Skyrim Tips and Tricks » Discussions

Ultimate Druid Guide

• DDMN

  

  Member
   

  February 24, 2014

  Yo. I've decided to post my secret little method to creating the ultimate druid. I figured it would be pretty obvious, but it seems no one has thought it up before. The main idea here is that you need to get a Spriggan as a follower. (Which is perfect for roleplay as a druid anyway.)

  An Unorthadox Ally

  To have a Spriggan as a permanent follower you must simply raise them with a sufficiently powerful resurrection staff. If you have fully reduced conjuration gear, your staff will never run out of charge. That being said, this is completely doable without the gear if you have high conjuration and are willing to soul trap.

  The staff ensures that their body will not decompose upon death or the spell duration ending, allowing them to be revived again and again. With the extended time perk and coupled with a potion of increased conjuration duration, you can revive a Spriggan for over 4 minutes. You may consider poisoning a dagger with a secondary fortify health effect to strengthen your ally.

  Incidentally, the most powerful staff, the Staff of Dread Zombies, works on any creature under level 13, such as a bear or sabre cat for all you Hunters out there. The only downside to this method is that the Spriggan (or whatever you raise) is unable to fast travel as the spell duration would cease before the destination is reached.

  Fear not, however, as there is a clever way around this. As posted by Masterpug in his Permanent Corpse Exploit, you can prevent the corpse from ever disappearing if you need to fast travel away temporarily. Now, I don't use fast travel so this never affected me, but if you are someone that does, then this will ensure the Spriggan stays where you leave it.

  Pack Mentality

  How effective is a Spriggan in combat, you ask? About as effective as all the wild life in a 6000 ft radius. At the beginning of every fight the Spriggan will summon creatures to aid her in battle, as she does when fighting the Dragonborn.

  Normally, this is where things get tricky: the animals that the Spriggan summons are all still hostile to the player. Again, however, I have a plan. You may override the hostility with use of either the Kyne's Peace or Animal Alleigance shouts; but the smart way to do it is via the Voice of the Sky active effect.

  If you take a trip up to High Hrothgar and activate the 10 stone tablets along the way you gain an ability called Voice of the Sky. With this effect active (it lasts for 8 hours real-time, not game time) the animals summoned will not attack you, and will instead attack your opponents. This method requires at most 10 minutes per gaming session, and is a small price to pay for such awesome power.

  Conclusion

  And there it is. With your new Spriggan ally you'll summon all nearby wildlife to assist you in any outdoor combat, and you won't have to wait that ridiculous cooldown associated with the Animal Alleigance shout. Your new ally will also be affected by your Necromancy and Dark Souls perk, making her even more effective in combat.

  Yo. I've decided to post my secret little method to creating the ultimate druid. I figured it would be pretty obvious, but it seems no one has thought it up before. The main idea here is that you need to get a Spriggan as a follower. (Which is perfect for roleplay as a druid anyway.)

  An Unorthadox Ally

  To have a Spriggan as a permanent follower you must simply raise them with a sufficiently powerful resurrection staff. If you have fully reduced conjuration gear, your staff will never run out of charge. That being said, this is completely doable without the gear if you have high conjuration and are willing to soul trap.

  The staff ensures that their body will not decompose upon death or the spell duration ending, allowing them to be revived again and again. With the extended time perk and coupled with a potion of increased conjuration duration, you can revive a Spriggan for over 4 minutes. You may consider poisoning a dagger with a secondary fortify health effect to strengthen your ally.

  Incidentally, the most powerful staff, the Staff of Dread Zombies, works on any creature under level 13, such as a bear or sabre cat for all you Hunters out there. The only downside to this method is that the Spriggan (or whatever you raise) is unable to fast travel as the spell duration would cease before the destination is reached.

  Fear not, however, as there is a clever way around this. As posted by Masterpug in his Permanent Corpse Exploit, you can prevent the corpse from ever disappearing if you need to fast travel away temporarily. Now, I don't use fast travel so this never affected me, but if you are someone that does, then this will ensure the Spriggan stays where you leave it.

  Pack Mentality

  How effective is a Spriggan in combat, you ask? About as effective as all the wild life in a 6000 ft radius. At the beginning of every fight the Spriggan will summon creatures to aid her in battle, as she does when fighting the Dragonborn.

  Normally, this is where things get tricky: the animals that the Spriggan summons are all still hostile to the player. Again, however, I have a plan. You may override the hostility with use of either the Kyne's Peace or Animal Alleigance shouts; but the smart way to do it is via the Voice of the Sky active effect.

  If you take a trip up to High Hrothgar and activate the 10 stone tablets along the way you gain an ability called Voice of the Sky. With this effect active (it lasts for 8 hours real-time, not game time) the animals summoned will not attack you, and will instead attack your opponents. This method requires at most 10 minutes per gaming session, and is a small price to pay for such awesome power.

  Conclusion

  And there it is. With your new Spriggan ally you'll summon all nearby wildlife to assist you in any outdoor combat, and you won't have to wait that ridiculous cooldown associated with the Animal Alleigance shout. Your new ally will also be affected by your Necromancy and Dark Souls perk, making her even more effective in combat.

• Knight-Paladin Robert

  

  Member
   

  February 24, 2014

  Great find! Although I find that having a quest marker on things like Beasts and animals a bit harder to do(given that they won't pick stuff up for you and can't give quest items to them once they're in your inventory) But I would love to use this with two of my current characters. Again, great find!

  Great find! Although I find that having a quest marker on things like Beasts and animals a bit harder to do(given that they won't pick stuff up for you and can't give quest items to them once they're in your inventory) But I would love to use this with two of my current characters. Again, great find!
• DDMN

  

  Member
   

  February 24, 2014

  Thanks, guys. I didn't think of that. I personally just used masterpug's permanent corpse exploit, but I figured you could just pick up the item from RotF and place it on them before activating the quests. (I thought that was the whole point.) Still, you can have a permanent corpse and temporarily go away to do something; come back and the Spriggan will still be there.

  Thanks, guys. I didn't think of that. I personally just used masterpug's permanent corpse exploit, but I figured you could just pick up the item from RotF and place it on them before activating the quests. (I thought that was the whole point.) Still, you can have a permanent corpse and temporarily go away to do something; come back and the Spriggan will still be there.

• Jeffery J

  

  Member
   

  February 24, 2014

  Excellent. I was thinking of making a character that used fortify restoration potion glitch (hear me out) to achieve 1-2 shot kills on bandits with a long bow or similar and iron swords/daggers, or similar. In return the same would apply for me. Realistic combat achieved on Xbox! I'll probably post the exact number I find most balanced once I'm finished. This would make a great addition to my character! Perhaps make him/her more druid-y and I'm set.

  The potion of fortify health for thralls your probably looking for is 

  Wheat+Nightshade+Impstool

  Correct me if I'm wrong

  Thanks! 

  Excellent. I was thinking of making a character that used fortify restoration potion glitch (hear me out) to achieve 1-2 shot kills on bandits with a long bow or similar and iron swords/daggers, or similar. In return the same would apply for me. Realistic combat achieved on Xbox! I'll probably post the exact number I find most balanced once I'm finished. This would make a great addition to my character! Perhaps make him/her more druid-y and I'm set.

  The potion of fortify health for thralls your probably looking for is 

  Wheat+Nightshade+Impstool

  Correct me if I'm wrong

  Thanks! 

• Oneness

  

  Member
   

  February 24, 2014

  Did you consider using Dead Thrall? I know that in normal cases with humanoid thralls they won't turn to ash after dying, I assume it works the same with Spriggans. If it does, then you should mention that along with the staff. Other than that, this is a pretty neat concept. I like the combination with Voice of the Sky because using Animal Allegiance would be kind of redundant. 

  Did you consider using Dead Thrall? I know that in normal cases with humanoid thralls they won't turn to ash after dying, I assume it works the same with Spriggans. If it does, then you should mention that along with the staff. Other than that, this is a pretty neat concept. I like the combination with Voice of the Sky because using Animal Allegiance would be kind of redundant. 

• DDMN

  

  Member
   

  February 25, 2014

  Thats the poison.

  I like what you're proposing for that character. I actually did something eerily similar. My friend has the pc version, however, and I was able to edit my save using console commands. Here's what I did: Fortify physical damage x 8, Fortify destruction damage x 8, Fortify Conjuration x 8 (Summons disappear way too quickly) Fortify Illusion x 1.3 (30 percent increase in the level illusion spells can affect), turn off health regeneration (A failed attempt to make my character need to eat), I tried to disable fast travel, but it didn't transfer over for some reason.

  This character was designed to be played on Legendary difficulty. Post modifiers, both me and my enemies were dealing double damage to eachother. Everything attack felt weighted. The only downside was that dragons were a bit too easy to take down. Other than that, though, the character was great. I decided not to use potions or restoration, so that I had to play it really safe in dungeons. Without the regen, waiting inside a dungeon wouldn't restore health. My character had to eat food or sleep to get his health back. 

  End nostalgic rant.

  Thats the poison.

  I like what you're proposing for that character. I actually did something eerily similar. My friend has the pc version, however, and I was able to edit my save using console commands. Here's what I did: Fortify physical damage x 8, Fortify destruction damage x 8, Fortify Conjuration x 8 (Summons disappear way too quickly) Fortify Illusion x 1.3 (30 percent increase in the level illusion spells can affect), turn off health regeneration (A failed attempt to make my character need to eat), I tried to disable fast travel, but it didn't transfer over for some reason.

  This character was designed to be played on Legendary difficulty. Post modifiers, both me and my enemies were dealing double damage to eachother. Everything attack felt weighted. The only downside was that dragons were a bit too easy to take down. Other than that, though, the character was great. I decided not to use potions or restoration, so that I had to play it really safe in dungeons. Without the regen, waiting inside a dungeon wouldn't restore health. My character had to eat food or sleep to get his health back. 

  End nostalgic rant.

• DDMN

  

  Member
   

  February 25, 2014

  Unfortunately Oneness, Dead Thrall only works on humanoids. If you want a permanent follower, it has to be one of the playable races using Dead Thrall.

  Or, you can use a resurrection staff over and over and make sure the corpse never disappears as outlined above. I've longed for non-humanoid companions for so long that I decided I would just make it happen myself. So far, this is the only way I could think up.

  Unfortunately Oneness, Dead Thrall only works on humanoids. If you want a permanent follower, it has to be one of the playable races using Dead Thrall.

  Or, you can use a resurrection staff over and over and make sure the corpse never disappears as outlined above. I've longed for non-humanoid companions for so long that I decided I would just make it happen myself. So far, this is the only way I could think up.

• Alastor

  

  Member
   

  February 25, 2014

  You could always do the Ritual Stone and Aetherial Crown. It's also worth noting that the regular Reanimate spells can be boosted to a duration of 12 minutes with potions, perks and dual-casting. The Spriggan will die but not for a good while.

  You could always do the Ritual Stone and Aetherial Crown. It's also worth noting that the regular Reanimate spells can be boosted to a duration of 12 minutes with potions, perks and dual-casting. The Spriggan will die but not for a good while.
• Oneness

  

  Member
   

  February 25, 2014

  Wow, shows how much I've ever considered the idea lol. I never use Dead Thrall on anything except humans so thanks for letting me know. The staff idea just seems to tedious for my liking, but I do admire your thinking. 

  Wow, shows how much I've ever considered the idea lol. I never use Dead Thrall on anything except humans so thanks for letting me know. The staff idea just seems to tedious for my liking, but I do admire your thinking. 

• Oneness

  

  Member
   

  February 25, 2014

  I'm actually using the Ritual Stone right now, I have no clue why I didn't think of that when replying  I'm on board with the Ritual Stone idea. I wouldn't like having to go find another spriggan to kill mostly because they annoy the hell out of me.

  I'm actually using the Ritual Stone right now, I have no clue why I didn't think of that when replying  I'm on board with the Ritual Stone idea. I wouldn't like having to go find another spriggan to kill mostly because they annoy the hell out of me.