Thrall Thread : Living with the dead

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HouseHosted

Mundus 9-5, Oblivion weekends
Just found out how to remove the stolen flag from weapons in display cases. Believe it or not, it involves thralls. Hurray!

Take away its weapon and make 'em hostile. As long as it isn't Keening or a Dragon Priest Dagger, they'll go for it. Very nice to finally be able to remove, at least, some of the permanent stolen flags.
 

Adam Warlock

Well-Known Member
Here's a new one: Was running around with my new Altmer Movarth and... he turned to ash after using the Dread Zombie spell on him. I am not entirely sure what the cause of this is, as there are a couple variables I'll need to work out.

I have a couple theories:

It may be because he is a higher level than me at 14. I am level 1. Also, it could be because he is not the real Movarth. This one I picked up is a respawn. I'd completed Laid to Rest on this character a long time ago... I'm quite certain it isn't because he is under the level of 31 for affected NPCs to Dread Zombie. I've been casting it on Hargar (max 25) with my level 32, and many others without issue. It's rather odd.
My Dread Zombie spell (if it raises the NPC) always results in an ash pile with the Dremora corsair the only exception
Only Dead Thrall and raising with staffs leave a corpse on deactivation
 

HouseHosted

Mundus 9-5, Oblivion weekends
Of course I raised him as a thrall first. It was then that I cast the spell on him. But, sadly it results, under conditions I am not fully aware of, in the recipient turning to ash. It isn't a big deal. Just means I'll need to figure out another means to keep my thralls at level one topped up.
 

Harkin

Necromatic Mastermind
I thought that too, the spell turns to ash.

I vamped my guy today to test my enchant countering weakness to sunlight and my regens are good, stamina couldve been a bit higher but then I think that it would be overpowered, and in the Night its fun.

Also gave ulfric a negative hp value fortification, about 4 markarth guards and my Team couldnt take him out for about an hour, not even critical blows from movarth were happening. Which is great news.

My only concern is when thralls just drop dead on fast travel. Thats gonna disrupt my saves.
 

Harkin

Necromatic Mastermind
Something else I wanted to ask, I've been youtubing "Skyrim Duplication Glitch" - because theres something I want to dupe and place on my allies for an interesting test.

However I've got the latest patch, no Hearthfire for Mannequin Glitch, was wondering if theres actually one that works - methods on youtube especially the whiterun drop, fast travel one havent given results.
 

HouseHosted

Mundus 9-5, Oblivion weekends
I thought that too, the spell turns to ash.

They do for you too? I haven't had any problem on my level 32 or 34, for that matter.... Just to be certain, I am casting Dead Thrall first... Then I'm casting Dread Zombie after it's already raised.

Can't help you on your duping.
 

HouseHosted

Mundus 9-5, Oblivion weekends
For all you Movarth lovers, I have some bad news. It isn't so much bad news if you know... but, obviously chances are you don't go looking for a solution unless something bad happened first... Anyways, Don't-- I repeat, DO NOT kill an enemy before Movarth has seen it. This will cause him to shut right down and your only salvation is to reload. I suppose it is possible my Movarth, being a respawn, has a different shutdown trigger than the real one. It's possible, though, I doubt it.

Recap: It's fine to kill an enemy in one hit, but an instance where you go to finish it off, and Movarth is still cautioned is a big no-no.

Despite this, I am very glad his AI will remain intact through thick and thin, as long as you avoid this particular scenario. Just wonderful.


Some lighter news: I've discovered how to give thralls permanent health regeneration... I still need to troubleshoot a couple grey areas, but I'll post something when I have an accurate formula.

edit: Seems I've totally misrepresented Movarth. Just shows you need to play through a single scenario upwards of 20 times before you get a definite answer..

(Caution: Spoiler)

It's the Dwemer Laboratory, not killing enemies in a certain way that was causing Movarth to shutdown. The scripted dialogue when going about the Thieves Guild somehow interferes with his AI. I can't make sense of it. If I wait for the one guard to come through the Locked Gate, he'll be fine for the area. Unfortunately, however, beyond that he'll shutdown for whatever reason before the next two guards talking about Dwemer traps... I sufficiently wore out my patience trying to discern the cause of his shutdowns in the first area, so I'm going to leave troubleshooting the next up to someone else. My solution: Leave him out front the Understone Keep for the duration of the quest...

....It may explain my rash assumptions since Movarth had shutdown the other day. We were traveling by foot through Falkreath. I honestly don't remember where I'd come from, but after reloading today I learned he'd forgotten how to fight. Reload. Lost about two hours gameplay which isn't bad. I just wish I could pinpoint what initially caused it.
 
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Harkin

Necromatic Mastermind
Rarely do I get an issue with Mov now, I recall one instance on the Katariah? The emperor ship, where he bugged out in his battle stance and wouldnt move.

I has to swim back, bash him, kill and rethrall, which fixed him. Sometimes he gets stuck when all enemies are dead but his a.i. doesnt return to relaxed state.
 

HouseHosted

Mundus 9-5, Oblivion weekends
Went and ran a bunch of tests on Alcantar. If it wasn't bad enough, you can't even keep him after the Thieves Guild quest, Hard Answers, I think it's called. I used a number of tricks to try to keep him around, but sadly, no matter what, he makes his way to the Hall of the Dead... The one thing I have not tried yet is: GR him before the quest and then go and proceed with the quest with him as a thrall. Seeing as how he'll instantly vanish from storage as soon as you enter Understone, it may be possible to go about the quest and, in effect, trick the game into thinking he's already GR'd. I don't know. It's a stretch. May be possible...
 

HouseHosted

Mundus 9-5, Oblivion weekends
And we're back!

So, it appears the health regeneration only sticks under the very specific circumstance that you had turned your thrall into an ash pile. The catch being: The ash pile cannot be accessible. As a result, my modes of attaining a similar instance beyond level one is... non-existent... Well, for now it is. The only spell I know of that can turn a thrall into ash is Bane of the Undead. Sadly these ash piles are lootable... I may think of something yet. Hard to say. This is before I uncover the true explanation for thralls turning to ash with my level one after casting Dread Zombie on them. For this, I am still leaning towards a level based factor... I don't know. It's just weird.
 

JayW

Active Member
I started a new build trying to get as many different thrall summons and special effects as possible.

Resto Loop fortify conjuration potions are great. You can get a perma dragon priest summon and were bear with them.

Taking the build a little further I used the multi followers glitch with the Dark Brotherhood. It lets you get up to four followers. Each Follower can in turn wield a summoning staff. That means one dremora, one storm thrall, one frost thrall, one flame thrall and a familiar can all be obtained at the same time. It's kind of like a pyramid scheme. Each follower or thrall can carry a staff. Your followers will not summon the same creatures at the same time reliably (they only do it in very particular circumstances), but they will summon different creatures all at the same time. This means a huge force of followers and their summons (Hence pyramid scheme).

If you throw in special thralls like the Traveler (Gargoyle Summon) or a Master Cultist (Seeker Summon) then you can get more varied and interesting summons instead of having a follower with a Familiar staff

The Team

Cicero - Sanguine Rose - Dremora Valkynaz
DB initiate - Storm Thrall Staff
DB Initiate 2 - Flame Thall Staff
Random Follower (I like the essential ones like Aela) - Ice Thrall Staff
Master Cultist - Seeker Summon
Traveler - Gargoyle Summon
Riekling Warrior w/ Giants Club

Endgame - Perma Dragonpriest Summon (who himself summons a Strorm thrall) + Werebear … they're cool

Overkilll I know but it's fun to see them all demolish a legendary dragon

Gear
Resto Loop Diadem of the Savant (0 Magica cost all schools / no need for recharging)
Jagged Crown
Miraak's Robes (I like the tentacle blast)
Amulet of Talos (Resto Loop 100% shout cool down)
Dragon Plate Gloves / Boods
Bonehawk Ring / Ring of the Hunt (WW)

All Followers can carry Giant's Clubs but I can't get a Thrall to.

Only Downside is cannot turn into a werewolf with Thrall's levelling above 40. Resto Loop can make ones that pass that threshold perma followers though.

Vampire Lord / Werewolf Hybrid on top + Glitched Ring of Arcana

I decided on an Argonian because I think they have the most useful endgame bonuses and they look the most like they were born of a dragon.

All done on XBox.
 
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I started a new build trying to get as many different thrall summons and special effects as possible.

Resto Loop fortify conjuration potions are great. You can get a perma dragon priest summon and were bear with them.

Taking the build a little further I used the multi followers glitch with the Dark Brotherhood. It lets you get up to four followers. Each Follower can in turn wield a summoning staff. That means one dremora, one storm thrall, one frost thrall, one flame thrall and a familiar can all be obtained at the same time. It's kind of like a pyramid scheme. Each follower or thrall can carry a staff. Your followers will not summon the same creatures at the same time reliably (they only do it in very particular circumstances), but they will summon different creatures all at the same time. This means a huge force of followers and their summons (Hence pyramid scheme).

If you throw in special thralls like the Traveler (Gargoyle Summon) or a Master Cultist (Seeker Summon) then you can get more varied and interesting summons instead of having a follower with a Familiar staff

The Team

Cicero - Sanguine Rose - Dremora Valkynaz
DB initiate - Storm Thrall Staff
DB Initiate 2 - Flame Thall Staff
Random Follower (I like the essential ones like Aela) - Ice Thrall Staff
Master Cultist - Seeker Summon
Traveler - Gargoyle Summon
Riekling Warrior w/ Giants Club

Endgame - Perma Dragonpriest Summon (who himself summons a Strorm thrall) + Werebear … they're cool

Overkilll I know but it's fun to see them all demolish a legendary dragon

Gear
Resto Loop Diadem of the Savant (0 Magica cost all schools / no need for recharging)
Jagged Crown
Miraak's Robes (I like the tentacle blast)
Amulet of Talos (Resto Loop 100% shout cool down)
Dragon Plate Gloves / Boods
Bonehawk Ring / Ring of the Hunt (WW)

All Followers can carry Giant's Clubs but I can't get a Thrall to.

Only Downside is cannot turn into a werewolf with Thrall's levelling above 40. Resto Loop can make ones that pass that threshold perma followers though.

Vampire Lord / Werewolf Hybrid on top + Glitched Ring of Arcana

I decided on an Argonian because I think they have the most useful endgame bonuses and they look the most like they were born of a dragon.

All done on XBox.

How did you get the Diadem of the Savant to let spells cost 0 magicka? I know what the resto loop is but I don't understand how you applied it to the Diadem. I'd like to try that. :)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

JayW

Active Member
I started a new build trying to get as many different thrall summons and special effects as possible.

Resto Loop fortify conjuration potions are great. You can get a perma dragon priest summon and were bear with them.

Taking the build a little further I used the multi followers glitch with the Dark Brotherhood. It lets you get up to four followers. Each Follower can in turn wield a summoning staff. That means one dremora, one storm thrall, one frost thrall, one flame thrall and a familiar can all be obtained at the same time. It's kind of like a pyramid scheme. Each follower or thrall can carry a staff. Your followers will not summon the same creatures at the same time reliably (they only do it in very particular circumstances), but they will summon different creatures all at the same time. This means a huge force of followers and their summons (Hence pyramid scheme).

If you throw in special thralls like the Traveler (Gargoyle Summon) or a Master Cultist (Seeker Summon) then you can get more varied and interesting summons instead of having a follower with a Familiar staff

The Team

Cicero - Sanguine Rose - Dremora Valkynaz
DB initiate - Storm Thrall Staff
DB Initiate 2 - Flame Thall Staff
Random Follower (I like the essential ones like Aela) - Ice Thrall Staff
Master Cultist - Seeker Summon
Traveler - Gargoyle Summon
Riekling Warrior w/ Giants Club

Endgame - Perma Dragonpriest Summon (who himself summons a Strorm thrall) + Werebear … they're cool

Overkilll I know but it's fun to see them all demolish a legendary dragon

Gear
Resto Loop Diadem of the Savant (0 Magica cost all schools / no need for recharging)
Jagged Crown
Miraak's Robes (I like the tentacle blast)
Amulet of Talos (Resto Loop 100% shout cool down)
Dragon Plate Gloves / Boods
Bonehawk Ring / Ring of the Hunt (WW)

All Followers can carry Giant's Clubs but I can't get a Thrall to.

Only Downside is cannot turn into a werewolf with Thrall's levelling above 40. Resto Loop can make ones that pass that threshold perma followers though.

Vampire Lord / Werewolf Hybrid on top + Glitched Ring of Arcana

I decided on an Argonian because I think they have the most useful endgame bonuses and they look the most like they were born of a dragon.

All done on XBox.

How did you get the Diadem of the Savant to let spells cost 0 magicka? I know what the resto loop is but I don't understand how you applied it to the Diadem. I'd like to try that. :)


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

The Diadem of the Savant reduces spell cost of all schools by something like 5%. So long as you put together a fortify restoration potion of 20x (2000%) then you can get one item slot that eliminates all spell costs for all schools of magic. It also works with the Arch Mage Robes but I like to use Miraak's Robes so I go for the Head Slot.

Once you use a Fortify Restoration Potion it will affect the enchantments on all items you wear until you take them off. If you want all the benefits as a werewolf then you need to keep a stock of potions on you at all times.

If you don't want all your enchantments getting godly upgrades then take the potion, equip the diadem, wait 1hr for the potion to wear off and then equip other items enchanted with for instance health boosts which can get out of hand otherwise (tougher enemies / mobs should always be able to kill you otherwise it takes all the fun out of the game but to each their own).

So long as they're strong enough, Fortify Conjuration Potions if taken before summoning a creature with a time limit - Like Konahrik's Dragonpriest or the Werebear from Dragonoborn can create permanent summons. Those two are my endgame thralls.
 

Harkin

Necromatic Mastermind
Hah, funnily enough my test I was doing, or rather, duplication I wanted to do, was with the Kohnaarik Mask - if only they didnt patch the duping, you could put one on however many followers you got glitched, and have them all summoning dragon priests (which was my overkill thinking)

I also found that Dragon priests reanimate if theres a nearby corpse is around, say their storm atronach died - or they'd replace it with a temporary reanimation.

In Numbers, thats crazy since the mask practically equates to 2 aditional allies.

Cicero + Kohnaarik = 3
Db init + Kohnaarik = 3
Db init + Kohnaarik = 3
Follower + Kohnaarik = 3

You get the drift, the only thing is % based summoning, and theres a solution for that, you just increase the chance of it happening more frequently.

I dont wear the mask myself, because the dragon priest instakills my thralls which is a huge no no. BUT I gave it to one of my followers and its ace.

You probably can get a giant bone on a thrall, but they'd need to be a follower first, command pickup then kill & thrall.

Companions or Blades recruits could work nicely, Belrand with one of those + his conjuration familiar.
 

Adam Warlock

Well-Known Member
Put a Giant's Club on a thrall? ...That's novel.
Thralls do indeed use Giant`s Clubs but they must be holding one prior to the time of their "first" death.
So this includes permanent followers(tested and confirmed with Illia , Stenvar, and Benor)

I suppose you could also do same with a Riekling and a resto-boosted reanimation spell.
 
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JayW

Active Member
Put a Giant's Club on a thrall? ...That's novel.
Thralls do indeed use Giant`s Clubs but they must be holding one prior to the time of their "first" death.
So this includes permanent followers(tested and confirmed with Illia , Stenvar, and Benor)

I suppose you could also do same with a Riekling and a resto-boosted reanimation spell.
I wonder whether you can get three riekling hunters with giants clubs / daedric armour permanently following you - I think that might be my next run through. I like the idea of a riekling tribe.

It might also work on those gargoyles and werewolves you run into in random encounters. For a themed Werewolf or Vampire Character. It's always fun getting two Demora with Duped Sanguine Roses to build a dremora army ((the Daedra build).

With perma summons like the Werebear and Dragonpriest I noticed that turning into a vampire or werewolf does not interfere with your pperma summons unlike dead thrall. As a werewolf you can get a perma familiar, perma wear bear and two werewolf summons for the wolf pack.

The werebear is great for early builds because you can get him at any level by paying the ferry fee. You can get the first word of bend will by going to the dragon camp on Solstheim.

I started farming Mogruls Orders and Writs of Execution on Solstheim. With them I was able to anchor every NPC I wanted. You can only ever hold one copy of each at a time but you can store them in different containers. With this trick I was able to keep every NPC I wanted - I filled up Volkhihar Cathedral with them and whenever gargoyles / skeletons or dremora respawned I would activate the Ritual Stone for a Royal Rumble.
 

HouseHosted

Mundus 9-5, Oblivion weekends
It's taken a while... The only thralls that turn to ash are Vampires. As a result, the only thralls that can be given health regeneration are... dun dun dun... Vampire thralls.

So, go ahead and enthrall a Vampire. Cast Dread Zombie on him/her, then either wait for the timer to elapse or cast a second time. Your vampire friend will turn to ash. Now reload that save you made before casting Dread Zombie. Your thrall now has health regeneration.

As a security measure I like to enter a building and reload the auto... I don't know. As impractical as it may sound, I feel it ensures the regen remains permanent.

...In other news, I was running around with my new build when I realized life seemed empty. As if... there was a certain dead corpse missing from my life... The first Volkihar Vampire encountered in Potema Awakened was equipped with Glass Armour and Boots. I don't think I've ever placed a Bounty letter faster. Now level 53, I ran back and picked her up, and boy, these things are INSANE! Similar to how I've not enthralled Orchendor yet, Volkihars have been neglected as well. That is, until now... I am mightily impressed. She has what seems to be an unending supply of magicka; casts Ice Storm, Chain Lightning, and the apprentice Lightning Bolt (that I've seen), uses a blade, Vampiric Drain, and-- I don't know... I don't think anything in the game will actually kill her 1 v 1 or 2 v 1 or 8 v 1. It's bloody insanity... Haha. And she now has health regeneration on top of that. Joy!

edit: I haven't even tried Dremora yet... I need to get on that.
 

Harkin

Necromatic Mastermind
So, thrall, save, dread zombie, let it expire, reload = perma hp regen?

Break this down of elaborate a bit, and this is the spell? not the staff versión or will either work.

And woo, havent done potema quest yet, been keeping the shield of solitude quest till lv 46
 

HouseHosted

Mundus 9-5, Oblivion weekends
^ Pretty well. I haven't done a whole lot of troubleshooting for the process itself. It's taken this long just to figure out who/what was affected by it. That said, there are a few things I have figured out that don't work. This mainly reflects what I'd earlier thought merely superstition; false:

You do seem to need to enter another area and reload the auto for the health regeneration to stick. This raises the question: Does this apply to all transitions? As I've found, no. The transition has to be one where when you reload the thrall is left behind, and does not follow you into the area you've moved to. This pseudo-stashed in memory phenomenon seems to dictate whether health regen sticks. Using any other kind of transition will yield health regen for a while, but will quickly right itself. Something that will also interfere is the remaining health of the thrall. It must have full health for this to work...

What else did I figure? ... There was something else.... GAH! It'll come to me eventually.

As far as I know, Harkin, you need the spell variant. We need the thrall to turn to ash... I mean, it's possible the staff may work, but I doubt it.

edit: There we go! My brain came back!

I'd neglected to mention there are ways the health regeneration is removed. Any instance where the thrall is placed in "memory", or as I like to call it, put into limbo, will void the effect. So, this includes:

Whenever a thrall must move through more than one transition to reach you, i.e. Exiting Windhelm via the docks by foot makes it so that a thrall, or any follower for that matter, has to backtrack through Windhelm Hold to reach you. Obviously fast traveling isn't an issue.

Another example would be leaving them in an area deactivated, and then going through more than two transitions to return to them, with the exception of distances that do not place the body into memory, i.e. Fast traveling to another place and back versus moving between a nearby house and back, respectively.
 
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