Welcome to the 37th installment of my Oblivion Immersion Series.  Fingers of the Mountain was one of the most interesting quests in the game, in that it focused on reclaiming the lost magics of the Ayleid precursors, something that the game pays criminally little attention to otherwise beyond the Umbacano quests.  But interesting lore stuff aside, the Fingers of the Mountain spell completely sucked.  It was a mediocre spell at low levels, and utterly unusable at higher ones.  This mod was originally envisioned as just a rebalance of Fingers of the Mountain and was intended as an independent release, but once the idea of Lost Sorceries of the Ayleids took hold,  I decided to fold Fingers of the Mountain Rebalanced into this larger project.

So here we are, with Lost Sorceries of the Ayleids.  This mod adds custom spells to Ayleid altars found at various ruins.  For the sake of simplicity (this is my first ever attempt at scripting after all - and by scripting, I mean copying and trimming down a pre-existing vanilla script), the altars will activate and grant you their power if you are carrying a Welkynd stone, without any extra steps or frills.

Fifteen altars have been added and will grant the following (see the Cheat Sheet for locations):

Greater Powers (once per day, 0 cost):
  - Fire King's Ire (200 fire damage in 10 feet)
  - Winds of the North (200 frost damage in 10 feet)
  - Power Overwhelming (fortify health, stamina, and magicka by 50 pts for 120 sec)
  - Sorcerer King's Genius (fortify all attributes by 10 pts for 120 sec)
  - Auriel's Favor (restore health, magicka, and stamina by 10 pts for 15 sec)
  - Daedrophile's Pact (summon dremora lord for 30 sec)
  - Shackled Servant (reanimate for 120 sec)

Lesser Powers (comes with magicka cost to cast):
  - Shadow Walker (chameleon for 40 pts, fortify sneak for 10 pts for 60 sec)
  - Supreme Domination (dominate animal/humanoid up to level 15 for 30 sec, rally for 50 pts)
  - The Tiger's Fangs (absorb health/stamina by 5 pts for 30 sec)
  - Rainbow Shield of Meridia (fire, shock, and ice shield 20 pts for 30 sec)
  - Armor of Oblivion (conjure complete bound armor for 30 sec)
  - Star Orphan's Hunger (spell absorption 25 pts for 30 sec)
  - Cloak of Magnus (resist magic for 25 pts for 30 sec)
  - Twisting Flesh (damage health/stamina for 5 pts for 15 sec, damage strength/endurance by 10 pts)

Fingers of the Mountain has also been retooled as a greater power with damage output equivalent to Fire King's Ire and Winds of the North.  Fingers of the Mountain Rebalanced is also available as a standalone bonus plugin in case you just want that.

A final word concerning in game balance between these spells: I tried to strike a balance between being suitably overpowered given the lore, usefulness and accessibility to the player across different builds, and still hard enough to find/hefty enough in magicka cost that it won't completely ruin the game.  I'm not sure how well I succeeded, but the game's vanilla level scaling is absolutely screwed anyway, so what does it matter if the spells are OP?

Version 1.1, for both LSA and Finger of the Mountain Rebalanced, re-tweaks the Finger of the Mountain spell so that it will work properly (with all the same effects) even if you have already completed Finger of the Mountain II prior to installing this mod.  The newer version is only needed if you completed Finger of the Mountain II prior to installing this mod.

A bash patch addition for the Unofficial Patch has been graciously provided by Dispensation, which stops UOP from invalidating the spell costs set in Lost Sorceries of the Ayleids when using a bash patch.

Full description: A small patch for Lost Sorceries of the Ayleids and the Unofficial Oblivion Patch. It ensures that UOP does not cause the bashed patch to remove the Manual Spell Cost flag, which results in the Fingers of the Mountain Greater Power costing a lot of Magicka (this is because LOOT gives UOP the SpellStats bash tag). Works with both Lost Sorceries of the Ayleids.esp and Finger of the Mountain Rebalanced.esp. Deactivate this ESP and import it into your bashed patch. {{BASH:Deactivate,NoMerge,SpellStats}}

Requirements
===========

Oblivion Version 1.2.0416

Installation Instructions
===================

Copy the plugin to the Oblivion data folder.  To update to V1.1, simply delete the old plugin and install the newer version.  The name of the updated plugin is unchanged from the old one to prevent the need to backtrack and re-obtain the spells. 

Uninstallation Instructions
=====================

Delete the plugin

Incompatibility
============

Will be incompatible with mods that overhaul the layout of Ayleid ruin exteriors.  This mod will be incompatible with any other mods that alter the Fingers of the Mountain quest or spell.  If you have an alternative mod that alters one or both of them, then load that mod after this one, and the rest of LSA will be intact.  Obviously don't use Fingers of the Mountain Rebalanced and Lost Sorceries of the Ayleids together; that is redundant. 

Known Issues
===========

None at the moment

Troubleshooting
=============

Feel free to come to me with questions or issues and I will help as best as I can.  That said, please bear in mind that I am a novice modder and may not be able to offer much in the way of assistance.

Credits
======
 
Thanks to:

Bethesda Softworks
TES Nexus
LHammonds - Readme Generator
The Imperial Library
 
Special thanks to HelelBenShahaar for pointing out the issues with the Finger of the Mountain tweaks

Special thanks to Dispensation for the UOP patch

Licensing
========

I am making this mod open to revision by the public.  If you have any ideas of how to expand or improve upon this mod, then go ahead.  No permission needed.  All I ask is that you give credit to me and to the creators of these resources.  This mod and its contents may not be distributed commercially.