Obscure's College of Winterhold adds two new towers, the Halls of Acumen and Diligence, and re-imagines the interiors of the Arcanaeum, Hall of the Elements, and Hall of the Arch-Mage. It envisions the College as a college first, and an enclave of wizards second, with the changes and additions focusing on this being foremost an institution of learning, study, and scholarly affairs, with an under layer of magical mystery and ancient secrets.
Signs have been placed throughout the college to help you understand, at glance, the contents of each of the five towers, as well as other information. These will help you find the bedrooms of each character, as well as workbench facilities or other salient features.
• Bedroom door signs list the owner's name, their rank, and/or their job within the college.
• These signs will update as time passes, with you rising through the ranks, and various characters moving in and out.
• These signs may be used to find the location of any NPC with a room at the College.
Version 1.5 brings an entirely new Hall of the Elements to Winterhold. It has been re-imagined as a lecture hall with an entirely new lower floor featuring multiple amenities, such as stations to practice offensive and defensive spells, a spectral sparring partner, laboratory, and a recovery area if your practice got a little too deadly.
• Many story scenes have been updated to take advantage of the new layout. For example, college members will sit when listening to lectures.
• The free potions in the recovery area are refreshed twice a week.
• Defense training allows you to defend against fire bolt, ice spike, and lighting bolt. These do not scale with your level.
• Destruction training targets slowly increase your skill.
• The spectral sparring partner scales with your level, and will eventually possess master level destruction spells.
• If you are defeated by the defense training or sparring partner, you will be moved to the recovery area with some health restored.
Version 1.5's proudest feature is the Arcanaeum, which has been rebuilt from scratch. It now spans multiple stories, filling the height of the College's great tower, with tall bookcases stretching to touch the ceiling. Urag gro-Shub's counter has been moved to a small front lobby, a space which is consistent with how the Arcanaeum would fit against the Hall of the Elements. An upper level has been added featuring the Arcanaeum's private collection, which is only accessible to those who have passed the rank of apprentice. Within you may find the rarest books in all of Tamriel. The collection is incomplete, however. The vanilla quest "Fetch me that Book!" now puts each book you recover on display, allowing Urag to finally call this collection complete. This quest has been rewritten to eliminate the randomness of the books you're being sent to find and to stop it from looping forever. Instead, you will run down a list of rare books, recovering them one by one, until you've found them all, ending the quest.
• The Investigator’s chest can be found under Urag gro-Shub's counter. (Unless you're using Finding Velehk Sain, which removes it entirely.)
• The bookshelves are static, but can be made interactive if you're using Bibliophile's Arcanaeum.
• The key to the private collection will be placed in your bedroom in the Hall of Attainment after you've completed "Hitting the Books," the third quest in the College's questline.
Version 1.5 presents a new take on the Arch-Mage's quarters by adding the ability to transform the central dais into one of six variations, right before your eyes. Savos Aren's default setup is a cluttered office, but once you're Arch-Mage you may transform it into a laboratory, council chamber, secret archive, heated spa, or back into the original vanilla grove. The chamber itself has been divided into public, semi-private, and private zones, separated by newly placed locked doors. The front lobby area is now totally public, allowing any member of the college to have access to the tower roof. The "horseshoe" in the back is now fully private, allowing the Arch-Mage to feel undisturbed at home. This private space includes many player-home features, such as weapon racks and mounts, a mannequin, a hearth with cooking pot, bookshelves, and additional storage space.
• The laboratory variation features an Alchemy lab, an Enchanting table, a dis-enchanter, a Staff Enchanter, and some storage.
• NPCs will undress when entering the heated spa. Bring your friends!
• If you Choose Your Own Arch-Mage they will select one of the six variations for themselves.
One of two new towers is The Hall of Acumen. It includes Thelsa's Cantina, tended by the College's new alchemy instructor, Thelsa Andalas. She’ll sell you snacks, drinks, potions (including a few novelty potions of her design), recipes, ingredients, and train you to master-level alchemy. A visit to the Cantina in the evening, or for breakfast, has been added to the routine of most College members. This hall is also home to Septimus Signus, who has been traveling for years. Finally, this is where many of the the characters of Immersive College NPCs (ICNs) dwell. These rooms are present even if you do not have ICNs installed.
The second of the new towers, The Hall of Diligence, offers offices for teachers covering the five spell-casting schools and two magical crafting schools. Each teacher has their office hours posted. The tower is home to Mirabelle Ervine, the four missing apprentices, and the groundskeeper from ICNs.
• After the crisis has ended, Mirabelle’s room will be updated to reflect the turn of events.
• The rooms of the missing apprentices have clues that will update your map to help you find them.
• In time, four new apprentices will move in. Cutting Room Floor (CRF) users will see them move in as the mystery of the missing apprentices is solved.
• The entire tower has been updated with newly created furniture, light fixtures, and fine tuned lighting placement.
The player's home dormitory has received subtle architectural updates, as well as a set dressing, clutter, and lighting overhaul. The hall has been cleaned of hay, barrels, sacks, and other "farmhouse" elements, with doors, desks, and personalized items added. A kitchen has been added to the upper level, as well as a small alchemy laboratory and enchanting table.
When you first visit your room during the tour with Faralda, it will be dark and vacant, missing furniture and clutter. The name plate will indicate that it used to be Nelacar’s. After you complete First Lessons, the room will be lit and furnished, with your storage space available. The door sign will have your name and rank. An Apprentices Handbook will be on your newly added desk, which explains the college ranks, and the five towers.
• Your room also features non-respawning storage and an interactive bookshelf, similar to ones found in the larger player homes.
• Chairs now have ownership, so NPCs are more likely to be in their own rooms.
• Ancano's room has been locked, with Thalmor-specific loot, and secrets, within. A day after the college’s questline is over, a new apprentice will move into Ancano’s room. (Steal his stuff before this happens or it’s lost for good.)
• Enthir now has a (very hard to spot) fence shadow-mark near his door, which will now be locked if Enthir is not around.
• The College Guards now have their own room, labeled “Guard on Duty” (Guards are re-added to the College with Cutting Room Floor.)
• Locked bedroom doors will unlock and re-lock depending on the presence of the room owner
• "Souls, Black and White" has been removed from the Hall of Attainment, as it is one of the books Urag sends you to find.
The Hall of Countenance has received a makeover similar to its sister hall. Clutter and lighting have been globally revised, with many bedrooms given touches that link them more closely to their owner. A few touches have been added to tie in with content from Cutting Room Floor.
• Added a disenchantment font to the enchanting room in the Hall of Countenance. (Script by XunAmarox.)
• Replaced upstairs meal area in the Hall of Countenance with a study room.
• Added interactive lecterns to the study area, allowing players to place up to three books.
You may catch a glimpse of college life on the notice board, and get your bearings with the map. In addition to the placement of two new powers, the college exterior has received many subtle tweaks and updates. The hardscaping in the courtyard has been expanded to increase the walkable surface and better connect the two new towers. The front tower has been modified to bear the college's emblem in its windows, as well as a slightly more detailed interior. Many of the surfaces have been updated to break up obvious tiling, mirroring, stretching, and tweak the placement of snow. Windows have been added to the stair halls of the four dormitory towers, as well as where windows exist on the interior but were not previously present on the exterior.
• Changed rooftop doors from “MinUse” to normal level-load doors so NPCs will use the roof to path between towers.
• A memorial in the courtyard will appear a day after the college questline is finished.
The circulation into and throughout the Midden has been revised. The Midden can now only be accessed from the Hall of the Elements, by a door in the lower level. A locked door now blocks the drop-off point which lead directly the Midden Dark. The key is near the atronach fordge. In the Midden Dark, a cave-in blocks the path directly to the Augur, requiring that you drop down and circle back up. The exit which lead to the foot of the College's rocky pedestal has been blocked, forcing you to ascend if you wish to exit. A new corridor has been built around the chamber with the black gauntlet, so that this room is no longer a thoroughfare. Once you've visited the Augur, there is a slope leading you over the cave-in which previously blocked your path. Once you've returned to the Midden, a stairway leads back up to the first locked door, which you can now open, and return to the College.
• The Midden and Midden Dark have both received many other tweaks and detail changes to their architecture and set dressing.
• Various crafting stations have been added to the Midden.
• The solitary Draugr has been removed. Two ice wraiths were added to compensate.
• Resisted the urge to turn the Augur of Dunlain into a tea kettle.
• The College has been thoroughly cleaned of hay and other barn-yard elements.
• Where barrels and sacks remain, they have been changed to hold apothecary items rather than foodstuffs.
• The personal wardrobes and chests found within the dormitories have been tweaked to include wizards' robes of the school appropriate to the owner, in addition to common clothing.
• All architectural chunks, even if they were not overhauls, have been edited to support more light sources to reduce glitching.
• All interiors have been given "occlusion" elements to increase performance.
• Navmeshes have been cleaned and simplified to ease the passage of NPCs.
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