Gaming

Anyway I concluded that exciting story with its little surprise twist and was planning to continue on to Windhelm but someone wanted me to go back to the college.
So I did.
And after a bit more conversation I'm now being directed to... Markarth? 

That's a long way. I'll probably save that for later, then again if I go to Windhelm I could always take the carriage from the stables to Markarth, or at the very least make the decision when I get there. So let's walk down to Windhelm.

It'll be nice not to sneak past that fort after I cleaned out those mages the last time I was here. But it's not empty now. Quick, sneak!
Oh, it's OK. It's just the Stormcloaks that have moved in like that bandit fort you previously mentioned. I think that's maybe the first time I've seen the soldiers taking over. Certainly on that scale. There were loads of them. They didn't want to talk though. They all kept saying "Hmm!" at me. It's an improvement on the angry mages and their ice spikes, I guess.

Then further down the road I saw M'aiq!
Haven't bumped into him for a while so I went over to see what wisdom he would tell me today and he just shouted "Enough!" and ran away.
I followed him but then he cowered by some rocks. What's wrong, M'aiq?
And then we were all attacked by Ice Wraiths.
At least he saw them before I did. But after the fight he was his normal self once more and told me something about snowflakes.

The weather was pretty good too on my walk. Every other time I was up here it was snowy or foggy or rainy but this time the sun was shining and I could see for miles. Saw a massive Dwemer ruin that I'd never noticed before (I'll remember that for another time), a big Talos statue that looks down on Windhelm from across the river which I also don't remember seeing before, and another road that I've never been down. So I took a little detour down there for a moment and...

 

Cultists!
Always three.
And as I killed the final one I somehow managed to do an amazing jumping attack with my axe!
Don't know how that happened.
It was some kind of running/sprinting move combined with a long-press power attack. It was very satisfying so I must remember to try that again in the heat of battle.

Oh, no. The first ones were only two. I think I took a screenshot of those as well when they accosted me in Ivarstead. But they soon switch to the triple threat and that extra guy adds just the right level of annoyance in a fight.

And after posting all that last night I loaded the game back in just to have a practise with my newly discovered one-handed jumping axe attack.
Three years of play and I never before thought about pressing sprint during a battle.

I always have caps lock on for walking.
Left Alt is sprint but it drains your stamina going that quickly.

You're lucky you're not playing Morrowind. You wouldn't be able to move at all in that game.

Charlotte wrote:

And.... if you always walk.... why worry about being over encumbered?


 

Ranged magic attacks. Like those ice spikes AND those cultists. They just stay out of your way and pick you off and you can't run quick enough to close the gap to actually hit them and then you is dead.
But of course I don't walk all the time, just ... most of the time, and I do find it quite satisfying when I slowly stroll into a town or city no matter what game I'm playing.

It's quite nice walking around in WatchDogs too because the character puts his hands in his coat pockets in much the same way that I do.
I also like it when characters casually interact with the environment as you walk by. In that Tomb Raider game I'm currently playing Lara will often just place her hand on the walls as you walk past and in AC Origins Bayek will reach out and run his fingers through the grass as you walk through it.
It's all the little immersive things like that that entertain me as I play through stories veeeeery slooooowly.