Wretched Excess

[BrettM]

Don't you just love it when several random encounters converge on you at the same time?

 

I had just managed to take out a giant on the tundra in Whiterun hold with a few well-placed sneak shots, but I hadn't noticed a couple of mammoths nearby, and they weren't happy. I wasn't yet up to taking on mammoths, so I ran off to try to shake them. Just as they stopped following, a dragon swooped in on me. This upset the mammoths all over again and caused them to come charging towards me. Now I had two mammoths trying to beat on me while a dragon hovered above toasting all of us, when suddenly a thief shows up and sucks me into his "your money or your life" dialog. Apparently those dialogs don't stop time but just prevent you from moving until you get out of them, so the mammoths got in a hit and the dragon got in some flames before I could tab out, at which point the thief was attacking as well. I still can't figure out how I survived that riot, but it was a darned good thing I wasn't low on health potions.

 

Another time I was facing off against the bandits in the tower ruins between Riften and the Black-Briar Lodge. No problem, until a fugitive ran up and sucked me into his "take this and keep quiet about it" schtick. We were all up on this little platform that is all that is left of the tower, so the fugitive couldn't get away because a hunter came running up the stairs right behind him wanting to know if I'd seen the guy that stole from him. The hunter started shooting at the fugitive, the bandits were still whacking at me, but the game decided there weren't enough of us crowded in that small area because it sent two Frostbite Spiders AND a wolf to join the fray. I guess I'm just lucky that no dragons were around and that there aren't any mammoths in the Rift.

 

What are your stories of wretched excess?

[Perraine]

Lol ... Not bad ... One of my most recent "Radiantisms" was one of those random guys telling you to "hold an item, double cross him and he'll keel you" he was being attacked by an Ice Wolf and a Frost Troll, plus I'd just zoned in, which had also triggered a random Dragon attack, and while I was trying to get away from HIM to fight the dragon, the hunter turned up and started attacking as well ... Ahh what fun ...

[thompsonar]

I had one near one of the stormcloak camps a while back that started with a couple thalmor wizards getting too close to the stormcloaks. While they were fighting there was apparently an imperial patrol nearby that ran and joined in, along with a couple sabre cats. I jumped in to aid the imperials and was getting wrecked quite honestly. Suddenly a dragon dropped down in the middle of everyone and started sending soldiers flying through the air and spewing fire everywhere. I ran a short distance away and just watched the battle until everything was dead but the dragon, which I then tried to kill but also became a victim (damn deadly dragons).

 

Another time I had just come out of some ruin after clearing it when those thugs showed up to "teach me a lesson" along with a courier who had an important letter for me. I got pretty hurt while in the dialogue with the courier so I tried to run and get some distance between me and the thugs. Well I ran right into a couple snow bears and got the attention of an ice wraith nearby. Then, you guessed it, blood dragon. I managed to hold my own for a little while but the damn ice wraith got me while I was distracted by the dragon.

 

I never seem to fair well when all hell breaks loose.

[CasperTheLich]

i was doing the stormcloak civil war questline. was on the infiltrate the fort & spring the prisoners quest. i had just managed to silently terminate the only imperial legionnaire in my way to the fort’s hidden entry. however, i had a hard time finding it. (and with frostfall and dd wasn't good)

 

well after about 5 minutes of searching for that side entrance 3 dragons attack: a zealot of akatosh, a volcanic dragon, and a storm dragon... at this point the imperials go crazy, the stormcloaks go crazy, the dragons are going wild, i'm dying from hypothermia, and i failed part of my current quest through no fault of my own. well most of the imperials & stormcloaks died, and i figured none of that would have happened if i only found the entrance sooner (which wasn’t marked at all and the quest marker was leading me in the wrong direction), so i reloaded cause i was pissed. and no dragons at all that time, happy ending... well, for the storm cloaks at least.

[memlapse]

It is these types of chaotic encounters that keep my playing. When you have several spawn mods enabled (ie, WIS, Occupy Skyrim, Patrols, etc), you get overlapping encounters. Throw in some vanilla encounters, such as the ones mentioned above, and it makes for a great time.

[RedRavyn]

My most recent one was in my last playthrough. I don't remember the exact location, but I was just wandering around looking for dragons to kill and I was following a dragon lair icon on my radar. I knew from experience with other playthroughs that this was Autumnwatch Tower, which is usually a pretty easy location. Out of nowhere a dragon starts swooping down on me, and I thought to myself ... "Self. You need ta be more stealthy when yer walkin' about. You done all woke up thet thar lizzerd!"

 

Now, I knew that I wasn't ready to face him where I was. I was in a narrow pass with nowhere to hide, so I decided not to fight him there. Instead, I made a beeline to Autumwatch, hoping he'd get distracted by some of the local wildlife or maybe by the soldiers at the nearby Rift Imperial Camp like frequently happens with this particular dragon. He only strafed me once and then, true to his inborn DADS (Draconian Attention Deficit Syndrome), he disappeared and I could hear him flying around and going aggro on everything in sight.

 

I arrived at Autumnwatch and headed straight for the tower so I could get on top and look around, hoping get a clear arrow shot to grab his attention again, but ... I woke up the Autumnwatch dragon! There he was, snoozing like a baby until I trundled in at full speed. Needless to say, he wasn't terribly pleased with having his slumber interrupted and he was all over me before I could reach the tower. This one was a fire-breather (Blood Dragon). Well, now that I knew exactly what I was facing here, I got on my two pieces of asbestos gear (boots and a necklace) and prepared to fight the Real McCoy.

 

Taking advantage of his circle and strafe maneuver I ducked behind the tower and healed up, peeking out to take a shot at him when he came charging back in, only to get attacked by frost. It was the other dragon, come back to finish what he started! The Autumnwatch dragon was still circling. I got off my shot, anyway, and his health bar popped up on my radar. This one was a Blood Dragon, too. The Autumnwatch dragon enjoined the battle only seconds later with a strafing attack of his own, and then they settled down to double-team me.

 

I wound up going through most of my healing potions in the first couple minutes of the fight, since they kept me continuously pinned down, but I kept plunking away at them whenever I could get a free shot. I eventually wore both of them down so that they were grounded, although they flushed me out of hiding several times and I was engaged in a run-and-shoot battle with two dragons out in the open. In a stroke of pure luck, I was flanked by both of them and caught in their crossfire at one point -- fire and frost. My health was hanging by a thread ... literally just a narrow line on my health bar, and what happened? The frost-breathing dragon killed the Autumnwatch dragon for me! This is the first example of friendly-fire I've seen in this game (and that was through twelve playthroughs), that actually killed an opponent. I got off a quick shot on the remaining dragon just as he lunged at me, and killed him with a crit, thanking the Nine Divines (I'm a Thalmor-hater) and my foresight to craft up a bunch of potions before starting on my hunting trip.

 

Later, I discovered that the nearby dragonmound (SE of Bthalft, NE of Autumnwatch, and almost due N of Froki's Shack) was empty. Alduin had gotten there right before I did. I think he was following me in that playthrough. On each of the previous two days I had come across him actually resurrecting dragons, which is something I've never seen before then, (except for Sahloknir, of course).