So every once in a while when I get bored I decide to follow around one of the patrols on the road (Thalmor, Imperial, Stormcloak) and it is interesting to watch them deal with various road-side threats such as bandits and animals.


Today I encountered a Thalmor patrol and followed them a while, eventually they caught up to another Thalmor patrol (with prisoner) so I held up the guys at the front so they would be in a perfect line. So from Rorikstead to Markarth I had my own little parade of Facist Altmer to keep me company and it was very interesting.


Way back when when I had a Stormcloak character I used to free the prisoners and give them weapons, armor, and food and then protect them all the way to Windhelm...was very fun.


Anyone else ever do this? Tell the story

I not only follow them I incorporate them in a character's roleplaying. One of my characters, a kind of guerrilla-style "freedom fighter," put on Imperial armor and masqueraded as a soldier in order to free the prisoner. She followed the patrol until it was far away from civilization and then killed the guards and freed the prisoner. Emboldened by her success, she spent the rest of her game freeing prisoners.

A couple of my characters have followed caravans. I roleplayed that they were hired by the caravan as a guard to protect the caravan as they travel from city to city. I gave them their own portable tent and stump to sit on so they could chill out while the caravan was camped outside of towns.

I don't follow any but I like to snipe the Thalmor because they are jerks and they mess with me first.


I don't know why but every charactor that ive played eventually gets a bounty by them.

Interesting idea, especially at lower levels it might be a good way to pick up free loot from whatever they kill! Unfortunately, at higher levels, Thalmor patrols don't seem to live long enough to accomplish much!

Yes, but I must say that Buffy even sometimes follows butterflies. . . .

Actually, it depends on who it is. For she has learned that bad things generally happen to those in the same cell as she as they run into all the random encounters meant for her.

She cares not a wit for either side in the humans' civil war but she does respect all soldiers and has always been welcome in both their camps - she usually brings venison to share when asking to share their campfire. So will not 'jinx' them by following along behind their patrols. In fact she might even precede them to clear the way.

She doesn't care for those Alikr fellows harassing all the Redguard women in Skyrim though, so she's happy enough to trail along behind them until a bear eats them.

She considers Azura one of her friends so doesn't exactly buy the overzealous act of the Vigilants. She tries to neither help nor cause them harm.

That leaves the Thalmor. As an elf, she feels quite the special dislike for these pompous embarrassments to elvenkind. She normally prepares herself for a fight and talks to them, taunting them into attacking her (no bounties for her). Then has a great time honing her horse archery skills as ske kills them in 'self-defense'.

I've never followed the patrols around, but I don't mind ambushing thalmor when ever I see them on the road.

My previous character liked to taunt the Thalmor also. Why worry about a bounty when they were so accommodating as to attack first? LOL Then she sold their gear. She left the army patrols alone.

If only they'd walk faster . . .

yeah they often stop for no reason and make you wait a bit but on the bright side they are just slow enough for you to run off and collect loot and still catch up again

None of my characters have followed those patrols as of yet, but back near when I first started playing Skyrim, my character came across Faldrus, that dark elf who is on a pilgrimage to the Shrine of Azura. I really wanted to go see that shrine and so followed along with him for quite some distance. Unfortunately, something attacked that got a bit out of hand and I lost him. I checked up and down the road to no avail and hoped he hadn't gotten eaten in the attack. I never found his body at least.

That character didn't last too long before I got interested in someone else, and it was only later that I realized that it was possible to run into Faldrus anywhere in Skyrim and that he also wasn't always going in the right direction to the shrine. Still, I've wondered if one does manage to stick with him the entire way if he will eventually end up at the shrine, but I haven't experimented with following him again to find out. I've never actually seen him there though at any of the times my characters visited.

I had a character who would regularly follow merchant caravans in Fallout 3 and it made me think about creating a Khajiit character who was part of one of Rashaad's merchant caravans, but I never did get around to doing it.

I liked following Ulfric, that was a fun time, LOL. You only get a couple of opportunities, depending on if you do the CW on the Stormcloak side, but he's a riot to travel with, he attacks everything, and the dialog makes me lmao.

Sometimes, the Thalmor head all the way to Solitude iirc

I've followed them in the past watch them get into a fight and loot all the corpses afterwards, if you don't feel like a scrap yourself or aren't up to it yet a good way of getting some decent armour early on.

I believe that once they're out of sight or range of the player they despawn anyway so I wouldn't worry too much about it.

Oh, the other group that's just hilarious to follow, or even try to follow: the man and his wife trying to get to Solitude (presumably for Vittoria's wedding? Don't remember for sure....) Seriously, I've met them near Meridia's shrine, then fast-traveled to Markarth and met them AGAIN. I was like.... HUH?

Seriously hysterically funny (at least to me)!

I've seen them down south, heading towards Riften, and they get so irate about *me* causing them delays. After that attitude, I conveniently never told them they were heading the wrong way!

During my Sanguine Rose quest, I had to stop off at Rorikstead. On my way there, I picked up and followed a Thalmor patrol (no prisoner).

So, I went to get Gleda back tried to get the Giant to follow me back to Rorikstead. He quit chasing before we got there, even with me sniping at him. Well, Gleda got delivered and I went on my way, only to catch up to the Thalmor being accosted by the bandits at that crossroad ambush site. I just let the scenario play out, which the Thalmor won handily.

I did not follow them to Robber's Gorge, going to Whiterun, instead.

I have waited for a nobel and his guard at Robber's Gorge, though. A couple of times. That never goes well for the noble

my previously mentioned parade of Thalmor went through Robber's Gorge, it was a glorious fight to see

I've tried following the random wilderness mercenaries several times but always ran out of patience in the end and gave up trying to see if they go anywhere in particular. I'm guessing they don't.

I've never tried following patrols, but I did encounter a farmer just outside Dragon Bridge who was on his way to Solitude. I walked alongside him, we got to the carriage outside Solitude - and he took a right turn. I followed him past the stables, past the docks, and stopped him again to ask where he was going. He replied "I'm on my way to Solitude to join the Legion. A united Empire blah blah blah." I really wanted a dialogue option to say "...but it's RIGHT THERE!"

Maybe he was headed towards that super secret entrance to Solitude. Maybe he got cold feet and didn't want to admit it. I just shrugged and let him go his merry way.

Never followed a patrol but I followed a Stormcloak Courier once. He ran into Riverwood and caused a riot. By the time I arrived, Stump the dog was dead, the Courier was fighting the guards, the kids were crouched down saying "why are they hurting each other?" and Gerdur and the Smith were fighting. I don't know if his warhammer could crush a giant's head like a walnut but Gerdur's iron dagger was no match for him. Sometimes being curious can lead to a complete disaster. Interesting to watch though.

I've followed different ones from time to time. Like others, I have had characters that would protect as well as stage an ambush.

Once, and only once, I had an encounter with Elenwen on the road towards Falkreath from the Guardian Stones. I was on my way to Markarth and thought we would travel together as far as she could. However, it wasn't long after leaving Rorikstead that she simply vanished right in front of me.

I guess her AI grew tired and decided to fast travel the rest of the way.

A bit off topic, but that reminded me of a question I've been meaning to ask. I sometimes meet mercenaries who are on their way to handle some sort of problem. I offer to do it, and they give me the job with a warning to make sure I take care of things as their reputation is on the line. I think they usually give me some gold to.

The problem is, I've never been able to figure out what I was supposed to go do! I didn't see any new quests, and I figured they added something to my map, but I could never figure out what.

So how the heck do you know what the "job" was?!?!?

Well.... I've never noticed anything added to the map (you usually get a "map updated" message when that happens). But a few times I've waited a bit, then followed said merc toward the "job" - and it's usually been something that I've got a minor lead-in for in the quest log. The last time I was on my way to - oh phoo wait while I pull up the map since I can't remember its name - ah! Lost Tongue Overlook. Met the merc, speech skill not high enough, didn't want to fight her, so just followed along and gosh, she headed right for the dragon roosting on the word wall. I would have saved her if I could have - but I was pretty damn busy keeping my own skin in one piece....

I tried that once. Was following a Thalmor patrol out of simple curiosity when an elder dragon attacked. The High elves tried really hard to beat that damn thing, but the big mean dragon was too strong. It bit down on one of them and threw him like, 20 yards and turned the other two into Altmer toast. The funny thing though? The prisoner was half a mile down the road, running his ass off. I ended up following him back to rorikstead where he just sat down at the bar and drank for awhile.

Freedom fighter.....huh. This gives me a play-through idea! Thanks Pseron!

The first time I played out the whole Companions' Quest I ran with the Circle from Whiterun to Ysgramor's Tomb and it was the most exhilirating thing that I'd ever experienced in the game. We took out random spiders and bandits on the road, ran through a Giant camp, it was awesome! Like, "Ain't obody messin' with my clique!" But then we got up around Winterhold and they started taking ridiculous roundabout loops and going in circles and Birgitte just went, "Uh, guys... it's that way. You wanna just- oh, no? OK I'll just meet you there."


I also try to run after the Headless Horseman but I can never catch him.

The same thing happened to me when I went with Companions to that Tomb. I guess Bethesda didn't really think we'd be crazy enough to actually follow them all the way there and didn't test the pathing.

I had no idea there was a Headless Horseman, after playing hundreds of hours (and some games with no fast travel) until just a couple of weeks ago when I saw this ghostly horse-shaped thing in the distance, came closer and saw a headless horseman! Amazing! I was able to follow it back to where it was going though.