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Yeah, all a woodcutter's axe is good for is getting firewood.

With some mills there's a quest available to do for them which allows you to use their sawmill to get wood for free, so you don't have to spend money on it.

I completed the Dawngaurd questline for the Volkihar, and now I'm building a house in the Morthal area. Is that chest beside the carpenter's table outside safe for storage?

Felina, Serana and Farkas started exploring Dustman's Cairn. At level 54, its just as hard a dungeon as it was when my Bosmer was level 19 or other. Epic battle between 2 draugr deathlords and one overlord in a crowded corner at the beginning of the dungeon. I didn't think Felina would make it, but she pulled through. I'm sure she'll die at least once going through there.

Finished Dawnguard on the Dawnguard side with Comes-Up-Last.

Then, as I was standing among the corpses of all those nightstalkers I knew so well in another life and wondering what to do next, I suddenly felt pangs of vampire nostalgia and loaded my Bosmer vamp for the first time in half a year. Set out from Castle V with just CuSith and Shadowmere, did some business & crafting in Solitude (after killing some Vigilants and imperial soldiers on the way), dropped by in Whiterun to look after the kids (who are probably turning into neglected urchins just like Marilyn herself was), hired Jenassa for company (I always thought the two would make a good team) and turned her into a vampire; she turned remarkably well, as Dunmer are wont to - even with the wrinkled nose her peculiar sinister beauty is still recognizable. I had just bought her a horse and we were setting out for Dawnstar when we were assaulted by an Awakened Dragon; fought it for what felt like half an hour, and just when we were beginning to make a sizable dent into its health I carelessly got too close to its maw and was treated to a nice animation of Marilyn being picked up, shaken, chewed and flung head-on onto a conveniently placed mountainside. Ouch. (But don't worry, I'll get the bugger tomorrow.)

Oh wow, that was in now way the last quest. I'm very glad I managed to get out of Solitude alive, dying in that ridiculous outfit would have been too much of an embarrassment... I ran back to the Sanctuary, looking over my shoulder the whole time. And just when I thought I was steering clear again and maybe things would be a bit less insane now, Astrid happened. I'm telling you, CoW sucked, but this questline is absolutely awesome.

With the exception of the one slight detail that somehow everyone stopped instantly recognizing me as the savior of the whole damn world as soon as I told them I was in fact someone else. Which doesn't make an ounce of bloody sense. Seriously, two seconds before I handed my papers to the Commander, one of the guards commented on my heroic battle with Alduin. Shouldn't the entire Skyrim be now aware that the Dragonborn is in fact Can you imagine some universally recognizable person suddenly taking up the life of crime and everyone ignoring it? Like, I don't know, Barack Obama the serial killer? Bono the drug trafficker? Stephen Hawking the arms dealer? "No sir, you are mistaken, I'm not the POTUS, I'm in fact... yyy... Jim! Yes, I'm Jim, the taxi driver. Not interesting at all. Now please, turn around so I can stab you in the back."

Yes. Well. Wow, sorry, got carried away a bit...

So now I'm running to Whiterun and very carefully avoiding any Imperial soldiers and I don't know how I'm going to show my face again in Haafingar again.

My PS3 Bosmer decided to do some dungeon diving (would have worked on Vulom, but it was too hot today for my PC). She went to Volunruud first and got a nasty surprise.

Apparently the dungeon still contains a Draugr Deathlord (ebony) Archer in the room that has the Ceremonial Axe. Poor Arandis was only level 26 at the time. The Deathlord was killing her in two shots (with the difficulty on novice). I opted for the shoot, run, and hide method. Took around 8-10 shots to bring it down.
After that, I made it through the dungeon just fine. Though I had a bit of an issue with the boss. Whatever his name is: the one who wields Okin and Eduj.
Realized too late that I didn't have any healing potions. Had to rely on my spell.

After that, she did some smithing and enchanting work in Whiterun before decided she needed to gather more Dwarven [&@%!] for making arrows (and leveling smithing enough so she could make glass gear). Went through Raldbtharz without any issue, but I picked up too much stuff. Had to walk from the top exit of the ruins all the way to Windhelm.

And you know what moments in Skyrim I really hate?
Those moments where you go "I hope I don't get attacked by a Dra-" only to have a Dragon attack you. Happened to Arandis at Anga's Mill. Of course, it just so happened to be a Frost (Arandis was level 29). Fought it and brought it down with the aid of fortify health potions, resist frost potions, and healing potions. And then waddled my way back to Windhelm because I was now carrying even more stuff.

Once at Windhelm (about 40 minutes after I left the Dwarven ruin), I processed all the Dwarven metal I had collected, disenchanted a few things, and emptied some things out of my inventory until I could run. Then I fast traveled back to Whiterun, made another 2000 or so Dwarven Arrows, and finally got my smithing to 70. Forged myself some glass armor and weapons (except for the bow. I took the Ebony bow from that damn Deathlord), then stopped outside of Dragonsreach.

Probably going to repeat the whole thing when I next get the chance. Just with different dungeons and whatnot.

I had never thought about it but totally agree about the castle, Finn. I just finished the Dawnguard side myself and even though I love the DLC as a whole, I'm feeling a bit disappointed in the similarities between the Vampire and Dawnguard paths throughout.

I also have had a couple of weird things happen today. First one I noticed, I'm not loading near any doors when I enter a room; I'm standing 20 feet inside any cave or building or shoved up against a wall. Second, I have Durnehviir, The Soul Cairn Dragon, as a follower... he never needs to be summoned and is always outside when I am... and it's a pain getting around a huge dragon on a narrow bridge after a fast travel :\

So there's that, and I joined the Mages College with hopes of mastering the art of conjuration and enchanting.

Cleared Shearpoint on Mastery difficulty level with 'Prideful Hand of Loki' and earned Krosis. Elven gear enchanted with Archery(Helm, Gauntlets, Ring), +48 Resist Fire(Ring), Stamina(Boots), and +29 Fire Damage(Bow)(of course not very useful in this instance). Damn hard fight for my Bosmer and Faendal, used EVERY potion. Had to hide and heal to avoid death from Krosis near the end of the battle while Faen kept nailing 'im. Then as krosis was near death I popped out of cover and Aced 'im! Mwuah Ha Ha!!!

Most of today's session was spent fighting dragons. A bit to my disappointment, I got a mere Magma Dragon upon reloading in place of yesterday's Awakened and had disposed of it soon enough (Slow Time ftw!) when I noticed another dragon circling above Whiterun in the distance. I had half a mind to let it be (especially as I hadn't exactly parted with the Whiterun guards on the best of terms *innocent whistle*), but remembering that my adopted brats beloved daughters might be in danger I hurried back towards my first encounter with an Aspect of Alduin. Oh the fun of fighting a dragon while being half blinded by lightning/frostfire effects/stagger-induced double vision, trying to aim while the earth is quaking under you and you're busy dodging boulders raining from the sky... somehow Big Al himself wasn't half the nuisance IIRC. Died a few times, but prevailed in the end. Yay.

Now as soon as I figure out why I'm getting CTDs in the Pale lately and how to fix that we'll be off to Dawnstar to get new orders from Mother and find out how Cicero looks as a vampire.

After clearing Ustengrav in Vampire Lord form (very refreshing), and obtaining the hilt of a certain weapon in Morthal, I decided to go through Labyrinthian en route back to Whiterun. In the process, I ran into a total of four frost trolls (killing only the first), the last of which chased me about a third of the way to Silent Moons Camp. And then there was the sabre cat, but that went far better (and I got a nice killcam).

I downloaded a mod and made many INI tweaks for performance, so I created a new Bosmer character to test things out. Basically just created him, then ran around and tested things while trying not to let my PC overheat.

Seems fairly stable. Not sure if I like the grass mod, though. No major performance impact either way.
Well... Maybe not. Gameplay feels far smoother than it did before. Then again, maybe I was just used to PS3 gameplay because I hadn't played the PC version all week before this. It needs further testing.

Switched around among a few different characters: my female Khajiit chugged through a few Dark Brotherhood quests (thanks for having my back, Veezara), my female Breton defended Whiterun from the Stormcloaks, and my male Bosmer finally did the Goldenglow quest. His stealth failed him more than once and he had to kill Aringoth and a couple mercenaries, and after setting three apiaries ablaze the game somehow decided a fourth one should also catch fire so Brynjolf and Maven got snotty with him.

Then I went digging down deep in the record bins save list and pulled up my Khajiit necromancer. He used to be blond but seeing him again, I decided he looked like mustard so I gave him a radical makeover. He then cheated totally legitimately won the Malyn Varen boss fight, and was spooked by Quaranir loitering in the corner of the Frozen Hearth because I forgot he'd be there.

Serana finally gets to see Fram ride a dragon, some warlocks and draugr get cremated, and Calcelmo grieves for Erj, Krag, and Staubin:

5th of First Seed, 4E 202 - Serana's Diary
5th of First Seed, 4E 202 - Fram's Journal
7th of First Seed, 4E 202 - Serana's Diary
7th of First Seed, 4E 202 - Fram's Journal

Finally finished Dustman's Cairn with Felina and Serana. The final battle was irritating. They got about 95% Draugr overlords swarming them. Of course, she ran out of soul gems, the draugr kept taking down her summons, while Serana and Farkas were reduced to moaning chimps on the floor. It was madness. But Felina fought with a rage and made it back home to her family in Whiterun. Of course, the first thing she heard at home were complaints about the neighbor kids. Some things will never change.

PS3 Bosmer did... A whole bunch of stuff. Basically explored, gathered ingredients, made potions, then ran across Skyrim selling them while buying more ingredients and making more potions. Also went down into Blackreach.

Created a new Breton on PC (after ditching the tweaks I made to the ini files) and walked off to the Lover Stone, then went back home and got things set up.
Ran into a Cave Bear at level 2 or 3, courtesy of one of the Companions random encounters. That nearly ended rather badly.

Dragonborn Sidequest

Got a bit bored and used Vampiric Grip to throw the Greybeards off their cliff.

Yesterday Thadon Sadris my newest bosmer went through 3 dungeons including: Volkihar Ruins The One With The Moth Priest and The Soul Cairn
Using Vampire Lord A lot Using Vampire Grip He slew the keepers throwing them around with vampire grip the last one was on a tower and he threw him 1-Hit-Ko
It Was Fun and he was starving for blood and a had to fight a deadly dragon(Deadly Dragons Is A Mod)And Then I Saved And Got Off The End

Downloaded a multi-follower mod and tested it out with my good guy for a bit after successfully destroying the Skull of Corruption. So now I've got Faendal and Erandur following my Dunmer. Apparently he's decided to put together an all-elf party. We then headed back to Whiterun so we could do a craft/improve/enchant/sell spree.

My bad guy took care of her first mark for the Dark Brotherhood and was accepted as a member of the Stormcloaks. She's now en route to her next mark.

Yesterday on PS3, I realized my game is starting to [&@%!] up. I'm stuck with a lockpicking skill that won't increase (stuck at half way between 59 and 60. No matter how many locks I pick, the skill won't increase. It only increases when I break a pick), cells that won't reset no matter where or how long I wait (wait inside Breezehome for over 40 days, almost no cells reset), ore veins that cannot be mined, and so on. By far the most irritating of those is the ore veins. I need to mine ore (I'm too cheap to buy any) to build Lakeview, but I can't because the ore veins cannot be mined even though they have apparently respawned. Also annoying is the fact that farms can respawn once, but then as soon as I leave the cell and enter it again, the plants automatically "despawn" like I've picked them.

Never had that particular problem on PC. Well, not the respawn thing. Lockpicking? Yes, but it usually starts working after a while.
PS3 character might have to be restarted, or a full reinstall of the game to rule out any corruption. Or both.
The PS3 character has around 40 hours of play time and her save is 8MB.



Anyway, things are going much more smoothly on PC. I started a Breton named Lerii and just wandered around doing the usual: mining ore, smithing, enchanting, some alchemy, exploring, hunting. Stuff.
Of course, she went to Falkreath and was immediately [&@%!] off by Bolund ("I can't believe we let provincials like you wander Skyrim"). Or whatever his name is. She tried to murder him, but was caught. I didn't have enough gold to pay the bounty, so Lerii got to spend some time in prison.

After that, she saved up some gold and bought Lakeview and is now in the process of construction. I'm trying to get some straw and glass without buying any.
To get around that (since the only way to get any in vanilla Hearthfire is by buying it), I modded the game so you could make glass out of malachite (closest I could get), and straw out of wheat. Once again, Mauin is too cheap to buy anything. Why buy it when I can do it myself (with some CK edits)? Heh.

Now I just have to get the malachite and the wheat... Kynesgrove has a malachite mine, and there is plenty of wheat on farms. I have a lot of wandering to do.
Not going to pay for a carriage ride, either. I have no gold. Besides, you miss out on a lot if you don't walk/run around Skyrim.

Got Legendary Edition, so I decided to do some modding. I retired my main and created a brand new sneaky Khajiit, S'Kirra, who is going to become a master archer and join the Legion (she's got rather shady past and is using all the wartime confusion to hide in plain sight. So she will be an Imperial soldier who does a bit of thieving on the side).

The mods and finally having all the patches is making a huge difference. Everything runs so smoothly now, and SkyRe, Frostfall, RND and SkyUI are making the game even more fun to play than before.

Fram gets tossed in jail, Serana fails to bust him out, and the Forsworn mistake Fram for Tyler Durden:

8th of First Seed, 4E 202 - Serana's Diary
9th of First Seed, 4E 202 - Fram's Journal
11th of First Seed, 4E 202 - Serana's Diary
12th of First Seed, 4E 202 - Fram's Journal

Deleted that Breton character I mentioned earlier and returned to Vara Rydilis for a little Dragon hunting.

I also messed with some of the INI tweaks (found here: http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/articles/1153//?)I was using before and found that it was the script lag tweaks that caused the stuttering and freezes. If I just use the multi-threading tweaks, I get a performance increase. Especially when recording. I haven't tested this thoroughly yet, but I seem to be recording between 25-40fps, depending on the location. That's up from the 15-25fps that it was before. While recording. When I'm not recording, it still seems to be in the usual 30-60fps range. Haven't seen any major stutters yet.

Right now I'm trying to get a decent test video recorded so I can upload it to show the improvements, and to show that my channel isn't quite dead yet. How I managed to get 28 subscribers is beyond me. Funnily enough, that only happened after I put the Black and White Sailor's Song as my main video. I would've though that song would chase most people away. But that's off topic.


Anyway, Vara went from Dragon Lair to Dragon Lair and fought more Dragons than I could count. She should have a good supply of Souls now.
As soon as I get tired of Dragon hunting, I'll probably switch back to Vulom and work on her. I've sort of been neglecting her, and if I ever want to record Dragonborn, I have to finish her. Still a long way to go.

Today Thadon Went To The College Of Winterhold and asked about a elder scroll and was told to go see Septimus Signus and started going there but found about 80 horkers and made a detour and still has not killed them all yet he's gained 2 vampire lord perks.

S'Kirra became thane of Falkreath today. I decided I like that Jarl - he's obviously dirty and doesn't mind that I am too. And with SkyRe clearing out a large bandit camp is not a three minutes long blitz attack, it took some planning, creative use of Illusion magic (I love Phantom Image spell) and some patient sniping. I also met a Stormcloak Rogue, dressed in Imperial armor and fighting some Thalmor Justiciars (that must be Civil War Overhaul showing itself for the first time, I've never seen anything like that before). I went to help her (from a safe distance, of course), but she went down before I could take good aim. I Frenzied the Thalmor though and killed them - not an easy fight either. Destruction magic can really hurt in SkyRe and I had to leg it and circle back twice before I got that last mage.

And then I sold their gear to Lod and bought myself some land. I have a house now! But if someone finds the dead Thalmor, I may have some uncomfortable questions to answer.

Now I'm hesitating between going north and joining the Legion (now that I'm the thane of two holds and people of Skyrim foolishly believe me to be a honourable and respectable person), and heading towards Riften and joining the Dawnguard, because those vampire attacks are slowly becoming annoying. I'm definitely not interested in the Greybeards yet, that's silly Nord superstition and I'd rather avoid those flying lizards than chase after them for now.

Oh, and I had to look up a console command for removing items from the world, because there's a stupid dead dragon following me. So far he dropped out of the sky in Falkreath twice (once in the middle of vampire attack, almost making me kill Lod, because I couldn't see what I was attacking), on the road between Whiterun and Riverwood, and on my front lawn at Lakeview Manor. That's called stalking, dragon. Not cool.

Restarted Felina Imhatius, Dark Brotherhood Mistress, a while ago in anticipation of her files no longer working, which ended up being the case. Deleted her level 54 saves and she is now level 8. She roamed around the woods and fought a bunch of spiders and wolves. I've decided to do some things differently this time and for rp purposes, she'll be staying with boyfriend Marcurio in Windhelm taking care of the Arentino boy. I wish he was adoptable. I'm thinking of leveling her up a good deal and doing contracts before taking her to the college. I want her to be good at smithing before her saves take another dive. Anyway, she'll hang out in Windhelm for a while, save Serana, then end her rabid love affair with Marcurio by leaving him at the altar and marrying Onmund instead. Must stick to tradition. Then maybe this way Serana can attend the wedding.