Introducing: Karlirah the Swordstress

Moving from a campaign based on Magic to a whole Race very much not.

Redguards, by and large, don't DO magic. There's a whole belief that spellcasting steals souls and meddles with minds, that the average Redguard just doesn't trust. There was 'Trayvond the Redguard' at the Mages' Guild in Cheydinhal, back in Oblivion, but the reason he was there in the first place was because he was hounded out of Hammerfell for practicing magic...

Yup. Magic is not so popular...

The Reguards are another race which appear to have undergone a bit of a revamp in Skyrim. You don't notice it quite so much whilst creating a character of your own, but when you start to encounter Hammerfell Native Redguards, turning up as NPCs, you certainly notice the difference. Granted I have not played every Elder Scrolls title out there, so maybe things have been different in the past, but certainly in Morrowind and Oblivion other than the obvious natural differince in ethnicity the aesthetic style of NPCs was not radically different from the rest of Tamriel's residents. They still dressed in the same clothes and armours.

But now, in Skrim, we have gone from this:

To this:

Yes, Redguards certainly appear to have become a bit more... well, Arabian. Right down to the use of Scimitars. It is kind of logical in some ways, I suppose. These guys are Alik'r warriors from the Alik'r desert region of Hammerfell. That kind of clothing for use in a desert environment is not an entirely implausible design choice. But it certainly feels a little bit jarring compared to what I've seen of the Redguard in previous games. You're likely to meet an Arabian styled troop of Redguard at some point, probably while you're in Whiterun, and then have to suffer City Guards all OVER Skyrim commenting on their 'Curved Swords'.

It becomes a little wearing...

As with previous versions of the game Redguards make some of the best out and out warriors you can have at your disposal. Great starting stats for using one handed weapons, and Adrenaline Rush to keep slashing at the hardier enemies for longer. Their resistance to poisons certainly comes in handy too.

I decided to take advantage of the higher one-handed starting stat by creating a character who would be dual wielding weapons from the start, and with Magic not playing a part I could split my focus on upgrading
Stamina and Health as I progressed through the levels.

This is Karlirah. Redguards don't tend to have surnames, unless acquired through marriage, so I haven't given her one. I figured it was time I did another female character, so why not a kick-ass female sword-mistress? A little bit frustrating producing a satisfactory result with the character creator, though. The Skyrim  character creator is nowhere near as detailed as Oblivion's for adjusting head meshes, and there doesn't appear to be any way of creating a female Redguard without tired looking circles underneath their eyes. It's nowhere near as bad as trying to make a pretty looking Dark Elf Female, but a tiny bit frustrating nonetheless.

I've also tried to get the hair and skin tint as close to the Redguards in Oblivion as I could.

As with last time, I had Karlirah follow Hadvar out of Helgen, and take refuge in Alvor and Sigrid's house in Riverwood. My intention had been to kit her out in Heavy Armour, creating a Knight style character. But once again I forgot that in choosing to side with The Imperials I wasn't going to be picking up any Heavy Armour at Helgen. Just Imperial Light Armour. Not quite what I needed...

On reflection this choice also didn't make the greatest amount of sense either, based on Race and Lore.

If this was Oblivion a Redguard wouldn't have much trouble helping out the Imperials. But in the two centuries between games things have changed. The Thalmor tried to seize parts of southern Hammerfell during their war with The Empire, and although The Imperial Army did send forces to fight them off, when it came to the END of the war it was a very different story. In signing the White-Gold Concordat (the peace treaty refered to so frequently in Skyrim) the new Emperor gave in and and gave The Thalmor the land they wanted.

The Redguards, not unreasonably, were pretty pissed off about that, and refused to acknowledge the treaty. They forced the Thalmor out of Hammerfell themselves, and since that point Hammerfell has remained a fully
independent State.

Now when you place all of THAT in the background... would a Redguard, who had just escaped execution at the hands of The Empire (Dragon attack or No) decide to follow an Imperial Officer? Or would they decide to run, with the aid of the guy from the Stormcloaks? Now that I've opted for the former I actually think they might be more likely to go with the latter.

Oh, well. Too late now.

To be honest, I don't think Karlirah will be likely to go down the Civil War path for either side specifically, though. She has no real common ground with The Nords, and as you can't really join the Imperial Army as an infiltrator... so I think neutral is the way to go. :)

So... a trip to the Forge later, I got Karlirah kitted out in Banded Iron Armour and two Imperial Swords. I had her smith the armour herself, up to 'Fine' quality. Mostly for the levelling, it has to be said. While it is
usefull for Heavy Armour wearers to have smithing skill, in this playthrough I think the focus needs to be on using the armour and weapons better, rather than being able to make them. Picking up smithing perks
would give me access to more impressive weapons and armours QUICKER, but at the cost of picking up those perks which best take advantage of this fighting style.

That's not a good trade off.

As you can see I picked Faendal again this time. Almost decided to go it alone, but decided a bit of back-up can't do any harm. This time, to make sure he didn't keep switching weapons, I insisted upon ONLY giving him bows and light armours to carry. It meant I came out of the Barrow carrying slightly less loot, but did mean that Faendal only used a bow throughout, as intended. An acient Nord Bow by the end, but a Bow nonetheless.

Oh, and in case any of you WERE curious as to what Faendal's 'Fake Letter' about Sven looked like, well, here you go...

Subtle. Clever. You see, Sven. You DON'T have to resort to racism... :)

Fighting with two swords was as enjoyable as when I was doing it with J'Vari. No Stealth this time obviously, but the damage dealt was good. Once again the Power attacks look awesome in Third Person, and with Adrenaline Rush active you get to do a bit more of that. Did kind of waste it though, by activating it for fighting the giant spider. Karlirah took out thespider far quicker than I expected, and then it ran out by the time I found any suitable number of enemies to continue using it on. Oh well. It is useful though.

Loot from the Barrow was sold off. No magical items which were of use to me, sadly. I was hoping that the end Draugr might be spawned with a one-handed Frost weapon. No such luck. Not really much use for a Battleaxe. Still, selling it all allowed me to purchase a full suit of Steel Armour and the ingots to upgrade it to 'Fine'. Unfortunately that also wiped out my finances a little. I can see where most of my future income is likely to be going already...

I dunno, though. While there were parts of this playthrough I definitely enjoyed , it did feel that in many ways they were just elements which I'd enjoyed through other characters already. I'm sure that, as I advance through the levels, this character could become an awesome fighting MACHINE. Possibly the best actual warrior character I'd have at my disposal. But I've just not quite gotten into playing as Karlirah as much
as my other characters. With the others I've been able to pitch where they'd be based out of, and what factions they'd associate with.

Karlirah's not quite THERE yet.

Given the trouble I had with carry weight, and therefore loot, I think I might opt for dropping the Warrior Stone and hunting down the Steed Stone instead. 100 more points of carry weight and no penalty of carry weight on movement.

We'll see.

Any recommendations or suggestions would be more than welcome. :)

Next Time: Argonians and Thievery. With a little bit of Magic. Come back and see...