Skyrim Special Edition

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JaySerpa

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jayserpa

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About this mod

Tired of the College of Winterhold not actually teaching you any magic? Tired of jumping into Saarthal after your very first lesson? This mod provides 7 new starter magic lessons/quests to make your College of Winterhold feel like an actual school of magic.

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College of Winterhold - Quest Expansion


FEATURES

  • 7 New Quests for the College of Winterhold.
  • These quests are not your "save the world" epic questlines, but basic entry-level College of Winterhold apprentice lessons.
  • They all mostly follow the basic principle of: Talk to the magic professor, they will lecture you about their school of magic, teach you a new spell and provide you with a problem where you need to use the spell to succeed. Learn by doing!
  • You must complete these 7 quests to unlock the continuation of the vanilla College of Winterhold quest line (Going to Saarthal). This means when you first join the College, you will be "forced" to learn a bit about magic before being thrown into Saarthal.
  • All new quests are fully voiced using spliced dialogue.
  • There are no dead ends: Quests can be completed in any order and there's always an objective marker guiding you towards what you need to do next. In some cases, you can opt out of some of these quests or take alternative paths resulting in different outcomes.
  • Compatible with practically all college and spell mods, no patch needed. 




 SPELLS, LESSONS & QUEST BREAKDOWN

As mentioned, all quests follow the basic template of:
1) SPELL: Scholar teaches you a spell
2) LECTURE: They give you a mini lecture on one important aspect of their field of expertise.
3) QUEST: They give you a task where you can put the new spell to the test.

If you don't mind spoilers, a very summarized version of each quest and lectures can be found in the spoiler below.

Spoiler:  
Show


(!)
1. ALTERATION: Tolfdir will teach you Waterbreathing, then ask you to journey with Arniel Gane north, where you will be asked to put the spell to the test and find some dwemer artifact in the Sea of Ghosts. An early variation of this quest can be watched in the video above.

2. DESTRUCTION: Faralda will teach you Firebolt, then teach you about the importance of using the most effective element against the right enemy. Then she will ask you to kill an enemy using your newly learned spell.

3. ILLUSION: Drevis will teach you Fury, then lecture you about the ways illusion influences the minds of your enemies. Lastly, he will ask you to put the spell to the test by making a bunch of confused skeevers be so confused that they hurt themselves.

4. ENCHANTING: Sergius is in a bit of a mood. He's VERY busy. If you manage to convince him that you can help, he will give you a simple task: enchant a weapon for a client of his. He will then ask you to deliver the weapon to said customer. However... things will not turn out the way you might expect in this quest.

5. CONJURATION: Phinis is not one to waste time. He will teach you how to conjure a familiar, then laugh in your face give you a lesson in humility. His lesson, besides the spell, is that every conjured creature has a purpose to serve... including the weakest familiar.

6. RESTORATION: Yes, this is a valid school of magic! Colette will share with you that not all restoration spells involve healing. She will teach you turn lesser undead and ask you to talk to Tolfdir, who's having a bit of a draugr infestation problem you might be able to help with.

7. KNOWLEDGE: Urag won't teach you any new spells, but he will give you an equally important lesson: the ability to judge and analyze the content of books as a true mage scholar. I hope you brought your reading glasses.




COMPATIBILITY

The basics you need to know: This mod does NOT modify spells, NPCs, the layout of the College or pretty much anything else. The only exception is one scene and one property in the initial vanilla quest (MG01). What this means is... this mod is pretty much compatible with everything. No patches needed. 

COMPATIBLE (NO PATCH NEEDED)
- Improved College Entry - Questline Tweaks (Load my mod AFTER this mod!)
- College of Winterhold Entry Requirements   (Load my mod AFTER this mod!)
- Spell Research
- Better Spell Learning / Immersive Spell Learning / Chewing Sounds for Spell Tomes
- Immersive College of Winterhold
- Obscure's College of Winterhold
- Ultimate College of Winterhold
- Bibliophile's Arcanaeum
- College of Winterhold NPC overhauls

COMPATIBLE (PATCH NEEDED)
- At Your Own Pace - College of Winterhold (Download patch in the optional files of the original mod)
- RS Children / Realistic Children Overhaul (Download patch in the optional files)

INCOMPATIBLE
- Not So Fast - Mage Guild > Not currently compatible. 




- Andrew, AresConnorMacpherbRedNickPanda Pancakes
& everyone who is supporting me on Patreon or through other means
Thank you! Your support means a lot


- Mern, EriBees, GreatPadinski, Urgie & RaccoonDance for helping out with testing
If there any issues with the mod, redirect your questions and complaints to them directly. (Please, don't)
- Parapets and Andrealphus for helping with some coding functions




 


- Is this the Ultimate College Mod Epic Quest I've been dreaming of?
Probably not. I know some of you wanted a fundamental super expanded version of the College of Winterhold questline with new epic quests. If that's the case, I'm sorry but this mod is probably not what you wanted. Most of the new quests that I've added are quite simple. Don't get me wrong, they do their job just fine, but these are mostly "apprentice" quests, meant to make you use magic, get familiar with the scholars and give you the "feeling of being a magic student". In that regard, I think this IS a good mod, but if you were expecting something else, you might be disappointed. 

- Does this modify what happens in the College of Winterhold vanilla narrative?
No, the vanilla quests remain exactly the same as in vanilla. My problem with the vanilla College of Winterhold guild is that it's too fast, it doesn't feel like a magic school at all (you don't learn anything) and magic is not required to advance in the guild. This mod EXPANDS the College of Winterhold vanilla quest experience by adding a section at the very beginning where I try to address these issues, but the rest remains the same. Once you've completed these 7 new "apprentice" quests, the vanilla quests will continue as normal.

- Can I install the mod mid-playthrough?
Yes, as long as you haven't joined the College yet.

- Do I NEED to use the spells I learn in each new quest to succeed in the quest?
Yes... and no. The quests provide the perfect opportunity and case study for you to use the spell that the scholar is teaching you in a relatively safe setting. It's up to you if you use it or not. The mod however DOES detect if you don't use the spells. Scholars will call you out and be disappointed if you ignore their lessons. There's also a final reward if you don't skip any quests and complete them in the proper way.

- Reward? What reward?
So the real reward is all the friends you make along the way! (Lol). Also, you will end up knowing at least one basic spell in each magic school. However, there's a possible extra small bonus at the end. This reward, like in most of my mods, is mostly symbolic and non-permanent. "Apprentice's Boon" lasts 3 in-game days and will make your skills increase slightly faster (5% boost) during those 3 days. It's similar to the vanilla effect you receive after sleeping in a bed. But keep in mind you only receive this reward if you don't skip a single quest and complete them all in the intended way (by using the intended spells for each quest.)

- I'm lost. I don't know how to advance the quest.
If you can't find the next quest giver, talk to Tolfdir. He can help you by showing you what quests you're missing. He can enable quest markers to any scholars you haven't talked to yet. If you're lost in the middle of a given quest, check the journal. Every step of every quest has a clear journal entry and objective marker.

- I'm stuck, I can't find the crystal for Arniel Gane.
Good thing you have a waterbreathing spell with you! Okay, I'll give you some tips. It's in a dwemer chest that is brownish in color. There's a total of 2 chests underwater. The one you want is in the furthest part of the Dwemer underwater ruins near a half-buried broken head of a dwemer centurion. North-ish. If you really can't find it, watch the video showcase above. Or you can install the "easy mode" patch, that will put a quest marker on the crystal.

- Is it compatible with X college mod?
Check the compatibility section above. Probably yes.

- What happens if I already know the spell the scholar wants to teach me?
The scholar will be impressed/happy and will ask you to practice the spell, so everything will continue as normal. I've accounted for these situations.

- What happens if I want to skip a quest because it doesn't suit my character? (Eg: I don't want my character to learn a conjuration spell)
I've added support to skip some of the quests via dialogue. If you're worried you might choose the wrong dialogue... Don't. It will be very easy to tell when this is the case, as it's very clearly indicated. Pretty lame of you to miss some of the quests though. Shame on you and your highland cow! I recommend doing all the quests, obviously. Some are quite the unexpected surprise.

- Why do scholars give me a spell tome instead of just magically giving me the spell?
For native support with mods such as Better Spell Learning or Immersive Spell Learning. This way it works for both vanilla and modded setups, and it makes sense that you actually have to study the tomes and all.

- How natural do the new lines sound?
Well, as natural as I could make them. I recommend checking the video above to see some examples for yourself. I'd argue I've gotten pretty good at it after making 500 lines for Bandit Lines Expansion, but there's always room for improvement. 

I just checked the URL of this modpage... Do you worship the Devil? Did you join the illuminati?
It was just a coincidence, of course... Hahaha HAHAHA HAHAHAHA

I want more mods!
If you're interested in this mod, you might be interested in my other mods too. Here's a summary of all my main releases these past 2 years! Yep, it's been 2 years since I published my first mod. It's been quite the journey. Take a look.

~2 YEAR MODVERSARY~



Enjoy, have fun, go cast some spells in my honor!