Forelhost (Skyrim)

Description
Captain Valmir gives the player the Siege on the Dragon Cult quest at this location. Forelhost Stronghold has several Dragon Cultists both in ghost and physical form. This place is not recommended for lower level players, as there are dozens of Draugr to wade through.

Forelhost is directly southeast of Riften on the nearby Mountain. You can find a pathway on the southeast side of the mountain, or just southwest of Broken Helm Hollow. However be wary of the stone arches that line the pathway, each one has a soul gem powered flame or ice thrower which does sustained damage of 200 points. For an easier way, search on the North Easterly side of the mountain. Near to Riften and just across a small stone bridge there is a single track that leads up to an abandoned bandit tower which will take you directly along it's bridge to Forelhost, minus the flame throwers.

Walkthrough
As you walk through the first section, the first Dragon Cultist will appear and attack you. They will keep popping up, though are not difficult to kill with the right equipment. You will continue meeting ghosts through the first section. There is nothing particularly special about them, but do remember to check the urns for health potions, for at the end of your quest lies the Dragon Priest Rahgot with mask.

The next stage of Forelhost is the crypts, a descent into traps, madness, and lots of Draugr. You will be heading down into the depths of the Crypts unless you possess Master lockpicking skills, in which case you can skip the crypts entirely by heading left in the first room and going down into the well. If you cannot pick the lock, you'll descend through darkness and be met at every turn with Draugr Scourges and Deathlords as well as normal Draugr. In one particular area you can cheat a little. The Draugr will set off their own traps causing a spiked gate to slam them into the wall, weakening them a lot.

As you get to the bottom of the crypts you will enter a room with an ornate chest to your right. As you enter, you will trigger a high powered Draugr Deathlord to rise from his coffin, along with other Draugr Wights. Defeat them and check the chest, in which you'll find the Forelhost Well Key.

Now head back up by quick route, up through the chamber and through the barred door. Watch out for the swinging axes as you go to the well as they will cause your companion to disappear (rectified by waiting a few hours confirmed xbox 360). Now it's time to go through the last sections.

Undead
Once inside Forelhost, the player will encounter many undead Dragon Cultists and Draugr. {C Some are Draugr ghosts, and they are invisible until they attack. One point of interest is that a player can sneak around, and as long as they don't attack, the ghosts will "detect" the Dragonborn, but they won't attack. The "hidden" and "detected" indicator would change back and forth as the ghost moved around, which increases the sneak skill fairly quickly (This will only work when venturing alone, any companion other than a member of the Theves Guild or Dark Brotherhood will cause the ghosts to target your companion). Only after attacking, do the spirit remain in ghost form (opaque with a blue hue) until struck either, with a spell or weapon, which would make them appear in physical form.

The undead at the entrance aren't that difficult, but as you get deeper into the dungeon, you will encounter melee and mage undead, as well as ones that can actually do dragon shouts (Draugr Scourge, possibly Draugr Deathlord). These are pretty hard, and are usually accompanied by a few friends (some of them even summon a Frost Atronach). Must be careful when using favorite weapons as they can shout Disarm, making difficult or even impossible finding it.

The actual area is teeming with traps designed to screw up your dealings with the Draugr, you will encounter in the crypts and depths of the dungeon hordes of Draugr normally encompanied by a Draugr Scourge. Alongside many 3-5 enemies attacking you they will set off traps that not only hurt them but send you (and your comapnion if you have one) flying into walls, being spiked in the head and shot with poison arrows. Make sure that you go through the loot and recover as many phials of health potions as possible because when it comes to the final battle your going to need it. Remember that the leveling up engine is different in Skyrim so the bosses and dungeons for lower levels will be very difficult in Forelhost.

Rahgot possesses a Dragon Priest Staff that sprays a wall of fire, damaging you each second you touch it. He also uses a fire cloak spell that does damage when melee contact is made, and summons many leveled Draugr to fight you. In order to prevent the latter from happening, if the player has solid melee skills, one method is to rush Rahgot and pummle him with strikes, preventing him from summoning Draugr to help. You will suffer extensive fire damage, so either equip fire resistance potions or prepare to heal often. Also if you go through a door & close it, the priest can't follow you and you can catch your breath or heal yourself. If you keep up a steady barage of hits, he should go down fairly quickly. Otherwise, you are in for a long battle with him and his minions.

Traps
There are a lot of traps in this dungeon. There are floor plates that trigger various traps. Some of the chests are trapped. There are swinging axes in slim hallways. There are mage runes in random spots that blast you if you get too close. There are trigger plates that lift when you take an item that is sitting on them. There are soul gems that are rigged to shoot lightning or frost at you (high damage) if you get in line of sight with it (these are wicked and will drop you fast). There is a trapped room where the floor raises up as you step on it and impales the character with spikes in the ceiling. Be cautious!

Inside
There are quite a bit of misc items and materials in this dungeon.
 * You will find the dragon priest mask Rahgot at the end which has the enchantment 70 stamina and the Dragon Priest Staff.


 * In the room with the dead spider, there is
 * one gold ore vein ,
 * one quicksliver vein ,
 * and a lot of glowing mushrooms.


 * There are a lot of alchemy materials in a few rooms since some of the undead are/were alchemists.


 * There are a few alchemy labs.


 * There is also an arcane enchanter right before entering the final room.


 * There are some rooms with smithing materials and forge/grindstone/workbench.
 * You'll find the Restoration skillbook The Exodus.
 * The remains of Dragon Cultists can be looted for Ancient Nord Armor

There are a LOT of other random things in here, if you want to load up, make sure you are really light before entering (or do multiple trips back to a merchant).

The Cultists are also a rich source of arrows - the archer variants will drop around 100 Ancient Nord Arrows each. Going through the dungeon using other arrows, it's very possible to come out with several hundreds - up to thousands of them.

One thing you will not find much of are populated soul gems. If you need these to keep your weapons charged, bring a good supply with you.

The door code is: Fox, Owl, Snake

Outside
Outside in the tower leading up to Forelhost is a dead (non interactive) body frozen laying on a bed roll. In the same room is a snow covered expert locked chest.

Dragonwall
The Dragonwall itself is actually outside of Forelhost. You can either go through the tomb normally or use the jump glitch to jump up the sides of the mountain or up the walls of the tomb to reach the dragonwall and learn the shout immediately.

Below is a phonetic translation in Dragon Language

-ahRK OND DRey SahROT-

-HeiMVERLUND MeyZ NOL HEVNO-

-BROM MED STRUN DO UZNahGaaR-

-NahKRiiN NOL SOVNGARDE NIMaaR-

This translates to:

And lo did mighty

Heimverlund come from [the] brutal

North, like [a] storm of unbridled

Vengence from Sovngarde itself

The word of power here is "Storm" or "STRUN" which is the first word to the Storm Call Dragon shout

This particular message was a preview created by Bethesda during E3 2011. They had a word wall up in their booth with these particular markings.

Bugs

 * , In the hallways with the swinging axes, companions might get hit with an ax and get pushed into the wall causing them to disappear (with a loud "squish" sound). If "Wait" option is used, companions will usually reappear next to the player.


 * , If you pick the well lock instead of retrieving the key normally, the Glass Claw door will not allow you to spin the rings. Save and reload to fix this. The answer to this door is Fox, Owl, Snake.


 * Known jump glitch, commonly found within the game, can be used to travel up the stone that houses the entrance to Forelhost (just behind the large arch). This will alow you to climb up to the upper walkway and immediately get the Shout.


 * In Forelhost Refectory, if the player runs back into the room where the Glass Claw was originally found while fighting Rahgot, the barred doorway may close after entering. If so, pick up any object and place it on the pressure plate where the Glass Claw was originally found and the door should open.


 * It seems there is a door with a wooden plank attached to it and, if you activate it incorrectly (unsure of how it happens), you will open the door, and the plank will stay down, unable to be moved, meaning the shortcut back is not an option, and therefore you must take the long way back.


 * In some cases the door that uses the Glass Claw to open will not respond to the correct combination. To correct this, leave the area (just through the closest door), then return and the combination should work.


 * If you climb up the mountain and stand upon Forelhost, there will be some holes in the building that you can stand on, and you can look inside Forelhost.