History GuideDangIt / TheElderScrolls

* Acquiring [[InfinityPlusOneSword Eltonbrand]], to the point where acquiring it ''without'' a guide would be nothing short of a miracle. To summarize, you first have to start the already obscure quest to acquire Goldbrand. Only one character in the game even gives you directions to the shrine you need to visit, and he is a.) not very trustworthy and b.) gives you inaccurate directions. Then you get even more vague directions from the Daedric prince in question to find a sculptor, who then asks you for a large sum of money and a unique book. Once you do all of that, you then have to wait the three in-game ''weeks'' for the shrine to be built in order to receive your reward. Then, to upgrade Goldbrand into Eltonbrand, you have to first become a vampire (which can be difficult enough to pull off, or near ''impossible'' if you've advanced far enough in the main quest to receive disease immunity.) Then, you have to complete one obscure vampires-only quest ''and'' have a specific amount of gold in your inventory (11,171) when you report back to the quest giver.

* BigBad FinalBoss Dagoth Ur has six "Ash Vampire" minions spread throughout his complex within [[{{Mordor}} Red Mountain]]. Killing them before battling Dagoth Ur is supposed to weaken him in various ways (strength penalty, speed penalty, health penalty, etc.), however, due to a limitation of the game's engine, scripts cannot be applied to actors who haven't been loaded yet. To get the penalties, you must first enter the cell containing Dagoth Ur and ''then'' go back to kill the Ash Vampires, something no player would reasonably do on their own.

* Becoming Thane usually consists of: 1) speak to the Jarl 2) complete the quest the Jarl gave to you 3) receive the task to help inhabitants of the hold 4) buy the local player house[[note]]non-''Hearthfire'' house only; this step is skipped in Falkreath, Morthal, and Dawnstar[[/note]]. Not so much for Riften: Jarl Laila Law-Giver wouldn't gave the prerequisite quest to become the Thane, but a seemingly nondescript Argonian citizen outside of the city, who complain about a drug dealing problem, would.

* Becoming Thane usually consists of: 1) speak to the Jarl 2) complete the quest the Jarl gave to you 3) receive the task to help inhabitants of the hold 4) buy the local player house[[note]]non-''Hearthfire'' house only; this step is skipped in Falkreath, Morthal, and Dawnstar[[/note]]. Since Jarl Laila Law-Giver doesn't initially provide the relevant dialog option, becoming Thane of the Rift is more convoluted: you need to complete a specific sidequest received from a NPC in the dock, then help five inhabitants of the Rift (there is no journal entry for this step), ''then'' you'll receive the instruction to visit the Jarl, who allows you to buy the local house, which itself allows you to receive the title.

* Similar but far easier to the above is the unmarked quest to find the body of Narfi's sister in Ivarstead. First you have to talk to Narfi the beggar in the derelict house. He'll tell you that Wilhelm, the innkeeper, said she'd be back soon so that directs you to him. Wilhelm will say she used to go to the nearby island, which gives you a hint, but again there is no quest marker and you have to go for another swim to find her body. Thankfully her body is easy to find since it's right by the bridge but it's still not obvious. And if you've already taken the contract by the Dark Brotherhood to kill Narfi, the quest becomes UnintentionallyUnwinnable.

* And another collection quest... it almost seems like a RunningGag. Scattered through the world are 24 'unusual gems'. If you show them to an appraiser (who is only available if you join the Thieves' Guild, which is a Guide Dang It! in itself), she tasks you to find all of them. Now, most collection quests give map markers to show you where to go, or at least narrow it down to a specific room. This quest doesn't - you'll stumble across half of them doing Thieves' Guild quests, but the other half have no indication at all. And the gems can be anywhere: their locations are fixed, but vary from caves and tombs to people's homes (one is located inside Proudspire Manor, which you can only enter after buying it) to places of high restrictions like a Jarl's quarters (which require you to sneak in really well unless the said Jarl made you a Thane). One is even located inside the Dark Brotherhood Sanctuary, which can only be entered after starting the Dark Brotherhood questline, either to join them or destroy them. And prior to patch 1.4, one of these gems was inside the Thalmor Embassy, which can only be visited during the "Diplomatic Immunity" quest; if you forget (or don't realize) to grab it, this quest becomes UnwinnableByMistake. Thankfully, after the patch it was relocated to a cave underneath, which is accessible anytime (but not marked on the map). Luckily, a few [[GameMod mods]] exist that make life easier, either by adding quest markers or by just putting all gems together in an easily reachable location. As with "A Return to Your Roots," at least the reward is absurdly good: a permanent ability that massively increases your odds of finding precious gems, more or less eliminating your money problems from that point forward.

* Similar but far easier to the above is the unmarked quest to find the body of Narfi's sister in Ivarstead. First you have to talk to Narfi the beggar in the derelict house. He'll tell you that Wilhelm, the innkeeper, said she'd be back soon so that directs you to him. Wilhelm will say she used to go to the nearby island, which gives you a hint, but again there is no quest marker and you have to go for another swim to find her body. Thankfully her body is easy to find since it's right by the bridge but it's still not obvious. And if you've already taken the contract by the Dark Brotherhood to kill Narfi, the quest becomes UnwinnableByMistake.

* Nowhere in the game tells you what a dungeon exit looks like. This has led to countless players getting stuck in Privateer's Hold, the [[NoobCave tutorial dungeon]], simply because they don't know how to actually ''leave''. For a while, typing "Daggerfall how to..." into Google has one of the top results as "...leave first dungeon". At the time of the game's release in the primitive internet days of 1996, this left many players completely stuck.