So, Skyrim's out 11/11/11

[Roland]

The ice troll is SO familiar. =) I love Lydia, but man, sometimes she's a little too aggressive.

Wait until you hit the Labyrinth on the way to dealing with the Greybeards. I snuck past three of the bastards. Killing 1 was tough, but doable. Killing 3? No thanks. The regen too quickly for an archer who has to relocate every 2 shots to avoid dying to their beastly claws.

Yay for Bethesda allowing same sex marriages. =D

Damn straight (although my character - a male - will definitely be picking up a female ). About time someone allowed it.

I haven't dealt with Lydia yet. I left her in Dragonsreach, but now that I bought a home (and fully decked it out) she's moved in - and spends all her time sitting in my bedroom! It's a little creepy when she always greets me with wanting to serve me... although I suppose I could turn that around into something more positive.

Anyway, my own tales of glory. Last night I killed 5 dragons. In the span of about 2 hours. I went and killed a named dragon as part of a quest - lots of fun, loving the main quest so far. Immediately afterwards I signed off to go play World of Tanks with the Basin crew (we kicked ass, BTW). When that was all done, I hopped back on to finish collecting some leftover items I couldn't carry. When I went back to that dragon corpse, though, there was a random spawn waiting for me! So I downed him, collected it all, and then went in search of a nearby dragon site with a word of power. Went there, killed the dragon, got the word (Frost, Cold - second word in the shout). Again, ran out of room, so after clearing out my inventory (I have this problem often) I fast-traveled back... to the wrong dragon site. There were two dragon sites near one another which had words of power. I warped to one I had cleared earlier, and low and behold the dragon had respawned! Well, I finished him off nicely, then found the other corpse I meant to travel too and finished up with all that. After wandering the area for a couple hours (I think I raked in about 50 Jay Berries, or whatever they're called, almost 200 Dragon's Tongue and about 100 Creep Clusters - not a bad haul!), I bought my house and started moving my collected items from Riverdell to Whiterun. Around the 2nd time I visited, yet another dragon spawned in Riverdell (third time for me), so I downed that one too.

Needless to say, there was much dragon killing last night. I even killed a Giant on the way to the named dragon quest - just because he was there, and I felt like it. The whole dragon random spawns is almost making the novelty wear off, and they're certainly not as fearsome in combat as they appear flying above, roaring and spewing fire or frost, but overall I'm pleased with the mechanic. There is SO MUCH to explore in this game, from the grandest mountains to the tiniest cluster of shrubs for ingredients. Do you know I found a trio of Hunters (2 female, 1 male) bathing in a natural hot spring lagoon? I kid you not! The exploration of this game is phenomenal, and easily more than half the enjoyment I'm deriving out of the game. There's just so much to do, it's impossible to get bored. Tired of questing? Run around! Tired of running around? Take your crafting materials and make some weapons & armor! Sell all your wares for cash. Mix potions and poisons for future use. All that time you're skilling up, growing in power, while doing leisure activities! I raised two levels last night, mostly from tradeskills (Smithing & Alchemy), and am very close to yet another level. As for Perks, unlike GG I'm saving several - I have 6 or 7 in the bank at present. I have a very clear goal for my character, so I'm only spending what I need to to stay on a relatively even keel. There were times I was underpowered, but a few Perks and a couple new items (unlocked via leveling) from the blacksmiths ensured I'm no longer weak. I can't wait to start crafting poisons in larger numbers, and with significantly stronger benefits - not that I've needed them at all so far. I also have... 4 shouts? unlocked. The complete Unrelenting Force, Aura Whisper (a more powerful version of Detect Life that shows ALL creatures - living and undead), the sprinting one, and the Frost one (which spits out a big ball of frost that envelops the enemy, and deals damage up front as well as over time). I love climbing around and finding the different dragon roosts that house the words of power. I've found several standing stones and daedric shrines, too!

The biggest downside I see to the game is the level-locking of the dungeons, so I'm trying to avoid as much of them as I can (although hopefully the open world areas that I've explored don't follow the same rules - i.e. bandit & giant camps, etc.), but it's difficult. If not for there being so much to occupy me without dungeon diving, I'd probably notice the loss more, but as it stands right now it's just something greater to look forward to. I'm about to hit level 17, IIRC, and aside from the poor pathfinding and numerous glitches I'm loving almost everything about the game. Definitely worth the investment, and will easily tide me over until D3 comes out - and well beyond!

Glad to see others enjoying the game so much. I intend to do a big run of exploring tonight - once I finish up this last little bit of the main quest I have hanging - so hopefully I can unlock one or two more words of power. I'd love to finish off that Frost one!

Edit:
Oh, that reminds me! To go along with kandrathe's Frost Troll story, I'll share my own experience. The first time I tried to climb the mountain, a dragon spawned - not even a quarter of the way up. Promptly killed me, and I reloaded... and decided to wait a few levels before daring to venture up again - for fear that it was part of the trials of reaching the Greybeards! Little did I know it was just a random spawn, although I found much humor in the irony regardless.