Rat-catcher quest is confusing.

[VGI]

When you go from the Temple District to the Waterfront District, you will have to pass through the underground market. A nice interesting place.

 

Here, you could get a quest, "Rat-catcher". There are some posters informing people of this job.

 

From an Imperial guard, you may take on the quest. Sounds easy enough. Kill some darker-furred variety of rats (possibly diseased), and get gold for every kill. The rats are located underneath the waterfront.

 

If you follow the map it will lead you to a door that has a "hard" difficulty of lock-picking.

 

Using Refscope I found out that this door is unlocked by an Imperial Key, and that this quest is connected to Better Cities.esp (or esm). Wouldn't you know it, the guard who gave you this quest has the key. So why didn't he give me this blasted key when I accepted this quest? How am I suppose to get underneath into the Waterfront tunnels to kill the rats without this key?

 

I steal this key from him and resist arrest. I make a run for it to the door and unlock it. Wouldn't you know it, it is a room of some NPC, I can only vaguely remember the name because Imperial Guards are on my tail, and this NPC is also attacking me. I open her "closet door" which is actually covers the door to the tunnels underneath Waterfront. The blasted door has a setting of "hard" again, so lock-picking it won't work. So, using Refscope again (while getting beat up by Imperial Guards and this NPC) I find out that this door is unlocked by a key of this NPC.

 

Ugh. I accept this quest. The Imperial Guard who gave me this quest should have given me the key. But no. He didn't. I swipe the key from him and he chases me, trying to arrest me. Uh...what? Then I open the door to the tunnels underneath Waterfront and get attacked by an NPC, who holds yet another key to the actual door leading to the tunnels underneath Waterfront.

 

 

These stupid mod-added quests! So it seems that certain mods adds things without telling you. Its not in the mod documentation whatsoever. In this case, this is the second quest I have seen that has been added by Better Cities. And the other one is just as confusing.

[Striker879]

This falls under the category Cheats (or you may decide to call them quest optimizers). Open the console with the tilde (~) key, click on the door you want open and enter "unlock" (without the quotes). It will probably be a little less exciting if you do this before getting everyone in an uproar. :tongue:

[VGI]

This falls under the category Cheats (or you may decide to call them quest optimizers). Open the console with the tilde (~) key, click on the door you want open and enter "unlock" (without the quotes). It will probably be a little less exciting if you do this before getting everyone in an uproar. :tongue:

 

Seriously? Gosh that only makes it more...lousy?

 

Sorry, I can't find a better name for it.

 

But I do seriously appreciate the input. Its just that, if you have to do this sort of thing...then the game-immersion goes down the toilet.

 

I just got a horse in the game involving this little quest about an orc lady eating horses in their stables. But the first real quest that I finished is the one involving the owner of the [forgot the first word] Coinpurse Shop. That was some seriously neat quest with some simple but lovely and quite effective twists to it. Got a lot of loot too!

 

Then I come across this Anertus Flores guy...and the Rat-catcher quest...it just ruined the momentum, you know? If a mod would add these things, I wish it would say so. I never imagined that Better Cities would add these quests. I thinkt it did a pretty awesome job of making Cyrodil cities a lot lot better...then RefScope tells me that it added certain...pardon the word "lousily" made quests...or at least these quests are connected somehow to Better Cities' esp and esm files.

 

...just makes me say a very disappointed, "*sigh!* Ah well, that's life......moving on."

 

I suspect that there is another way into the Waterfront tunnels. Also, I believe that I should loot Anertus Flores stinkin' carcass...or at least take the Undelivered Love Letter and Aisha's Wedding Ring (+5 Luck Constant effect on Self) in the hopes that perhaps I may (emphasis on "may") come across Aisha one day, and again, hopefully (though the quest log was not updated), I could tell her that Anertus killed himself or something like that.

 

Then again, with a broken quest like this, if ever I do come across Aisha one day, we would most probably just talk about rumors. Seriously, that is what I am thinking.

[Striker879]

Here's a link to a thread in the Spoilers section: What's the first thing you do ... . It comes from the Spoilers section ... you chose whether to click or not. Have fun. :biggrin:

[VGI]

Here's a link to a thread in the Spoilers section: What's the first thing you do ... . It comes from the Spoilers section ... you chose whether to click or not. Have fun. :biggrin:

 

Now why would I spoil the game even more?

 

Its got a lot spoiled several times already.

 

Is there any reference to Anertus Flores or the Rat-Catcher quest in that thread?

[Striker879]

No none at all. I only posted it because I thought you might appreciate some ideas on where to venture next. There aren't any true 'spoilers' in the thread that I can recall ... mostly just where people go first when they exit the sewers and their reasoning for doing so.

 

Even the vanilla game quests have plenty of 'gotchas' (things that break quests because they were done in the wrong order mostly). You won't get any in-game warnings beforehand or indications why a quest won't advance. I use the UESP Wiki resources because stuff like that bugs me and I want to avoid pitfalls where possible. You'll need to develop you're own way of dealing with the inevitable disappointments ... you will have some. Overall the game is still enjoyable for me ... I just take a different approach than you (and that doesn't make either method better ... just different).

Edited March 10, 2011 by Striker879

[VGI]

No none at all. I only posted it because I thought you might appreciate some ideas on where to venture next. There aren't any true 'spoilers' in the thread that I can recall ... mostly just where people go first when they exit the sewers and their reasoning for doing so.

 

Even the vanilla game quests have plenty of 'gotchas' (things that break quests because they were done in the wrong order mostly). You won't get any in-game warnings beforehand or indications why a quest won't advance. I use the UESP Wiki resources because stuff like that bugs me and I want to avoid pitfalls where possible. You'll need to develop you're own way of dealing with the inevitable disappointments ... you will have some. Overall the game is still enjoyable for me ... I just take a different approach than you (and that doesn't make either method better ... just different).

 

Ah, excellent reply.

 

I believe this will help me go on with the game. So, even vanilla quests can get broken, huh?

 

I guess things like this is what would plague most open-world games. If Bethesda would have trouble with quests, how much more mod-authors? But Bethesda should know much about how to deal with it by now so that at least, vanilla quests won't break. I am anticipating TES5.

[Striker879]

A further suggestion for you to consider VGI.

 

This UESP Wiki page is the main page for vanilla game quests. It's just a list of places and categories of quests, no spoilers from checking it out. From each of the links it provides a page of quest names and short descriptions opens. For example, the Unfriendly Competition quest you've just completed in the Imperial city has this description showing on the page that lists all quests starting in the IC:

 

Unfriendly Competition: A newly opened shop run by Thoronir is selling goods below cost, causing big problems for the other merchants.

 

Each link provided on this second page leads to the actual walkthrough for that quest. Any quests that have bugs, have them described in a separate section at the bottom of the walkthrough. For example here's the bugs section for Unfriendly Competition excerpted:

 

Bugs

 

It is possible to kill Agarmir before starting the quest, as he is not marked as essential. This will make Thoronir wait in the garden for nothing, because nobody is going to show up. You'll need to fix it using the console or load a previous game.

Sometimes when you slay Agarmir, it reads 'One of the characters needed for this quest has died'. If you then take the shovel, you will be unable to drop it as it somehow counts as a quest item.

Sometimes, when you follow Thoronir to the garden, the conversation never actually starts between him and Agarmir. Even if you go up and talk to them, it may not update your quest. In this case, you will have to wait until the next day and follow Thoronir again before it will work.

If you take the shovel before killing Agarmir, you will need to drop it and pick it up again to get the quest update.

If you have completed the Dagon Shrine quest, make sure that any hostile Mythic Dawn agents in the city have been killed before following Thoronir to his meeting. These agents may occasionally attack nearby guards during the conversation, causing Thoronir to run off to help fight them. Since the quest never updates properly, you will be stuck in cinematic mode and be unable to move, leaving you little choice but to reload from an earlier save.

This bug is fixed by the Unofficial Oblivion Patch.

If you try to sneak attack Agarmir or Rolgarel in Trentius' Mausoleum, it will count as an assault and a guard will appear in the tomb to arrest you. After the guard has taken you away (whether to pay the fine or to serve jail time), you will never be able to re-enter the mausoleum. The mausoleum is locked and the only key to open the door is carried by Agarmir, who is inside. Sometimes, however, Agarmir may appear outside the jail upon your release. You can then attack him as usual and finish the quest.

On the PC, this can be fixed by using the console. Click on the front door to the Mausoleum, then type unlock.

If you can cast a strong Charm spell on the guard when he first appears, he will "pay the fine" for you, and you will remain inside the crypt.

Once you have been taken out of the crypt, there is no fix for Xbox 360 or PS3 players.

This bug is fixed by the Unofficial Oblivion Patch.

 

The bugs section is always located near the bottom of the page, just above the table that shows the quest stages and journal entries. When you do something in-game that starts a quest you'll get the quest start dialog and journal entry (unless it's a miscellaneous non-journal quest). By looking at your journal for the quest name (e.g. Unfriendly Competition) and your location (e.g. Imperial City) you could navigate to the quest walkthrough and then immediately scroll to the bottom of the page. All you would see is the quest stage table and bugs section. That would give you a bit of a leg up on pitfalls to avoid. There are some pitfalls that you may have not known about prior to the quest starting (e.g. if you are ever near a place called the Temple of the Ancestor Moths don't explore inside ... I won't say any more but you will have occasion to thank me if you avoid this pitfall), no way of avoiding that.

 

I'm only offering an alternative here ... you decide if the suggestion has any merit for you. Again ... have fun.

Edited March 11, 2011 by Striker879

[ElricOfGrans]

The quest is bugged as all heck anyway. Even if you go down and kill the rats, it never triggers the update where you get your reward and never finishes. The guard also seems to get his AI scripts messed up by advancing the quest. I think most, if not all, of the quests added by Better Cities are like this. That is my experience at least.

[VGI]

The quest is bugged as all heck anyway. Even if you go down and kill the rats, it never triggers the update where you get your reward and never finishes. The guard also seems to get his AI scripts messed up by advancing the quest. I think most, if not all, of the quests added by Better Cities are like this. That is my experience at least.

 

Ouch. Better Cities should have just stuck with Bettering the Cities. That's what it is popular for. That is what it does best.

 

Adding these broken, and poorly-made quests just takes away points from Better Cities.