In Skyrim

[Frith-Rae]

1- Dragons DO get higher in level. At a certan point (I dontknow what level you are but Ive read people who are high enough) you get "Elder Dragons" and then beyond that is "Ancient dragons" so yes whiel they start off relatively weaker than some other mobs - they definitely get harder and then harder again (not sure yet if there is a dragon above Ancient...LOL).

2 - Those having the issue with your mouse/scroll/clicking on your quest options - for me I found this was bugged out after I would use scrolling (mouse wheel scrolling) specifically on the map. Once I STOPPED doing that entirely Ive yet to have the problem again. For me it cropped up as me being unable to crespond to any quest with anything OTHER than the top choice. When I tried to highlight/click/point to any other option fo rwhatever reason it was like it was "stuck" in scroll and would just return to the top option.

So I stopped trying to use my scroll-wheel for anything. Issue has not returned.

3 - When you are a vampire you have to eat periodically to keep from everyone attackig you. If you do not eat 4 days your physical form changes so much that everyone can TELL you are vampire which is why you cant do anyting in town. If you feed again it will go down and as long as you feed once every day or two you wont have the issue with everyone being hostile.

Me - I went werewolf because as long as you dont change around town or something there are almost no negatives (I just dont get rested bonus when sleeping...shuckydarn). Otherwise you can go the entire game and never bother with it and still benefit from the passive bonuses .

So far I havent been snuck up on by dragons (learn to watch for shadows on the ground moving fast..its a hint there is a dragon up there LOL) - but I WAS snuck up on by TWO mammoths. Let me tell you, hearing the boom and turning around to figure out what it was only to be eye-line sight with a GIANT FOOT and LEG can scare the beejzus out of you.

Luckily, they arent hostile until you hit them. Else I would have been dead.

I was dead anyway as I decided to test the "is there a herd mentality when I shoot one?" FYI - YES THERE IS! LOL.

Btw - I see some of you talking about "sneak"w ith dragons. Um. its impossible for me to be in sneak ANYWHERE when a dragon is flying in t he sky. Even if I cant see him, the second Im sneaking I pop out to "detected" and there is no way to sneak around the dragon.

Is my sneak just not high enough?? Cuz so far Ive used it as another "clue there is a dragon flying around close by - I pop out of sneak for no reason".

[Shian]

Yeah I couldn't figure out why I was detected than not detected then detected again. I have a really high sneak along with muffling boots and other shebangs. Dragons and critters know you are there.

Rant: Took me forever to figure out what was bothering me. The background music is pretty, but sometimes when I am wandering around, I hear the first few bars of Rift's loading screen then it goes into Skyrim's version of the song.

Found an Elder dragon today. Holy heck can they do some damage!

[Dhalin]

Dragons sneak up on you?

LoL. Anytime there's a dragon anywhere nearby, a special background chanting music starts playing (kinda like the ambience a shout word does) and there's special roars and such. Don't see how you could possibly be ambushed by a dragon because the game gives you such a HUGE notice there's one anywhere within a 5 mile radius.

RE: Mammoths: Giants and Mammoths are friends with each other. Attacking one causes them all to be aggressive to you. They are also territorial too, they won't attack you unless you get too close to their camps.

[GlindorOcculus]

If anyone has yet to try out being a werewolf; I highly recommend it. Really no bad side effects and the stamina when you're in beast form is incredible. And sprinting in beast form is faster than a galloping horse. You have to consume dead bodies (humans) when in beast form otherwise you'll end up morphing out and if it happens in a fight you'll be standing there stark naked.

[Fratricide]

if it happens in a fight you'll be standing there stark naked.

bonus!!!!!!!!

[Dhalin]

Isn't it impossible to use spells or drink potions while being a werewolf?

What happens when you morph and you end up fighting a powerful enemy and you NEED healed, but can't because you're stuck in werewolf form? lol.

I think I'd rather keep my ability to heal myself, to be honest. I suppose you could always turn tail and run and wait for the morph to wear off and hurry up and re-equip all of your armor and weapons....

[GlindorOcculus]

Isn't it impossible to use spells or drink potions while being a werewolf?

What happens when you morph and you end up fighting a powerful enemy and you NEED healed, but can't because you're stuck in werewolf form? lol.

I think I'd rather keep my ability to heal myself, to be honest. I suppose you could always turn tail and run and wait for the morph to wear off and hurry up and re-equip all of your armor and weapons....

Can't access menus when in werewolf form. So, no items, no spells. But really you shouldn't need to heal yourself. Beast form is pretty powerful. You just need to know what you can handle and what's beyond your skill level.

[Dhalin]

Can't access menus when in werewolf form. So, no items, no spells. But really you shouldn't need to heal yourself. Beast form is pretty powerful. You just need to know what you can handle and what's beyond your skill level.

So basically, it is for killing weak crap quicker.

I view that as a waste of skill levels, though.

On weak mobs, I practice low-skill things, such as Destruction Magic, Conjuration, maybe I'll even grab a two-handed weapon and practice that too.

You can't do that if you turn into a werewolf every time you come across a dungeon full of pathetic bandits.

And when you DO run into something incredibly powerful that you can't use werewolf form on, well, the werewolf form ends up being useless anyways.

So, eh...

Why get it? IMO. *shrug* Everyone has their own playstyle, though. I'm just mainly stating the reasons why I personally wouldn't bother.

[rizo/nawkia]

Lvl 13 werewolf smokes giants and mammoths....almost got a dragon..just sayin

[Frith-Rae]

Well think of it this way -

The only downside to having the possibility of fighting in WW form is you dont get rested-bonus from sleeping. Thats it (long as you don't shift into WW form in the middle of town that tends to upset everone LOL).

The benefits include the passive buffs as well as having a cool way of fighting for 3 minutes (2 minutes something like that) when you want to. Against strong stuff or weak stuff - whatever you want. WW is pretty powerful and unless you are taking on something that is impossible for you do kill at your level - you arent going to need healing

I see it more as a cool fighting-stance or something I can use once a day if I just want something different for a few minutes *shrugs*. Since, unlike vampire, you dont have to do ANYTHING at all to avoid any negatives, I thought it was an easier way to go while still having some flavor.

Its not a perma-change to gameplay - you dont have to use it at all if you dont want to and still get some passive benefits. Or you can cure it at any time. So why NOT? Its not like getting WW form requires some multi-hour quest chain. Its literally step-two in joining the Companion faction and takes all of 5 minutes to follow the NPC and complete the ritual heh.

So its a fun flavor thing you get doing what you would be doing anyway so wee..sure!

[GlindorOcculus]

Frith has some great points. I mainly use it because beast form is fun and that's what your suppose to have in games.
So what if you don't get skill levels. It's easy to find something to kill in Skyrim =P

[Dhalin]

Hmmm, I suppose.

I'll eventually end up doing the Companion questline anyways, so I suppose I might play around with it a little.

And besides, that leveling destruction on weak bandits stuff is starting to slow down, and archery is pretty well caught up (thanks to an uber-long dwarven dungeon crawl in the College questline).

Dwarven robots are SO stupid, lol. You can pepper them with arrows and it takes them hours to figure out where the arrows are coming from if you have even a half-decent sneak skill. Better yet, they act like skeletons, in that you can never lose your arrows if you look around the floor for them.

I have a Sneak of like 60 and I was sneaking in un-enchanted heavy dragon armor. LOL. Armor Weight decreases Sneak's effectiveness, so....

I can only imagine what that would have been like, if I had grabbed my Dark Brotherhood set before going there, LOL.

I killed a Centurion and he never found me. With an elven bow and IRON arrows.

[Sereamha]

I find things kill me with spells super fast when I am a Werewolf, so I gotta watch out for that, but it is good for help when all other methods are exhausted, at least for me.

As for vampires, when I was one, I found it neat, but it was annoying to to have to feed every few days, but if you are good at sneaking, it is simple.

I WAS snuck up on by a dragon once. Kinda up on a hill, skipping along and humming to myself, then BOOM, I just see scales and a dragon was on top of me. Was rather funny, if surprising XD

[Dhalin]

I found an annoying thing with dragons:

There are SOME areas they really should have made exempt from dragon attacks.

The College of Winterhold is one such area. I got attacked by a dragon in the courtyard and had it almost dead, and then it flew and landed outside the courtyard.

I tried following it, but yet I couldn't, but yet NPCs went through the door and continued to fight it.

Dragon died, I got no bones or scales, nor dragon soul.

AND this happened when I was in the middle of a quest. I had to wait a bit and try again to progress my quest.

[Frith-Rae]

Hmmm, I suppose.

I'll eventually end up doing the Companion questline anyways, so I suppose I might play around with it a little.

Well not saying you SHOULD or that you have to - you can choose not to do so and its all good. Your game, single player so dont have to really worry about it. However, I would inspect those passive buffs you get (for example Imm immune to all disease now regardless of what form I am in, thats the only one I remember off the top of my heaad but there are others) you might like the perks.

And besides, that leveling destruction on weak bandits stuff is starting to slow down, and archery is pretty well caught up (thanks to an uber-long dwarven dungeon crawl in the College questline).

Word to teh wise - major huge oopsie on the devs again but right now magick (esp. destruction) damage does NOT SCALE with your leveling. Weapons all outdamage the spells the higher you go. Not saying theh conjured companions have this weakness but I know that the desctrution/direct damage stuff does not scale up. Leaving you at a significant disadvantage if you go full magic without some type ofo backup weapon.

Wether it will be fixed with the first patch after thanksgiving or wether we have to wait for the modders to do it when the tools come out - dont know. :/

Seeing as I how I enjoy playingn with the destro spells myself this is bummer - BATTLEMAGE FTW!

I have a Sneak of like 60 and I was sneaking in un-enchanted heavy dragon armor. LOL. Armor Weight decreases Sneak's effectiveness, so....

I can only imagine what that would have been like, if I had grabbed my Dark Brotherhood set before going there, LOL.

Remember to WALK while sneaking and heavy armor effects on sneak are almost nullified. As well as walking in very short bursts (like tap tap tap instead of a constant hold down of the key) - amazingly realistic, the briefer your movement spurts are the less noise you make as well - walking or running. At least, until you get high enough of sneak that it negates any sound your armor makes regardless.

Dont hav eto fool with no light armor to play a sneak class..just gotta be smart .

And yes, archery - esp. sneak archer - is pretty dang OP. I may not can go hand to hand with some mobs right now (and Im only level 14), but if I sneak shot them with my dinky little fire-bow and iron arrows I can down things in 2-3 shots.

So even at close range - JUST bow and arrow can end up being more OP than a 1h/2h or duel wield depending on how you enchant it and how you put your points (apparently the archery tree really tweaks it out).

[Dhalin]

Well, the thieves' guild and DB armors give bonuses to sneak and that "muffled" on the boots lets you full out run while sneaking and you never get caught. lol. Well, almost never.

Certainly makes it a LOT easier.

Also, I love how bows make for an awesome distraction. Apparently, Nords (and anything else really) are too stupid to put 2 and 2 together when they hear a "twang... TINK!" sound, they run over, see an arrow laying on the ground, you'd think they'd look around for where it came from... eh, no. lol.

All the MORE reason why Archery rocks. Got lots of Ancient Nord Arrows on me (zero weight lol) for distraction purposes. They might not do very much damage, but they make all the noise you need them to, to make guards go running down the hall away from whatever it is you wanna steal.

[Dhalin]

Okaaaay, another little mini-rant...

The stronger undead nords who have Unrelenting Force shout are annoying, especially the ones who have all 3 shout words (who can knock you clean off your feet).

Just fought a "boss" where this one splits up into 3 and him (and his two mirror images) can all do it.

Basically, you spend 5 minutes being tossed around like a rag-doll because you keep getting hit with fus ro dah every 5 seconds.

Annoying. Highly so.

It might be funny to use that to throw a bandit off a cliff or something, but it is a bit annoying when mobs do it to you every few seconds. lol.

[Akrion]

Okaaaay, another little mini-rant...

The stronger undead nords who have Unrelenting Force shout are annoying, especially the ones who have all 3 shout words (who can knock you clean off your feet).

Just fought a "boss" where this one splits up into 3 and him (and his two mirror images) can all do it.

Basically, you spend 5 minutes being tossed around like a rag-doll because you keep getting hit with fus ro dah every 5 seconds.

Annoying. Highly so.

It might be funny to use that to throw a bandit off a cliff or something, but it is a bit annoying when mobs do it to you every few seconds. lol.

Dual cast destruction spell stagger and ~300% mana regen 4tw.

[Sereamha]

Hey Akrion, I was wondering something....where are you getting powerful spells? They don't level with you so eventually I am finding they are more and more useless against the high high level stuff. I can dual cast and I do stagger people, but it isn't blowing anyone out of the water or anything. Makes me wonder if I am missing a spell somewhere.

[LungTien Temeraire]

Hey Akrion, I was wondering something....where are you getting powerful spells? They don't level with you so eventually I am finding they are more and more useless against the high high level stuff. I can dual cast and I do stagger people, but it isn't blowing anyone out of the water or anything. Makes me wonder if I am missing a spell somewhere.

*gives Sereamha Primal Cast formula and Breath of Flame Burst ability. "This will help you not getting smashed by little giants."