So thought we could build a list of things about skyrim that are good to know but wont spoil the game for anyone looking for helpful information before they start. I will start

You learn new spells when your 5 points off the next 'level' in the perk tree - so for instance expert destruction rank is 75 - you get the chance to learn new destruction spells at 70+, adept rank is 50 so new spells 45+.

Everyone knows the favorites menu, but you can also have two quick equips on d-pad left/right, to do this open the favorites menu and hold left or right on an item, a number will appear by them to indicate it's hot-keyed.

If you like stealth you can get away from enemies that are aggro'd by hiding where they can't see you, after about 30 seconds they'll start saying things like 'where'd he go?!' and the detection eye while sneaking will slowly close, you're safe once the text 'HIDDEN' appears under it, be careful as non-aggro enemies don't have compass pips.

You can pick any lock, perks only make them easier, picking harder locks increases your skill more than easy ones.

You can zoom the third-person camera by moving the left stick up or down while holding the button, zoom out far enough and tilt the camera down and you'll have a isometric view that's impractical but awesome :D

@ViciousReiven: Thanks for the keybinding tips - will definitely be using the quick-equip one.

My general tip would be - read books. At least skim them. Besides good stories they can provide skill points, map markers, quests, alchemy recipes etc.

Also, grab all the cheese wheels you see. +15hp is nothing to scoff at when you're getting mauled to death by a sabertooth tiger.

General Tip for Dragon fighting: Many of the random encounters occur when you're within a minute or so of a town. If this is the case try and lure the dragon over near the town and the guards will begin to attack it. They are way more accurate than you are with the bow, so if you're a terrible archer (like be) and aren't having luck taking the dragon on up close, this is a great way to take them down easily.

And if you're on the world map trying to find where you need to go for a quest, you can bring up the start menu from there and change your active quests with the map still up so you can see which ones are closer...I found that convenient.

Everyone knows the favorites menu, but you can also have two quick equips on d-pad left/right, to do this open the favorites menu and hold left or right on an item, a number will appear by them to indicate it's hot-keyed.

I'd just suggest not worrying about leveling about specific skills, do what you want and your play style, and as a result your characters skills, will naturally emerge.

You can use torches offensively to set shit on fire. Equip it and hold block.

You perform the instant kill finisher with the dagger if you're undetected and your swing will do enough damage to one shot them, which means it's always best to power attack. This is why x15 backstab damage will almost always trigger it, it just won't trigger if they are sat down.

Is there a quick equip function for mouse and keyboard players on PC? As for my advice, here are some fairly obvious points that I stupidly didn't think about until a little later in the game.

Always loot corpses when you're playing as an archer. You won't get all your arrows back but you'll usually get one or two, add that up over the countless enemies that you'll shoot over the course of the game and you've saved some gold.

Don't use healing items or food unless you desperately need health right away. Just use your healing spell, it only costs magicka and it'll level up one of your skill trees.

@junglistgamer said:

Is there a quick equip function for mouse and keyboard players on PC?.

To hotkey items and spells on the PC first add them to your favorites list by hitting F with the item/spell highlighted. Open your favorites menu (Q) and press a number 1-9 while your item/spell is highlighted.

Since the lockpicking is designed similarly to fallout 3, if you are good you can unlock master locks efficiently, without ever spending 1 perk on the skill. The key (pun unintended) is to only touch lightly at a random area. A rattle sound and effect to the pick immediately tells of a wrong spot, but a smoother movement indicates you are close to/at the point of unlocking. It takes a bit to get used to but with practice you can live without a single lockpicking perk.

When you are close to a dragon shout(?) you will start to hear Viking singing.

If you are having problems with a dragon, try to bring a friend(like Lydia, for example). They draw aggro, attack the dragon, and can carry all those heavy dragon scales and bones. Make sure to keep them alive.

Winterhold has a warrior that gives you a easy quest that gives you money and a free level of Heavy Armor. He is located near the blacksmith. Winterhold also has a mage-the Jarl's mage, that teaches you up to 5 levels of Destruction magic, provided you pay.

Solitude has a lot of armor, weapons, and stuff to buy. Visit the place sometime, they have a lot of good gear.

After finishing the main questline at High Hrotghar, you can visit the greybeards, and the leader can point you towards new shouts.

If you have a companion who can teach you a skill, such as Aela the Huntress in the Companions guild (archery), you can pay for her teachings then go into her equipment and get a refund.

Pick up everything and sell what you do.

Giving a coin to a beggar will get you "The Gift of Charity", which will give a temporary 10 point boost to speech. Easy way to save some cash if you're on your way to buy/sell anyway.

I wonder if anyone can answer this:

During the Horn of... quest, where you are tasked with retrieving a horn from the depths of a dungeon for the greybeards, there is a puzzle that requires you to activate three timed gates, and shout through them before they close.

No problem, with regards to that.

What I am having trouble with, is that I told my companion (Lydia) to 'stay' beside the gate-puzzle, because she was doing my fucking tits in with her incessant standing in the way.

I was convinced it didn't matter that she never followed me through because she would magically re-appear as I left the dungeon. Alas...

This was at least a few (real-life) hours ago now, and I'm just wondering if I trek back through the dungeon if she'll still be there?

Getting too close to a dragon while you are fighting it can result in instant death =\

@GetEveryone: As far as I know she'll still be there, so you should probably go back and get her. I ran into the same problem.

A lady in Ivarstead wants 10 bear pelts, and a woman in Riften wants 20 each of Nirnroot, Nightshade, and Deathbell, so start building a stockpile now, especially of Nirnroot.

@PieGuy: Oh my god, thank you.

Anyone can activate traps in dungeons, even your enemies.

@GetEveryone:I wouldn't bother, Lydia emerged from that place with me just fine. But she disappeared sometime the day before yesterday.. I had no Idea if she was alive or dead. Bought a house yesterday and within 10mins she had spawned in there. At least check the place you got her from before going back to the cave

The PC version keybind function is similar, you just highlight the item/spell in your favourites menu and press a number, I think you can use all of the main number keys so lots of customisation options are available. Hitting a key twice that is bound to a spell will equip it in both hands, useful for dual cast overcharge spells if you have the appropriate perk, or for dual wielding bound weapons etc.

For an awesome easy money earner early on, find the transmute mineral spell which transmutes iron ore into silver, then silver into gold. I'm sure it doesn't take a genius to work out the financial benefits of the transmutation, but if you want to stockpile silver ore from this spell, you'll need to use the spell on some iron then drop the silver you get or it will be instantly turned into gold next time you use the skill. Kinda annoying but necessary for crafting silver jewelry with the gems you get early on in the game.

Finally, the easiest way to get to all the main towns is to find the man in the horse and carriage, usually outside the main gates of the town, and get him to taxi you to each one (will cost about 200-300 gold total, between 20-50 each trip afaik) so you can fast-travel there later.

@GetEveryone: @Ragnarok512:After a while, she'll return to the Jarl's keep (I got the message along the lines of: "Your companion tires of waiting for you.").

At least that's what happened when I told Lydia to "wait" and forgot about her right after I got "access" to her.

If you contract vamparis sanguinares, or however dumb vampire disease is spelled, you can heal it at any deity shrine, or with a cure disease potion provided you do not sleep and advance the disease. The disease can also advance after a few days of not sleeping. If the disease advances it is a real pain to get rid of, and I contracted it as early as about 1-2 hours into the game. Get to the whiterun Talos shrine or alchemist shop ASAP to save your self some trouble if you don't want to be a vampire!

@Mnemoidian: putting access in quotes made that sound so much worse...

Simple one - take a companion everywhere, use them as a mule to carry all the loot to save you getting weighed down until you get back to a trader to sell, this advantage outweighs the sometimes insane AI they have (like blocking you in a corridor! if you stare at them for a few seconds they will move out the way usually), they can also be helpful in a fight to distract the enemy.

If you're a sneaky person you can lure bad guys to specific spots for easier sniping positions. Simply shoot an arrow into an object or a wall and they'll move over there to investigate the sound of the impact, open for you to snipe them. Just make sure you're far away, otherwise they might check out the sound of your bow instead. This is also a good tactic whenever you enter a new big room which will most likely be an ambush. Stand at the entrance, shoot an arrow to the wall far away, and every enemy in hiding will run over there to check out the noise the arrow made. Now you know beforehand what to expect.

I have two questions
 
-How do I set weapons to quick select on the PC?
-How can I get new spells aside from the randomly found spell books?

Two questions (new to the series, but LOVING this game):

1. Is there a way to manage what gear/weapons your companion is actually using/wearing?

2. Is there a way to dual-wield a 1H weapon and magic? (Think Bioshock 2)

@GreatNorthern said:

Two questions (new to the series, but LOVING this game):

1. Is there a way to manage what gear/weapons your companion is actually using/wearing?

2. Is there a way to dual-wield a 1H weapon and magic? (Think Bioshock 2)

For 2- Just click the L1 on the sword, and press R1 on the magic.

L2 is sprint on PS3. Took me 15 hours to learn that.

@Zidane_24 said:

A lady in Ivarstead wants 10 bear pelts, and a woman in Riften wants 20 each of Nirnroot, Nightshade, and Deathbell, so start building a stockpile now, especially of Nirnroot.

Oh my God, the Nirnroot quest is back? I spent hours looking for those fuckers in Oblivion.

@Daiphyer said:

@Zidane_24 said:

A lady in Ivarstead wants 10 bear pelts, and a woman in Riften wants 20 each of Nirnroot, Nightshade, and Deathbell, so start building a stockpile now, especially of Nirnroot.

Oh my God, the Nirnroot quest is back? I spent hours looking for those fuckers in Oblivion.

I'm 40-ish hours in Skyrim so far. I've found 4.

If people keep telling you that you look sick - you are. Go to a temple and pray to be healed [cost=free].

If you give your companion armour or weapons that are better then their defaults they will equip it. My Lydia is using a magic two handed axe and is wearing a full set of dwarven plate.

Also holding the use button down (a on the Xbox) over an item will allow you to grab the item and manipulate it in the world without putting it in your inventory or stealing it. This is useful for decorating or movin items away from npcs to steal, you can also put pots abd stuff on thier heads to make then blind so you can rob them.

If you want to learn new enchantments you have to destroy the enchanted item you find so if you see a weapon that you wouldn't use but it's magic don't just sell it destroy it and get that enchantment so you can put it on a weapon you would use.

i noticed something in Ivanslar (the town before you climb the mountian to see the greybeards). while standing near the river near the inn i can hear some sort of singing, as if there was some secret, it gets louder when im more in the river. has anyone else noticed the singing anywhere?

Sorry for posting again it won't let me edit on my cell phone for whatever reason. If you are on the menu screen you can spin items around and look at them, if you click in the right analog it will actually zoom in on the item and bring it onto a full screen so you can read and see the details more clearly. Found this out by accident.

You can take potatoes, leeks and cabbages from farms (it doesn't count as stealing) and sell them back to the farmers. While this is pocket money at best, there's a Nirnroot farm somewhere near Riften where you can pick all the Nirnroot growing and sell it back to them to make some good cash, early on.

Also, that Nirnroot farm is probably worth finding for that quest that requires 20 of them. There's loads growing.

@Rave: Yeah, the zoom function is useful for the Golden Claw quest in Riverwood.

@Rave said:

Sorry for posting again it won't let me edit on my cell phone for whatever reason. If you are on the menu screen you can spin items around and look at them, if you click in the right analog it will actually zoom in on the item and bring it onto a full screen so you can read and see the details more clearly. Found this out by accident.

Any idea what the button is on PC? I know I can mouse wheel up on the picture but there's supposed to be a way to zoom in and out on it.

You can give companions healing potions and they will use them when low on health. So, might not be a good idea to store useable items on them, if you plan to see action.

If encumbered and can't run. Ride a horse. They still go at normal speed and can still run.

@Zidane_24 said:

A lady in Ivarstead wants 10 bear pelts, and a woman in Riften wants 20 each of Nirnroot, Nightshade, and Deathbell, so start building a stockpile now, especially of Nirnroot.

This sounds kinda like one of the infinite quest that comes up for stuff that you haven´t come across naturally.

L2 is sprint on PS3. Took me 15 hours to learn that.

Oh right... I've bin EATING Nirnroot.

@GetEveryone: She'll get bored of waiting and return back to home, or her default location or whatever.

@Lustreplush said:

If people keep telling you that you look sick - you are. Go to a temple and pray to be healed [cost=free].

In general, if you are curious what buffs or debuffs (diseases) you have on you, just look at "Active Effects" under the magic menu. Debuffs appear in red.

Also, regarding collect quests, there is a person in Riften who wants three flawless amethysts, so don't sell those if you find them.

Leveling up Smithing

As far as I can tell, smithing an item gives you the same amount of skill experience, regardless of how rare the item is. This means that the fastest way to increase it is to smith large quantities of armor out of easily obtained materials. Leather Gaunltets are good; they take 2 leather strips and 1 piece of leather to make. Just collect hides early on and smith them whenever possible. After you have some extra gold, every time you come to a smithy, buy all their leather (usually 15-20 pieces) and raise you skill a few levels. Start this early enough and you can be a master of Smithing around level 20, I would imagine. (Took me a while to figure the method out, but I am 85 in smithing at level 23)