College of Winterhold (Skyrim)

"You know, if you have the aptitude, you should join the Mage's College in Winterhold."

- Farenger Secret-Fire

The College of Winterhold is a faction and location that appears in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. It is a guild of Magic users, similar to the Mages Guild of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.

Savos Aren is the guild's Arch-Mage, with Mirabelle Ervine serving under him as Master-Wizard. The College is located in the northern section of the city of Winterhold.

Joining the College
Before entering the college, the gatekeeper Faralda wishes to see a demonstration of magical powers. She requests to see a spell appropriate for the Dragonborn's level before gaining passage. Some of these spells could be:


 * Firebolt
 * Fear
 * Magelight
 * Healing Hands
 * Conjure Flame Atronach
 * Conjure Familiar
 * Fireball

Although she doesn't state it explicitly, the spells should (in some cases, such as Fear) must be cast at the emblem on the ground, or she will ignore them.

Bypassing
A persuasion check bypasses this test. If the player has not learned that spell, she offers to sell it for 30. Once completed, the college can be accessed at all times. It can be rather amusing if the Dragonborn bluffs their way into the college, especially if they have no skills in magic.

Architectural Design
The College of Winterhold is located north of Winterhold on a large cliff. A narrow bridge in a state of disrepair connects the city to the college.

The central courtyard is dominated by a statue of the first Arch-Mage of the College, this is the hub of the facility, offering access back out to the bridge and into the three Halls. The exterior windows offer exceptional views of the coastline.

The courtyard branches off to the three halls of the college. The Hall of Attainment, the living quarters for mage apprentices, is off to the left, while the Hall of Countenance, the living quarters for more advanced mages, is off to the right. Straight ahead lies the Hall of the Elements, the lecture hall of the college.

From the Hall of the Elements, the Arch-Mage's Quarters branches off on the left, while The Arcanaeum, the college's library, branches off on the right.

The Midden, a prison or storage area beneath the college, houses an Atronach Forge, Augur of Dunlain and the Daedric Relic. Ice Wraiths and Draugr inhabit the halls of The Midden. A tunnel here leads to the world map.

Historical documents
Papers kept in the College's library are meant to prove its age, reportedly dating back 700 years. This, however, has been proven untrue, as the Great Collapse occurred only 79 years prior to the events of The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and this is the documents used to "prove" the antiquity of the college. . In actual fact, the first recorded evidence of the College's existence is Pocket Guide to the Empire, Third Edition: Skyrim

Relation to the Mages Guild
As the College is independent from the Mage's Guild, Necromancy was never made illegal by the College, unlike the Arcane University in Cyrodiil. The practice is generally regarded as a tool, not a weapon, although practicing it outside of the College is frowned upon. Like Cyrodiil, there are still wandering groups of Necromancers that do not function alongside the College. Because the College is independent of the jurisdiction of the Mages Guild, it was unaffected by the Necromancy Ban of 3E 431 and the subsequent eradication of that ban, which led to battles against Mannimarco.

Distrust
The college is often blamed for the Great Collapse and is therefore widely distrusted. It is often believed that it was activities at the college that caused the disaster and that the proof of this is that only the college remained untouched. The college has since been cautious as to avoid provoking the population of Skyrim. Many nationalistic Nords also do not trust the College because of the fact that the immigrant Dunmer make up the vast majority of the members within the faction. Additionally, most Nords view magic and its practitioners as spineless and weak, as stated quite humorously by a feuding couple upon entering Winterhold.

College of Winterhold Quests

 * First Lessons
 * Under Saarthal
 * Hitting The Books
 * Good Intentions
 * Revealing the Unseen
 * Containment
 * Staff of Magnus
 * The Eye of Magnus

Side Quests

 * Arniel's Endeavor
 * Daedric Relic
 * Aftershock
 * Out of Balance
 * Finding Tolfdir's Alembic
 * Fetch me that Book!
 * Shalidor's Insight

Follower Quests

 * J'zargo's Experiment
 * Onmund's Request
 * Brelyna's Practice

Trainers

 * Colette Marence: Expert Restoration trainer
 * Drevis Neloren: Master Illusion trainer
 * Faralda: Master Destruction trainer
 * Sergius Turrianus: Expert Enchanting trainer
 * Tolfdir: Master Alteration trainer
 * Phinis Gestor: Expert Conjuration trainer

Master-level Training Quests

 * Alteration Ritual Spell
 * Conjuration Ritual Spell
 * Destruction Ritual Spell
 * Illusion Ritual Spell
 * Restoration Ritual Spell

Trivia

 * As with most other places in Skyrim, the College is a possible spawning place for dragons.
 * Just beneath the floor of the College quarters there are four chests containing various powerful robes, tomes, soul gems, quest items, and other mage-oriented gear organized by magic school. They can be accessed on the PC version by typing "TCL" into the console to toggle no-clipping mode and enable the player to walk through solid surfaces. On the console versions, these chests are randomly accessible due to bugs in the game's texture loading system. There may be a missing floor tile in the Hall of the Elements, revealing one of the chests. It is then reachable by crouching close to the chest without touching the broken floor. Note that any objects taken form these chests are considered stolen.
 * The college has some of the most useful and powerful items and powers, as well as skill trainers, in the game and can be a good place to develop one's magic skills.
 * Unlike other inhabited locations where dragon attacks are somewhat rare, (towns and cities), it is possible for the college to come under attack by several dragons.
 * Killing a student causes other college members to refuse speaking with the killer, starting the Rejoining the College quest.
 * Although this may be purposeful, even after joining the college and finishing the College of Winterhold questline, the Farengar Secret-Fire will still say, "You know, if you have the aptitude, you should join the mages college in winterhold".
 * Oddly, the College of Winterhold has more teachers than students at the time the Dragonborn joins.

Bugs

 * It is dangerous to fast-travel to the College while on horseback. Though humorous, the mounted Dragonborn will either be launched high into the sky (i.e. Giant glitch) or fall off the side of the bridge. This won't always happen and you can, but very rarely, travel there and be unaffected by glitches. It isn't suggested though.
 * The "Visit the College of Winterhold" miscellaneous quest (radiant quest - can be obtained from Court Wizards, Innkeepers, even Guardsmen - all across Skyrim) is bugged and as of patch 1.3, will not complete if the persuasion or Dragonborn dialogue options are used. PC users can fix this using a console command (setstage MG01Pointer 200).
 * After doing the quest Revealing the Unseen, there will be an explosion. Nobody will talk to you about the next quest and there will be no way to start it, if you go outside the Arch-Mage will be dead on the floor however none of the mages will take any notice of him and will say normal speech, you can only search the Arch-Mage and not start the next quest. As of now there is no patch that has fixed this but should be fixed in the next patch.
 * Many of the mages at the college can die during dragon attacks, stopping you from gaining them as allies or doing their side quests.
 * Sometimes if you side with Ulfric in civil war quests, Savos Aren will "disappear" for unknown reasons. This potentially makes the mages college questline uncompletable because of having to speak with him to continue.
 * Dismissing a follower inside the Hall of the Elements while magic is being practiced will cause the mages and the follower to become hostile towards one another. This will usually cause the follower to be killed do to the multiple magic attacks.
 * There is also a glitch whereby Faralda asks you to cast a spell so she will allow you entry to the college, but after you cast it she does not acknowledge that you have, and so you cannot enter, however you can still enter the college by walking to the very bottom of the mountain it is perched upon, finding a small cave in the wall which leads upwards to a door (you have to shuffle left and right up an almost vertical wall to get up to the door, which does take a while) and then you enter the door and proceed upwards through the bowels of the college to the college grounds themselves. Tolfdir will still treat you as a new student when you first meet him and opening the college gates from the inside will allow you to come and go as you please, rendering this glitch simply a massive inconvenience.

Appearances

 * The Elder Scrolls: Arena
 * The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim