Morrowind: Help with Mage Quest for Ranis

[Michael Anderson]

Hi:

I have finished the quests for Ajira, and the 'collect dues' and 'join us'
quests for Ranis.

Now he has given me the 'unsanctioned training' quest, and I am in the South
Wall with Only-He-Stands-There. My Speechcraft is 6 and my initial
disposition is ~40/100. I'm a mage (obviously) and I try bribing him, but
even taking him all the way to 100/100 he only says 'people can't afford
Mage services ... perhaps you can convince me'. Subsequent bribes alternate
failure and success, but don't change the outcome.

Any clues for me?

Thanks,

Mike

[Augustus]

Post by Michael Anderson
I have finished the quests for Ajira, and the 'collect dues' and 'join us'
quests for Ranis.
Now he has given me the 'unsanctioned training' quest, and I am in the South
Wall with Only-He-Stands-There. My Speechcraft is 6 and my initial
disposition is ~40/100. I'm a mage (obviously) and I try bribing him, but
even taking him all the way to 100/100 he only says 'people can't afford
Mage services ... perhaps you can convince me'. Subsequent bribes alternate
failure and success, but don't change the outcome.

I didn't have a problem with this... bribed him up high enough and then
accepted training from him

Only thought I have here is maybe you need to be a member of the thieves
guild? (or a certain level within the thieves guild?)

If all else fails you can always just bump him off and move on to the next
quest... iirc he has some decent spells, but you are probably at the point
where you are buying the basic spell and either enchanting it on an item or
building a custom spell from it anyhow

[Sarah]

Post by Michael Anderson
Any clues for me?

Is there a dialog option for "unsanctioned training" or something like that?

[Michael Anderson]

Post by Sarah

Post by Michael Anderson
Any clues for me?

Is there a dialog option for "unsanctioned training" or something like that?

That's the funny thing - there *was* that option, but I got nowhere with it.

I finally got through it, and here is what I think happened.

I had a quicksave from before talking to Ranis. When I first tried bribing
Only-He, I pumped him with cash (1000) and decided to try again. Next time
I got the quest, and that was when my troubles started.

I had left it behind and done other stuff (I never finished the first Blades
quest, so I did a few of those), then I came back and talked to Ranis.
Guess what - he offered me the same duty, and this time, I made sure I
checked out everything he said and clicked all the links, and finally got a
'journal update'. After this, it took me all of $200 to bribe him into
stopping the training. So I guess that I wasn't getting the complete quest
before. How frustrating is that?!?

Thanks again,

Mike

[Augustus]

Post by Michael Anderson

Post by Sarah

Post by Michael Anderson
Any clues for me?

Is there a dialog option for "unsanctioned training" or something like

that?
That's the funny thing - there *was* that option, but I got nowhere with it.
I finally got through it, and here is what I think happened.
I had a quicksave from before talking to Ranis. When I first tried bribing
Only-He, I pumped him with cash (1000) and decided to try again. Next time
I got the quest, and that was when my troubles started.

To pump up how much somebody likes you, you don't need to fork over the
1000gp

Just do it with the 10 gp... they might get mad at you and drop their favor
but keep doing it and it'll eventually go up. With the rich and snobbier
people around towns you'll fail alot until you get down to 10/100 with them,
but eventually it'll go back up again

Also, by plying everybody with 10gp a few times to get them up to 80 or 90
favor you'll be increasing your speechcraft

[Michael Anderson]

Post by Augustus
To pump up how much somebody likes you, you don't need to fork over the
1000gp
Just do it with the 10 gp... they might get mad at you and drop their favor
but keep doing it and it'll eventually go up. With the rich and snobbier
people around towns you'll fail alot until you get down to 10/100 with them,
but eventually it'll go back up again
Also, by plying everybody with 10gp a few times to get them up to 80 or 90
favor you'll be increasing your speechcraft

Thanks for the hints ... I ended up training my Speechcraft up with gold ...

But I appreciate the 'bribe with 10' tip - I see fail, reload and try 100
and never did 10 again.

Live and learn - kind of how I learned that by upping my mercantile, I can
get more gold for what I sell - I was just doing the NWN thing of taking
what was given.

Mike

[Darin Johnson]

Post by Michael Anderson
Thanks for the hints ... I ended up training my Speechcraft up with gold ...

I never did this with gold. I just complimented people instead for
the same effect. I think the gold might succeed more often, but if
you're early in the game and finances are tight it's a bit hard to do.
Whereas flattery is free. If the subject gets too mad at you, then
you can try using some gold to butter them up again.