The Adventures of a Mage in Skyrim

A Mage - in Skyrim!

Preface

I rarely play games lately, but one I always come back to is Skyrim. I'm playing the Elder Scrolls-series since Morrowind and enjoy their open and very dense world. I got the habit though to play more or less with the same set of skills: light or heavy armor, sword, bow and arrow, additionally some healing, a bit alchemy (to poison blades and arrows) and of course smithing. So basically a pretty physically and well-armed character. For this adventure though I wanted something different which I haven't played yet in this depth: I decided to play a mage!

When starting with this game-diary I soon realized that its going to be a much longer narrative than expected. I think it takes me roughly the same time to write my adventures down as it actually took me to play them!

Since this project soon became something rather big and because I don't like to ”write into the drawer”, I wanted my text published. If anybody likes it or not is not my priority though.

As for the story itself: I write it down as it happened. Of course I might shorten or extend some events when I find it suiting and add or remove minor events. Usually to develop the story or characters, or when taking a narrative short-cut to avoid repetition. I want my player character being believable and “alive”. She has her motives, interests and principles and I think they reflect mine to a degree. So don't expect her to be a heartless villain. Believe it or not: that would simply not be me!

The skills my character develops and the items she uses reflect my premise: She won't wear any armor nor use any weapon other than a mage's staff. Her priority will be the school of magic. And she will make use of it in which way ever it suits her.

She will also pick locks where needed, persuade and make the occasional jewelry. But without putting too much emphasis on any particular non-magic skill.

The game itelf is quite modded, but with emphasise on a believable, lore-friendly world. There will be no Über-weapons or other silly things I regard as cheating. My character will be able to perform as bard (thats part of her background story), she will get drunk (just a hilarious mod!), might help to rebuild Helgen, run in general into more civil-war related events (several mods which add more NPCs to the game) and instead of dying she will be at the mercy of the Death-Alternative mod (much better than just relying on a safegame), in addition to Sanguine's Debauchery (where the player can get enslaved by the victor). There will also be the Devious Devices mod plus the Captured Dreams Store active. Some may object these mods because of their BDSM-content, but I understand them not as terribly lore-unfriendly really. People are people after all. In whatever setting they are. I'm though not decided yet about the degree these things will find their way into the narrative. It is quite possible that they don't appear at all. After all they are not the emphasis of my diary, rather an option my character can take if her story leads her that way.

As for the difficulty-setting I decided to use the neutral Adept-level, where player has no penalties when dealing or receiving damage, but also no bonuses. I find both pretty silly.

Additionally I have installed the Immersive Difficulties-mod set to Jarl level, which spawns more tougher enemies than the vanilla game. Since your character is at some point stuffed with potions and magic equipment this slight disadvantage just seems fair to me. It makes especially the early stages of the game more difficulty, which will of course find its reflection in the story itself.

This should give you the outlines of what awaits you in my text. Now if you excuse me, I slip into character.

The Adventures of a Mage in Skyrim

An Unfriendly Welcome

Well I guess being tied up and sitting on a carriage to my execution isn't the best way to start the story of my life in Skyrim, but my story prior to my arrival wasn't really glorious. So I prefer to lay a veil of silence about my life before the remarkable events I'm going to tell you about.
The carriage was heading (no pun intended) to Helgen, where the imperial legion has prepared us a very special welcome. I can't say the welcome was very cheerful, but we certainly had their attention. We, that was - by the way – Ulfric Stormcloak, the leader of the Nord-rebellion against the Empire, his companion Rolof, two people who's names would never learn: a horse-thief and another of Ulfric's soldiers - and myself.
When waking up on that carriage I had little idea in what trouble I was into, but when listening to the other prisoners talking I realized pretty quickly that we were all going to die for high treason. Whether I was being involved in the rebellion or not didn't matter for the Imperial soldiers. I was caught while crossing the border near the place where they ambushed Ulfric and that was obviously enough to be guilty.
As the carriage arrived at Helgen the Legion was already busy with preparing the execution. It seems they were just waiting for us to arrive.
I got a glimpse of hope I might get out alive of this after one of the soldiers told his captain that I wasn't on their list - the Empire loves their lists after all, as Rolof pointed out. But the captain simply decided that I was going to die too despite me being obviously a born citizen of Cyrodill!
Running for my life wasn't an option. The horse thief who was on our carriage tried it and got shot down by archers after just a couple of steps.
The rest happened like in a dream. The first head did fall, blood was gushing to the ground (I really shouldn't have looked) and just after a Legion boot kicked the lifeless body of the first deliquent away from the block, I heard the Captain crying that I would be the next.
I didn't at all expect the thing that would happen next. It is now of course part of Skyrim's history just like the war itself already is. No matter how it will turn out in the end.

I got lead to the block, brought down on my knees and bent over it. The last thing I thought I would see was the jagged and bloody headman's axe raising over me. But just when I was about to close my eyes waiting for the inevitable, a loud roar of thunder made the earth shake.
A huge, black silhouette did land on one of the towers just behind the headsman. It was a dragon!
The beast's roar – I had no other words to describe that sound – sent the headsman to the ground. My life was saved – but for how long? I was still bound and totally disorientated. There was chaos everywhere. Fire came from the sky and people started running around in panic. Some soldiers tried to attack the beast but to no avail.

Finally I came to my feet and started running for my life. It is hard to remember exactly what happened in the next few minutes before I was in relative safety. There was fire everywhere, people shouting and buildings collapsing. Within moments the execution became a battlefield.
I somehow made it to the keep where I could catch some breath. I met Rolof again there. He took of my bindings and offered me to take the uniform and axe of a dead Stormcloak who was laying on the floor.
I have to say I was quite moved by his offer - well he ordered me to do so – but still. I politely refused and told him that I never pick up a weapon. He was pretty surprised to hear that, but I told him I prefer to use the few magic skills I taught myself. It wasn't much really, but somehow it was enough to get out alive.
In hindsight I am pretty surprised how well I handled myself. It seems in moments of great danger we are able to mobilize energies in ourselves we never thought we had.

We soon ran into some legionaries who attacked us despite the much bigger thread waiting outside for all of us. Ironically the first legionarie we encountered was the captain who ordered me to the block just moments ago. I burned her hide with my fire spell. And I really enjoyed it. I even found a set of mage's clothes not long after. Which I enjoyed wearing quite a bit too. Not only because they were looking pretty fancy, but also because they were enchanted to subtly support my magic skills.
Making our way through the castle wasn't easy. Walls were crumbling everywhere and more than once we just barely escaped the dragon or falling boulders. Eventually we found a underground passage, which obviously hasn't been used in years, if not decades. The passage lead to a cave and we fought our way through spiders and a man-eating bear up to the surface. Towards freedom.

When getting out of the cave the sun was shining on us and the world looked so peaceful as if there never had been an execution or a dragon. This lasted only a moment though, then Rolof told me to get down and we saw the massive black beast flying over the mountains heading north; towards Whiterun.

I am still grateful to Rolof. Not only for helping me getting out of almost certain death but also for the generousity he showed me afterwards. Together we walked to his home town Riverwood. With a short stop at some standing stones which granted me their blessing on the way of the mage. Something not too common here, as he told me, since magic has a bad reputation in Skyrim.

A first look at Bleak Falls Barrow

When arriving at Riverwood he introduced me to his family as a friend, something which really moved me. They offered me to share some of their supplies with me, which I gladly accepted. I literally had nothing but the clothes I was wearing and a handful of things I did pick up in the keep. We did spread the news of the dragon attacking Helgen and I got asked to go to Whiterun and warn the Jarl about the threat. Of course they couldn't have sent Rolof, one of Ulfric's most prominent companions. The city, so they told me, was officially neutral, but with a strong imperial influence.
It's no lie when I say I had at least sympathies to the Stormcloak rebellion at this point, even as born Imperial. Who would argue with me about my affinities after the Empire showed me its most ugly side? And it was after all a Stormcloak who helped me getting out of this hell alive. My good impression though would change during my travels through Skyrim. But more of this at a later point.