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worm82075
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« on: June 09, 2008, 03:04:42 pm » |
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Origin of the Mages Guild Quests.
This Guide is dedicated to those users who registered on the website and are supporting my work. This guide was not going to be written at all, but because you are supporting me, I will support you. Bewarned, this is not a walk through, it really is just a guide. Please note that I have written this assuming you will read all the sections at the top and then read the sections concerning the quests as you need to know them. So any vital tips you must know are found at the top and mentioned again in the first quest that uses them but not the others. This means you can use this guide as a reference tool and do not have to read it all, but you do need to read down as far as the first quest.
Quests, Problems Procedures explained.
Oblivion Timer Bug.
Waiting in the game repeatedly prevents some scripts from running, there is a delay of 3 seconds between scripts running and if you wait a second time before a script has had chance to run, you will stop that script from executing. But waiting 3 seconds is just how long the game is supposed to take to repeatedly run scripts. On slower systems it takes longer and the more mods you have installed the longer the delay between it running scripts after you finish waiting. For this reason, all my quests now check if you have passed the current delay time or use a delay that repeats each and every week until it finally does runs. This means you may skip it once, twice, three hundred times, but eventually it will run and the quests will continue. So do not worry if a quest does not start or day another user gave comes and goes and you do not see the quest, its all normal. Any conflicts that may prevent a quest from running will be explained below.
NPC conflicts and Quests.
Julienne Fanis is an NPC I added packages too for certain quests and she makes a very good example of how other mods can break my quests in this mod. If any other mod changes Julienne Fanis then my packages will never be added to her and she will not go to the council chamber to offer you a quest when the time comes. So if any NPC appears to disobey the quest description mentioned in this guide, the chances are extremely high you have a mod conflict that is over riding that NPC.
Required Quests
These quests are quests you must do to progress in this mod, all have a solid basis in game lore and should be beyond question. Even so, I found some self confessed lore fans apparently know less than I do about the game lore or ignore evidence found in the game. So some areas of these quests have been toned down and say a lot less about game lore than I wanted them to say. This avoids a dispute amongst lore fans. I will explain this in the Lore Guide later.
All required quests are presented in the Council Chambers after you restore the Council. Any NPC offering a required quest will walk to the council to brief you. Also, all required quests popup with a log entry telling you that they are available. So you cannot miss them. They appear with some degree of randomness thanks to the problem the game has tracking time, but all you need to do is wait and they will appear. These quests require you to be Archmage before they will start and most other quests need one of these to be completed before they appear.
Optional Quests
These quests are provided by the Councilors in council chamber, they cover quests and improvements you may or may no want to do. The choice is yours, these are also optional because some aspects of these quests are disputed lore, eg there can be more than 1 correct version of events. You need to speak to various NPCs about these and they become available usually after the Bruma Guild is restored, but that may not be true in all cases.
Side Quests
These quests are not always simply accepted by talking to an NPC. You may find a note that leads on a quest without that quest being announced and without you getting any log updates for it at all. EG you may be told a cave is of special interest or a clue about the Bravil Ayleids may be dropped somewhere. Some of these clues are real clues, if you follow them up, you will be rewarded. Some are red herrings.
The Council Chambers.
All Required and most Optional Quests are only offered in the council chambers, so you must go there to get them. This is explained below but you should consider it common practice for the Mages Guild to deal with business in the Council Chambers. Some department specific quests will be available from the department that offers them. They are the exception to the rule. Additional rumors to explain lore can be found in various departments but these have nothing to do with any quest even if they only appear after you have done some quests.
Quests
Required Quests
Recruitment
This quest starts with you getting a popup message telling to go to the Mages Guild Lobby and speak to Raminus (there is a delay and it may appear random). He gives you a list of people who will make good councilors that you must find and promote. It is an easy goffer quest, go here, go there, nothing hard. More a quest to demonstrate the Councilor's have lifes of their own and opinions of their own. Which I may use later smile.gif The end result is the Council is formed and takes over the day to day running of the Mages Guild for you. They also made decisions for the guild that you will see popup from time to time. One such decision is the opening of the Arcane University to day time visitors, which when combined with specific optional quests really brings the Arcane University to life.
Bruma Guild Hall
A popup message tells you when this quest starts (there is a delay and it may appear random). This quest starts after the Recruitment Quest has finished and this quest is the quest that most optional quests need you to complete first. During this quest Raminus sets up a standard system for getting quests that you MUST follow for all future REQUIRED QUESTS. He tells you to go to the council chambers and he will send Julienne Fanis to you. You are supposed to learn that business (REQUIRED QUESTS) is ALWAYS conducted in the Council Chamber from now on. Julienne Fanis should turn up and wait during normal council meeting hours which are 8am till 11am, and 4pm till 7pm. She will keep returning until the Bruma Guild is restored. She will guide you through this quest, it is easy so I doubt you will need further help. Also after this quest is completed many other little changes take place, for starters there is a new Black Horse Courier news letter that appears everywhere but lots of other quests become available too.
Socially Unacceptable
After the Bruma Guild is restored Raminus Polus manages to lose 2 of his staff members, the two Mages are in fact Inquisitors and they often get assigned dangerous tasks. This time they are hunting down Conjurers. The quest in question is watered down considerably compared to the one I wanted to make and I will explain why on the lore page covering the lore behind these quests. Raminus needs these two mages to open the new Daedric studies department but that cannot be done until you have found them. Your first step is to speak to Calindil at the Mystic Emporium. He tells you that he delivered some supplies to Gottlefont Priory.
Here I expect you to find the Priory your self, it is part of the quest to try and find it because those green arrow sometimes ruin quests if used all the time. Once you do find it, look in front of the church doors for the supplies Calindil spoke of. Open the crate, read the dairy and find out where Ivan went too. Then go there and help him fight the Conjurers outside Ceyatatar. No need to enter, just kill any bad guys that exist and speak to Ivan.
The rest of the quest runs and ends on its own using a timer and that timer is subject to the timer bug mentioned above but will eventually trigger so do not worry. The timer it self will trigger once a week until the quest finishes. Also when you finally get the quest complete message, the door to the Daedric Studies Department will be open and you can use it. This quest may seem clear cut but it deals with a dispute between some Lore fans over the Summoning of Daedra and the Mages Guild rules surrounding it. So this topic is one worth reading about after you complete the quests. See the Lore guide for more info on this.
Optional Quests
Building the Teleporter
This quest is optional and adds a Teleporter to the game. The Teleporter may not be what everybody wants so it is optional for that reason. If built then NPCs from this mod and others will use it to travel between cities. Making the Mages Guild Halls very busy places. Your companions will also use it to follow you between cities and certain extra features of this mod become available such as weekly meetings in the council chambers for various newly added NPCs from the local guild halls. Also some NPCs from local guild halls will use it to attend the Arcane University once or twice a week. But all these only happens if you build the Teleporter.
Players should not do this quest if they have the Cyrodiil Transport mod installed, I am told certain doorways occupy the same space as the ones placed in this mod. So either use the teleporter in this mod or the ones in the Cyrodiil Transport, not both. I recommend users save the game before doing this quest and then testing each system to see which one they prefer. I can see some guilds getting a little too busy if certain busy roads mods are installed.
The quest is offered by Archmagister Yola Brunafelt in the council chambers after you have restored the Bruma Guild. It requires you to give Yola 7 Welkynd Stones and assumes you will go to various ruins to get them. The quest does not actually care where you go to get them, you may have some kicking around you can use, which is fine. This is one of methods I have used to reduce the amount of testing I have to do, if this disappoints you than sorry, but nobody likes to help me test these mods so this is the price you pay. The other item you need is a Varla stone and unlike the 7 Welkynd Stones, this one is one I have scripted properly and you cannot cheat to complete this quest. The Varla stone you need is in Hame and I have added extra bad guys to the ruin to spice up the battle. So be prepared for the fight. It will appear after Yola tells you he needs it and not before, so you cannot go there early. After the quest is completed, Hame is restored to its former self.
Also please note that in Hame there is a key on a book in a secret room on the final level, if that key is knocked off the book, it may be hard to find. So I have placed 2 bodies on the floor in the room with a spare key and some teasers. Those innocent looking notes are your first taste of the kind of hints I have dropped else where for you to find regarding other events. You can ignore them, not reading them does not stop other things from happening but it does give you clue that something else is happening that you would otherwise not be aware of.
The Ring of Vanus (Vanus Quests Part 1)
This is an optional combat quest, you have to find the Ring of Vanus which is hidden in Fort Istirus. This quest features the return of the God of Worms and is completely lore legal, see the Lore guide for information on this. The Ring is actually hidden in a chest in the fort somewhere but additional bad guys have been placed to make sure you have a real fight on your hands. Also, all the Vanus quests use the leveled lists from your favorite OOO style mod, so what ever you have installed supplies most of the monsters for all the Vanus quests. The exception is the Undead Knights of the Lamp, they are my creation and are supposed to be left overs from Mannimarcos battle against Vanus, there is actually a hint at this in the quest. Archmagister Vin Tor offers this quest and kicks off the Vanus quests for you if you accept this one. These Vanus quests give you an introduction in to the Vanus vs Mannimarco story.
The Robes of Vanus (Vanus Quests Part 2)
This is another optional combat quest, you have to find the Robes of Vanus which is hidden in Fort Linchal. It becomes available after you recover the Ring of Vanus. Archmagister Yel Alota offers the quest. Once again the robes are in a chest somewhere in the fort and additional bad guys have been added with full support of various leveled list mods.
The Staff of Vanus (Vanus Quests Part 3)
This is the final combat quest in the Vanus series, Vanus whilst still a Mage, was said to have had an Axe not staff but since I was making a Mages Guild mod. I did not want to give the player an Axe and I felt it perfectly reasonable to give the player a staff instead. The Staff is hidden in Dark Fissure in a chest and once again additional bad guys have been added to slow you down. Mannimarco or more correctly "The God of Worms" tells you at the end of this quest that if you mess with his Necromancers he will return. Archmagister Jane Henal offers this quest after the Robes have been recovered.
Assistant
This quest allows you to get a new companion. One that knows where all the Guild halls are and can go to them, one that can be trained in any primary Magic class and customised to compliment your own character whilst questing. Also if your under 16, she is a hot babe too smile.gif. On a more serious note, Mary is a very complex companion and you only get one chance to configure her. The book you are given tells you what each class does and was written after I personally tested every single class. So the info is accurate. Read the book before you tell Mary to train up as something. After a few days (timer bug permitting) she will return fully trained to lobby. If she does not, just use the new spell to summon her. Some players have found the Witch is good configuration for those who want a daedra summoning companion. Share your experiences here with your fellow players, not every configuration is a good compliment for every character you can create for your self.
Side Quests List (Freeplay Questing)
If I told you that just one of these quests has 3 megs worth of additional audio added to it but then said, there are no logs, no NPC offers these quests, no book triggers or anything, they just exist for you to find. Would that spark your interest ? Given the hidden secret nature of these quests, would you expect me to tell you all about them here....of course not...So go out and find them. Look in the Guild Halls and Arcane University for clues about the existence of these side quests, follow them up in your own time to get the rewards I have placed. Do not expect every reward to be a new sword, some rewards are services. ALL teach you lore as a reward.
So enjoy tracking down the clues, those who find them earn the Bragging Rights and the title of Master of Academia, ok not in the game but that is what you are doing, you are the Master of Academia if you do these smile.gif
Additional Notes
Version 4 of this mod adds the largest quest yet to the mod and it is a freeplay quest too, meaning there is no popup message about it. The quest is the Cyrodiil Vampire Clan Quest and it adds the missing Vampire Clan back in to the game and gives them some substance. No longer are they a name only clan or a random NPC some odd side quest reveals once in while.
Part of the quest reveals a secret city I called Arkays Mockery, this city (more of a commune) is part of an idea I call Deep Dungeons, that is that the bad guys have a life of their own and do not simply stand around in caves waiting to be killed or leave their treasures in chests in dark damp places for you to steal. Deep Dungeons attempts to make this a little more realistic and Arkays Mockery is my first attempt at this.
Another level that may need explanation is the Maze.
When you enter this level you will notice the walls move, meaning the maze changes shape as you move around it. Somewhere in that maze are 2 levers you need to pull to progress so you have to enter the maze to do this quest.
The thing to remember about the Maze is that the outside walk way is never blocked, it never changes, so you can walk right around the maze without being stopped at any time. But once you enter it, the rules change completely. This is classic Old School RPGing when combined with the levers etc. The map reveals very little so you are to remain focused to progress here. Try not to get lost.
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