August. She's having... Issues.


I should know in a week or so if I can actually do this one. Might squeeze it in.

I think you may be underestimating the difference between Adept and Legendary. I just looked at my test Altmer mage's stats, just after Dimhollow.

Level 8, just over 8 hours of play time.

Destruction 42, Illusion 33, Restoration 21

Smithing 16 (skill book), Heavy Armor 19, Block 15, 1-Hand 16 (skill book), Light Armor 15

Health 130 (plus blessing of Arkay and a minor ring), Magicka at 270 with bonuses, Armor rating is 26 (boots and gauntlets)

It was basically a cakewalk, using runes and firebolts. I'm pretty sure I could have done it at Expert, without too much trouble.

OK...so I think I have everyone's entry so far... If I have missed anyone...please let me know!! This look's to be a nice round!! I'll get going probably tomorrow night or Friday morning, I have work tomorrow am...

Looking good, Areial!

My first test character took into Dimhollow couldn't survive at all. He could complete the quest, but NOT without dying. I didn't even bother to take that one into the area after releasing the lady... Of course, that was exactly the reason I created that character, to learn what worked and what did not.

I don't believe I've ever done that quest on vanilla adept at all, which may explain my perception that adept isn't all that different. Normally, I'd have Deadly Dragons and Deadly Monsters (along with Immersive Creatures and others) hard at work, and even Bleak Falls is quite challenging, let alone Dimhollow. Which of course also explains my notion of the necessity of grinding skills on Legendary.

The thing is that we each choose our difficulty level, and then do what we have to do to enable our characters to survive as long as we stay within the rules. If you want an eye-opener, make a save at the entrance to Dimhollow, then some time later on load it up and take your same character through Dimhollow on Legendary...

Level 0

still installing mods

but ...............run run run...........yum yum yum ...........giggles

I'm stuck in a Hank Williams Twilgiht Zone...

"Did you ever see a night so long,

When time goes crawling by,

The Moon just went behind a cloud,

To hide its face and cry..."

Adella wants to look her best for the competition, so she is insisting on something special from her private photographer. But being the demanding diva that she is, I just can't find a perfect look that she is happy with. I have tried getting some opinions from the below stairs staff, but they all seem too frightened to be honest about anything! Well, except Bertie Crabtree the stablehand. He had a lot of unusual opinions about how the Contessa should look, but he seems to have disappeared!


Oh well, just keep clicking away I guess. She says I can take a room in the east wing if I need to continue tomorrow.....I was hoping to leave for home before sundown, what with all the vampires about an all

I look forward to creating Rhea, tonight. It's been a long while since I've played a female character.

Heh, kinda funny. I'll be playing a male Skyrim character for the first time in... oh, two or three years.

Nevermind, lol. I just realized I played an Orc female only 2 comps ago.

That's actually the reason I said what I did, and it appears that we agree. I've briefly tested it at high difficulty; one needs to be very well "prepared" beforehand. At Expert, though, I found that it was feasable; my character could survive, and if I had been playing at Expert prior to that point (thus accruing more skill-points), I'm pretty sure it would have been comparable to Adept.

The primary early problem with our limited skill set is that we have no practical ranged attack at all until we raise Destruction. Firebolt is not a very effective projectile, and it takes too much magicka to cast, to be useful. The most effective Destruction spells at early levels are the Runes, which can be used as ranged "grenades" with the Rune Master perk (Destruction level 40.)

Glargg, Tyler had not problem with fire bolts getting through BFB... at lvl 5 Adept... that is as far as I got really..other than random bandits and Embershard mine.

Ignatius and Faendal blew through BFB and then took on Mirmulnir. BFB presented little problem once I slowed down (had a hairy moment with the first Draugr encounter). Mirmulnir nearly roasted Iggy a couple of times, and as noted above, the apprentice level destruction spells stink. Iggy would get one or two ice spikes off then have to go hide in the tower. However, now he is Dragonborn and is picking up odd jobs around Whiterun. He needs a fair amount of experience before heading to the more treacherous parts of Skyrim. He is currently wearing steel armor, with the Imperial Captain's helmet. His only enchanted gear is an amulet of Zenithar. He has just crafted a dwarven sword that he needs to break in. Currently, Iggy is level 7.

Decided to throw my hat in, what the heck....not that I expect to come close to winning haha

Me: AccidentalNinja

Char: Gabriel

Race: Breton

Gender: Male

Difficulty: Adept

So far in 95 minutes of play Gabriel has cleared through Helgen by the side of Ralof, made his way to Riverwood and sold off all his possessions, crafted banded iron armour and shield, acquired a fury spell from Lucan, cleared Embershard Mine and made his way to Whiterun. Currently in Dragonsreach to speak to the Jarl at level 2.

Not the quickest off the blocks, but we'll get there....next on the purchase list is a turn undead spell to practice on draugr in BFB and a firebolt/rune spell to cook bandits with before moving on to get the Lord Stone and maybe entertaining a diversion on behalf of Lady Mara to build a base for taking on vampires

YAY! AccidentalNinja

Okies we are off and running. Itaei made it through Helgen with Ralof and then went about his way after grunting at Gerdur. Embershard Mine is cleared and he's on his way to Whiterun.

Fun Fact: On his test run he didn't run into one two hander. This time, he's run into 3 already and he just reached level 2. There has been a LOT of running away and circling already.

Ooopss ... almost forgot. Here's a pic of the handsome fella

http://i.imgur.com/MCowacX.jpg

A Ninja.....glad ya made it mate.


The Contessa is not yet fully motivated and last time I checked, she was sat in the drawring room at Nascosta-mente Manor, by a roaring log fire sipping at a slim cigar whilst swirling a matured Cognac in a ridiculously over sized brandy glass.


Apparantly she needs to relax a while because riding around the paddock is so exhausting.......quietly and privately the servants thought so too.

Yes, firebolt is fine in BFB at low level. Flames is enough in BFB; the only place you would need anything longer range might be the bandits outside. I was thinking about Dimhollow and beyond.

I've just bought myself some nice new headphones (my old ones were falling apart), and now the sound of Skyrim is special.

Lolly Gaggin has arrived in Riverwood fresh out of Helgen with a big armload of junk to sell. And Gerdur gave her a Necklace of Minor Haggling. How handy is that?

yes... but if you keep destruction "balanced" ( as well as possible ) by the time firebolt isn't as effective as it should be, Fireball is useable. Fireball with the right perks and magic "points" plus amulet or what ever one has found/bought. If one can combine flames, fire runes, Stendar's Aura ( or flame cloak... someone gives you some nice ones to "try out") and a weapon with a fire enchant ( for desperate times ) Also Staff's saved for desperate times... In a very hostile place a staff of paralyze and fire wall might just be the difference between a redo and life.