Morrowind for the XBOX published by BETHESDA software
Adventure Logs

Status

Previous Log 6/18

6/19/02 -2nd update

After last failing to find the dungeon because of getting side tracked, I took my ranger to Vivec to the famous "Hlaau Vaults" to test out my ideas on how pickpocketing is related to the skill of the character as well as the NPC level. A difficult thing to play around with indeed without any sort of battle/skill attempt logs or any "con" system to judge NPC level. Perhaps picking pockets is the de facto test. According to some spoilers I read on the net, there are many riches to be had in the Hlauu vault, then again that isnt much of a spoiler since all the great house vaults should be stocked. The game design sometimes supplies a booby prize though, and since everything in the game requires time investment, it is best not to waste hours for items that you aren't even worth selling.

Along the way to the vault I stopped off at some random shops, ended up picking up a delivery quest, coincidently to one of the NPCs at the vault. I promised delivery and gave the NPC his note, he thanked me and instructed me to report back to the job giver. I had other plans. With my +5 sneak boots equiped I began skulking behind pillers and tables in order to activate the "sneak icon" which tells you if others are noticing your behaviour or not.

The room was filled with 3 commoner NPCs and 2 "ordinator" gaurds. Disappointingly like all NPCs in Morrowind, they move around a little but don't do much other than speak. Its a flaw in the game for sure, but forgiviable considering there are 3,000 NPCs and scripting actions animations for even 100 of them beyond normal AI routines would have added months to the development time, perhaps even years

After a few failed pick pocket attempts I was able to swipe and keep the outer vault key from one of the NPCs. My excitement level was up as it is quite a rush to nab something important like a key, it's part of the immersion of the game, playing a theiving character, skulking, waiting and lifting. The failed attempts are of course met with 2 gaurds rushing you and the room full of NPCs punching and spell casting. I could have killed them all but with each living witness comes a 10K fine + the loss of all your stolen gear (90% of what I own) and isnt worth it. Far less time to simply reload and try again. I opened the outer gate and walked into and disappointingly empty vault. Apparently EVERYTHING was on the other side in the "inner vault" the Gaurds of course did nothing when I unlocked the gate, I guess they assume if I have the key I must be legit?

The vault was loaded for nice expensive armour/weapons/gems and gold pieces as well. Unfortunately only 2 weapons were worthy keeping since they fit my character's skills. The most expensive items were not all that powerful, not even magic. I overloaded my character with stolen goods til I could not move. My trusty recall amulet warped me to the Creeper merchant and the vault gaurds stood there with 2 unlocked doors an empty vault , and were none the wiser. While not completely realistic, it was as close to a bank theft as you can get in a videogame, and damn it felt good. Selling 120K worth of items to a merchant who has only 5K in gold every 24 hours takes time. Even with the recall / sleep time saving routine, it still took me a good hour or more to properly organize every sale and drain him of his 5K every day without underselling too much. An occasional 100-2000gold loss on my end was well worth time saved. The items I kept were the much needed glass greaves, a glass firesword and yet another glass jinks dagger. A ranger can never have enough weapons that cast paralyze, especially items that only weigh 1.8 lbs

Now that I had my glass greaves, all the cash I could want (for now) I decided to pay for some training, hell why not, all that sneaking around, my STR and Endurance were not being used, neither were my magic skills. I hadn't done much training before but it is well worth it. It seems a little cheap to simply buy skills , but it is a great way to get multipliers for skills you never use. For instance only medium armour/heavy armour or spear use endurance, my character doesnt specialize in any of those so getting endurance multipliers was difficult to impossible without training. Thankfully there is a cap on training and NPCs will only teach you so much, forcing you to acheive higher rank in a guild to get higher lvl training. Which is good since it wouldnt be any fun to level to 50 without every leaving a building.

Happy with my STR anad END boosters I headed out in an attempt to find that dungeon with the +20 gauntlets, AGAIN. I found a Dark Elf stronghold along my travels and invaded it. I decided to try using more "sneak" in combat as you can sneak behind an enemy and strike before they notice you. With my high sneak rating I found this to work very well. I would neak up behind an NPC in the dungeon,and depending on his class kill him/her in one blow, and receive the "critical damage" text. This game really needed more of this type of stuff, messages during combat to make it more interesting. "You miss" "You Block" "You Parry" etc... like everquest, maybe next time. The sneak/backstab was very satisfying when successful and at times you get noticed which jars you as you have to prep your weapon , exit sneak mode and engage in standard combat. Almost as though the NPC is getting the upper hand as exiting sneak mode takes a moment and you can be struck many times. It is actually far more fun than theft since 1. you are in combat 2. there is no need to reload if you fail since duking it out is almost as fun.

After clearing this dungeon with my newfound backstabbing technique I found some very useful items for a change, a nice shortsword with a much higher charge of paralyze than the glass daggers as well as a ring with a nice 40% chamealon and a longer lasting invisibility with lots of charges. Unfortunately magic in Morrowind is much more useful as enchanted items than casting a spell yourself, if you are a melee/stealth class. I imagine a full blown caster would have higher INT thus casting spells would be more efficient, it just seems that there is an underbalance for spellcasters as you give up far too much in strength and endurance for high INT and you get better bang for your buck with STR than you do with INT for everything from damage done, to amount you can carry.

Still haven't found those damn gauntlets, but I did rediscover the joys of combat through my new backstabbing technique (well new to me) and it has liberated me from being a greedy thief (for now)as I can use my joyous sneak skill, AND kill people in order to take their stuff. I have some strong leads on this dungeon with the +20 gaunts I once had in another life, and now that I am satisfied with my cash reserves/gear set up/spell selection, I can really focus on the short term plan, I hope. Afterwards I will return to the main quest, and ascend in the thieves guild quest tree as well. All in good time