Stuck on Dragonborn quest

[Wererommel]

The Situation: I met Frea and cleaned out Miraak’s Temple. Next, I was supposed to go to Saering’s Watch and learn the Bend Will shout. There was a dragon there, who I guess I was supposed to fight. I drew my bow and offered combat. Neither the daedric arrows from my enchanted dragon bow nor the various spells I tried seemed to have any effect. The various summoned creatures I also brought in couldn’t do a thing to the dragon. It just kept circling and making rude comments. It wouldn’t land. I was Level 69 and had killed six dragons already, and I couldn’t do a thing to it.

 

Maybe it needed a flat place to land? I tried moving around, and there seemed to be lots of space, but no luck. This went on for HOURS. Eventually, the dragon lost interest in me and went up in the mountains and circled around there for awhile. I had no way of getting to it. Then it disappeared and I got a message that Miraak had taken a dragon soul. He killed my dragon!

 

I got the Bend Will shout, but I can’t use it. I’m supposed to shout at the Wind Stone, but nothing doing. I have 15 shouts, but can only use two of them. When I click on Bend Will, I get the message that I have to kill more dragons and gain their power. But I don’t get to choose new shouts, and Bend Will is near the bottom of the list. At this rate, it will take me MONTHS before I can use Bend Will, assuming I can kill any more dragons. I could use the console to advance the quest, but it’s the main quest and I’m afraid I will screw it up.

 

Things look kind of hopeless. What should I do?

 

[anjenthedog]

You need to "spend a dragon soul" in order to enable new shout bits. Each one needs a dragon soul.

Go kill dragons. Shouts don't have to be enabled "in order", as if you have to enable fire breath before ice breath or so forth. You choose which gets enabled. (and to which degree - one word, two words, all three words)

[Wererommel]

I found an Old Dragon sitting on an island and killed him. Then Buzzkill Miraak showed up, said something like, "I wonder if it hurts when a soul is torn from the body," and absorbed all the energy. I got nothing. (Naturally, I filled him with arrows, and naturally, it did no good.) I think I'll just give up and go back to Skyrim. Maybe Miraak won't follow me there. It looks bad for the Skaal Village, but I have a feeling that their problem will keep.

[anjenthedog]

Go back to the mainland and kill some more. Annoying as it is when he shows up, eventually Miraak will miss a "steal" or two. And ftr, he will show up, even on the mainland.

 

PS> clue: pretty much everyone goes static (their problems "keep") when you're not there to further the story line

[Gorgopis]

SPOILER!

 

If you haven't visited Ustengrav a second time, please note you can get a "free dragon soul" there, by revisiting the tomb of Jurgen Windcaller.

 

Go back into the dungeon, and return to the tomb through the exit you used on your first visit, go up to the sarcophagus, stand right up next to it, and you should see a flash-message appear, "activate sarcophagus" or something like that.

 

You might have to walk around to the side, to get the activation flashscreen.

 

You can't get the soul on the first visit, when you get Delphine's note. But if you have 15 dragon souls already, you should be able to do it now.

 

The tomb will pass an extra dragon-soul to you. No need to use the console to advance the quest?

 

BTW, if Delphine was down there already, how did she reach the tomb? She left lots of spiders, draugr, and skeletons behind! Some Blade!

[Wererommel]

I just killed three more dragons, and it still says I need to kill more. So far, I have killed 9 dragons and only have two shouts. How many do I need?

[anjenthedog]

That's puzzling. You should be able to spend a dragon soul to enable a single shout word.

 

idk, maybe some other mod you have installed, that's designed to weaken you so you level slower or something? (I sometimes see posts from people who ask how to limit their growth rate, so it wouldn't surprise me to find there are mods that do that sort of thing)

 

On the other hand, maybe you have some baked in glitch in your save that's broken the ability. A new game should be able to test that (or the possibility of that being the case), or loading a lower level instance of your player and playing for a while, with the express purpose of gaining a single dragon soul, then spending it on a word that you've found but not activated yet. Or spending one you haven't used yet.

[7531Leonidas]

Question - have you cleaned your master files? I know that doing that caused a game-breaking bug in the final DB showdown w/Miraak, weirding out the Apocrypha level where you

find the dragon to ride to confront him..

 

 

I had to verify my game files through Steam, and re-enter that chapter in the book to complete the quest. Couldn't do that now, as it was before the 1.6+ game update, and I am still on v 1.597.

[Wererommel]

ReSaver says there's nothing wrong with my saves. I can't do anything to fix the master files, because I'm still on SE v 1.5.97. Also, I don't think it would help for the following reason:


I went back and refought five dragons, back to the time when I learned the first shout. Nothing changed. Both the two first shouts were scripted, they didn't depend on killing any more dragons. So near as I can figure, my problem is that I killed three dragons BEFORE getting the Dragonstone. That screwed up the count of dead dragons, and it never reset. There are now two ways forward. I could use

player.teachword.

to learn new words, regardless of the number of dead dragons. OR I could use

player.modav dragonsouls #

to reset the number of dead dragons. Presumably, I should set it to 3 to learn Bend Will, which is what I need next.

[7531Leonidas]

If I remember correctly, the player.modav dragonsouls console command will add the number of dragon souls to your total. I used to have to utilize it often when there was a common bug that killing a dragon would not give the PC a soul. I suggest that you use it at the value 1 (player.modav dragonsouls 1), activate your word, then repeat. It might prevent other weirdness.