Daggerfall Hints - Part 2

                     Taken from the Net

@~Continued from Issue 54

ARGH! TOO MUCH INVENTORY!
You may be a burly man/woman/thing, but in the end you can only
carry so much inventory. A wagon can be bought to carry many
things, though it doesn't come cheap. Instead, what you can do is
rent out a room from an inn for a long period of time. This way,
you can store excess inventory in the room while you go out and
adventure.  Obviously, in the long term, this isn't very cost
effective. One day, you will have to get a wagon, or a house, or a
ship to store all the treasures you gathered from your adventures.
Remember that gold is heavy. Your encumbrance will be high, even
if your inventory is low, if you are carrying around lots of gold.
One way to lighten your load is to trade the gold into credit at a
bank. There is a small transaction fee, but a letter of credit

stating you have $100,000 in gold is much lighter than $100,000 in
gold!

TAKING PICTURES
For those that want to capture the moment, there is a way to take
BMP pictures anywhere in the game. Simply create a PICS
subdirectory in the DAGGER directory that is installed on your
harddrive. Now whenever you play the game and see something truly
spectacular, all you have to do is press the / key (backslash key)
and a BMP picture is taken and stored into the PICS subdirectory.
To view the picture, simply exit the game and click on the file in
the PICS subdirectory. You can now document your adventures
through Daggerfall and share them!

TRAVELLING - TIP 1
You have several methods of travelling, ranging from foot, horse,
to ship. Each one has a distinct advantage and disadvantage. A
wagon is not considered a mode of travelling, but it can reduce
your encumbrance whether on foot or horse.

FOOT
Walking around can be a leisurely activity, however it can become
tedious, especially in large towns and cities, and can also drain
your character of energy and leave you fatigued. This goes double
for running around. However, running around does build your
running skills. This results in faster travel, when on foot, and
is particularly useful when questing in dungeons and castles, as
you cannot ride a horse in these environments. Your Speed
Attribute affects how quickly your running skills increase.

HORSE
Having a horse can make travel much quicker, especially when you
are in large towns and cities (i.e. Daggerfall, Sentinel and
Wayrest are especially large cities.) Though buying a horse is
expensive, once you own one, it will never die nor will it get
sick or fatigued. You can mount a horse in any outdoor
environment. Riding a horse, however, prevents you from building
your running skill, as you are not running on foot.



SHIP
Needless to say, buying a ship is extremely expensive. However,
owning a ship has two advantages, besides being a status symbol!
First, a ship can reduce travel time across the ocean. If you own
the ship, travel is free across the water, otherwise it is quite
costly if you use it regularly. Second, a ship can be used to
store all of your belongings and treasures. You need not worry
about pirates and thieves, as your ship cannot be attacked at sea
or docked in a harbor.

TRAVELLING TIP - FAST TRAVEL
When you travel from town to town, and from province to province,
you can fast travel to get there quicker.

CAUTIOUS VS. RECKLESS
Travelling cautiously takes longer, but your character always
arrives in daylight, when the city gates are open.


INNS VS. CAMP OUT
Camping out is always free. However, it increases travel time a
bit to account for the need to hunt for your food.

BREAKING DOWN DOORS
When a door has nothing to fear from you, it means that your
lockpicking skills just don't cut it. But there is a way around
this. You can break the lock on the door by beating on it! Use
your weapon or foot/hand and continually pound on the door til it
opens. It may take quite a number of hits before you succeed.
There are some notes of precaution. Using your weapon to break a
door open will degenerate your weapon, and eventually render it
useless (then you will have to find a blacksmith to repair it.)
Use your foot/hand as often as possible.  However, this method
will take longer to get results compared to using a weapon, and it
also leaves you vulnerable to attack since your weapon is not
ready. Be caution in monster-infested dungeons and castles when
attempting to break open a door. Also, magically held doors will
not break down by this method.

BREAKING AND ENTERING
If you want to be a thief at least think like one. Break into
houses during the night. Check around to make sure as few people
are around to see your activities. You may successfully break into
a house, but stealing may set off alarms to the household, and the
guards will come after you. Remember that breaking into a house
and stealing are two different skills. Also, if a house has a
second floor, there might be a door into the house from the second
floor. Breaking and entering from the second floor will attract
less attention.

BAD BEHAVIOR CAN BE COSTLY
It sure is fun to break into people's houses or steal from stores.
Or you may be the immoral type that kills innocent people for no
reason.  Either way, you should know that your behavior can have
harsh consequences. If you are caught too often and brought into
court, you could be banished from a town. The result is that you
cannot get in for a long period of time. If you are the type that
likes to run away from the law, you can outrun the guards, and
escape from the town. If you do, you can enter back into the town
and the guards will not recognize you. That is, if you do not pull
anything criminally excessive off, like kill a dozen innocent
bystanders. The guards will recognize you if you exit and enter
the town again, and they will chase you down.

STORES AND MERCHANTS
Pay close attention to the text that appears whenever you enter a
store. If the text indicates that the store is of good quality,
you want to look around to find rare items for sale which are hard
to come by.  There tends to be high quality items in these stores.
However, you should never sell your inventory to these stores.
These merchants tend to be shrewd business folks, and can often
negotiate better than you. However, if the text indicates that the
store is of shoddy quality, you want to sell your inventory. The
merchants that run these stores tend to be worse at negotiation,
thus you will be able to get more money for the things you sell.
Note that if you want to purchase merchandise from a store, click
on the shelves where the merchandise is located.



When buying and selling items, a COST bar appears above your
character portrait. The first number is the base value of the
items being exchanged. The second number is how much gold your
character is carrying. Beware! You will never buy or sell items
for the price shown here. However, you can find out how badly you
bargained or how dramatic the economic conditions of the region
are influencing prices. Even in the best of circumstances, there
will be a significant difference between the buying and selling
prices of items.

TAVERNS
If you rent a room in a tavern for many days, you can leave your
stuff there safely. So long as you return before the time expires,
your stuff is safe. When you enter a town, a message appears on
the screen if you have a room at any tavern anywhere in that town.
Once every four hours you can buy food or drink at a tavern. This
will restore a small amount of health.


QUESTS - EXTERMINATION
Some quests will have you out to kill creatures that have infested
a house or a tavern. When you attempt to kill these creatures, be
aware that there could be a variable number of them infesting a
certain location. Do not let them gang up on you! You do not have
to kill all of the creatures to successfully complete the quest.
Generally, the quest is completed once you kill about 2/3 of all
creatures. Text will generally appear to indicate that you have
successfully completed the quest.

QUESTS -YOU'RE A HITMAN/HITWOMAN
You may be called upon to kill someone. When you discover where
that person may be hiding out, note that the door may be locked.
It's locked for a good reason. He/she knows that hitmen are out
there!  You may have to break the door down. Also, you may not
find your victim at certain times. They too have lives, and may be
located at different locations at different times of the day.
Often times if you wait at your victim's hangout, they will
eventually come in. One quest has you going after someone who
sleeps in his house at night, works during the day, and drinks at
a tavern after work. He can be found at one of those locations. If
you ask around, someone might be able to direct you to him.

QUESTS - DON'T ALWAYS BE A HERO
Often times, a quest giver will threaten you if you do not take a
quest.  Do not take his/her word too harshly, as ultimately his
threats will have little consequence in the game. Make sure that
your skills are advanced enough, and that you have the proper
equipment before you accept a quest. Failing a quest will have a
greater negative effect on your reputation than turning a quest
down.

COMBAT - ARCHERY TIP 1
Using a bow and arrow as a weapon can be extremely useful in
avoiding hand to hand combat, especially against creatures that
can paralyze you. You do have a limited supply of arrows, and the
number of arrows you can carry depends on how much encumbrance you
can take (check encumbrance level on your Character Sheet screen.)
What do you do when you are deep in a dungeon and run out of
arrows? Try searching the body of dead enemies which you killed
with an arrow. Chances are you can successfully find the arrows
and reuse them. This also goes for arrows which are shot at you.
Check your inventory, and see if you managed to pull the arrow out
to reuse! Now that's recycling! There is a distinct disadvantage
when using a bow and arrow. When enemies manage to get close in
and attack you, it will take a few seconds for you to switch to
close range weapon, thus leaving you vulnerable to the first
attack.

STARTING OUT AND EXPLORING CITIES
There are over 16,000 locales in the game Daggerfall, ranging from
dungeons, towns, farms, castles, to cities. Some of the most
impressive sites are the main cities in each province. Take some
time to explore the cities of Daggerfall, Sentinel, and Wayrest,
each located in their prospective province by the same name. The
main quest will have you visiting these cities one time or
another, so explore them at your leisure, and enjoy the sights. Of
particular visual beauty are the central castles in each city. It
is not recommended to visit the city of Daggerfall at night. It is

haunted by the undead, which are difficult to kill. You can avoid
these creatures by staying indoors at night.

CONTROLS
When you start the game, experiment using the View Interface. This
is the interface used in many 3D action games including
Terminator: Future Shock and the other game equivalent to "Ground
Shaker".  Basically, your movement forward and backward are
controlled by the keyboard, and your ability to look around is
controlled by the mouse.  Most of the people at Bethesda prefer
the View Interface, though Julian Lefay and a few others prefer
the Cursor Interface. Since you are going to be sitting down with
the game for a long time, get comfortable with an interface which
you think will be the most effective and efficient for you in the
long term.

BUILDING YOUR SKILLS: TIP 1
Never do anything normal in Daggerfall, because it doesn't build
any skills. Daggerfall is designed so that when you use a skill
more often, the better you get at it. Even simple things like
exploring a town and dungeon can become training grounds. When in
a town, always run around. This builds your running skill. When in
a dungeon, sneak around since this builds your stealth skill.

BUILDING YOUR SKILLS: TIP 2
Always try to build your primary and major skills. Your
advancement in level directly depends upon how quickly you build
up your entire group of primary and major skills. There is a
specific formula that is used, but to go into detail of how it
works is like math class. However, what I can tell you is that
since skills advance at a decreasing rate as you become more
proficient at that skill, it will take more effort into building
that skill. However, there are certain skills which you do not use
often and will naturally be lower. Train in guilds to build these
skills. They will initially advance faster, and the faster you
advance in overall primary and major skills, the faster your level
advances. Remember, it is the sum of skill points in the primary
and major skill categories that advance your level.


WHO KNOWS WHAT ABOUT WHAT
It can be trying attempting to get information you need from
someone.  You just have to know who to talk to. Certain types of
people tend to have more information about things than others.
Folks walking around the streets tend to know more about specific
places in towns and locations. Scholars in guilds tend to know
more about specific objects.  Merchants and the underworld
(thieves, prostitutes) tend to know the gossip about certain
people. By the way, prostitutes are generally found in taverns.
And no, you cannot partake of any unscrupulous activities with
them.

ETIQUETTE/STREETWISE SKILLS
These two skills play a factor in several things.

TONE OF COMMUNICATING
When communicating with others, you can speak to them in several
tones, which include polite, normal, and bluntly. Your etiquette
skill influences your ability to speak to others politely. The
better your etiquette skill, the more likely those well received
from polite conversation will address your needs. Nobles and
knights are just a few examples of those that demand polite
conversation. The more you use polite conversation, the more your
etiquette skill will develop. Your streetwise skill influences
your ability to speak to others bluntly.  Thieves and other
uncouth sorts will respond towards this tone better, and in fact
prefer it. The more you use blunt conversation, the more your
streetwise skill will develop.

STANDING BEFORE A JUDGE
There are several instances where you must appear in court (i.e.
killing a townsperson, and then surrendering to a guard.) If you
deem yourself not guilty, you have the option to debate or lie to
clear yourself. Your etiquette skill influences your ability to
debate. The better this skill, the more likely the judge will set
you free. The more often you debate, the more your etiquette skill
will develop. Your streetwise skill influences your ability to
lie. The better this skill, the more likely the judge will buy
your story. The more often you lie, the more your streetwise skill
will develop.

COMBAT: TIP 1
When engaging in close combat with an enemy, you should move back
and forth often. When you swing your weapon, move in close to
strike, then move back out to give you time to ready your weapon
again and to dodge the enemy's attack. Note that enemies will only
engage in combat when you are close to them. They will not react
and swing their weapon if you are out of range. Of course this
only applies to enemies that do not have long range attacks.










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