You know, I think I was wrong about Skyrim. For years after its release, I actually didn’t like it very much. Sure, like everyone else, I sunk about 50 hours into the thing, but then just left it, telling myself “it’s not as good as Oblivion.” Oblivion still holds a special place in my heart, but Skyrim is worthy in its own right. The environments, Bethesda’s trademark, are beautiful, the dungeons are well-designed, and the voice acting, while not amazing, is better than its predecessor. At least there are no Gray Fox conversation loops to get stuck in this time.
That said, it is definitely not a flawless game. It’s got a fair share of problems, and its often lackluster writing is responsible for about 99 percent of those. If it had been written by Obsidian or someone of their ilk, it could have been a perfect game, but all too often the questlines force you into badly thought out or just plain bad avenues. I hesitate to say there are more bad quests than good, I don’t think that’s true, but there are a ton of quests that for one reason or another just don’t really work, and effectively just serve to help you grind up your skills a bit. In this list, we’ve pulled together 10 amazing quests that show what Skyrim, at its very best, is capable of, and 15 that show its somewhat less able side. Got any quests you’d like to have seen featured? Think I’m totally wrong about a quest you love/hate? Let us know!
25 Hurt: The Bard’s College
Oh my word. When I first played Skyrim, and found out that I could join the Bard’s College, I had images of being a charming troubadour winning over the province’s womenfolk with my colorful songs. Then I joined and what do I get? The Companions II: Bardic Boogaloo. I have to go to this generic dungeon or that generic dungeon, fight some Draugr, then retrieve an item. That’s not even Companions level, that’s on the level of the unnamed quests that every NPC wants you to do for them.
24 Hurt: A Return To Your Roots
Perhaps the definition of a fetch quest, having to collect 30 crimson nirnroot growing about Blackreach is not innovative gameplay. It’s boring. Extremely boring. Blackreach is a cool ruin and all, but collecting 30 (count them) of these little sods isn’t a cool way to give me a guided tour, Bethesda. It would be like going to some ancient ruin and the tour guide kicking me in the unmentionables before telling me that various interesting tidbits of information were laid out somewhere around the ruin, but that he wasn’t going to tell me where.
23 Saved: The Pale Lady
I don’t know about you, but I stumbled upon this quest quite by accident. Fast travelling to a nearby location, I walked into a fight. After defeating the winner, I discovered a note that drew me into this cavern. Investigating deeper and deeper I found a bandit expedition gone horribly wrong. Going into the depths of Frostmere, I fought and defeated the wraith, the Pale Lady, and was rewarded with an awesome sword, The Pale Blade. This quest is a masterclass in pacing, and is something that all Skyrim players should experience.
22 Hurt: The Temple Of Miraak
This isn’t a particularly bad quest in itself. Exploring the temple, situated on the weird and wonderful island of Solstheim is great, but what happens after you defeat Miraak really isn’t. See, this Dragon Priest isn’t just a regular old member of the draconic clergy, no. He’s dragonborn too. And he will follow you about stealing the soul of every dragon you end until you deal with him once and for all. This railroads you into finishing this questline before you do absolutely anything else.
21 Hurt: The Companions Questline
Look, I’m willing to accept the Fighters Guild not being in Skyrim. The Companions really having just one hall, though? That’s quite hard to believe. Not only that, but they appear to be quite astonishingly desperate for members. You get invited into their inner circle after you’ve done about three quests for them. They show you their darkest secret that they must keep hidden from the outside world after they’ve known you for about two days. You can quite easily become Harbinger in about seven. This is a shambling wreck of an organization, apparently.
20 Saved: J’zargo’s Experiment
What makes this quest so good? For a start, it’s very open-ended. J’zargo gives you some scrolls that should cast flame cloak, and wants you to test them out on some undead. Conveniently, there’s a dungeon nearby, The Midden, but if you’d rather test them out elsewhere, that’s fine too. Unfortunately, the scrolls don’t quite work according to plan. When you return back to J’zargo, after testing them, he will willingly become your follower. That’s awesome, because he is by far and away one of the funniest and most useful companions in the game.
19 Hurt: The Forsworn Conspiracy Questline
This duo of quests, The Forsworn Conspiracy and No One Escapes Cidhna Mine, are cool in that they give some background info on the Forsworn. However, they can’t quite live up to their promise. In the second quest, you have the option of becoming a Forsworn, those not-so-fey, exceptionally violent men of the forest. However, if you do, and complete the quest, nothing really changes. Most annoyingly, the Forsworn are still hostile to you, except for the few you helped, located at Druadach Redoubt.
18 Hurt: Blood On The Ice
Ah yes, a chance to play Sherlock Holmes and investigate an elimination most foul in the frozen streets of Windhelm. It’s all fun and games until you get your reward and find out that none of it was worth it. It’s the Necromancer Amulet, which makes conjuration spells 25 percent cheaper to cast, and boosts your magicka by 50. Great, you might think! There’s an exceptionally severe downside though, it cuts your health and stamina regen by 75 percent. I have never used it, which makes the quest something of a waste of time.
17 Saved: A Night To Remember
The morning after the night before is always rough, especially if you’re a dragonborn who’s woken up in the Temple of Dibella. After a drinking contest, you awake to find that you disgraced yourself in the temple, throwing your trash all over the place. This wasn’t your only misdeed. You also stole a goat from a Redguard called Ennis and sold it to a giant. Oh, and you also got a wedding ring for reasons best left unsaid. A hilarious questline with a substantial reward, this quest contains some of Skyrim’s best writing.
16 Hurt: The Civil War
This huge keystone quest in Skyrim gives you an astonishingly poisoned chalice. Neither side are good, which is slightly problematic. I understand the “shades of grey” argument, but neither is redeemable. On one hand, you have a bunch of ethnonationalists who want to make Skyrim “clean” again. On the other, you have a corrupt government that’s in thrall to the equally racist and evil elves, the Thalmor. It’s no wonder that 99 percent of the time I just sit this one out, and I’m willing to bet most other players did too.
15 Hurt: Diplomatic Immunity
I wanted to infiltrate the embassy all sneaky like, but I’m pretty sure that’s impossible. It turns into a long, protracted fight with the Thalmor regardless of what you do. There’s one lockpick in the building, so if you forget to bring yours, then wave goodbye to that cool loot in the display case. You can’t even get back in after the mission is over. The embassy just shut down, apparently. No enemies carry the corresponding key to unlock the embassy, so it’s just left as an impenetrable abnormality on the map.
14 Saved: The Mind Of Madness
Quite a controversial one this, but I really liked it. Not only did it see the return of Wes “STOP RIGHT THERE CRIMINAL SCUM” Johnson, but it was an entertaining quest in its own right. Meeting Sheogorath, who is heavily implied to be the Hero of Kvatch, and solving metaphors of people’s issues is a very imaginative set of tasks for you to complete. You’re also rewarded for your time with the Wabbajack, which, while something of a double-edged sword, can be superb: turning a frost troll into a mudcrab, anyone?
13 Hurt: Find Arvak’s Skull
A controversial one, again. I hate the Soul Cairn. Its dark as blackest night, there are sod all landmarks to guide you, and the draw distance feels like it’s been quartered. It’s as dull as the prairies. Finding Arvak’s skull is particularly annoying. While the reward, a mount that you can summon at any time, is really useful, there’s no marker telling you where the skull is. As such, you have to bumble about the huge, empty environment, hoping to bump into it. It’s an exercise in frustration ultimately. Even when I used a guide, it took me about 15 minutes to find.
12 Saved: Frostflow Abyss
I love the smell of Lovecraft in the morning…smells like eldritch abominations. When you enter Frostflow Lighthouse, it’s immediately clear that some bad stuff went down here. There’s evidence of several attacks, and once you descend into the abyss, you find a hoard of abominations waiting for you. There are falmer, chaurus, and chaurus reapers, all waiting to tear you to pieces. Get through all this (which is a tough proposition at lower levels), and you get the active effect Sailor’s Repose, which makes healing spells 10 percent more powerful.
11 Hurt: The College Of Winterhold
Oh boy, this is going to catch me some flak. I don’t like this quest. I think it’s maybe even worse than Oblivion’s Mages Guild questline, and that’s saying something. It’s extremely dialog heavy, which in a game like Skyrim, isn’t a great thing thanks to some shonky writing. The quests are extremely repetitive too. They all involve motifs meant to show the power of magic, but that ends up just being frustrating. If I have to listen to the Arch-Mage give a lecture for several minutes again, I’m throwing my PS4 out of the window.
10 Saved: Ill Met By Moonlight
Being a werewolf is a lot of fun in Skyrim. You get to toss people about with power attacks as though they were made with paper, and can wipe out whole forts with ease. Have you ever stopped to think about what it may really be like to be a servant of Hircine? This quest shows that it’s not all fun and games, especially if you posess a cursed ring. The quest’s final moments present one of the toughest moral decisions in the game, and if you don’t feel sorry for Sinding, you have no soul.
9 Hurt: The Lost Expedition
Picture the scene. You’ve got an old Dwemer ruin that’s full of Falmer. Falmer who are, let’s face it, pretty easy to deal with. However, you’re not going to deal with this problem the old fashioned way, but instead, you’re going to start up an old Dwemer security system. This floods the ruin with Centurions and Spheres, which are WAY worse than Falmer. You then head off on your merry way, leaving this significant problem for the next expedition to deal with. Dude, what?
8 Saved: Innocence Lost
Even though I prefer Oblivion’s Dark Brotherhood storyline, I think Skyrim definitely handled their introduction better. Instead of just having you bump off a random NPC, you steal one of their contracts. You have to take out the cruel headmistress of Honorhall Orphanage, the ironically named Grelod the Kind. When you see how badly she treats the kids in her charge, taking her out becomes both a joy and a privilege, and also earns you the ire, and a place, in the Dark Brotherhood.
7 Hurt: Darkness Returns
The whole direction of this quest was a baffling choice on the behalf of the devs. Do you remember how cool it was in Oblivion when you got the skeleton key? An unbreakable lockpick, it made all the difference to that game’s shockingly bad lockpicking. You get the skeleton key in Skyrim too, and while it gives you that sense of power, you have to give it back. Yep, really. You’ve got to return it to Ebonmere, the portal to Nocturnal’s plane of Oblivion, from whence it never returns.
6 Saved: Rise In The East
Now this is a really cool quest. It sees you joining forces with the East Empire Company, located near Solitude, to take down some pirates. This doesn’t mean what you might expect, however, that you just get on a ship and then fight some people, no. You get to sail out on a ship to attack their base on an island, complete with a big artillery bombardment by your ship. It’s a truly epic battle, in the way that the Civil War battles never truly were. If you want to experience true battle in Skyrim, play this, and hunt down the Blood Horkers.
