Nyff

Which mask is that? The 100% faster magika regeneration one? I should get my hands on that in a couple of quests time. It is amazing how detailed some of the stories off the main quest are. I sometimes forget that the quests I'm doing for the mage's guild aren't actually part of the main quest itself. But still, looking forward to turning up for the main quest again in some quality robes with one of the masks on.... Might power-level my enchanting later so I can work towards a 0 cost of casting destruction spells.

Walking around right now wearing a funny little crown type thing. Has exactly the same effect as the hood I was wearing, but I just want to stand out from my other mage friends! Think what I will do is look to level up my enchantment so that I can enchant my boots/amulets/arm things/rings until my destruction spells cost 0 Magika. Will do this alongside levelling conjuration and destruction until I can go into battle, send in a conjuration to take the attention off me, and then spam everyone with whatever destruction spells I fancy. Bit gutted that my character is going to look fairly similar for the whole thing, like, but at least I can walk around in a mask like I don't have a care in the world... (Suppose, though, that no one has got massively far yet, so maybe there is more scope to what I can do at a much much later point in the game)

Yeah, I can wear a few other things aside from the robes so will probably level up my alchemy thing and try and make my other armor have magic regeneration or similar...

Getting through the mage quests quite easily. Rather worryingly, in a couple of quests time (assuming I am a high enough level to get through them) I should get the arch-mages robes and the mask that is specific to magic and stuff. Will be a little disheartened if they happen to be the best robes I can get despite the early stage I'm at, but oh well! Guess from then on I just go about improving my magic and archery? Wondering if there is something I am missing out on...

Yeah, sounds like him. I was hoping the dragon that sometimes sits there would help out but he didn't and I was just running from more people! Is it worth going to talk to the Stormcloak people? What benefits do they give you? Found before that I got to a point after one of the missions where I just couldn't be bothered with them. Normally in a game this would mean switching it off and going and doing something else, but instead I found myself going off to pawn some of the goods I had and doing a bit of exploring. The amount the game engrosses you in it is absolutely unreal.

Yeah, I did that when fighting some magician guy who just wouldn't die. Was the guy in front of one of the dragon shouts...voice throwing or something? Eventually just drew him far away enough to run in, get the shout, then get straight out of there again.

Yeah, managed to take down a dragon myself. Fairly straight forward - just some up a flame woman and she takes the attention away whilst I bow and arrow him or hit him with some magic. The path I am taking looks like I will be using the destruction and conjuration magic to inflict pain and distract attention from me, and then levelling up archery to inflict more damage when possible. Trying to work through the college of Winterhold quests so that I get arch-mage status and get my hands on the arch-mage robes. Them, along with the dragon mask I should pick up along the way, should make me a fairly powerful mage who shouldn't need to turn to anything else too much.

Just wandering along on my way to a quest for the Mage's guild and stumble across a dragon. I don't have a chance in hell of defeating the thing so I start to leg it...straight into a pack of wolves. They are easily dispatched but then the dragon is still after me. I perch on some ledge and the dragon comes down straight onto a giant, who proceeds to take out the dragon in a matter of hits. I nip in, take all the good shit from the dragon and claim the glory, then about to make my merry way hen the giant decides he too has a problem with me. Luckily speed isn't his thing, so I'm there zapping him then running until I finally take him down. Phew! Hectic, but a good all round result! When should I be able to take out dragons with relative ease? I think I am level five right now and that dragon was quite the challenge..

My guess is for us to put out a resolute performance, holding Citteh with 11 men behind the ball at most points in the game. The thing with City, though, is that they have such incredible talent. We could try and hold them in the hope they do an Arsenal and create some nice moves but never finish them, but I can't see it happening. Expecting a 2-0 loss, hoping for a cheeky 1-1 draw.

My plan is to head over to Winterhold tonight and spend my time doing the quests for the Mage's guild so that I get the Archmage robes and then look out for the dragons mask which should mean my Maga regenerates stupidly fast. Must admit that I am gutted not to be using the various weapons/armour that are around, but there I can always play through the game again if I wanted to!

Is there a certain level I should look to be before going off on my own? Not even necessarily doing side quests right now, just sort of wandering about discovering things. If there is ever an enemy too difficult for me then I just summon up some creature to take the pain and leg it...

Is there an easier way to quick-equip things rather than pressing up and cycling through options, btw?

Getting stuck into it a bit now. Going for a pure mage type guy. Only level four but seem to be progressing quite nicely. Enjoying being able to summon up the dead to fight for me and the general power of the magic. Unsure I'm doing things 'right' and can't find many decent robes, but I assume I will progress nicely when I get to the mage's guild.

About to load up the game now! Wish me luck! Hopefully it is fairly self-explanatory what to do (I'm fairly new to all this).

What is the best way to go about being a mage? Being a battle mage? Would I need to have some sort of weapon in my hand other than a bow to have a realistic chance of coming out of most fights alive? Just as a general question - what have people on here chosen to be? (Apologies for all the questions! Making up in my own mind whether to pick this up today or not..)

Think I will go High Elf and level up conjuration and archery and be some sort of bad-ass Legolas sort of guy who conjures up a load of cronies to fight...

Fair enough. If I were to start wanting to be some big ass huge sword swinging takes-no-shit sort of guy, what race should I be choosing?

I think I am just going to give it a go. Got to admit - these things aren't normally for me, but the world of Skyrim just looks absolutely stunning, and I'm sure if I give it enough time then I can really get into it.

The thing I am usually awful at is making sure I level up in the right areas to create a character who plays like I want him to. Is it easy enough to do? I always tend to end up with someone who is fairly useless in everything rather than someone who has a particular strength. By the sounds of it, if I want a character who is all brute, all action, all hack-n-slash, then it is perfectly doable?

By the way, Semimental, I am buying Skyrim purely on your obvious loving of it

Yeah, this game is a pile of bullshit. Putting it away and it isn't coming out again for a while. Just had a game where it was 1-1 (his goal from a penalty that I have no idea why it was even awarded). It gets to the 89th minute and I'm holding him a good few yards outside my box. Eventually he gets frustrated and fires in a shot. My keeper saves and holds on to the ball. I haven't even pressed a button here. Before I know it the commentary goes "Oh, it's a penalty!!" and the guy steps up and converts. No idea why on earth he got it at all. Then down the other end in another game I beat all his defenders, run into the box, tap to shoot but get pulled back so I trip over without hitting the ball. Do I get a pen? Of course not. All this, added with laggy button presses and laggy servers, makes this Fifa a really frustrating game to play at times. Going to save it for when I have friends over and invest in a game made by a company who cares about their end product. Don't even get me started on the players randomly falling over - as funny as it is sometimes!

After being completely frustrated with Fifa 12 I think I might just give this a go. Can always take it back if I don't enjoy it!

I didn't particularly like Oblivion and found the first person view annoying and the fighting not brilliant. I have heard great things about this game and have the money to buy myself a new XBOX game. Is it worth it?

Can't quite believe that a team with the best defensive record in the PL with a defence in which 3/5 are English still don't have anyone in the national side.

Pardew has been spot on with tactics of late. We played such a different game here than we did at Stoke. If there is any way to tactically nullify the vast amount of talent that City have at their disposal then I wouldn't put it past Pardew to give it a go.