Skyrim talk:A Blade in the Dark

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Dialogue[edit]

I wrote down Alduin and Sahloknir's dialog before the battle, I tried to translate it, but don't have enough knowledge of the language to get very close. Here is the transcript, and my notes:

Alduin: Sahloknir! Ziil gro dovah ulse! (Ziil is close to Zii "spirit", gro is close to Gron "bind", Dovah : "Dragon", Ulse is close to Ul "Eternity")

Alduin: Slen Tiid Vo! (Flesh Time ___) < Flesh Time Undo

Sahloknir: Alduin, thuri! Boaan tiid vokriiha suleyksejun kruziik? (Alduin, ___ Time ___ Ancient? suleyksejun appears to have both Sul "Day" and jun "King" in it)

Alduin: Geh, Sahloknir, kaali mir. (Kaali is almost Kaal "Champion",Mir: Allegiance) < My champion?

Alduin: Ful, losei Dovahkiin? Zu'u koraav nid nol dov do hi. (Losei is close to Los "is", Zu'u is similar to both Zul "voice" and Zun "weapon", Koraav is only one letter off from Kodaav "bear". Nol dov do : "From wyrm of")

Alduin: You do not even know our tongue, do you? Such arrogance, to dare take for yourself the name of Dovah

Alduin: Sahloknir, krii daar joorre. < kill these mortals. (Daar is similar to Daanik "doomed" and Joorre is similar to Joor "Mortal")

I don't know how to add whats important to the Wiki itself, but I'm sure someone else will know what to do with this. 67.142.166.20 08:31, 20 November 2011 (UTC)

Nice work on the transcribe, Vo is Dragon for un, as in unkind, Suleyksejun could mean power of king, as Suleyk means power. Thur (from thuri) means Overlord.
Could be something like this:
Alduin:Sahloknir! I bind your dragon spirit for eternity!
Alduin: Flesh unrot!
Sahloknir: Alduin, Overlord! The ancient undead rise again?
Alduin: Yes, Sahloknir, the Allegiance of Champions
Alduin: So, is this the Dragonborn? Your voice shines not from Dragonkind, but from yourself.
Alduin: Sahloknir, kill this (or these) mortal (or mortals)
Rough guesses based on the dragon language in the Official Strategy Guide --Dovahfron613 09:03, 20 November 2011 (UTC)
I think the "i" at the end of a word in Dragon language means "my". So "thuri" means "my overlord" and "kaali" means "my champion". So perhaps it all comes down to something more like this:
Alduin: Sahloknir! Eternally bound dragon spirit!
Alduin: Regain your flesh!
Sahloknir: Alduin, my overlord! Has the time come again for the rise of our ancient dominion?
Alduin: Yes, Sahloknir, my trusted champion.
Alduin: So, are you supposed to be the Dragonborn? Yet you bare no resemblance to any dragon.
Alduin: You do not even know our tongue, do you? Such arrogance, to dare take for yourself the name of Dovah.
Alduin: Sahloknir, kill this mortal.
This is a more "interpreted" translation.Parochy (talk) 21:01, 9 January 2014 (GMT)

Notes removed from Page[edit]

I removed this: "*The name of this quest is likely a reference to "A Knife in the Dark," a Dark Brotherhood quest in Oblivion, as well as being a pun concerning the Blades and the term 'cloak and daggers'. Both quest titles also reference a chapter title in the Fellowship of the Ring, first book of The Lord of the Rings, in which Frodo is stabbed with a poisoned dagger by the Witch-King of Angmar." Believe it or not, but not every instance of a word's occurrence in a work of fantasy can trace its genesis to LOTR. As for the quest's name as "likely" being a reference to "A Knife in the Dark" from Oblivion, well, sure maybe, as both quests involve killing someone to prove oneself to an organization, but does it belong under "Notes"? It barely qualifies as trivia, imo. 174.61.225.217 01:16, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Sahloknir won't appear[edit]

It is possible for Sahloknir to not appear. In this case it is impossible to complete this quest without using the console. Use the command "setstage MQ106 200" to finish the quest and "player.setav dragonsouls 1" to give yourself Sahloknir's dragon soul. -123.243.45.64 12:59, 22 January 2012 (UTC)

Sahloknir visual bug[edit]

I managed to kill Sahloknir before he finished his reincarnation animation. When I absorbed his soul, he didn't turn into a skeleton, and had no hitbox. This is on the 360. Ivan the Vandal (talk) 20:13, 23 October 2012 (GMT)

Quest Stages 150 and 155[edit]

Quest Stage 150 I believe is after you kill Sahloknir, but before Delphine agrees to trust you. (She got stuck for me saying "I've wanted a closer look at one of these buggers".) Setting stage to 155 didn't seem to update any quest thing, but Delphine is willing to talk.

(Sum up: 155 might seem like a "useless" quest stage, but it does have a use to be set to. I tried a couple of times to kill Sahloknir to get Delphine to update, but all were after the quest started, so I don't know what broke it.) — Unsigned comment by 68.35.238.126 (talk) at 14:45 on 25 October 2012‎

Usually quest stages are not really useless, but currently we only document quest log entries and objectives given in those tables. Summarizing what happens at each stage will probably make the table way too big. --Alfwyn (talk) 16:48, 25 October 2012 (GMT)

Next quest won't start[edit]

After killing Sahloknir and absorbing his soul Delphine only has two conversation options. Using setstage MQ106 155 did not work and and using setstage MQ106 200 finished that quest but now Diplomatic Immunity didn't start and I can't progress the quest line. Can someone help me? — Unsigned comment by 203.87.141.82 (talk) at 11:40 on 18 November 2012

Hi
I have the same problem :P
I prove any kind of situations to get right Delphine's dialogue (go alone with no companion, have the Unrelenting Force before meet Sahloknir, dont have the Unrelenting Force, play all the way in the cave whre you go for Jurgen Horn...) and still the same bug.
setstage to 155 dont work at all, and like the others, set to 200 endend the quest but can open the next quest...
Any idea what have to do? or to prove? Is annoying start another game (have more than 100h. in this and probably i have to do this quest before but...) and dont know if this bug gonna happen again :( — Unsigned comment by 62.57.232.203 (talk) at 23:38 on 28 January 2013‎


Same problem here. setstage mq106 150 155 160 won't work because the quest already advances to 160, yet Delphine's dialogue still doesn't change. Tried without mods and with all manners of combinations suggested in the wikis/forums. I suspect savegame corruption after an update, since the first two playthroughs (one before Dawnguard, the other before Hearthfire) went smoothly. Starting a new game with Dragonborn 1.8 update. Will keep y'all posted. (Curiously, I found that the vast majority of these bugged reports are dated after November 2012. Perhaps it's the latest version?)-Deltahost (talk) 00:22, 21 February 2013 (GMT)

Edit: Okay, back from full reinstall + update to Dragonborn v1.8 + all necessary NMM mod updates + new savegame. The quest is no longer broken. Seems I may have been right in that previous updates may have corrupted the savegame/game scripts. So if any of you have a similar problem and the fixes on this wiki don't help, then I guess this is the only surefire way to debug it. Huge pain in the a**, but what can you do? At least you no longer have to suffer through slaying Sahloknir a billion times. Happy hunting. My joy at this revelation cannot be overstated. :)-Deltahost (talk) 07:09, 21 February 2013 (GMT)


I had this bug, and from what I can tell the save for whatever reason becomes unable to set some quest stages, specifically those done during conversations. It's a save game corruption issue, and I don't think there's a fix for it. Bound Until Death also suffers from this problem. Kirro (talk) 02:33, 18 May 2013 (GMT)

No soul[edit]

Exactly the same thing happened here as happened at the Western Watchtower: with the Dragonborn DLC included, the dead dragon does not disintegrate and the player does not receive a dragon soul. I suspect disabling the Unofficial Skyrim Patch and doing the whole thing again will fix this. 174.6.51.17 16:06, 25 February 2013 (GMT)

This is a well known bug caused by the USKP. They have since fixed this with UDBP. Jeancey (talk) 16:23, 25 February 2013 (GMT)

No dragons[edit]

So, after starting this quest and sending Delphine off to Kynesgrove, I wandered off and did other things. Thirty levels later I noticed I hadn't seen a single dragon. Not one. Is this a known thing? If so, shouldn't it be in the article somewhere? I went back to Kynesgrove, finished the quest and suddenly I'm up to my ears in scaly immortal flying lizards, so there would seem to be a firm connection.

DeltaOne (talk) 13:55, 2 April 2013 (GMT)

Yes, there is a global "MQ106TurnOffRandomDragons" that is set (actually earlier, sometime during Ustengrav). All "random" dragon encounters - both the Wilderness Encounter or World Interaction ones - require that global not be set. I think static dragon lairs are unaffected but I haven't checked. The "freeze" on dragons is cleared as part of the confrontation at Kynesgrove. This is verifiable through the Creation Kit, though you have to do some digging. I'd speculate that they were trying to prevent a random dragon attack while accompanying Delphine to Kynesgrove, since it would be rather unbelieveable for her not to recognize you as Dragonborn when you killed it. I don't understand why it's set at Ustengrav, since there seems to be no reason to turn off random dragons at that juncture. A Blade in the Dark does technically start at that point (at stage 1), so I'm guessing they just put it into the first quest stage.
On the PC, you can always clear/set the global at your leisure via the console (or check the current status by using "help MQ106TurnOff 3"). Aetryn (talk) 06:44, 28 September 2013 (GMT)

Bugs Cleanup[edit]

  • Delphine may never enter her hidden basement room to trigger the involved dialogue.
    • Reloading an earlier save may fix this.
    • On PC It is possible to bypass this bug with a sequence of console commands: resetquest MQ106, setstage MQ106 0, setstage MQ106 1, and setstage MQ106 5. After that, renting the attic room reappears as a dialogue option.
  • Talking to Delphine after slaying Sahloknir and absorbing his soul may not trigger the quest update.
    • On PC Using the console command setstage MQ106 155 can correct this.
  • Sometimes when you reach the dragon burial site there will be no vortex-like effect rising from the burial mound. If this occurs, when Alduin raises Sahloknir from the grave, Sahloknir will not appear as dragon bones but as a complete dragon.
    • Reloading a save file saved before beginning this quest may fix this.
  • You may be unable to absorb Sahloknir's soul and Delphine will get stuck saying "Gods above, look at that".
    • On PC You can enter the following codes in the same order they are written, setstage MQ106 150, setstage MQ106 155, setstage MQ106 160. This will unlock her dialogue options and enable you to finish A Blade in the Dark and unlock Diplomatic Immunity.
  • Delphine may turn hostile, preventing you from moving forward in the quest.
    • Rarely, another dragon may interrupt the summoning and fight you. You can fix this by slaying it.

These bugs have sat unconfirmed long enough. Silence is GoldenBreak the Silence 21:11, 17 August 2013 (GMT)

The second one, at least, I can definitely confirm. I've had it on multiple playthroughs and came to the page today to look up the console command to fix it for my most recent one. I restored that one to the page's bugs section. -- Ben 50.131.243.230 07:45, 23 January 2014 (GMT)
Turns out MQ106 155 is the current stage the main questline is at when you slay the dragon. Using the above code will do nothing by this point as you are already at that stage. Using setstage MQ106 160 has been proven to correct this issue, and will cause her dialog to work again! — Unsigned comment by 198.13.253.142 (talk) at 21:03 on 20 April 2014‎

A workaround for the quest stage 155 bug[edit]

I found a solution for the bug where the quest won't update after killing Sahloknir. If setstage mq106 160 won't work, you can use the console command completequest mq106, followed by setstage mq201 30. This causes Delphine to run back to Riverwood, and you can talk with her there and proceed with Diplomatic Immunity as normal. I don't know if anyone still watches this webpage, but as I am an outsider on UESP, I would prefer not to edit the article without guidance from a veteran. I will try to remember to check back here later, and if nobody has edited the article or responded to this comment, I will edit the article as best I can.73.37.37.3 22:45, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

On second thought, I'm going to "be bold," and edit the article. Apologies if I do something wrong.73.37.37.3 22:53, 27 January 2019 (UTC)

Random dragon attacks[edit]

This page says that random dragon attacks are supposed to stop while this quest is active, but I just had a dragon attack at Winterhold while the quest is active. Does anyone know of a possible explanation? Maybe the dragon attack was already "queued up" from before I began A Blade in the Dark. I'll see if I get anymore attacks while the quest is active. Midnightq2 (talk) 16:13, 5 January 2021 (UTC)