Dawnguard Review

Okay, first off this isn't a DLC you want if you are just starting to play Skyrim. The added monsters, and creatures are tough to beat. For instance, you will no longer only face Volkihar level vampires after Level 50. Second, many of the quests in this questline require that you have progressed through at least the main questline if not the Mages, and Thieves Guild questlines.

Overall this DLC is pretty good. There are some bugs. For example a few of the original quests become broken if you start Dawnguard quests before completing them. There are also some issues with random vampire attacks taking out half of your NPC townspeople (I lost Brand-Shei, Madesi and Edda and like 4 guards after a vampire attack on Riften and then two dragons simultaneously attacked right after and killed Hemming Black-Briar and nearly killed Maven). But Bethesda is pretty good about fixing problems in a patch. So I am sure we will be seeing one pretty soon since the DLC only recently came out.

Character Development: The new NPC's are well developed and multidimensional. Truthfully, I felt sorry for Serana after the first few quests. In a reflection of reality for many of us, Serana is simply a weapon to be used by her parents against each other and it often shows in her lack of confidence about her relationships. You also get a lot of information related to cannon lore in the Elder Scrolls series. For instance, there are true snow elves in this DLC, and their history links them with the history of the Companions, the Dwemer, humans on Tamriel, the Altmer, and the Dunmer as well as with the conflicts between the Aedra and Daedra or the gods that rule Tamriel.

Gameplay: Dawnguard adds several new aspects to gameplay. For example you can now fight from horseback, a touch that would be historically accurate for the medieval setting of Skyrim, as well as being more convenient for ranged fighters and melee fighters under certain battle conditions. For instance, one can attack with a sword from horseback and then ride away essentially allowing a traditional melee fighter to perform more ranged or distance attacks. There are also crossbows. These are more heavily powered than regular bows and pack a lot more punch.

Overall: This DLC gets 5 stars. The gameplay is great, the storyline and quests make sense in the overall body of Elder Scrolls cannon, and it is fun for those of us with higher level characters

First Post: Dawnguard and all that Blehhh

I finally got my copy of Elder Scrolls V :Skyrim: Dawnguard. I haven't had much of a chance to try it, but it looks like a real blast. My Thief/Assassin/Vampire looks to get some real boosts from this. Still haven't decided whether to side with the vampires or the Dawnguard. Just doesn't make a lot of sense to me to save the world from Alduin only to turn it into a vampire fun house after all.

But anyways I will be reviewing this in the next few days. This little blog is only beginning mwahahahah


Also future advice- if you are going to get DLC for the Xbox just buy them at the Xbox marketplace, its faster and you don't have to deal with FUBAR gaming websites