Dragonborn - Omni-guides/Tuxborn GitHub Wiki

This page is an overview of what Tuxborn players can expect when running the Dragonborn DLC.

"What changes does Tuxborn make to Dragonborn?"

Starting the quest

In vanilla Skyrim, Miraak's cultists start showing up to assault you at the first town you enter, following The Way of the Voice. This can happen very early in your game, and it is not level dependent. It only requires that you finish the first visit to the Greybeards and then enter any town. Returning to Ivarstead after visiting High Hrothgar counts!

In Tuxborn, however, the first cultist attack is delayed. You will still need to finish The Way of the Voice regardless, but cultists will not spawn for you until you've done both that and reached level 25. This is set by the Timing is Everything mod, and that setting can be adjusted if level 25 is not to your liking.

"What changes are made to Anniversary Edition content on Solstheim?"

Ancient Ice

The quest to get the Stalhrim Fur armor, Ancient Ice, is impacted by the mod On A Crimson Trail. You will need to speak to Geldis Sadri at the Retching Netch to get the requisite pointer to launch the quest for this armor, if you want it.

Ghosts of the Tribunal

We are running the Ghosts of the Tribunal - Reduced Cut mod, but we're running the version of it that retains the quest. Items provided by that Creation have been distributed by the mod out across the game, though, where appropriate. You'll see citizens and guards in Raven Rock wearing some of the Ghosts of the Tribunal items.

We're also running a patch for synergy between Ghosts of the Tribunal and Moon and Star. So when running the quest for the latter, you'll see characters in that mod wearing stuff from Ghosts of the Tribunal.

Put a Fork In It

This quest is the one that would normally allow you to get the Fork of Horripilation and the Staff of Sheogorath. It is launched by finding a note pinned to one of the kegs just past the door of the Retching Netch. In our load order, that note is not present. This quest is pre-empted in favor of Saints and Seducers Extended Cut. Play that mod to get these items. See Mod overview: Saints and Seducers Extended Cut for more details.

"What other mods make changes relevant to Dragonborn and/or Solstheim?"

Ancient Nord Stalhrim

This mod allows for higher-level draugr to be carrying Ancient Nord Stalhrim weapons. Which means that even before you make it to Solstheim, you have a chance of getting weapons you can then smelt down into a stock of stalhrim. If it's important to you to be able to make stalhrim gear once you learn how, be on the lookout for these weapons as a source of stalhrim.

Bloodskal Blade - Tweaks and Enhancements

The Bloodskal Blade mod we're running is an overhaul for that specific weapon. So you may want to give it a second look once you run the relevant Raven Rock quest.

Cannibal Draugr on Solstheim

Pretty much what it says on the tin!

DLC2 March of the Dead Fix

This mod adjusts the position of the note from Carius, if you don't loot the Ash Spawn that holds it before the remains disappear.

Elmlock Armor and Blade

Related to Ancient Nord Stalhrim, since the Elmlock armor set can be smelted down into stalhrim due to how that mod constructs the armor (see the Armor and weapons available in Tuxborn page for details), this is also a sneaky backdoor way to build up a stock of stalhrim if you have enough ebony to burn to make multiple sets of that armor.

Frost Giant Overhaul - Mihail Monsters and Animals

This mod is a replacer for frost giants in general, and Karstaag in particular. It also reworks some of Karstaag's attacks. See recommendation notes below.

Legacy of the Dragonborn

Several of the items in the Tools of the Trade quest are found on Solstheim. Most notable among these are Picky's Beacon and Picky's Resonator, which give you the ability to summon the Dev Aveza to a new position if you wish to do so. So if this sounds fun to you, you may want to prioritize going to Solstheim earlier in your playthrough, so you can get those items.

You should be able to take the Dev Aveza to Solstheim, and then use it while you're there. However, you'll need to go to Solstheim via the boat at Windhelm's docks first, just so that you can discover Raven Rock and have that available for the airship to reach it. If you want use of the airship on Solstheim, you should make your initial visit to Raven Rock brief. Then return to Skyrim, pick up the airship, and come back at your leisure.

Lucien

Dumzbthar is a Dwemer ruin added by Lucien's mod, and you will visit that as part of the latter stages of his personal questline. It is located a short distance from White Ridge Barrow, in the northwestern portion of Solstheim.

You will not be able to enter Dumzbthar if you're not running Lucien as a follower, as he is the only source of the necessary key to enter the ruin.

Morrowind Creatures

As you would expect from the name, the Morrowind Creatures mod adds creatures to the game that originated in Morrowind. The most significant one of these that you'll see on Solstheim in particular is a rideable guar in Raven Rock.

A New Source of Stalhrim

The mod Source of Stalhrim Quest Fix provides a minor fix that allows you to kick off the stalhrim quest in case you see Deor and Fanari get stuck.

Project AHO

One of the landing pads for the AHO is located at Nchardak.

Spaghetti's Solstheim

This is the main mod we're using to do an overhaul of all settlements on Solstheim.

Trade & Barter

Trade & Barter is known to impact the Dremora Merchant that you can summon if you run the Black Book Untold Legends at Benkongerike, and choose the Black Market power off of that book. This gives you the ability to summon the Dremora Merchant and sell items out of your inventory to him.

In vanilla, he spawns with 2,000 gold. In our load order, however, he spawns with 0 gold due to how Trade & Barter's code for determining how much gold all merchants should have works.

Fortunately, the MCM provides you options for fixing this, on the Merchant Inventory tab:

  1. The Merchant Inventory tab includes, in the section with the header Merchant Gold, a bunch of sliders for various merchants. These allow you to set whatever their default gold should be. You should see all of these set to 0, so that Trade & Barter can dynamically determine their gold amounts. The Dremora Merchant is represented in this list of sliders, too. If you select his slider, you can set it as you wish. We recommend setting it to 2,000 gold to match the vanilla behavior, as this will not impact any other aspect of the mod.
  2. On the same tab in the MCM, below all the sliders, there is also a checkbox that reads "Disable Merchant Gold Options". If you activate this, it will reset all merchant gold back to original vanilla values.

"What followers are best to bring to Solstheim?"

Consider any of the following options.

Follower Notes
Gore He'll react to your initially being attacked by the Miraak cultists. As per his mod page on Nexus, he should also have relevant commentary once you're on Solstheim.
Lucien His personal quest involves the Dwemer ruin Dumzbthar. You won't be able to access that ruin without Lucien, so if you're interested in it, bring him. He does not have much in the way of Solstheim-specific commentary otherwise, nor does he comment on Dragonborn events. But the Dwemer ruin is large and has an interesting two-stage plot to explore.
Lydia She was already one of the better housecarls to bring to Solstheim, since she does have Solstheim-specific commentary even in vanilla. If you're still running her by the time you make it to Solstheim, the modded version of her will likely be comparable if not better. We'll update this page with more specifics when we have them.
Remiel She has Dragonborn-specific commentary, as well as commentary on some of the base game side quests, as per her mod page on Nexus. If you're also running Xelzaz, she will have conversations with him about the ashy conditions in Morrowind.
Xelzaz Very strong follower to bring to Solstheim, especially when you get to Tel Mithryn. He'll have conversations with both Talvaz and Neloth, and a side quest will kick off for him there. And he'll be very strongly invested when you go to Ashfallow Citadel as part of the quest Served Cold, with additional commentary to you after.

"Does Dragonborn have displayable relics for the LOTD museum?"

Yes!

Base game content

The following base game items from Solstheim have LOTD displays:

  • All of the Black Books, and Miraak's gear. Details can be found on the Hermaeus Mora and Miraak display page on the LOTD wiki
  • Karstaag's skull
  • The Lusty Argonian Maid folio you can recover from the Wreck of the Strident Squall (you'll be able to make a copy of it in the museum after you give the original book back to Cindiri)
  • Bonemold armor worn by Redoran guards, or craftable by you if you have the materials
  • The Champion's Cudgel wielded by Falx Carius
  • The Bloodskal Blade
  • The Deathbrand Treasure Map
  • All four pieces of the Deathbrand armor set, as well as Bloodscythe and Soulrender, the two scimitars wielded by the ghost of Haknir Death-Brand
  • Hoarfrost
  • Horksbane
  • Stormfang
  • Both halves of the Amethyst Claw, when you run Vahlok's Tomb
  • The mask and other gear pieces dropped by Vahlok, in the same tomb
  • The dragon Sahrotaar, who will die during your final confrontation with Miraak, will drop scales you can use to make a display for him in the Gallery of Natural Science
  • All craftable pieces of stalhrim armor, and all stalhrim weapons, to fill out the Stalhrim display in the Armory
  • If you're running the Thieves Guild, and you do the side quest to get the improved bonemold formula back for Glover Mallory, the armor pieces you can make as a result will be displayable
  • Related to previous, if you then go tell Sapphire that Glover is her father, the Exquisite Sapphire she gives you can be displayed
  • All six Ahzidal items you find as you run Kolbjorn Barrow
  • The mask and gear dropped by Ahzidal, at the end of running Kolbjorn Barrow
  • The mask and gear dropped by Zahkriisos, at the end of running Raven Rock Mine and Bloodskal Barrow
  • The Ancient Nordic Pickaxe you get back from Crescius, by request of Glover Mallory
  • The Dagger of Symmachus
  • Randomly spawning seashells displayable in the Gallery of Natural Science can appear on Solstheim's shores, at any point around the island

The Kagrumez Resonance Gems are displayable, but only manually, and they do not bump up your display count.

‼️ Advisory about Miraak's mask in Tuxborn 1.1.3 ‼️

There is a known issue with Miraak's mask in Tuxborn 1.1.3 not being properly displayable in the LOTD museum, and also not having the correct description on it. You can, however, still create a replica of the mask and display it.

This will be fixed in Tuxborn 1.2.

CC content

Many of the armor, weapons, and clothing items covered in Ghosts of the Tribunal will have displays in the Hall of Wonders. There's an entire side area of the lower floor of that hall for Ghosts of the Tribunal content.

Ghosts of the Tribunal - Reduced Cut allows the Dremora Merchant to sell Hopesfire, Trueflame, the Mask of Dagoth Ur, and the Masks of the Tribunal. Which means that, since our load order keeps the Ghosts of the Tribunal quest, you could in fact wind up with duplicate, displayable copies of these artifacts.

Armor items covered in other CC content will also be displayable, though you may need to specifically craft armor pieces first to get displayable versions. CC content known to have displayable items includes:

  • Alternative Armors - Stalhrim Fur: all four armor pieces
  • Netch Leather Armor: all of the armor pieces of the various netch leather types
  • Nix-Hound: the spellbook to summon your new nix-hound
  • Staff of Sheogorath: the Staff, as well as the Fork of Horripilation
  • Nordic Jewelry: the ring, amulet, and circlet you can randomly buy as loot from merchants, as well as the Certificate of Authenticity you receive when you do so. You will also be able to craft these items after running the relevant side quest on Solstheim, if you still need to find them

Legacy of the Dragonborn content

See above note re: some of the items in the Tools of the Trade quest being located on Solstheim. These are also displayable, so you'll want to think about which ones you'll want to actively use, and which ones you'll put on display in the museum.

Also, when you finish the Dragonborn plot, a Skaal villager will come find you with a gift from Frea. The Skaal Amulet exists in the base game, but is not normally acquired by the player. LOTD gives you access to this object, and makes it displayable.

"What recommendations are there for running Dragonborn in Tuxborn?"

If you have an opportunity to go to Solstheim prior to formally launching the Dragonborn DLC, try to do so. If you can pre-discover Raven Rock, this will give you a fast travel marker you can use to come back in on the Dev Aveza. And this, in turn, will give you player home/storage space to use prior to acquiring Severin Manor.

‼️ That said: if you do go to Solstheim early, whether on purpose or whether you spawn there as part of the Left for Dead option in chargen, try to avoid engaging with too much of the Solstheim content before you're ready. You should be at least level 25 before kicking off the Dragonborn DLC main quest, and you should be level 36 before trying to do the Deathbrand side quest! ‼️

You will need to finish the first quest stage of the Dragonborn plot, which also happens to be called "Dragonborn", before you can travel to Nchardak via the AHO. Once you fulfill that requirement, the AHO's control cube should let you just send the AHO straight there.

Auryen's random relic fetch quest may possibly send you to Solstheim, as well as the research projects you can launch from the desk in the museum library. Also, if you're running the Thieves Guild, jobs from Delvin or Vex may send you to Raven Rock. Take advantage of any of these options as you like, for excuses to go to Solstheim pre-Dragonborn. Or, even just consider making a preliminary recon mission to find out more about this Miraak guy, and why he wants to kill you! Whatever works best for your character.

Getting Severin Manor is not quite as critical if you have the Dev Aveza or the AHO, and can use either while you're on Solstheim. If you want to get the house anyway, be sure to run the relevant plots to unlock access to it. We recommend getting Glover's objective to recover his Ancient Nordic Pickaxe first. Then, when you go to speak to Crescius in Raven Rock Mine, make sure to ask him for the pickaxe before you enter the mine. You'll want that pickaxe to properly mine the two stalhrim ore veins you'll find.

Bloodskal Barrow has two different areas which may be challenging to your followers:

  • The large multi-level area with a waterfall, where you'll have to fight multiple high-level draugr, at least two of which will be archers and who will take potshots at you and your followers
  • The corridor with not one, not two, but SEVEN swinging blade traps

If you and your followers are geared up well enough, you'll probably do all right with the draugr. But if you're feeling extra cautious, and if you're running Lydia, you might want to set her Essential to guarantee she'll make it through there intact.

And to get through the seven swinging blade traps as fast as possible, you might just want to speed run right through there with Whirlwind Sprint. Or, if you have it, the Shadow Step spell. Then just summon all your followers to catch up with you, using the UMF Check command if you need to, or any summons means provided by custom followers. This will take a lot less time than trying to shepherd a large squad of followers through those traps!

Once you've reopened Raven Rock Mine, then you can proceed to find Captain Veleth at Old Attius Farm, and kick off March of the Dead. Once you do that, you can proceed to Served Cold, and gaining citizenship in Raven Rock and ownership of Severin Manor.

If you're feeling ambitious enough to try to take out Karstaag the ghost frost giant, we are running a mod that modifies him, but you should absolutely still consider him an end-game level boss. Vanilla tactics for fighting Karstaag are still applicable here. He's a level 90 monster and will do brutal frost attacks. Frost resistance is pretty much mandatory. Weapons that do fire damage should also be critical.

And if you want to take the time to run Neloth's side quests in Tel Mithryn, be advised that the quests Briarheart Necropsy and Telvanni Research can be blocked by QuickLoot, which can keep you from properly harvesting the samples Neloth sends you to look for. This can be addressed by adjusting QuickLoot's MCM settings. See the Known quest‐blocking bugs in Tuxborn page for further details.

Credits

Thank you to the following players on #txbn-general for contributing information for this page:

  • Danshov | Kida, for confirming Dumzbthar is not accessible if you don't have Lucien as a follower