Do I suck, am I just unlucky, or am I missing a point here?

[Ranorak]

A few months back I got Morrowind, played it a bit and (as usual) made a few more character.
Then I gave up.
It's not because I don't like the game, I do. Played this shit out of Oblivion, and if I could see in the future, I'd probably see myself dead behind the pc with a copy of Skyrim still running.

It's also not about thinking it's outdated, the graphics or anything.

I just can't seem to kill anything before getting two shot.

I made several characters, from heavy armour orc, to mage.
And it takes me several quick saves to free those slaves in the cave near the start zone.

Am I really that weak at the start?
How do I improve without dying every 10 seconds?
Hunting mudcraps?

 

[steeple]

uh, yeah just go around killing those tiny weakling for a while, and get some training for your skills to level up as fast as possible...

took me about 3 hours to get to the 2 level, but after a rough start I could pretty quickly just kill most of the things I came across (and after gaining even more levels I can right now be crowned god-emperor of morrowind, since I can kill some of the stronger enemies without even breaking a sweat...

 

[RevRaptor]

Well there is always the play guides to look at, It really shouldn't take 3 hours to get to level 2 though. 3 hours in I'm usually level 5 or something. There is a trick to leveling up in morrowind that takes a little practice. also don't go after that cave first thing. come back for it when you level up a bit.

 

[Dexiro]

The combat system in Morrowind is pretty sucky, a lot of people use mods to make it a bit more similar to Oblivion. Otherwise it might help to follow a guide to help you get on your feet near the start of the game.

The enemies don't scale so even a lot of the early quests can be a nightmare if you aren't familiar with the game.

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

That cave is actually quite tricky for a level 1 character. Go to Balmora, join the Fighters guild, do the first two or three jobs for Fire-Eye, get some training from your guildmates and go back and try that cave around level 6 or so. Morrowind does not feature levelled creatures like Oblivion does, so it is quite easy to unintentionally wander into a dungeon that is way over your character's head. By joining Guilds and Houses you help ensure that you are only sent into situations that your current level can deal with (since faction ranks are skill level dependent).

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

No, you can easily get about 3000 gold in the first town if you try, then go to balmora and use the guild trainers to increase your minor or major skills (like long sword or whatever) every ten of those you train you go up one level, so it's faster to just get a bunch of money and quick train certain skills at the off set (train medium armour, cause it's based in endurance and for every 10 points of endurance your health goes up by 1 (so at a total of 100 you get 10 hp per level) and around level 5 or 6 you can beat most things in the game. If you play like me you can also do things like kill the guards around the vaults in Vivec, which are full of glass weapons and armour, jewels and gold. (I've walked away from there with more than 30,000 after selling everything.)

Spoiler: Monetary wheelings and dealings

A nice little earner is looking out for Glass Daggers in shops. In various shops around Vvardenfel (the pawn shop in Suran and the Telvanni enchanter in Vivec are two off the top of my head) are glass daggers with 5/100 condition. These are on sale for 20 drakes (due to the poor condition), and can be easily fixed up with repair hammers (free if you're in the Fighters Guild) and sold to Creeper in Caldera for the full 4,000 drake value. And it increases your armourer skill at a rate of knots too.

EDITed 'cause content was, well, spoiler-y.

 

[Slash Dementia]

Hm, I'm guessing that it's the first cave near the silt strider. It's kind of difficult in there if you're level one.

When you start out, you're pretty weak, even with your major and minor skills, so what I did was hunt mudcrabs and those little bugs (forgot their names). It is rather annoying to get levels up before even getting the chance to properly hit something, but once you get passed that, you'll be good. Just use the items you're planning on keeping as well as what others have said, and pay for trainers to level you up--you can also look for books that level you up, too.

 

[sketch_zeppelin]

There's a cheat you can do (i don't remeber it so look it up.) that will up your skill in a weapon of choice to like a 1000. I normally don't like to cheat but its sorta necassary in marrowind all it does is makes it so your weapon hits 100% of the time so its just making the game play more like oblivion.

 

[spartan231490]

A few months back I got Morrowind, played it a bit and (as usual) made a few more character.
Then I gave up.
It's not because I don't like the game, I do. Played this shit out of Oblivion, and if I could see in the future, I'd probably see myself dead behind the pc with a copy of Skyrim still running.

It's also not about thinking it's outdated, the graphics or anything.

I just can't seem to kill anything before getting two shot.

I made several characters, from heavy armour orc, to mage.
And it takes me several quick saves to free those slaves in the cave near the start zone.

Am I really that weak at the start?
How do I improve without dying every 10 seconds?
Hunting mudcraps?

Everyone is that weak at the start. You basically have to hunt mudcrabs for 2 levels. and even that is tough. Also, there is a quest chain in the town you start in that you can handle the first quest or two even at level one that should help you level, it's the main quest. I can't recall why though, I just remember it's nice to be able to handle it if your smart and get some experience to level.

 

[BiggyShackleton]

The best thing to do when starting Morrowind:

Pick a weapon class that you're going to use and a race that gets bonuses towards it. If you can get the particular skill to about 40-50 from the off you can actually hit things.

Get to Caius Cosades as quick as possible, get the money from him and join a guild. Random dungeon crawling will probably result in you getting mauled early on.

If you have the GOTY Edition then..

Spoiler

Killing a Dark Brotherhood assassin (an event triggered by the Tribunal expansion) the first time you rest can give you some nice armour that's both good for defense or selling depending on your class.

If you go to Ald-Ruhn (available from a fast travel strider thing in Balmora) then you can raid the guard towers (you won't miss 'em) for full sets of Bonemold armour and some weapons. Each tower has one guard that is on a pretty simple routine with plenty of windows for thievery. Once again, selling these can give you some money to use on trainers or you can simply wear it.

It's a hard game to get into but once you do it's so worth it and for me, in many ways it's better than Oblivion.

 

[SpiderHam666]

i found running around in circles and jumping like crazy a good way to bring up stamina and agility(?) after stealing everything that wasn't nailed down and selling it.

 

[SovietPanda]

Arent you meant to get of the boat then immedietly steal everything in sight, then buy yourself some decent protection. Then do as many poxy little errand quests as you can find. stealh archery and longsword with a couple points in magic was usually an effective way to go.

 

[Halceon]

Umm... never had that kind of problem. Well, ok I tried attacking a civilian right off the boat once, but that's a different thing altogether. I just looted stuff from the Seyda Neen guardhouse and then walked off to Balmora. By the time I'd get there, I'd usually be level 2 at least.

 

[Weslebear]

Combat wise you're not really missing anything, the combat is definitely not Morrowind's strong point, tedious and poorly done.

Exploring however is rather fun, some really awesome places to find. I advise finding some combat mods and enjoying Oblivion-like game play in an fantastic new world to explore.

 

[Argtee]

Yeah, the combat Morrowind is a *****.
I think the best thing that you can do is take some hints from this website.

It made it really easy for me to create different characters in Morrowind.
(especially since I don't have the Morrowind Manual and I can't find descriptions of skills anywhere else.)

In my experience, if you just throw skills together haphazardly while creating your class, it can make the game more difficult, so I'd definitely recommend taking some time (or a lot of time, which is what I do) to think about the class you want to create.