Ebony Blade (Skyrim)



The Ebony Blade Is a Two-handed sword in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. The Ebony Blade is a Daedric Artifact.

Locations
You can obtain it from the quest "The Whispering Door".

Characteristics
This weapon comes with a 10 point life leech and can be upgraded by slaying your friends (i.e., someone you've completed a favor for, completed a task for, or won over during any type of quest). For every two such characters killed the weapon increases in power, adding two to the strength of the life leech effect up to the maximum of 30.

Contrary to it's classification, this weapon benefits only from one-handed damage item enchantments. only armsmen perks will affect it's damage value. The mystery of this perk mismatch is only deepened, since a character with a properly filled Two-Handed perk tree and an untouched One-Handed can still perform decapitations with the ebony blade.

Using the Ebony Blade can benefit characters who want to continue leveling up through weapon advancement but have maxed out their one-handed weapon skill. The weapon allows for a character to train the two-handed weapon skill without sacrificing damage or having to change gear. However, for characters that use two-handed weapons normally, this weapon is a poor choice because of its skill/perk mismatch.

In total, the weapon behaves as a two hander with the following exceptions:

1. It benefits from +one-handed damage effects from enchants and potions and does not benefit from +two-handed damage effects from enchants and potions.

2. It benefits only from armsmen perk at all. only onehanded damage perks seems to work on it currently.

This unique behavior may or may not be a glitch, see commentary below.

It cannot be improved via smithing even if you have the Arcane Blacksmith.

Its life leech enchant is not limited by charges; it has an unlimited charge.

Considering its pretty low base damage value (lower than a regular ebony twohanded weapons which is pretty common) it seems more than likely that this weapon is actually meant to be an onehanded sword and not a 2handed one. because for a 2handed sword even wen fixed its damage is really really poor compared to normal 2handers out there. and its speed is more matching to a 1handed sword aswell.

Background
The Ebony blade was rewarded to the Hero of Daggerfall sometime after the War of Betony. The blade was around, since the time of the Eternal Champion. It is also believed that the Eternal Champion himself once wielded the blade.

During the Oblivion Crisis, it is often said that the mighty Hero of Kvatch himself wielded this Daedric Artifact of Mephala. Some say that the Hero had to complete an indeed gruesome task given by Mephala, to acquire this demonic blade. If this story is really true, we may never know.

The Ebony Blade is indeed dark. The legend says, "The Ebony Blade, sometimes called the Vampire or the Leech, resembles an ebony katana, and its power is very dark indeed. Every time the Ebony Blade strikes an opponent, part of the damage inflicted flows into the wielder as raw power. The Blade itself may not be any more evil than those who have used it, but at some point in its history, a charm was cast on it so it would not remain with any one bladesman for long. The wizard who cast this charm sought to save the souls of any too infatuated by the Blade, and perhaps he was right to do so."

Upgrading

 * First way: You have to kill NPCs you did quests for. You can either go on a killing rampage in a town or select your victims one by one.
 * Second Way ("Victimless"): You have to own Breezehome and have to have Lydia as a Housecarl. You have to kill Lydia with the Ebony Blade and resurrect her using console commands (click on Lydia and type in "resurrect" without the quotes). Repeat until the Whispering Lady tells you that the blade has returned to it's full glory (around 10 times).
 * (struck: Meeko counts as a victim, thus there is no "no victims" way of upgrading the blade. Any NPC killed will count towards the upgrade, even if you resurrect them via console commands.)
 * Incidentally, the other Daedric Shrine quests often provide numerous opportunities to upgrade the Ebony Blade. Boethiah's quest involves both slaying a companion (one charge) and the cult leader who gives the quest upon investigation (second charge). If you choose to obtain Mehrune's Razor at the end of 'Pieces of the Past,' Silus counts towards another charge. The same applies to Hircine's quest, should you choose the Savior's Hide instead of the Ring of Hircine.
 * Mercenaries and followers are also easy ways to add charges. Foes that you best in gambling brawls often become followers immediately thereafter, and mercenaries can be hired for 500 gold.
 * For PC players, another way to cheat and empower the blade without negatively effecting NPC relationships is to find NPCs like bandits to set to a relationship rank of 3 or higher via the console and then kill them. This is the only way for a player who wants to maintain an unblemished "good guy" radiant story set to empower the blade. Otherwise, such as with the resurrect method, effected NPCs and their affiliations are liable to maintain the negative mark against the player resulting in, among possible other changes, greetings such as "Every time I see you my blood boils." and "What do you need you miserable wretch." etc.
 * Another charge can be obtained by killing the blind bandit in White River Watch. Just tell him you are who he thinks you are first. It should give you a charge (it did for my game) since he thinks you're telling the truth.
 * You can also kill the orc settlements if you have befriended them. Orcs are ugly and therefore do not deserve to live.

Bugs

 * When trying to place the Ebony Blade on a weapon rack or weapon plaque, it "falls off" immediately. After this, the same happens to any other "greatsword," such as a Dwarven Greatsword or a Glass Greatsword. Exiting the area does not seem to fix this either. The only fix appears to be loading a previous save.
 * This seems to be a way to "drop" Red Eagle's Fury from your inventory indirectly.
 * The Ebony Blade, though it uses a two-handed mesh file, uses the template for a one-handed weapon, resulting in improper sound files, attack speed, damage, weight, perk benefits, impact force, and stamina usage.
 * Bethesda has not confirmed whether the blade is intended to be one-handed or two-handed, and is currently a mismatched amalgamation of the two.