Morrowind talk:Starting Out

Pearl Diving

Is the area where you can dive for pearls Nimawia Grotto? If so, I would think the directions from the Tradehouse are approximately NNW. Pueblonative 00:16, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Creeper

"The first time you reach Creeper, you'll find a crate in the corner on the top floor that contains an orcish cuirass, pauldrons and greaves, which can be stolen with no consequences and sold to Creeper for around 6,000 gold."

No. No they can't. Creeper only carries 5,000 gold unless you start doing merchant tricks by buying his inventory and reselling it. Anyone going to mind if I explain that here, or is there some other method that is being implied? 169.231.103.230 20:14, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Just a typo. I went ahead and fixed it.--Ratwar 15:36, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

Ratwar, the first commenter's first point has been missed. The orcish armour cannot be stolen with impunity. The crate they are in is owned by Ghorak. This can be double-checked in the CS. The Orcs will also complain and attack you if you take the armour. 118.107.241.10 10:27, 11 June 2010 (UTC)Ether_Drake

Yes it's owned, but nobody attacks you if you take it. I just tried it. rpeh •T•C•E• 05:52, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

nobody attacks you AND it does not increase your bounty— Unsigned comment by 206.172.234.17 (talk) on 10 feb 2011

Stealing from the Census and Excise Office

[...]drop the item[...] The guard will rush over, reprimand you, but will not issue you a bounty. After saying goodbye, simply pick the item back up.

Is it even necessary to drop the item first? On the Xbox version, I didn't bother dropping anything and got to keep them every time. Also works after you hand your papers over to Socucius Ergalla. You can take everything in the room without dropping anything and he'll let you off with a warning. Can someone confirm that it either always, or doesn't always work this way? --KFM 04:34, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

I've done it on the XBox Non-GOTY AND GOTY version, and he'll take stuff from you either way. It's good how it is, because I've never even heard of it working another way. (One of the possible dialogs you'll get is "I'll take the item now. Make sure you don't do this again." or something like that.) 75.15.184.244 22:37, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

I tried it but I dropped all my stuff and it wasn't taken but when you try to take the warehouse key and aren't fast enought to open your inventory Sellus Gravius takes it and all the things you stole. :( Plus their is a Steel Dagger of SwiftBlade under the pillow in the top room behind a door (30) and an Imperial NewtScale cuirass if anyone's interested in finding good quality armour but haven't got any of the expansion games. Plus there is also a bug in the Warehouse that can cause your xbox to crash and create a restore game. The bug has only crashed my xbox once in the warehouse, once in the customs place in the same room as Socius Ergalla and in Vivec though I can't remember which canton i was in at the time. Plus there's the Iron Shardaxe in a tree trunk stashed near the Lighthouse as well as a silverware cup and 25 gold in a tree trunk right next the the stairs that take you to the lighthouse door. Only problem is that you have to leap off the end of the walkway onto it to get the stuff instead of activating it like the Hollow Treestump in the pond.

Full set of Dark Brotherhood armor with Tribunal expansion

The first time you rest for more than 5 hours with the Tribunal expansion, a Dark Brotherhood member will attack you unless you're in certain areas (like the Mages Guild). A very hard fight for a new character, but the payoff is a full set of high end Light Armor and it's some of the best armor you'll have access to for a long time without having to take major risks. Every slot is 20+ armor value, giving it excellent protective value (second only to glass armor), even at low light armor skill levels. Torinir 19:25, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

I should correct myself a little. The first time you rest 5+ hours outside of a certain distance from a town will trigger the Dark Brotherhood attack. 67.193.109.219 20:48, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure that it doesn't matter were you are when they attack because I have been in Foryn Gilnith'(murderer of Processus Vitellius) shack in Seyda Neen and I have been in the Mages Guild and I have been attacked. Perhaps it could be randomized? — Unsigned comment by Skyland (talk • contribs) on 31 may 2011

Yes. It does not matter where you are. I was attacked once in the Census and Excise Office and in the Balmora Mages Guild too. That is a nasty one, because the Guild NPCs are all around and get in the way. --Brf 00:51, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Because it doesnt matter, you can use it to your advantage. For instance, if you sleep in the beds in the bedroom on the basement floor of the Balmora Fighters Guild, the assassin will always be stuck in between the beds and be helpless. 74.132.249.206 16:27, 3 May 2012 (UTC)

I have been attacked by an assassin in the Balmora Mages Guild once, and killed him without him noticing me. I got some rare item, I can't exactly remember what it was. — Unsigned comment by 91.125.84.165 (talk) at 11:07 on 16 August 2012 (UTC)

That must have been A Carved Ebony Dart. —Legoless 11:49, 16 August 2012 (UTC)

Balmora

joining the fighters guild nets you some free equipment in the equipment chest and lying in boxes around the street are items you can legally take: empty soul gems,gold,bowls and jugs and even ENCHANTED WEAPONS (i found arrows) also hlaalo manor IF you can get inside (LVL 50 lock)is a free storage area (ralen hlaalo's corpse can carry an infinite amount of stuff) you can also take everything (except thats in the servants room) with no ramifications!!! Why hasnt anyone mentioned this!?!

hmm... i'm not really sure why i think it should probly go on the page oh and please sign your coment with four of these ~~~~ or press the button at the top of the edit box--GUM!!! 14:13, 17 April 2010 (UTC)

Sorry for the necropost, hehe, some three years later. I've recently been playing through Morrowind for the first time, and I have to agree, Hlaalo Manor should definitely be on the Starting Out page. Placing a Mark beside Ralen Hlaalo's body has been the single most useful thing that has helped me when starting out in this game. — Daric✐ 11:55, 24 July 2013 (GMT)

Moved From The Main Page

Moved from the main page

====[[Morrowind:Enchanting|Enchanting]]==== If enchanting is one of your major skills, or you are following the suggested methods of making a ton of gold right away, a few easy to make enchanted items can really help a new character. Balmora has crates and baskets and containers all over which often have pretty soul gems at random. If you join the mages guild and do the first 3-4 quests, the enchanter there will leave her desk so you can place a fake soul gem. When you do this you can take her filled gems to create a few potent items to get started -- however these gems are stolen, they may be taken if you break the law and you certainly do not want to try to pay her to enchant an item for you with her own gems (use the temple enchanter nearby if you want to pay for help). If your enchant skill is less than 30, its probably best to pay for help or make one item to level up enchanting for now. If you are honest and do not take her gems, you still want to join the mage guild as the basic gear chests contain cure disease scrolls and soul gems to use. The major benefits to enchanted items are their weight and recovery features. Enchanted items can greatly reduce your weight load by replacing potions since a potion can weigh 1/2 to 1 or more units each while a ring can replace 10 or more of those potions while weighing less than 1 potion! Also, while you have to stop to find ingredients and brew more potions, a simple nap will refill your enchanted items. The items I recommend for a new character to create are the following: Gemfiller weapon -- enchant with a cheap soul gem for soultrap, bound weapon, 10 second duration each, cast on strike. Hitting any monster will enable soul trap and provide you a hard hitting bound weapon for an easy kill. Be sure to change the cast to "cast on strike". Since the weapon is not used to fight beyond the first hit, a lightweight, cheap weapon works great. Vampire weapon -- enchant a weapon to restore 10-15 health on strike, so you effectively take no damage at all in combat. More charges (better gems, stolen gems) is important. Warning: this item is overpowerful and can make the game boring unless you increase the difficulty or are having a hard time. Deadly weapon -- enchant a weapon to do 9 damage (fire, frost, etc or just damage to health) cast on strikes. More charges (better gems, stolen gems) is important. More than 9 damage uses more charges, the point is to not run out of charges after 2 fights... Enchanter's item: A harmless low level enchant on an item to use over and over to level up your enchanting, such as 1 point of light for 1 second, 200+ charges. Use this until out of charges after every time you sleep. Trinkets -- From here, a variety of trinkets replace alchemy or spells for characters who are weak at alchemy or casting. Good examples are open door, levitate, water breathing, water walking, healing, restore fatigue, and so forth. Levitate is one of the most important effects in the game as many good items are hidden up high; at least 2 chests are only reachable by levitation in the first (main quest) dungeon and later on, many quests require levitation. A bound longbow for 10 seconds is ideal for picking off cliff racers. Any spell or effect that you could get from alchemy or magic can be produced on an enchanted item; experiment to see what works best for you.

This seems like with some work it could be useful but parts of it are first person and others would need redoing so any thoughts on this ? Is it worth the effort?--TheAlbinoOrc^{any_questions?} 19:14, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

Page for Oblivion?

This page is very useful for starting out in Morrowind but should we also make one for Oblivion? I didn't know where to put this so came to this talk page.--Raleka 08:47, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

There's a very similar page here. The basic idea is the same. rpeh •T•C•E• 09:42, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Not really. Thats helping get used to gameplay btu this page for Morrowind helps get set as a strong player. Like for a page of this for Oblivion I could suggest a few great ways to get good light/heavy armor early without a bounty or having to kill someone.--Raleka 08:55, 12 October 2010 (UTC)

Balmora Mages Guild

You don't have to join them to get those soul gems. Just punch or otherwise strike the enchanter (don't kill her!) and make her chase you to the downstairs entrance. Leave the building through that entrance once you see her come within line of sight of it, turn yourself in (pay the 40 gold bounty), then enter the building through the upper entrance to where the enchanter was. You'll have adequate time to take everything off the desk, and you'll never have had to join the guild in the first place. This method is a lot faster than the one already mentioned as well. — Unsigned comment by 50.9.51.167 (talk) at 18:39 on March 21, 2011

Getting yourself in trouble with the law isn't usually the greatest tips. Besides, there's no point in describing every situation in which you can circumvent normal events by punching someone. --DKong27 ^{Talk Cont} 23:41, 21 March 2011 (UTC)

Difficulty Slider?

I own the original version of Morrowind (as in not the GOTY edition and no DLC) and I can't seem to find the difficulty slider. Where is it located at?

The original version did not include the difficulty slider. It was not added until GOTY. Sn0L3prd 05:24, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Gold is for the Birds, Generate Wealth Instead

Most get-rich-quick schemes for this game focus on gold as the medium of exchange. Just like in real life, however, focusing on money and not asset value is a simpleton's distraction (and provides a limitless supply of political trash talk for politicians of all stripes to forcefully bicker over!). The is even more true in Morrowind that the real world because of the presence of vendors in game who sell replenishable stackable items -- a phenomenon which violates all set-value systems. When combined with the game feature where each successful trade with a merchant adds +1 to their disposition towards you until you completely close the dialogue window with them, you can use the temporary trade increase across any number of petty trades to easily max disposition (this takes a few minutes of course).

The fastest, most complete route to unlimited wealth:

1. Talk to a vendor who trades in any cheap, stackable, replenishable item (kwama eggs, apprentice's armorer's hammers, chitin arrows, whatever) and at least one item that is expensive, stackable, replenishable and light-weight.
2. Trade back and forth with this vendor for petty junk in your inventory (like the things you probably swiped from the Census and Excise Office and found in the nearby cave), a single item at a time without closing the dialogue window after each trade.
3. Watch critical trends like the disposition of the vendor increasing by +1 after each trade, the prices geting better as you trade your disposition value up, your gold supply increase and their gold supply dwindle (gold isn't replenishable/stackable like other commodities, hence its lack of real in-game value for those with their thinking caps on...).
4. At a certain point you will be able to sell an item for more than you paid for it. After a few more trades you will reach the critical moment where you can trade a leser gross value of stackable items for a greater gross value of a different stackable item (in other words, you can bypass money as the medium of profitable exchange).
5. Once you either run out of junk to sell or they run out of gold, start trading cheap replenishable stackables for other cheap replenishable stackables. Since gold is a limited item but replenishable stackables are not, you can simply begin converting value between two different stackables and forget about gold completely. Start buy buying the vendor out of, say, 100 arrows. On the next trade sell them back but in exchange for buying them out of a set of something else that is replenishable but worth more overall than the arrows you traded back (iron, potions, whatever).
6. Continue trading stacks of one for stacks of another until the stack sizes/values become completely ridiculous, and convert the values up to the highest two categories of stackables the vendor has that weigh the least (potions, gems, high-end soulstones, silver daggers, grandmaster's armorer's hammers, etc.).
7. Whenever you feel like you've inflated your personal commodity economics enough, go on a shopping spree, and generally ignore money altogether unless you want to do things like buy spells or train (cash only services). Instead of using money, pay in rubies -- not only does this sound really cool, its one of the more compact forms of wealth in the game.

With some vendors or perhaps some items (unsure which effect is in play) some stackables won't yield a profit against other stackables but will yield a profit in gold. In these cases you can still run the total value of a stacked commodity up to unlimited amounts, but instead of squaring the total value in circulation with each trade the way you can trading between two stackables, your new value creation per-turn will be capped at the total value of gold in circulation. In this situation generate as high a stack of items as you want (or have patience for), and on the last trade buy back all your gold in exchange for a single turn's worth of whatever the stacked item is. In this way you can leave the table with all of your original gold, all of their gold and a stack of a sellable item of arbitrary size/value to trade for whatever it is you really to buy elsewhere.

Because the items bought belong to you, you can safely stash them anywhere, including right in front of the vendor. Any time you want to buy something of obscene value -- such as a full set of glass armor -- set your mark in front of the glass armor vendor, go pick up your stack of 10,000 rubies (or chitin arrows -- doesn't matter at this point) and recall to the glass armor vendor. Another enormously useful way to use this trick is to divert some of your trades with an alchemist through complimentary reagents thus providing yourself not just with unlimited wealth, but unlimited practice reagents. Buy the highest level set of alchemy tools you can find, and make tons of potions. If you're alchemy is at 100 your potions are enormously valuable in trading and fabulously light weight (or weightless) thus providing you with completely portable extreme wealth.

This process takes about 30 minutes if you know what you're doing -- and once accomplished the entire wealth calculation of Morrowind can be bypassed without abusing any bugs or using any cheats.

This was originally posted on the article, but it's far too long and nebulous. This is the Getting Started section of a gaming wiki, not a symposium at the London School of Economics. rpeh •T•C•E• 21:50, 5 October 2011 (UTC)

So removing the single most important way of escaping the game's value system, which is most critical when starting out, is appropriate because it requires an understanding of economics to fully utilize? All the other "make money" methods listed, which involve a lot more text than this, are a complete waste of time by comparison. Zxq9 08:13, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

The other methods don't take anything like this much text. They're all explained in a couple of paragraphs, and even the Alchemy tip is a fraction of the size of this. This tip may work, but it's just too dull. If you're going to spend the first 30 minutes of a new game bartering with merchants, you're playing the wrong game. rpeh •T•C•E• 08:22, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

You're right. Nothing in Morrowind is tedious (like selling souls as suggested on this page). What would be an appropriate place to give this sort of advice in the wiki? A new page, perhaps linked against the glitches section? It obsoletes every other money/wealth generation method other than using cheats, so I can hardly see that completely removing it from the wiki is the right choice. Zxq9 11:27, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

This content was not completely removed from the wiki. It was moved here, to the talk page, where you were obviously still able to find the information and make use of it. Furthermore, the reason for moving it here was that it needs to be rewritten -- in other words, yes, the information is appropriate for the article, but it's currently in a format that makes it far too difficult for readers to understand it. If you would like to rewrite the content and place it back on the article, you are free to do so. --Nephele^Talk 00:00, 8 October 2011 (UTC)

Personally, I think the original text was rather long-winded, subjective/vague (watching "critical trends", at a "certain point", "critical moment", sizes/values become completely "ridiculous", you "feel" like you've "inflated" your "personal commodity economics") or riddled with personal bias/preference (using rubies instead of gold because it is "cool" or a "compact form of wealth" despite rubies being practically unavailable to a player who's just starting out) so I agree that it needs to be either removed or rewritten. I most certainly have no doubt that it needs to be discussed.

However, allow me to also contribute an observation regarding "wealth generation" in the game. For PC users (where buy one/buy all is conveniently achieved using the Ctrl and Shift keys), it appears that, to make the most of a trade, the player must either buy items as a stack (in order to buy low), sell items per piece (in order to sell high) or a combination of the two. (See Morrowind:Glitches#Sell_Nothing_For_Money) For example (at 100 Disposition), it is cheaper to buy a stack of 100 Chitin/Iron arrows for ~60 to 70 gold while selling the same amount of arrows one at a time will net you the full 100 gold. However, I have observed that, at 100 Disposition, this is only worth the effort if the stackable item has a value of 1. Otherwise, it is better to buy items per piece and sell items as a stack. I am not sure, though, if this also applies to a range of other conditions (different disposition values, different Mercantile skill values for both player/merchant), or even if it might be of any help to the new player in the first place, which is why I'm adding this to the talk page for now. Salamangkero 09:59, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

It seems to me that people are badly overcomplicating the best method of making money in Morrowind. (Including whoever wrote the instructions above, and the description on the glitches page)

In truth, it's incredibly simple: You can buy items cheap and sell them back expensive. The more money/items you have, the easier it is, because the marginal by which you can decrease the buying price and increase the selling price gets bigger. (An added benefit is that when you broker a tougher deal with a merchant, your mercantile skill increases more than it would if you just accepted the default price)

You can do this at the beginning of the game with Arrille, with minimal mercantile skill, if you give the healing ring to Fargoth so that Arrille's disposition goes up.

1. Bulk buy as much stuff as you can with the money you have. Decrease the buying price as much as you can. (But obviously not so much that the merchant won't accept the deal)

2. Bulk sell everything back. Increase the selling price as much as you can.

3. ???? (flawed game economics)

4. Profit!

Weroj (talk) 08:42, 24 December 2012 (GMT)

Brotherhood Assassin

Out of the 12 playthroughs I've had in Morrowind I've NEVER encountered the Brotherhood Assassin before level 10. In fact, I ALWAYS encounter them while trying to sleep for the 11th level. I'm not sure why this clarification was removed from the page, as from all my testing its never random and you can test and receive the same result every time. I would enjoy enlightenment on this one. Chronic 01:04, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

Thats the same for me, I never actually checked what level they did appear but it wasn't at a low level. (Eddie The Head 01:07, 24 January 2012 (UTC))

I just added this because I tried to place it under Here so that the dark brotherhood assassin could be predicted and new players could prepare. However it was reverted.Chronic 02:32, 24 January 2012 (UTC)

Tested on the Xbox 10/10 times the dark brotherhood assassin appeared after level 10, while sleeping to gain the 11th level.Chronic 21:40, 26 January 2012 (UTC)

Just had an assassin attack at 1st level - in hut at Seyda Neen. Fortunately for me I'd already been to Balmora and got the Jinksword sold in the fighters guild. If relevant, I'd started playing only Morrowind: I'd failed to tick the data file boxes for Tribunal and Bloodmoon. The assassin appeared on my first or second sleep after enabling them. Tim G.80.111.206.170 21:54, 24 September 2015 (UTC)

Skill-Specific Starting Out Hints

Okay, for everyone's convenience, a little background. This is an excerpt from revision 926959, Early Useful Item:

Ebony Cuirass - behind Orvas Dren in his plantation. Recommended only if you
chose Sneak as one of your major skills, as a decent sneak skill is required.

It was rolled back in 926996, with the following reason:

If it requires a certain amount of skill, it's not really suitable here.

Finally, the current revision, 927026:

====Ebony Cuirass====

Inside Dren's Villa in the Dren Plantation is a very nice Ebony Cuirass. While it's
guarded by Dren himself, there is a blindspot. Behind the pole in the room, Dren
cannot see you. Inch towards the cuirass on the shelf, and it's possible to still not
be seen. If you did not select any bonuses to Sneak in character creation, you might
find snagging this difficult. However, simply selecting Sneak as even a minor skill
is sufficient enough to grab it without being seen.

I initially agree with the rollback, that is, this page should contain Starting Out hints for ANY character, fresh off the Imperial Prison Ship, that is, WITHOUT preference to race or skill set. However, further examination of the article shows otherwise. For instance:

• To obtain the Sword of White Woe in Suran, the article recommends a decent Sneak skill, a potion, a scroll or an enchanted item, which provides either Invisibility of Chameleon. This advice rather is impartial to those who have a certain amount of Sneak Skill
• In Making Easy Gold as a Soul Hunter, the article recommends starting with a bit of Mysticism (for Soul Trap, of course) This, however, could be reworded as there are various other means of casting Soul Trap without mysticism, such as scrolls and other enchanted items.
• In Making Easy Gold via Alchemy, well, that's an entire section devoted to Alchemy already
• The article also recommends using Spears, to improve one's Endurance

So I propose that this article might be reviewed with the following guidelines:

Does the tip/trick/hint require a certain skill to be at a certain level above 5?

• YES - Move it to the Hints page
• NO - It stays here

On a similar note, does it also require a certain attribute to be at a certain level above 40?

• YES - Move it to the Hints page
• NO - It stays here

Will the player have greater benefit in doing the tip/trick/hint as early as possible, instead of later on?

• YES - It stays here
• NO - Move it to the Hints page

Nonetheless, this is only my suggestion; what does the rest of the community (that is, contributors who watch/edit this page) think?Salamangkero 13:38, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

I don't particularly watch this page, but I have noticed some need for cleanup and planned to work on that, and this would be an excellent start. I agree with moving the skill-related information. The Sword of White Woe could stay there if invisibility spells/potions are easy to come across in the beginning. There should be a small note about alchemy being profitable, as it's the only crafting skill, but details should go on another page.

Hm, the MW namespace doesn't follow the OB and SR ones. There's a First Time Players page for OB and SR, which would match this page; a Hints page for all three; and a Making Money page for OB and SR, which, if a MW one were made, would help move some of the content on this page and the Hints page.

I think that those general guidelines you set up would be agreeable. Vely^{►Talk►Email} 15:03, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

I like Velyanthe's suggestion. It's best if it follows the same convention in the Morrowind namespace as well. While these guidelines are sound, they might be a bit too confining if followed too strictly. Let's say that first time players is a term that applies to characters with a level lower than 6. That way the requirement for a skill level of 5 and an attribute level of 40 are surpassed, and a little more freedom in the selection of methods is allowed. Wolok gro-Barok 17:35, 9 April 2012 (UTC)

Conjuration and Combat

By taking Conjuration as a major skill, you will start with Bound Dagger. By taking short blade as a major skill, you will have a much easier time in early combat. I hesitate to put this up though, because of the potential consequences; that is, accidentally earning up way too much Speed to handle higher level threats. 74.132.249.206 09:54, 6 June 2012 (UTC)

Alchemy Tips

I saw this on the main article previously, tested it on the PC version, and can confirm at least part of it. In addition to the Caldera Mages Guild, a second place to get a full free Master's Alchemy set is indeed by stealing it from Nalcarya of White Haven's shop in Balmora. If you stand just around the corner from Nalcarya so the post obstructs her view of you, you can still access the crate in the corner containing the Master's set. What's more, you can sell her the set you stole from Caldera PRIOR to stealing her set to make a little extra gold, and then steal her set.

However, it is not possible to steal the Grandmaster's Mortar & Pestle from the shelf without the guard seeing you, since it's in plain sight, unless you use Chameleon or Telekinesis.

I also have a much shortened version of the alchemy economy starting tip.

• It helps to take Alchemy as a major skill, but it's not absolutely required.
• Acquire a full Master's Alchemy set as described above.
• Purchase 100 corkbulb roots from Ernand Thierry while at the Caldera Mages Guild.
• Purchase 100 ash yams, guar hide, and netch leather from Aunius Autrus at the Imperial Cult Shrine, Wolverine Hall, Sadrith Mora. (Careful, this may over-encumber you.)
• Attempt to mix the four ingredients into a potion.

And I just realized that the wiki already mentions you can get all four of these ingredients from Eldrilu Dalen at the Vos Chapel in Vos.

This potion has four effects, all beneficial, including Fortify Intelligence and Fortify Luck, both of which are very useful for the budding alchemist. You'll fail a lot at first, but once you've made enough attempts to raise your Alchemy skill, stop for a moment to drink the potions. Now repeat the process. Your success rate will increase exponentially, as will your potion strength and value.

Now that your Intelligence and Luck are probably in the tens of thousands, go through your collection of ingredients to see what else you can make, both for consumption and for selling. I tested this and was able to do all this before even reaching Level 2.

Should this be on the main article? Feedback would be appreciated. FrozenWolf150 03:56, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

The Master's Alchemy set is on the new Making Money page--the Hints and Starting Out pages were majorly reformatted and some information went to that new page. The Alchemy economy tip is also on that page, but much shortened. It's more of a general tip than "make unlimited gold fast", so it applies to more people and playstyles. I don't think it's important to put the specific amounts and ingredients back in the section, since people can collect over time or come up with their own ideas of what vendors to pick and where to go.

Edit: Oops, missed some wording there. You can add the new Master Alchemy set to the Making Money page, I think they'd fit there. Vely^►t►e 04:04, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Actually, now that I'm looking, your tip is on the Cheats page, since it so extravagantly raises the skills. Vely^►t►e 14:48, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. I've already read that part. I just thought it needed more specific details. This is the only recipe I've found that fortifies 3 stats, the vendors are easily reachable from the start, and the amounts aren't unreasonably expensive. I wonder though if it can go in the section on useful alchemy recipes, if there is such a section. I only saw a few recipes listed on the Cheats page. FrozenWolf150 21:03, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

I did find the following topic on the forums [1] that lists some favorite recipes. The one I mentioned is first on the list. FrozenWolf150 21:19, 2 September 2012 (UTC)

Article cleanup needed?

I've moved these two long paragraphs from the main article, since they're somewhat unrefined and their details are redundant. I do think the beginner's exploit of Ajira's second quest should be mentioned, but there's no need to go into all the details of the first quest. The alchemy set in Caldera is already mentioned in the article, as is the Sword of White Woe. I also think that it's a very bad idea for starting players to taunt and kill the guards at Ghostgate. Many of the tips here admittedly require a high level of skill, for which training must be done in a very specific order. This content belongs in a walkthrough, not a general guide for players starting out. FrozenWolf150 (talk) 07:29, 27 August 2013 (GMT)

Another way to quickly level and become powerful in Morrowind is to take advantage of the training system. When you start in Seyda Neen, go directly down towards the light house. There is a tree next to the largest building in town that should have two types of mushrooms on it. Somewhere between this tree and the nearby lighthouse should be two more types of mushroom. Together, the four mushroom types are Luminous Russula, Violet Coprinus, Bungler's Bane, and Hypha Facia. Once you have at least one of each, take the silt strider (on the opposite side of town from the light house) to Balmora and head to the Mages guild. Talk to Ajira, you have the mushrooms for her first quest. Talk to her again about duties and she will tell you about a bet with Galbedir and a fake soul gem. Head up towards the entrance and up the stairs in the entry hall. The desk in the small room up there is the one you are looking for and also has some soul gems worth a lot of money. Grab them and turn in the quest. It is also recommend that you get the sword of white woe while in Balmora. Even with no sneak, you should be able to steal it by jumping up on the edge of the bed and using the pillar to block the guard's line of sight. Once you have these, head to Caldera via the guild guide in the Mages guild. At the top of the tower in the Mages guild is some alchemy items that are also worth a bit. More importantly, head towards the Smith in Caldera. The building opposite the smith has a door on the back, go through and up the stairs to find the Scamp there. He has 5000 gold and will buy most items (such as the soul gems you recently stole). You may need to find some more items to cash in the big soul gem for what its worth, but at least right now you should be able to get up to 20000 gold or more with the lesser soul gems and the sword of white woe. Remember, merchants will recover their gold if you wait 24 hours. Once you have this, train! It is strongly recommended you look at a training guide if you are not familiar with the leveling system in Morrowind, you don't want to waste levels.

Another tip is to visit Ghostgate. If you can make it to the Ghostgate (A ways north and east of Balmora), in the tower of dusk is the master spear trainer. He is behind a level 50 locked door, but will train spears to 100. This also helps get you endurance up quickly which is important since endurance dictates how much life you gain per level. If you make this journey, first pick up the spells Mark and Recall so you can get back easily and get your training completed. There are also master trainers in Balmora (short blade and security) and Caldera (sneak), see the master trainer list for more information. If you can make it to level 20 or so, there is an ancestral tomb right next to Caldera where Daedra and Golden Saints will spawn. They will drop very expensive weapons which can be sold to the scamp and will make you rich. They can be tough at first, so you should grab some potions and maybe some scrolls if you do not have a good weapon. Also, if you made the trip to the Ghostgate, there is glass armor you can steal. You can also taunt one of the guards into attacking you and take it from them once they are dead (be careful, they can be tough and taunting takes forever unless your speechcraft is high). There is also an armory behind the spear master trainer that, if you can break into (level 60 lock), has some weapons worth a lot of money. Ghostgate is a good place to get a significant number of levels and enough loot to finance training to level 30 or so, at which point the game becomes much easier since you can loot higher level enemies for their valuable weapons.

I think the topic "Spears to Improve Your Endurance" is itself redundant: spear is the only weapon to improve Endurance but not using either Medium nor Heavy Armor is not a good hint if you want to max out Endurance asap. Depending on the build it could be even impossible. Finding a spear should not be a challange needing a subtopic, so I'm going to remove it.

Hla Oad Free Steel Armor is variable

Not sure how to word the necessary edit, but the 'free steel armor' in Fatleg's in Hla Oad is not a complete set sans 1 pauldron; the containers are randomized and reloading saves will generate different results every time. The first time I was there it gave me three cuirasses and no pauldrons, for example. Also, one of the crates generates a random steel weapon, which is worth noting. Theomniadept (talk) 07:14, 14 May 2014 (GMT)

Checked in CS and changed accordingly. -- Kertaw48 (talk) 08:52, 7 June 2014 (GMT)

Auriel's Bow

getting it early on? the guy you kill is level 19. Somepeter (talk) 17:52, 6 June 2015 (UTC) 12:51. 6 June 2015 CST

I'd have to agree with this. I don't really see how this quest is a good fit for the getting started page as there isn't really an easy way to complete it as a new character. You either have to kill a well-equipped opponent or manage to pickpocket an item, which is very difficult to do even if you have high sneak and access to strong chameleon spells, which a new character probably wouldn't have anyways. Compare that to the other quests that are currently listed that really contain no challenges whatsoever. So while a new character could complete this quest, I doubt too many newer players to the game would actually be able to do so. Forfeit (talk) 18:33, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

I'm sort of indifferent about this now. It is a Telvanni Mouth quest which, according to Quest Timing, should be completed early on. I also loaded up an old save of my character and was able to kill him at level 1 by taunting him into a fight (granted, that took a while to do). I only used some flin and adrenaline rush to help me out as well and was using an incomplete set of iron armor and an iron longsword to fight with. Now the catch is, he kept using his poison spell which did little damage to me as a Redguard. I think one or two swings of his weapon when he finally pulled it out dropped me to half my health. My character's long blade was already in the 50's as well, so that certainly helped. Still, I'd imagine if you followed a lot of the other tips on this page that you could probably give Ralyn a decent fight as any character. Forfeit (talk) 20:24, 12 June 2015 (UTC)

I agree this doesn't belong on this page. A lucky poison-resistant Redguard is a special case; this page is about general advice for newbie characters. — Darklocq ^☎ ¢ 03:04, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

Update: I'm working on an overhaul, and I think something about this can be retained, but at the end of the section on easy quests with great rewards, which should be ordered from no risk to very low risk to fairly low risk (e.g. also the Dreugh Warlord's cuirass, which is a big fight if you are level 1–5 or so. That way, starting players are sensibly implied to take them in that sequence. This will help ensure they'll not walk into a surprise slaughter and think this article tricked them, since each one they did before that one got notably more challenging, and they'll thus be expecting it. I'm also going to merge in "free loot for newbies" material from the Morrowind:Making Money article, which is a mess. That page should be about money-making strategic play, not about "there's a valuable item you can just go pick up without risk" tips, which belong in the section about that here. (High-level players have no interest in a free sword here or cuirass there, and already have more loot than they can sell.) And I'm expanding that section with more such items that require no or very little risk or skills to obtain and which are either very useful or will provide good funding for training and gear. Also organizing it better, and adding some more general Morrowind gameplay tips (it's not all about loot, right?), since we expect this page to be many players' first stop and their gateway into figuring out the game. — Darklocq ^☎ ¢ 09:10, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

"Ahnassi, a Special Friend" 's Redoran Vault storyline does not belong in this article

Ahnassi, a Special Friend is not a beginner quest. It requires killing someone who can fight back, just to start the storyline, and this has to be done with Frenzy Humanoid or some similar means, or half the tavern will come to her aid, aside from the murder bounty problem. The Redoran Vault sub-quest is mid-way through her quests, and requires another death fight. I think this should be removed from this article, as someone clearly added it as an additional tip about free armor looting versus having to buy high-end armor, when this page is about easy noob stuff, not free armor looting in particular. It's not "free", in the beginning character survivability sense, if you have to kill a Daedric Sorceress then a Camonna Tong thug to even be told where get the key to the loot. This page could potentially just say where the key is, but even that may not be noob stuff; I think that room is guarded (about to go check). — Darklocq ^☎ ¢ 03:02, 24 April 2017 (UTC)

Update: I've checked, and just going and getting the key without any Ahnassi stuff, this one is easy (though tedious if you also want to get into the Upper Vault, which this key does not open). I've rewritten the material in detail, though put that in the section for this caper at Morrowind:Vivec Redoran; the Starting Out page need not duplicate this material (and shouldn't, per the redundancy policy). — Darklocq ^☎ ¢ 08:52, 26 April 2017 (UTC)

Dragonbone Cuirass

This requires some combat, but Mudan Grotto is easily accessible early in the game. While the Steam Guardian is unusually powerful, the potion of heroism and a handful of standard restore health and fatigue potions can even the odds even for a level 1 character and the reward is one of the three best armors in the game and a good selection of dwemer armor. It might be more of a pain for magic or stealth based characters, which shouldnt be an issue because the dragonbone cuirass isn't as great a reward for them anyway, but any characters who have heavy armor as a major or minor skill should be able to handle the guardian. Should this be added to this page? 76.174.116.82 11:26, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

Early quests

The Koal Cave and Auriel's Bow quests are really not suited for a character anywhere near "starting out" (the Dreugh Warlord can do up to 160 damage in one hit; Ralyn's not exactly a pushover either unless you're willing to reload dozens of times to pickpocket the bow successfully, and you have to do a lot of running around to finish the quest afterward). Does anyone object to me removing these? Magic9mushroom (talk) 10:11, 8 December 2019 (GMT)

Merchants

I removed much of the information about Merchants in a recent edit because much of it was simply not correct. For example:

Most merchants have had their stats auto-generated based on their class, which can be learned by simply asking most NPCs, and its assigned major/minor skills. This means characters with dedicated merchant classes such as "Trader", "Publican" or "Pawnbroker" will offer low prices for your goods while demanding high prices for their own since those classes have Mercantile as a major skill.

Checking in the Construction Set reveals that out of 57 Trader Service-class NPCs, only 6 are auto-calculated; only one out of 19 Pawnbrokers is auto-calculated, and none of the 19 Publicans are auto-calculated. Most of these merchants do not, in fact, have Mercantile as a major skill (the skill level is typically set far lower), and asking them about their profession will reveal absolutely nothing about how well they will barter. (For example, Clagius Clanler and Ra'Virr are both Trader Service NPCs in Balmora; Ra'Virr's Mercantile level is 20, while Clagius Clanler's is only 12. If they were auto-calculated, Ra'Virr's Mercantile level would be 34, while Clagius Clanler's would be 43.)

Alchemists and Smiths don't have Mercantile as a major or minor skill, and as such most will offer favorable prices, even if your Mercantile skill is low.

Again, not necessarily true. The vast majority of Alchemist-, Apothecary-, and Smith-class NPCs are not auto-calculated, which means their Mercantile skill is set higher than it would normally be. Most of these have Mercantile skills equalling, or even exceeding, those of Traders et. al. (e.g. Uulernil has a Mercantile of 20, equalling Ra'Virr and exceeding Clagius Clanler). You won't necessarily get any better deals out of them.

While most proper merchants have high Speechcraft to make persuading them difficult, Alchemists and Smiths also lack these skills.

True only for Smiths; most Alchemists and Apothecaries have Speechcraft skill levels of 20 or more.

Dealing with the right merchants is good advice, but the only real way to discover the best ones to deal with is to try selling them things and see who offers the best deals. I have reworded that part of the article to reflect the points outlined here. — Wolfborn^(Howl) 02:11, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

My apologies. I thought this was the reason for alchemists and smiths had consistently low Mercantile compared to "proper" merchants by my sampling. --Agiletek (talk) 05:48, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

No worries. Here is a listing of all the merchants in the game, including their Mercantile values. Sorting the table by Class shows that quite a few Alchemists, Apothecaries, and Smiths do have a relatively low Mercantile value, but some (quite a few in the case of Smiths) also have higher values, and there are plenty of Traders who also have lower values. There's enough of a mix that a player (especially one who is just starting out) can't really rely on profession alone to tell who will give the best deals. One also has to factor in the type of items one is trying to sell; Alchemists, while they might offer better deals, also buy far fewer items than Traders (typically only ingredients and potions). The article could probably be tweaked further by offering some specific suggestions for low-Mercantile-value traders; unfortunately, I don't have the time at the moment to go into that kind of detail. — Wolfborn^(Howl) 10:11, 23 April 2021 (UTC)

Split into spoiler and non-spoiler

Half the page being stuff to exploit sours my opinion on this page a great deal. I feel the various tips about working around Morrowind's opaque game mechanics should be on one page, and all the easily obtained super items should be on another. --Agiletek (talk) 05:42, 4 May 2021 (UTC)

Perhaps it might be better to just remove the easily obtainable super items from this page? For a guide on "Starting Out", this page contains far too much mid-game info.

A new player could certainly loot the C&E Office, ransack the Lighthouse area, loot Tarhiel's corpse, maybe even clear out Addamasartus on their way from Seyda Neen to Balmora to Arkngthand. However, someone fresh off the boat doesn't exactly go out of their way and:

• Acquire a Levitate spell effect for a long-term light source
• Fend off a school of slaughterfish to chat with Boethiah
• Join the Fighters' and Mages' guilds to access their supply chests
• Join the Mages Guild and do Ajira's quests to raid Galbedir's soul gems
• Level up just to kill a Dark Brotherhood assassin
• Level up just to kill the Dreugh Warlord
• Play hide-and-seek with the guard in C&E Warehouse
• Travel to Ald-ruhn for free bonemold armor
• Travel to Caldera for free Master's alchemy equipment
• Travel to Caldera, then Gnaar Mok, for complicated footwear
• Travel to Hla Oad for free steel armor
• (Re)Discover Vassir-Didanat for a Daedric weapon

I mean, technically, they could... but that hardly qualifies as "starting out" anymore, does it? Most of them involve mid-game places, or even quests, for that matter.

On second thought, if we really want to preserve the exploitables somewhere, perhaps a section in Making Money or additional entries in Quest Timing? Salamangkero (talk) 21:26, 8 May 2021 (UTC)

Overhaul proposal.

In relation to the above I've been working on a thing to serve as a replacement (or framework for one) that merely introduces players to the (often rather opaque) mechanics of the game rather than spoiling them with exploits and treasure. Feel free to suggest any changes here or on its talk page, and you can go ahead and fix typographical errors or add links. --Agiletek (talk) 00:15, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

I haven't had the time to review it point by point, but I don't know how I feel about the first line, and the most recommended option, is to start using mods. Additionally, all of the advice is written very clearly with the PC in mind. A lot of Morrowind players were and are on the console. --AKB ^{Talk Cont Mail} 01:02, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

The mods in question are a way to make the game run on modern machines with less bugs (including many stability improvements), a bugfix, a fix for an issue with the expansion packs (something the console GotY release has, one of the few deliberate changes that isn't), and a patch that does nothing but make the game run smoother. I frankly think playing the Xbox release, 360/One/S backwards compatibility or not, is not advisable in this era. Morrowind will run on relatively simple hardware far better than that. --Agiletek (talk) 01:55, 24 December 2021 (UTC)

I concur that the mod recommendation section, especially the particular emphasis placed on it don’t fit such a guide on the wiki. It outright assumes that the player is playing on pc which is far from the truth. Not recommending play throughs of the game on console is neither here nor there. As a console player of the game for many years myself I can confidently say I’m aware of all the things I miss out on by playing on console, and have proceeded with my prefereed playing method regardless. I see a lot of useful information on the guide from what I’ve read but I think before it’s added to a main page the mod stuff needs to be either axed, or worded around in such a way that acknowledges that particular advice is for pc players only. Dcking20 (talk) 21:51, 29 December 2021 (UTC)

Tweaked the wording on it. --Agiletek (talk) 05:36, 30 December 2021 (UTC)

I have mixed feelings on how the page could benefit from an overhaul, starting with renaming it to "First Time Players", partly to be consistent with this page's counterpart in Oblivion but also partly because it seems like a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, the proposed framework seems equally problematic. As others have already pointed out, there is a heavy bias towards playing Morrowind on PC. Personally, I agree with you; I will never play vanilla Morrowind and would also discourage other players from doing so. However, this is a reference site; not a personal blog / guide / walkthrough. Thus, it is not for us to advise or gatekeep how players should enjoy Morrowind, regardless of the era.

Pointing out gameplay details that are not immediately obvious for first-time players seems reasonable. For example:

• The almost-universal influence of Fatigue
• The underrated importance of restoring strength and curing diseases
• The 4x damage multiplier when landing sneak attacks

However, the proposed replacement often makes several misguided assumptions, foremost of which is that the player wants an "optimal" character. On the contrary, we do know that other players may make "sub-optimal" choices for the sake of role-playing, which is also an equally valid way of playing Morrowind. Thus, I find it inappropriate how some recommendations attempt to shoehorn the player into a specific playstyle. For example:

• Willpower being better than Intelligence
• The most useful birthsigns
• Spears as the best weapon for stealth-focused characters
• The best use of the Mark spell
• Spells that should be obtained ASAP

To be fair, the existing page also has a good number of superlatives similar to those boldfaced above, which usually indicate contributors' opinions / recommendations.

Overall, while I appreciate your zeal in raising the quality of this page, I find that, from experience, it is usually more realistic to implement small, incremental changes rather than doing an complete overhaul / page rewrite, for the following reasons:

• It is easier for contributors to either concur or give feedback on specific sections than for them to "sign-off" on an entire rewrite with a mix of new, existing and deleted content.
• There are more contributors watching this page, which means more pair of eyes to either catch mistakes or add more details. In other words, you have the advantage of a more reliable "safety net".
• On the contrary, very few, if any, would be invested enough to watch a user page, let alone make any changes there.
• If/when something does go wrong, it is easier to compare revisions and/or revert edits when the changes are small and isolated. For example, if you were to replace the whole page now with your proposal, the sheer amount of changes would have made it difficult for contributors to notice that the info regarding the difficulty slider has disappeared.

TLDR: The idea is good but the execution needs further work. You have some good material but I would not recommend an overhaul. Salamangkero (talk) 12:00, 30 December 2021 (UTC)

"First Time Players" is also a page for Blades, ESO, Redguard, and Skyrim. One potential option is to keep "Starting Out" and make "First Time Players" its own page, but explicitly mark "Starting Out" as spoilers. As for the second, Morrowind is an extremely imbalanced game. I have not yet encountered a fan who will object to this statement in the slightest. It is also a game with zero respec options that expects all character choices to be made at the very start despite very vague descriptions, so telling new players information on how to make efficient characters seems totally reasonable. As for levitate ASAP: Morrowind is an extremely vertical game in design to the point it is objectively impossible to complete the main quest properly without some source of levitate/jump/mass fortify acrobatics (Even if you exclude Corprus Cure, and Mehra Milo and the Lost Prophecies for handing the player potions of levitate, there's still a dead end at Telvanni Hortator). There's also the matter of how the game can easily be softlocked if a player can not levitate, either by being trapped between some rocks (depressingly common) or falling into a lava pit in Dwemer ruins.

For the final point of incremental changes: That is completely non-viable. The entire point of this project/proposal is that well over half this current page is spoilers and exploits, something this project is trying to eliminate entirely. Replacing half the page for a single reason is absolutely not something that can be done incrementally. --Agiletek (talk) 20:35, 30 December 2021 (UTC)

Swapping sections 2 and 3; DO NOT PANIC

In a few moments, I'll be making what looks like a significant revision but is actually just swapping these two sections:

• 2 Easily Obtainable Items
• 3 Early Adventuring

I don't think it's sensible that the flow of the page runs along the line of:

• Use the difficulty slider
• Here a list of early-game items (and their locations all over Vvardenfell)
• But first, here's how to get out of Seyda Neen
• Here's a list of early-game quests
• Here's a list of early-game spells

TLDR: I am simply swapping the two sections. Their contents will remain unchanged. DO NOT PANIC.

Thank you! Salamangkero (talk) 10:15, 1 November 2022 (UTC)

Removed section "Useful Magic Items in the Beginning"

===Useful Magic Items in the Beginning===
Here are a few items that might prove useful in the early game:
*[[Morrowind:Ring of the Wind|Ring of the Wind]]: +30 Agility, constant effect
*[[Morrowind:Mentor's Ring|Mentor's Ring]]: +10 Intelligence, +10 Willpower, constant effect
*[[Morrowind:Mara's Blouse|Mara's Blouse]]: +10% Resist Magicka, constant effect
*[[Morrowind:Boots of Blinding Speed|Boots of Blinding Speed]]: +200 Speed, Blind 100% on Self, constant effect
*[[Morrowind:Fists of Randagulf|Fists of Randagulf]]: +20 Strength, +20 Agility, constant effect
*[[Morrowind:Amulet of Shadows|Amulet of Shadows]]: Chameleon 80% for 60 secs on Self, on use

Some fighting may be required.
Fists of Randagulf can be obtained during the Main Quest, but you can always get inside, steal the artifact, and get out.

I planned to remove this section but thought it prudent to just move it here. The list contains three types of items:

• Rewards from quests best done early, meaning they just redundantly duplicate info from Quests to do Early.
• Rewards from quests done later in the game, meaning they hardly belong in a "Starting Out" page, not to mention how they spoil their respective quests.
• The Mentor's Ring, which, I feel, could just be mentioned in passing above, inside the Samarys Ancestral Tomb, along "The Road to Balmora".

Full disclosure: I'm currently working on a cleanup of this page (ie. better structure, less words, more links, etc.) but I'm doing so incrementally (as opposed to a full rewrite) so that in case of dispute, other contributors can discuss, review and/or revert only the specific, problematic changes. Salamangkero (talk) 15:39, 8 November 2022 (UTC)

Mages & Fighters guild supply chest: which restock rate?

This page: «they restock every in-game month.»

Morrowind:Fighters_Guild#Fighters.27_Guild_Equipment_Chest Fighters_Guild's page

Morrowind:Mages_Guild#Mages.27_Guild_Supply_Chest Mages_Guild's page

«their contents respawn every four months»

--Tuxayo (talk) 02:06, 8 October 2023 (UTC)