Explore the Bodies of Water
If you want to see the entire contents of a body of water (lakes, steams, etc), jump into the water and descend down very slowly and incrementally while looking forward and slightly down. If done correctly, you can see the water separate from your view, and instantly, everything in the water beneath you is 100% lit up and visible. Very useful for treasure hunting or killing those damn fish.
Submitted by: Wilhelm (cashmoney)
Avoid In-game Bugs
To avoid any irreversible main quest bugs, complete all side quests/guild quests/etc that you have going first. Make sure that all loose ends are tied up and then proceed with the main quest. Also, don't do any dark brotherhood quests before you beat the main quest as the dark brotherhood will raise your infamy...greatly.
But after the main quest is complete, you can purge anyone the dark brotherhood seeks fit and when guards come running (their disposition should be 100 after you complete the main quest), hold block and click on them to *yield*. They will talk to you and say "because your such a friend I'll just look the other way" or something of the sort. This makes looting, pillaging, and killing all the easier without worrying about arrest warrants, fines, and resisting arrest.
Submitted by: Wilhelm (cashmoney)
Repent Your Sins Wicked One Bug Fix
To fix the "Repent your Sins Wicked One" bug at the chapels when you try to use the alter, there is a short process to follow. First, commit a crime...just go whack someone with your sword. Pay the fine, and you'll lose any stolen merchandise on you and your bounty goes to zero.
From there, seek out a thieves guild member who can pay off your fines and bounty. Pay them the 50% cost, and then sleep for at least 1 hour. Pray at a chapel and all of a sudden you're no longer wicked. I've tried other combinations, but this seems to be the only method that works 100% of the time in correcting the bug.
Submitted by: Wilhelm (cashmoney)
Picking Locks is Easy Business
It took me a few days to really get the hang of it, but I found that listening for the famous *PLINK PLINK* is not the best way to pick locks. There are several speeds for which the pins move on the lock. There's very fast, fast, medium, slow, and very slow. Depending on your security level, you can click and lock the pins with any of these speeds, the faster the speed the harder.
The easiest method is to grasp the mouse with your finger poised. Play around with the first pin for a while (or any pin, the order doesn't matter), watch for the different speeds. When your eye has determined the different speeds, and you can calculate when the pin is moving up at the very slow speed, click the mouse immediately. No matter how fast you think your reaction is, you wont click it in time unless you do it in literally .250 of a second after the pin hits the top of the tumbler.
If you click the moment you see it going up slowly, the time it takes the brain to send the neural signal to the fingers to click the button, the pin is already at the top and you have .249 seconds. If you hesitate for even a nanosecond, just keep playing around and timing it again. Less lockpicks is good, and constantly locking the pins in place improves your security at a fast pace. Once you hit 40+ security, you can start aiming for the very slow, slow, and even medium speeds.
The medium are very hard to hit, but with finesse, you can nab those also. The higher the security level the more reaction time you are given. It is also a proven fact that visualization stimulates faster tactile response than auditory processing. Meaning, most people react to things faster if they see them rather than hear them.
Submitted by: Wilhelm (cashmoney)
Quick Tip for Good Money
A quick tip for some good money (if you don't use cheats or the vampire potion reward exploit. Wait for after 9pm and pick the lock on the chest by the arena. There's 500 gold in there, and it replenishes randomly. I found that the gold replenished in 52 hours oblivion time and with 8 hours of player sleep...but it probably varies per player.
Submitted by: Wilhelm (cashmoney)
Join the Guilds
For quick and easy cash for your new character, join the Guilds - the Mages and Fighers Guild in particular. You can then go to the different Guild Halls and all the items that are on shelves or chests you can take and sell! This provides some easy gold, as well as basic weapons and potions/poisons when you are starting out.
Submitted by: Blake Bolt
More Oblivion hints and tips on next page...
