I don’t know if it removes it by default, but there is a talent for enchanting that allows you to improve enchanted items. You should be able to have both (at least with talents). Smith-improving seems way more powerful than enchanting so far, but my enchanting isn’t high yet.
Also, I get the impression that if you make potions or enchants that boost a skill, their potency might be tied to your level in that skill in addition to your alchemy/enchanting skill.
There’s a perk in the Smithing skill tree that lets you improve arcane pieces. That’s the one you need. Requires 60 Smithing, IIRC.
Don’t worry, it’s not the end of the question chain, not by far I assume. I mentioned werewolves upthread, but didn’t say were to become one. So let’s hope the person who mentions the conclusion tags it.
Maybe Steam recognised my decent net connection (100MBit) as when I installed the game it first asked for the Steam code (in the box) and once inputed it immediately started downloading the patch instead of installing anything. I simply wasn’t given the option to install from the DVD, despite me having inserted it and running setup.exe from it.
The patch was about 5.6GB and due to the servers getting hammered it took 2-3 hours to download, only ever maxing out at about 1.2MB/sec, but often going as low as 50kb/sec and at one point stalling completely.
Just finished the Sheogorath quest, which throws up even more questions about the Oblivion expansion.
Personally, I prefer to think that [spoiler]the Sheogorath we see in Skyrim is the Champion of Cyrodiil - just grown into the role of Madgod over 200 years. Mantling the role of a Daedra meant he walked like Sheogorath until he was Sheogorath. Plus, I like the idea of my new character chatting with the old one.
It’s either that or the Prince of Madness played a huge practical joke throughout the Shivering Isles, making it all in the CoC’s head. While something Sheo would do, it rather diminishes the experience. Plus, his comments point to the former outcome rather than the latter - calling Martin the greatest Septim, foxes (the Gray Fox) heads (the DB quest), blood (of Aedra and Daedra - the main quest in Oblivion) and cheese (Sheo’s shrine quest).[/spoiler]
Overall I think they handled it really well. A lot of people were scratching their heads after the expansion, but they pulled it off I think.
No, it didn’t- it was labelled as being “For Children” and was pretty simplistic, but I was impressed they included it all the same. I mean, as far as Easter Eggs go (do books in a game world count as Easter Eggs?) I thought it ranked way up there on the Coolometer. 
Seems like alchemy is a print-money skill in this game. In Oblivion, I robbed every place that had food or other alchemical ingredients every night, and brewed a bunch of potions that I then sold. Of course, then I’d walk outside and get jumped by a goblin in daedric armor…
At first, I was skeptical when I heard that there weren’t going to be classes, but it works pretty well. I just play the way I want to play and that’s my class.
Also, I’m not a power gamer, but in Oblivion and Morrwind, if I was about to level up and I was just shy of getting the +5 modifier for an attribute, I would do some pretty stupid stuff to secure it; things like sneaking next to a sleeping person, jumping in place, etc. I don’t miss that kind of incentive at all.
So apparently this “radiant quests” thing isn’t only about adding some random fetch quests after you complete the pre-scripted ones from a faction.
It seems many quests have various random facets that will try and get you to places you haven’t been to, use familiar people, etc.
For example, I noticed, talking to a friend, that the quests stemming from a drinking contest played out similarly, but with different people and in different locations and with some different dialogue. Pretty cool.
I have the same video card, a tri-core ~3GHz, and 4GB of RAM, and run Skyrim at 1650x1080 on high settings.
I’d think you might need some more RAM, but otherwise you’re probably good.
Is a Radeon 5750 in a laptop better or worse than the recommended 4890?
Don’t know if anyone is interested in this, but IGN has a section on Skyrim that gives locations of some of the highlights in the game, such as were all the dragon words are, what houses are available to buy and how much they are, items and weapons, a character builder, etc.
-XT
This might be a very subjective question, but is it at all feasible to try to play spoiler-free like I’m trying to? It seems to me that Skyrim is almost set up in places to make people want to look at spoilers (or, more likely, to buy the game guide), especially with the dungeon puzzles. I know it would be a lot easier to play with spoilers, but, hey, I like to play like a real adventurer and life doesn’t come with a game guide!
Significantly worse, assuming it’s a 5750 “mobility” radeon. Laptop graphics cards are inferior to their desktop cousins by a large margin, and the the 4890 has more horsepower than the regular 5750.
But it should run it fine, just probably on medium.
I know I’m way late to the party, but my copy of Skyrim is coming by mail today, and 5 PM (which is when the mail arrives and coincidentally, when I finish working) can not come soon enough. Woohoo! I may just have to take the day off tomorrow to catch up with you guys. 
I’ve been playing during all my free time since Friday, and I have yet to need a guide. Granted, I’m not to far into the game, but the few puzzles I’ve run into have been really easy. I’m sure the people who want to get everything 100% will need a guide, but so far, I’m good.
Taking a look at the character builder here. It looks like a step forward for RPG character advancement systems!
But how do you gain levels in order to put points into perks? Do you have to use a particular skill a certain number of times or something?
The only place I’ve looked at guide stuff is for the murder mystery quest in Windhelm, and it appears that my problem is that the quest is bugged - my current in-game quest objective is to talk to Jorlief (?) the Jarl’s dude for guidance. I’ve gathered a bunch of evidence and have a suspect, but I get no dialogue options when I talk to Jorlief or the suspect. The wiki article on the quest (last I checked, anyways) was written by someone who had exactly the same issue. Hopefully someone finds a way to console one’s way past this impasse eventually.
But that’s not the same as needing spoilers to do something. That’s needing spoilers to bypass a bug.
On another note, the one issue that kind of bugs me about the leveling system is that it becomes essentially impossible to not advance some skills. Notably, lockpicking. You’re always going to attempt to pick a lock so long as you have picks. So every character you make will advance lockpicking at about the same rate, whether fighter or mage or rogue. Likewise Restoration, unless you self-impose rules on your character, you’ll always use the basic heal spell after combat. This is going to generate a certain sameness to characters across multiple playthroughs.
I’d also say that the game overuses the “unpickable, key required” feature to an extreme degree.
Very few real complaints.
10 skill point increases, just like in previous games. The difference now is that an increase in ANY of your skills counts towards a level-up, not just an increase in whatever skills you picked as “class skills.”
Gorsnak, did you talk to both
Viola something, and the trinket salesman? In the locked house, you should find a locket, a secret room full of corpses, and a bunch of flyers. When I did it, according to the wiki I was supposed to investigate the body once I had permission, then talk to the Arkay priest and get more info that helps me find the house. I somehow missed all that because I wandered too close to the house but it worked out okay. I’m at the last part and can’t advance, but I’m not so sure it’s a bug as much as me being lost.