Gameplay Video Dissection

[General Darius]

Just checked out the latest and greatest videos on elderscrolls.com. anyhoooo....I had kind of been working with the hope/theory that the soldiers that helped Todd slay the dragons at the ruined fort were none other than my imperial legionnaires. With the great quality of the video i have been able to hit pause and make out the shield of the guy who gets chomped and tossed (1:45) and it appears to be some other symbol that may turn out to be just the city guard of Whiterun.....could be the rebels...who knows. Just made me wonder if any of you guys had dissected any other information or concocted any theories from anything you saw.

[Chaos the N'wah]

My first thought was that those guys were either A) Patrolling Guards or B) Companions (the Fighter's guild in Skyrim)

[OblivionDuruza]

• Spell Tomes are in the game (2nd video, about 4mins 30).
• Adept is a level of spell mastery, i.e. like Expert, Master, etc. in Oblivion
• Rockjoint is back as a disease, which you may contract from Wolves.
• Enemies swear at you in English, as opposed to Dunmeris.
• Roasting Salmon doubles its restorative effect to health (5 becomes 10).
• Wood can be chopped and presumably sold in Riverwood.
• You must hold down the cast button for Detect Life - although other spells with this effect might have a duration.
• You can put away your bow with an arrow drawn.
• CoD-esque blood on the screen when you are hurt.
• New bit of Lore, Nords worshipped Dragons long ago. I do not believe this was Lore before Skyrim, but I could be wrong.
• Over 150 hand-crafted dungeons - we already knew this, but the 150 number is a number
• Your sneak skill (presumably) determines whether or not you have been detected after an attack, i.e. you stealth kill one enemy, does his/her companion detect you?
• Dust actually falls dynamically from the ceiling when the bats fly out of the cave roof in the 2nd video.

[General Darius]

Yes yes....according to lore the nords have worshiped dragons for a pretty long time now. Alduin/Akatosh was known as the time eater for having eaten the years of the nords until they were all about 6yrs old...back in the days of Ysmir I beleive.

I looks to me like spells such as fireball shoots a single ball of fire whereas frost or heal lasts until you run out of magicka or let go of the trigger/button

I kind of automatically assumed cooked meat would be more beneficial than uncooked meat from having played fo N/V......which I know was an ob/beth deal but it makes me wonder if there will be a hardcore mode like in NV....I mean in a game where you don't need to eat and there are handy spells and potions for curing anything from scrapes to sucking chest wounds...why would they include cooking if not to cure hunger? hmm I will be pretty stoked if there is....I really liked that feature in N/V.. .it was a lot more immersive. And since everything isn't irradiated it will be easier to find a clean drink......unless of course you can contract diseases from stagnant water.hmm hmm hmm

[Morrovion]

Yes yes....according to lore the nords have worshiped dragons for a pretty long time now. Alduin/Akatosh was known as the time eater for having eaten the years of the nords until they were all about 6yrs old...back in the days of Ysmir I beleive.

I looks to me like spells such as fireball shoots a single ball of fire whereas frost or heal lasts until you run out of magicka or let go of the trigger/button

I kind of automatically assumed cooked meat would be more beneficial than uncooked meat from having played fo N/V......which I know was an ob/beth deal but it makes me wonder if there will be a hardcore mode like in NV....I mean in a game where you don't need to eat and there are handy spells and potions for curing anything from scrapes to sucking chest wounds...why would they include cooking if not to cure hunger? hmm I will be pretty stoked if there is....I really liked that feature in N/V.. .it was a lot more immersive. And since everything isn't irradiated it will be easier to find a clean drink......unless of course you can contract diseases from stagnant water.hmm hmm hmm

Pete Hines confirmed via twitter that there will be no hardcore mode

[General Darius]

oh well....less to think about

[OblivionDuruza]

Yes yes....according to lore the nords have worshiped dragons for a pretty long time now. Alduin/Akatosh was known as the time eater for having eaten the years of the nords until they were all about 6yrs old...back in the days of Ysmir I beleive.

Pre-Skyrim, there wasn't much Lore on that subject. A lot of it is new Lore made for the game.

[Morrovion]

I don't know if anyone noticed, but I understand COLLISION-DETECTION is mighty heavy on the hardware and for optimizing....

But check out that blue dude that the hovering-undead-comes-out-of-a-coffin summons, when he walks down the stairs in the 2nd video? horrible collision detection.

the WORST example, which I hope Beth fixes by gold-stage, is the first dragon in the third video... like ouch 90's graphics. The wings are more than half in the ground.

Did you notice how the PC tried to keep it out of sight by looking up more and keeping the now-dead dragon away from camera view?

I don't mean to sound like a negative nancy, but we're dissecting the positives here, what about what they can improve on, based on these videos?

[Wolfie]

I dont know about you but its less then 2 months away, I think its safe to say there is not much more they will fix.

[Morrovion]

well then... sadface.

[Wolfie]

We can talk about what we want them to fix, just I think relsitcly all they are doing now is fine tuning some things

[IVA Jakel]

i noticed that tod howard said there a 13 standing-stones (guardian-stones) throughout the land. we have only see three so far (mage, thief and warior) they all have a different effect on you character (like the ones in the demo makes your skills in either combat, magic or stealth increase 30% faster... we can only guess as to what the other ones will do:)

[MaKo]

You must hold down the cast button for Detect Life - although other spells with this effect might have a duration.

I was wondering, if the same applies to e.g. Light and Night-Eye spells, and if there are variations with duration. Night-Eye and Detect Life could be useful with duration, to be able to aim with your bow in darkness. Furthermore, I'm thinking how you use those spells with bow or two-handed weapon? Does the weapon unsheathe if you use the spell?

How about Water Breathing? Is there enough time for magicka to regenerate, so that you can stay underwater infinitely? If you make "short bursts" of Water Breathing, does the "oxygen bar" reset back to maximum?

EDIT: In one video, a light bolt is shot from staff to wall. It probably works with Light spell, too? But does it work with e.g. Detect Life and if yes, how? What about Night-Eye, can you shoot a Night-Eye "bolt" to wall?

i noticed that tod howard said there a 13 standing-stones (guardian-stones) throughout the land. we have only see three so far (mage, thief and warior) they all have a different effect on you character (like the ones in the demo makes your skills in either combat, magic or stealth increase 30% faster... we can only guess as to what the other ones will do:)

I have understood, that that three-stone thing is "collective" thing, so that you can change what skills get more rapid development, and that there are 13 of these kind of formations all over the Skyrim, so that you don't have to make long trips if you want to start to develop another set of skills. But this is just a guess...

[IVA Jakel]

i noticed that tod howard said there a 13 standing-stones (guardian-stones) throughout the land. we have only see three so far (mage, thief and warior) they all have a different effect on you character (like the ones in the demo makes your skills in either combat, magic or stealth increase 30% faster... we can only guess as to what the other ones will do:)

I have understood, that that three-stone thing is "collective" thing, so that you can change what skills get more rapid development, and that there are 13 of these kind of formations all over the Skyrim, so that you don't have to make long trips if you want to start to develop another set of skills. But this is just a guess...[/quote]

Smart!

[soda popinski]

i noticed that tod howard said there a 13 standing-stones (guardian-stones) throughout the land. we have only see three so far (mage, thief and warior) they all have a different effect on you character (like the ones in the demo makes your skills in either combat, magic or stealth increase 30% faster... we can only guess as to what the other ones will do:)

Actually one of the reviewers came across one that lets you turn invisible once a day.

So each of the stones is going to be like the birthsigns in prior games.

[Dracomagne]

I was wondering, if the same applies to e.g. Light and Night-Eye spells, and if there are variations with duration. Night-Eye and Detect Life could be useful with duration, to be able to aim with your bow in darkness. Furthermore, I'm thinking how you use those spells with bow or two-handed weapon? Does the weapon unsheathe if you use the spell?

You can't use magic with two-handed weapons, including bows.

[soda popinski]

[qoute="MaKo"]
I was wondering, if the same applies to e.g. Light and Night-Eye spells, and if there are variations with duration. Night-Eye and Detect Life could be useful with duration, to be able to aim with your bow in darkness. Furthermore, I'm thinking how you use those spells with bow or two-handed weapon? Does the weapon unsheathe if you use the spell?

You can't use magic with two-handed weapons, including bows.[/quote]

I dont know if thats true across the board. The frenzie spell did not require constant casting

[linktothefuture]

The main thing i gleaned from the new gameplay is that the music HAUNTS MY SOUL!! (in a good way)

[MaKo]

I was wondering, if the same applies to e.g. Light and Night-Eye spells, and if there are variations with duration. Night-Eye and Detect Life could be useful with duration, to be able to aim with your bow in darkness. Furthermore, I'm thinking how you use those spells with bow or two-handed weapon? Does the weapon unsheathe if you use the spell?

You can't use magic with two-handed weapons, including bows.

Generally, yes, but I was merely wondering, how you could sneak in a dungeon with a bow, and use Detect Life to see if there are some prey ahead. Do you need to unsheathe your bow/warhammer to use the spell, or can you temporarily carry it with one hand.

I dont know if thats true across the board. The frenzie spell did not require constant casting

...what makes me think about the next subject; how skill gets experience from constant casting? Does it get one single "experience point" when started, or could you increase your casting skills with "rubber band trick"?

[Dracomagne]

Generally, yes, but I was merely wondering, how you could sneak in a dungeon with a bow, and use Detect Life to see if there are some prey ahead. Do you need to unsheathe your bow/warhammer to use the spell, or can you temporarily carry it with one hand.

I don't think it would be difficult with the hotkey system, but you can't wield them at the same time.

I dont know if thats true across the board. The frenzie spell did not require constant casting

It was confirmed some time ago. Again, though, it won't be a huge problem because of the ease of the new menus.

[soda popinski]

I dont know if thats true across the board. The frenzie spell did not require constant casting

It was confirmed some time ago. Again, though, it won't be a huge problem because of the ease of the new menus.

Well, I understand that if you're holding a bow, you have to switch from that to a spell, but I'm saying we don't know how many of the spells must be continuously cast like the healing and detect life that we've seen, and how many are fire and forget like the frenzie.

So with regards to light and night eye, they might have to be continuously cast, but perhaps not.

[magius241]

FRENZY, guys, not frenzie

[AeraDunmerMoon]

Well, and with continuous casting, perhaps it's unique to that particular Detect Life Spell. There was talk about each spell type having variations (Fire could mean an explosion or a fireball or a jet of fire.) So perhaps there are single cast versions of that Detect Life Spell that time out, or a single cast Heal over Time spell. We wont know till...probably a few days after 11/11/11. I know I probably won't look at anything but Skyrim at that point...

[apploud]

Maybe I'm missing it..But in the first video when they're sifting through the items, I don't see a Condition rating/bar. So does that mean Weapons and armor don't break?

[Wolfie]

Maybe I'm missing it..But in the first video when they're sifting through the items, I don't see a Condition rating/bar. So does that mean Weapons and armor don't break?

we know they dont, its been confimred