I’ll be talking about my Skyrim adventures today. So if that’s something you find very dull, I apologize. But it’s what’s on my mind right now.

“Beat” the game with my Argonian (scaly lizard dude) character, Monstrum et Facie. ^[1] We’ll call him Monty for short. ^[2]

I’d forgotten how arduous the final section of the game was. There’s some extremely tough enemies there. It’s a bit of a shock because by the time you get there, your character is extremely powerful and most enemies are laughably easy to dispose of because while you have gotten stronger, they have stayed the same.

But not the zombies and skeletons in the second-last phase of the game. Their power is defined relative to yours, and therefore no matter how powerful you get, they are just as tough to beat.

And I approve of this. You don’t want the run-up to the final showdown with the game’s big bad, the dragon Alduin, Eater of Worlds, to be something the player character can just breeze through casually.

That might be easier, but it would be less fun and make the ending less satisfying.

Instead, I found myself having to fight as hard as I did at the beginning of the game, where you are fairly weak relative to a lot of the monsters. Harder, in a sense, because I had all these amazing powers and abilities and it was STILL a tough fight.

And I brought a troll ^[3] and a werebear named “Riddick” ^[4]to the fight by my side! I never would have made it if I had been fighting alone.

Which is a problem. I feel like I was relying too much on my followers and pets and that meant that I didn’t get as far in my skills as I would have had I been flying solo. And, in general, I got “soft”.

But what the hell. I was playing a character whose specialty was up-close hand to hand combat, and I just don’t have the reflexes for it any more.

I started a new character this morning, but I don’t think she will work out. I am trying to make her be too many things at once because I had so many competing character ideas when character creation time came around.

But she can’t be a wizard specializing in conjuring AND a sniper (or “sneak archer” as they call it in the fandom) AND a two handed weapon expert AND a battle mage AND a dozen other things I could think of.

Plus, this is my first serious time trying to play as a child character, and it’s just not working out. It feels so wrong to be taking my little elf gal into horrible mortal danger as an adventurer. Before I tried it, I thought it would be kind of cute. A tiny little elf child summoning big powerful monsters, then just sitting back and letting said monsters take on the bad guys for her.

But no. It just feels wrong. And there’s surprising practical difficulties as well. Like not being tall enough to reach parts of important puzzles.

So I will start over again, lesson learned. 

That means I have to choose between two main character concepts, a lady wood elf who is a “sneak archer” and in harmony with nature, or a ice-cold high elf sorceress who specializing in conjuring magic.

Right now, I am leaning towards the former. I’ve never played a ranged weapon based character before, nor have I played a stealthy character,. and I am intrigued by the challenge of having to pay the game a totally different way.

The real challenge, though, will be keeping myself from getting frustrated and saying “Fuck it!” and starting over with a character idea that is more straightforward.

My guess is that my lady elf will end up being more warrior than sniper. I’ve been through this before. I think sniping is very cool and I always want to be a sniper in video games, but I just don’t have the temperament for it.

I see the enemy and I want to fight it, right there, directly. I don’t have the patience to slowly sneak into place, line up my shot, wait for the right moment, then take them out with a single well aimed shot.

That’s way too indirect for me. I like having it as an option, but I am, as you know, a Taurus, and we have a built in intolerance for indirect engagement.

We’re very direct people. We can’t stand things that are slow, indirect, overcomplicated, and deny us access to one of our primary strengths, which is our ability to tackle a problem head on and use our ability to focus our energies into an action to solve the problem via overwhelming force.

Bulls aren’t exactly known for being sneaky.

Still, as long as I keep tackling those situation as an archer, I will forced to play the game in a somewhat different way.

But part of me will be aching to just whip out a sword and start hacking away.

I suppose my chilly conjurer lady concept could be seen as indirect. But it’s the kind a Taurus likes, the kind where others take care of the instant action type things while we get time to think and plot our next move.

Come to think of it, that’s what I had with MEF. Hmmm. I might have to recruit allies again so I can hang back and snipe like a mofo.

Well, I’ve rattled on about things nobody but me cares about for long enough. Thank you for indulging me, gentle reader.

It feels good to talk about the other half of my “life” for a change.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.