You’d think that, as I’ve already played the game through to completion and worked through the all the expansions three times, that I’d know what I’m doing in Skyrim.

Guess not… as I stumbled over something I’d never seen before, which may have been fan created… but something that had me scratching my head.

I knew enough to spam a couple of choice spells to level up quicker (the spell MUFFLE is incredibly helpful to level up early doors) and which side quests offered some helpful rewards at the end… and yet I reached the end of a quest I’d never seen before and had my behind handed me on a plate several times,

I won’t go through the story again… it’s been done before… I always marry Aela the Huntress because I find it hilarious that this Amazon-like, face painted warrior, dressed in animal skin clothing… who is, by the way, a Werewolf… suddenly abandons the Companions for domestic bliss and opens up a little shop to keep herself busy.

I will go through the one quest that had me stumped… I asked a Khajit caravan if they were having trouble and it turns out they’re being attacked by gangs in decided different outfits… all very regimented, all identically clad, and the outfits nothing the likes of which had been seen before.

Save some caravans, attack their bases and you end up in the sewers of Solitude where a Mage has stumbled over the very well-preserved remains of an ancient battle and has been flogging the uniforms to different bandit gangs for profit… once you find him and attack, he summons warriors from these clans and they kill you very, very quickly.

I level up several times and go back, makes no difference… death is swift.

I take numerous potions, improve my gear… death comes once more.

In the end, I just transform into my Werewolf form and it all goes much smoother, some good loot and the spells to summon these warriors myself… which I never do for the rest of the play through.

At the end of another 90+ hour run, all the DLC is done… all that remains is level grinding to hit 78 for the Legendary Dragon.

They’ve changed a few things with the new version, just smashing out Iron Daggers does little for your Smithing skill… so I make use of another method, which helps me level up several skills to the point I can reset them and repeat the process.

I travel from city to city buying up as much Iron and Silver Ore as I can, also small Soul Gems, I travel to various Mines from the map I know have these three items for harvesting… all the while spamming MUFFLE to level that up.

Now there is another spell, TRANSMUTE, which will turn Iron Ore into Silver Ore, and Silver Ore into Gold Ore, and also levels up your Alteration skill, even if it’s a little slow… turn the Gold Ore into Ingots and craft Gold Rings… Smithing is now increased by the value of what you create, if you have gemstones in your possession add these for even more value.

With 100+ Gold Rings in your pockets, head off to the Enchanters table and add an effect to them, Enchanting goes up, head off to the stores with these Rings and sell them… Speechcraft goes up… repeat.

It’s not ideal by any means, but it’s easier than levelling up the more standard and traditional methods and I hit 78 fast enough to not go insane… Legendary Dragon appears and I can delete the game again.

As I write this the rumours of an Oblivion remake are taking off again, and we’re a week or so from an Xbox Developer Direct show with the usual, as yet unknown segment on the press release… in the absence of any new Elder Scrolls that would have to suffice until we eventually get the next instalment… curse you Starfield… had you not existed we might have had a new ES game by now.