Just bought Skyrim for 360! Anything I should know?

[Doclector]

Firstly, restoration is not necessarily essential, but it's that bloody handy that it's more than worth putting points into. Especially with some other perks that increase magicka regen or give you stamina as well as health in your healing spells.

Don't underestimate conjuration. If you don't want to invest in offensive magic at all, fine, it'll work fine anyway, but sometimes a conjurable creature is great for, if nothing else, drawing attention.

Keep a spare weapon on hand. There are some draugr who use disarming shouts, and in a battle, it can be pretty hard to find the weapon again.

Remember when choosing to use two handed or one handed weapons that blocking with a shield is more effective than blocking with a weapon, even if said weapon is two handed. So it depends how offensive/defensive you want to go.

Before you do anything else, I'd recommend striving to get the complete fus-ro-dah shout. It's really handy in tough situations. Just follow the main quest until you get it, you'll know when. Then, if you feel like it, leave the main quest altogether.

Bows are handy for getting your stealth up if you're not very good at stealth in general. You don't have to get so close to land a stealth attack.

Make a good amount of saves per character. Even now, skyrim can be rather prone to bugs.

Aside from that, go nuts. There's no build that full on just doesn't work.

 

[Aabglov]

When you first get to Whiterun join the Companions. Their questline seems kind of lackluster at first, but it really picks up. You can join them by going to the big circular building with two doors atop the hill next to the palace near the shouting guy. Good luck!

 

[Davey Woo]

Don't listen to these guys telling you to dual wield. Grab the biggest greatsword you can find and cleave everything to death!

I had so much fun playing two-handed greatsword in Skyrim, there was nothing more fun than pulling the side-wards power attack with a few enemies in front of me and watching their ragdolls fly off into the corner of the room.

(To do power attacks move in a direction and hold down the attack button, if I remember correctly you have to 'unlock' them by getting far enough into the skill tree for that weapon)

 

[Phrozenflame500]

Buy it on PC. Mods are half the fun of Skyrim. Ninja'd by absolutely everyone

Assuming you're still going with the console version:
-Save all the time because Bethesda.
-Do the Dark Brotherhood/Thieves Guid quests ASAP, even if you aren't going stealth. They give you some of the best shit in the game and they're fairly easy.
-Fus Roh Dah is OP. Get it before inevitably abandoning the main quest.
-Join the Empire. There is absolutely no gameplay or story benefit for this, but the Empire is just better.
-You can easily steal things by putting buckets 'n shit over the heads of nearby NPCs.
-Focus on one weapon type. You said you're going melee, but what type of melee? (I HIGHELY recommend you don't go unarmed for your first playthrough)
-Any companions you get are immortal. Feel free to put them between you and that frost troll.

 

[crazyarms33]

OP: Avoid the giants until you're high level. Also make no arrow to the knee jokes. Enjoy what you do and play it however you want but make sure you build in some flexibility.

 

[Right Hook]

the only thing I know about this one is that it might have dragons in it.

Oh, and for the record, I plan on using a melee build for my character.

No dragons...none at all.

I'm trying to recall my early Oblivion days, my advice would be, don't get overwhelmed by the sheer amount of options, find something worth doing and stick with it.

Fast travel is your friend, figure out how to use it, I didn't know about for my first few hours in Oblivion and was getting ticked at riding a horse through the hills for twenty minutes at a time.

Lastly I'd recommend going easy on the thieving, at least at first. You don't want to get into too much trouble until you have a better understanding on how to handle yourself, take it slow.

Oh, and for the record, real men use two-handed swords.

 

[ZZoMBiE13]

Just one pro tip. Kiss your loved ones good-bye for the next few weeks while you explore the frozen wastes of Skyrim. Let them know they won't be seeing much of you.

 

[Fijiman]

I only have one bit of advice to add to what others have said. If you ever come across a book called Remanada and you don't have a mission to find it do not pick it up until you have a quest to pick it up.

 

[Darren716]

First off I would like to address all the people telling him to play it on the PC, he got it for the 360 what is it to you, you don't know if he doesn't have a powerful enough computer to run it just let him enjoy his damn game without telling him that he will only be able to enjoy it by playing it on a specific platform.

OT: I say the best thing to do is to get the main story out of the way first since you gain some very useful abilities by playing through it that make exploring Skyrim much more fun. Other then that I say just walk in a random direction and see what you find you are bound to find something interesting eventually. So have fun and kiss your social life good-bye.

 

[triggrhappy94]

Two Handed weapons are kind of OP, or at least the last time I checked. Stealth and Archery also gets really OP.

I found One-Handy Swords and shields the most fun. It requires the most thought too (unless, I guess, you count magic). You have to time blocks, attacks, and shield bashes.

People are going to suggest blacksmithing a lot because it's the only way to get the highest level armor.
I'd also suggest Alchemy, just because I found it kind of fun. You have to eat somethings to figure out effects, then start combining random stuff. You'll also end up with a lot of free healing potions.

Sell your extra shit early and often, it will only pile up. You'll never run out of jewelry to sell, but merchants will run out of cash to buy stuff.

Install the game on your system if you have space, it'll save time.

Don't be afraid to not know. Bethy games tend to be so complex that the best thing to do your first time is to just let yourself wander through the quests. If that doesn't work for you, then there's two really good wikis.

 

[Battleaxx90]

Thanks for all the advice, guys!

By the way, the reason I'm playing it on 360 is because we've had this PC for over five years now and it can't run newer games for toodles. We're thinking about getting a new computer that's capable of running high-end games like this one, but I doubt it'll be happening anytime soon.

So anyways, I'm a few hours into the game and I have to say, I can see why this game is so great. My character is a Nord named Borris who specialises in one-handed swords, shields and heavy armour. I get the feeling that there's fifty different things I could change about my guy to make him a better fighter, but this IS my first playthrough after all.

I'm up to the point in the story where I'm looking for the Greybeards, or whatever they're called. So far, I've found two seperate bandit camps on the hike there; I slaughtered my way through the first and in the process of eradicating the second.

I've heard the "arrow in the knee" line three times already from passing guards in Whitehold, or whatever that place is called. Let's hear it for internet memes!

This whole thing about the Stormcloaks Vs. the Empire is going straight over my head. I'm just ignoring it for now.

All in all, it's a bloody fantastic game that's definitely deserved all those GOTY awards. Now then; back to Skyrim!

 

[EmperorZoltan]

Return it and buy the PC version, mods turn a great game into one of the all time greatest, and you'll also have access to user created content. Some of which is, IMHO, superior to the official expansion packs.

 

[revjor]

Buy it on PC. Mods are half the fun of Skyrim. Ninja'd by absolutely everyone

Assuming you're still going with the console version:
-Save all the time because Bethesda.
-Do the Dark Brotherhood/Thieves Guid quests ASAP, even if you aren't going stealth. They give you some of the best shit in the game and they're fairly easy.
-Fus Roh Dah is OP. Get it before inevitably abandoning the main quest.
-Join the Empire. There is absolutely no gameplay or story benefit for this, but the Empire is just better.
-You can easily steal things by putting buckets 'n shit over the heads of nearby NPCs.
-Focus on one weapon type. You said you're going melee, but what type of melee? (I HIGHELY recommend you don't go unarmed for your first playthrough)
-Any companions you get are immortal. Feel free to put them between you and that frost troll.

Oh they can die. Normally in battle they don't die and will just fall to one knee. But if YOU hit them while they're down on their knees they'll die permanently. I killed A LOT of companions.

 

[revjor]

Fun Fact: Play as a Redguard with double daggers and black outfit and you are suddenly playing the best Black Panther game ever.

 

[Tono Makt]

So yeah; after finally remembering that I have a fully functional Xbox 360, I decided to go out and buy The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim for it. The thing is, I know absolutely fuck-all about this game. I've never played an Elder Scrolls game in my life and the only thing I know about this one is that it might have dragons in it. However, I am a big fan of RPGs and I've heard good things about this one, so I think I'll enjoy it.

Therefore, I beseech my fellow Escapist chums, who have no doubt been playing this game since launch and know literally everything there is to know about it; is there anything that I should know about this game heading in? I'm looking for things like possible plot-relevant information from previous games that this one'll be assuming that I already know, or a heads-up about common pitfalls that newbies like myself tend to fall into. Things like that.

Also, this probably goes without saying, but no spoilers, please. If you must insist on saying something spoileriffic, remember that spoiler tags are a real thing. I'm counting on you guys!

Oh, and for the record, I plan on using a melee build for my character. Any advice on that would be muchos appreciated.

Orc. Heavy Armour. Orc. Two Handed Warhammer. Orc. Orc. Orc. Orc. Orc. Dragon. BESERKER RAGE! Whistle the Orc song happily happily as you wander back to your favourite hidey hole to stash the dragon bones and dragon scales. Orc. Orc. Orc. Seriously, Orc + Racial Ability (Berserker Rage) + Two handed warhammer + heavy armour = dead everything. (Except Giants and Mammoths, at least until level 50 or so and some fancy Enchanted gear and Alchemicial potions.)

As for what to expect... well, expect to be entirely underwhelmed by the story, you might find that your accomplishments in the game are not respected ("I'm a Thane of this city, I've become the head of the Fighters Guild - which is headquartered in your city! - I've saved this city from dragon attacks, and you're still calling me a sneak thief?!?!") but also your choice in character is barely respected or punished ("You hate and distrust all elves... except me, who you've never met before but you have a Quest for me to accomplish so you trust me with it. Huh."). When you hit about level 40, expect to be underwhelmed by combat to the point where you decide to try something new just to escape the boredom of yet another One Hit Kill.

Expect that you may never actually finish the game because you grew utterly bored with the main storyline and decided to just follow a butterfly one day and see where it lead you, find that it lead you to a few dozen quests that were far more interesting and rewarding than the main quest. Expect to spend hours trying to figure out how to make a new Shout worthwhile, but then never use it anyway because it's just so much more fun to Shout people off of cliffs. Expect to buy a horse not because you want to move through the landscape faster but because you want to see if you can get it to climb a tree, and the 5,000 septim cost for a horse is essentially free for you. Expect to play the game 10+ times, just to see what it's like to play a Dark Elf, a High Elf, an Argonian and an Orc.

All in all? Expect that you will end up liking the game quite a bit but at the same time being vaguely disappointed in it. Expect to find that there is something there to draw you in and keep you in, but at the same time not enough to keep you in it long enough to finish the game for each character. And expect to be oddly okay with that strange situation.

 

[JonnyHG]

I would suggest reading all of the perks before deciding what you want to specialize in.

 

[Ranorak]

Thanks for all the advice, guys!

By the way, the reason I'm playing it on 360 is because we've had this PC for over five years now and it can't run newer games for toodles. We're thinking about getting a new computer that's capable of running high-end games like this one, but I doubt it'll be happening anytime soon.

So anyways, I'm a few hours into the game and I have to say, I can see why this game is so great. My character is a Nord named Borris who specialises in one-handed swords, shields and heavy armour. I get the feeling that there's fifty different things I could change about my guy to make him a better fighter, but this IS my first playthrough after all.

I'm up to the point in the story where I'm looking for the Greybeards, or whatever they're called. So far, I've found two seperate bandit camps on the hike there; I slaughtered my way through the first and in the process of eradicating the second.

I've heard the "arrow in the knee" line three times already from passing guards in Whitehold, or whatever that place is called. Let's hear it for internet memes!

This whole thing about the Stormcloaks Vs. the Empire is going straight over my head. I'm just ignoring it for now.

All in all, it's a bloody fantastic game that's definitely deserved all those GOTY awards. Now then; back to Skyrim!

Just a question, but do you have the GotY edition? With all 3 major DLC?
If so, keep some Cure Disease potions at hand for when you get attacked by vampires. Unless you rather not cure it.