How do you alchemists keep track of your experiments?

[SpellAndShield]

I love alchemy but it's tough to use in the game, tedious.

[gblouin86]

Here's an example of what I am talking about.

 

Let's say you have Vampire Dust. You can eat it to find out first effect. Then you can start combining it with other ingredients in attempts at uncovering what it's other 3 effects are. So you combine it with Snowberries - not result? So means it shares nothing with snowberries. Next try Garlic, no result? Try Salt - oh ok uncovered a new effect! This leaves two more unknown effects. So you keep doing this but it's easy to lose track of what you already tried. Did you already try combining it with Garlic? Yes, No? I dont remember!? Thats what I am referring to.... And I dont want to use a cheat to ruin the fun :) I just need an easy way to keep track of what I have already tried....

 

If you have already made it and it didn't work, it will be greyed out. If you've already made it and it did work, it will show you what potion you'll get out of it before you make it instead of displaying "potion of unknown effect".

[vorius]

Here's an example of what I am talking about.

 

Let's say you have Vampire Dust. You can eat it to find out first effect. Then you can start combining it with other ingredients in attempts at uncovering what it's other 3 effects are. So you combine it with Snowberries - not result? So means it shares nothing with snowberries. Next try Garlic, no result? Try Salt - oh ok uncovered a new effect! This leaves two more unknown effects. So you keep doing this but it's easy to lose track of what you already tried. Did you already try combining it with Garlic? Yes, No? I dont remember!? Thats what I am referring to.... And I dont want to use a cheat to ruin the fun :) I just need an easy way to keep track of what I have already tried....

 

If you have already made it and it didn't work, it will be greyed out. If you've already made it and it did work, it will show you what potion you'll get out of it before you make it instead of displaying "potion of unknown effect".

 

This is not true though...

 

I know I tested it - I combined 3 ingredients and got no potion.

 

Then if i gain selected one of the ingredients the 2nd and 3rd ones remained white, not greyed out.

[zimmit18]

Literally all you have to do is go to www.google.com and search for skyrim alchemy recipes or something of or that nature. Then on top of that, if you have a printer, print out all the recipes....playy skyrim, go adventuring into the wilderness and over the next few hours you'll collect tonsssssss of ingredients. Then when u happen to go back to town, go to the alchemy shop and look at your printed sheet of paper with all the recipes on it. And what I did was just start from the top and unlock all the different recipes for the future purposes.

[PsYchotic666Joker]

Literally all you have to do is go to www.google.com and search for skyrim alchemy recipes or something of or that nature. Then on top of that, if you have a printer, print out all the recipes....playy skyrim, go adventuring into the wilderness and over the next few hours you'll collect tonsssssss of ingredients. Then when u happen to go back to town, go to the alchemy shop and look at your printed sheet of paper with all the recipes on it. And what I did was just start from the top and unlock all the different recipes for the future purposes.

 

or look at page 1 of this thread and find my post at the bottom there is a link to all recipes

[vorius]

You guys are missing one important thing: I dont want to cheat!

 

I want to continue to explore and discover the effects of these ingredients on my own ! I dont want to lookup some cheat sheet to see exactly what does what! I just wish the game provided better interface for me so I dont have to write down all the combinations I have been sampling...

[gblouin86]

Here's an example of what I am talking about.

 

Let's say you have Vampire Dust. You can eat it to find out first effect. Then you can start combining it with other ingredients in attempts at uncovering what it's other 3 effects are. So you combine it with Snowberries - not result? So means it shares nothing with snowberries. Next try Garlic, no result? Try Salt - oh ok uncovered a new effect! This leaves two more unknown effects. So you keep doing this but it's easy to lose track of what you already tried. Did you already try combining it with Garlic? Yes, No? I dont remember!? Thats what I am referring to.... And I dont want to use a cheat to ruin the fun :) I just need an easy way to keep track of what I have already tried....

 

If you have already made it and it didn't work, it will be greyed out. If you've already made it and it did work, it will show you what potion you'll get out of it before you make it instead of displaying "potion of unknown effect".

 

This is not true though...

 

I know I tested it - I combined 3 ingredients and got no potion.

 

Then if i gain selected one of the ingredients the 2nd and 3rd ones remained white, not greyed out.

 

It is true if you only combine 2 ingredients. Do that until you've uncovered the properties completely, then you can start mixing 3 ingredient potions based on common effects to get more powerful ones. For the sake of uncovering properties, 2 ingredients is the way to go.

[vorius]

 

It is true if you only combine 2 ingredients. Do that until you've uncovered the properties completely, then you can start mixing 3 ingredient potions based on common effects to get more powerful ones. For the sake of uncovering properties, 2 ingredients is the way to go.

 

But then wont I waste more ingredients?

 

The way I understand it is doing 3 ingredients tests multiple combinations at the same time.

 

For example: Garlic, Salt and Wheat.

 

I can combine all three, and discover any shared effects amongst them in one attempt, using 1 of each ingredient. Right??

 

Or I can do this:

 

1) Garlic + Salt

2) Garlic + Wheat

3) Wheat + Salt

 

Using up double the ingredients in triple the effort.

[Sjakies123]

Here's an example of what I am talking about.

 

Let's say you have Vampire Dust. You can eat it to find out first effect. Then you can start combining it with other ingredients in attempts at uncovering what it's other 3 effects are. So you combine it with Snowberries - not result? So means it shares nothing with snowberries. Next try Garlic, no result? Try Salt - oh ok uncovered a new effect! This leaves two more unknown effects. So you keep doing this but it's easy to lose track of what you already tried. Did you already try combining it with Garlic? Yes, No? I dont remember!? Thats what I am referring to.... And I dont want to use a cheat to ruin the fun :) I just need an easy way to keep track of what I have already tried....

 

If you have already made it and it didn't work, it will be greyed out. If you've already made it and it did work, it will show you what potion you'll get out of it before you make it instead of displaying "potion of unknown effect".

 

This is not true though...

 

I know I tested it - I combined 3 ingredients and got no potion.

 

Then if i gain selected one of the ingredients the 2nd and 3rd ones remained white, not greyed out.

 

This does work for me though. Here's how i do it:

i select the ingredients tab at the top of the menu. If i now click 1 ingredient, some of them will become greyed out because i tried that combination allready, but if i add a 2nd ingredient, those might light up again because i have not tried that 2nd one with all those other ingredients. but once you tried that combo it should grey out your 1st ingredient when you only select the 2nd one, but not everything that was combined before, so it wont grey out everything you combined with that 1st one if you only select your 2nd one since you have not tried those combos yet. The minute you have selected 2 ingredients at the same time, everything lights up, this is true, so you have to select 1 ingredient at a time to see what combos you tried wit that one.

Clearing your selection (press F by default) over and over again after checking 1 plant is very much recommended when looking at the total list or else everything stays white :excl:

So far using a 2nd (and then a 3rd) ingredient makes almost everything light up again, because there are just to many possible combinations if you use 3 instead of 2 ingredients. ill grant that is a pain, but it is also the faster way of discovering effects.

Adding a random 3rd ingredient to an existing potion recipe is a good idea to discover effects, but idd, it wont show you if you tried that 3-way combination allready.

 

Alchemy this way has become a way of trial and error, frankly i like this better then how it was before. Im not gonna say it adds realism, but it does make a lot of sense to me since it now pays to buy potion recipes from vendors.

Edited November 16, 2011 by Sjakies123