Master Assassin is not here to serve your every whim. He comes with strings attached. You must earn the right to become his companion.
Lucien’s equipment
This is armour and weapons that come with the new Lucien – either Companion or Player. They have to sit separately so that they could be used everywhere. Since these are only resources, they can be a part of the Real Estate ESP, but they should not appear anywhere – they do not appear in the base game.
New faction: The Nightingales.
New magic: Nocturnal’s powers of Stealth, Strife and Subterfuge.
New items: black Nightingale robes and hoods, plus a “Desert” variant in a dusty white, brown leather boots and gauntlets. All comes either as clothes or as light armour. Overall enchantment equals that of the Black Hand robe and hood. Nightingale sword (short sword). Magic-based “throwing knives”.
Throwing knives are really not that at all. It’s a lesser power based on shuriken idea, it uses up throwing knives from the inventory (miscellaneous item) and costs no magicka. The strength of the spell depends on the caster’s agility and skill in blade, marksmanship. When the spell hits, a throwing knife is added to the victim’s inventory with a certain random chance, so you would be able to recover some of the knives. When no more knives are left, the spell is removed. The knives have their own model and can be dropped into the world or stored in a chest. They are sold by blacksmiths and found in loot – but not from this mod! The levelled lists are updated only if either the Companion or the Player ESP is loaded.
Dark Brotherhood real estate
These are simply new properties or upgrades that can be used either with the vanilla game, with Companion Lucien Lachance or Player Lucien Lachance. When using with the base game, you never see Lucien at the Sanctuary – this doesn’t change, however his bed and chair are still owned – by Lucien Lachance who never comes there. This ownership is overridden by the Companion or Player files.
Some properties become available for use after a standard quest is completed. This is done with a separate Property Update quest from the Real Estate mod – remove it from the Companion mod.
Cheydinhal Sanctuary is modified, but it does not interfere with the standard quests. It is now all a single cell, has an extra room for the Speaker and has an added swimming pool. All beds in the living wing are owned, and the player has his own bed too, and a chest (added a bed and a chest). The ladder exit is replaced by a Black Door leading to the Dark Brotherhood Crypt which has an exit through a city wall tower. The well shortcut still exists, but it too leads into the crypt, although this time it comes out right next to the door to the Sanctuary. Both the well and the tower door require a the player to have the key to enter, but they let any other Dark Brotherhood members pass, the same as both Black Doors. This is changed from an explicit list of NPCs which didn’t even include all the members – this is necessary for new DB members that may be introduced by other mods.
Fort Farragut is upgraded with better furniture, but is otherwise unmodified to avoid glitches with standard quests. It can be used by the player once you reach Assassin.
Cheydinhal Abandoned House is unchanged, this should be a separate module.
Lucien’s Arboretum Underground Apartment is a living space in the Arboretum sewers. You can only enter there if you have either the Companion or Player file installed, but never with the base game alone. The door displays a message asking for a password – with all the wrong answers. Then it zaps the player for good measure. In the base game it is just called “Underground Apartment” – to be overridden in the mods.
There is a chest in Lucien’s Arboretum apartment that contains three complete sets of Nightingale robes and armour, minus Lucien’s armoured set. This is meant for the three Nightingales – Lucien, the player and the third one to recruit. There are no other copies of this gear anywhere. Note that the assassin’s swords and throwing knives are not Nightingale gear. The swords are Black Hand, the knives are generic. Other Black Hand members also carry these swords, and Ungolim has a real Blade of Woe. To be added to NPCs if the Companion or Player ESP is loaded.
Chorrol Francois Motierre’s house: becomes the property of Dark Brotherhood after the quest is done. Renamed into Motierre House and upgraded with a few chairs and a bed. The chests in the bedroom are made non-respawnable from the start.
Summitmist Manor in Skingrad is available before the start of the quest and after the corresponding quest is completed. The original manor is replaced by a new cell which has the three original cells combined, with the basement and upper floor put in subspaces. Fafnir now resides at the manor permanently. The player can gain entry when he/she becomes a member of the Black Hand – Silencer or higher.
For the base game it means that it only becomes available after the standard quest, but for the Player it is available from the start (since he’s a Speaker already).
Dark Brotherhood Archives is a separate cell accessible via a hidden teleport from the basement of the new Summitmist Manor, and only when escorted by Fafnir. There should be some conversation for that, eventually.
Anvil Abandoned House: becomes the property of the Dark Brotherhood after Corvus Umbranox (Grey Fox) is killed. Swapped for a different cell which is decorated as a Black Hand office. The house is also fixed up from the outside – changes enabled via a single parent.
This property is never available in the base game, and probably also not for the Player.
Black Hand Offices in Bravil is a new space accessed through a special entrance in the city wall tower near the chapel. The Black Door is guarding it with a password, asking it every time. You get the password once you make Silencer. “What is the heavenly light?” “Revenant, my Brother”, “Masser, my Brother”, “Serpent, my Brother”, “Shadow, my Brother” (the right answer).
Let the other members of the Black Hand travel around and make use of the Offices every now and again. It is essentially a place to stay, with sleeping and dining quarters, as well as a conference room. Not every meeting takes place in the presence of the Night Mother. This is the Listener’s office – Ungolim no longer spends his days by the statue of the Lucky Lady.
Companions: all members of the Sanctuary become potential companions once you attain the rank of Silencer or higher. In the base game this only happens after you’ve killed them all, so they never become your companions. But with modification, this becomes possible, depending on how the quests have been modified.
Companion Lucien lachance
The character himself is a duplicate of the original Lucien Lachance, with different scripting. The different versions of Lachance never appear together.
Lucien comes with a number of residences and quest lines, plus an alteration to the original quest line at the point of Purification. Companion Lucien Lachance can be introduced right from the beginning, but until you become the Silencer, he will not come with you. You will see him around the Sanctuary though and can chat with him and exchange rumours.
With this modification you become Silencer only after the traitor is found, so none of your Brothers and Sisters can help you find him.
Factions: Dark Brotherhood – Speaker, Nightingale – Agent of Stealth.
Scripting and AI: standard setup.
Horse: Shadowmere at the Cheydinhal stables. This is not the actual Shadowmere from the game, but rather a different black horse.
Location: Cheydinhal Sanctuary (extended). Companion Lucien occupies the Speaker’s quarters (the new room) and has a schedule to use the Sanctuary’s facilities similar to the other residents.
Silencer Contracts: There’s a lectern on Lucien’s desk marked “Contracts”. This is for Silencer’s contracts only. If you try to open it when your rank is below Silencer, a message informs you that you don’t qualify. Otherwise there may be something there – to be added by other mods. If you choose to purify the Sanctuary, this lectern is disabled forever.
Fort Farragut: Companion Lucien Lachance will not enter Fort Farragut if the original Lachance is there because Companion won’t come with you until you make Silencer. See Dark Brotherhood quest line for details.
Lucien’s Arboretum Underground Apartment is a living space in the Arboretum sewers. You can only enter there once you are a Nightingale and when accompanied by Lucien Lachance (script on the door). Lucien has to take you there himself before the door starts behaving nicely towards you. Before that, regardless of whether you are a Nightingale or whether Lucien is with you or not, the door displays a message asking for a password – with all the wrong answers. Then it zaps the player for good measure.
- What is the meaning of life?
- Death, my Brother.
- Chaos, my Brother.
- Love, my Brother.
- Wrong, my Brother/Sister. Zap!
If you are a Nightingale but Lucien is not with you, the door displays the message “Master is not here” but doesn’t zap you.
Special schedules: Lucien can be relocated to several other towns where he follows special schedules for that town, once the relevant quests are done:
- Skingrad – Summitmist Manor
- Anvil – Abandoned House (Brotherhood Office)
- Chorrol – Mottiere House
- Imperial City – Arboretum Apartment
- Leyawiin – Three Sisters Inn
- Bravil – Black Hand Offices (new)
- Bruma – Jerall View Inn
Lucien’s equipment: Lucien comes equipped with the Nightingale light armour, sword and throwing knives from the start. He also has his Black Hand robe but no hood. He changes into the robe when he is not wearing armour. The Nightingale armour pieces are the same as those available to the player, but they are duplicated and marked unplayable so that they cannot be removed from Lucien. This cannot be done with the sword though, only clothes and armour. The Desert robe and hood have marginally better armour rating than the black variant (by 0.1 point each), so that if you give them to Lucien, he’ll prefer them over the black set. He will not wear any armour with a lesser armour rating than his own.
You can remove the Black Hand robe from Lucien if you want him to wear something different when he’s not armoured. You can also give him any piece of clothing with a non-zero price and he’ll prefer it over the robe – the AI looks at the monetary value.
Player Lucien Lachance
There is also a player file for Lucien Lachance, which starts him already at the rank of Speaker. This file uses Lucien’s properties but none of the quests – this is Lucien’s life, not that of the other Brother or Sister.
Start the player character with the correct face, gear, class, birth sign, level 5, Speaker of the Dark Brotherhood, start in Fort Farragut. Look at Alternate Start Revamped.
- It is necessary to change default hair and eyes for the Imperial race to make sure that it doesn’t get overwritten. Alternatively, create a custom race and use SetRaceAlias to make it work as Imperial. Check whether race relations work correctly.
- Lucien’s Shadowmere is at the fort – not the original.
- Delay Shivering Isles DLC and modify the start to Vile Lair DLC. The other DLCs can be modified with mods like Delay Those DLCs – I simply don’t have them in my game.
- Give the player the password for the Black Door in Cheydinhal and the key to the well. Put letters into his desk regarding all other locations from the Dark Brotherhood Real Estate, with keys given upon reading. The Anvil house is an exception since it is linked to the completion of Nocturnal’s quest.
- Prevent the Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood quest lines from starting.
- Make all residents of the Sanctuary into companions.
What is the player to do if the standard quests are not available? That depends. There are a number of Dark Brotherhood quest mods on Nexus that one could do, or Lucien could play the modified Purification quest line and the Nightingale quest line. Considering that Lena had already done this in my mind, I could test it with Lucien. In the story I could always argue that Lucien investigated some of the contracts himself, as he wasn’t sure whether everything that was coming from Ungolim by post was in fact genuine. That would also unlock the Anvil property for him.
If Lucien is playing “Catch the Traitor”, members of the Sanctuary stop being potential companions for the duration of that quest. Lucien must do it alone.