Morrowind:Speechcraft

Skill: Speechcraft
Governing Attribute: Personality
Specialization: Stealth
Increase: Successful Persuasion: +1.0 Failed Persuasion: +0.0

Those skilled in the art of Speechcraft influence others by admiring, intimidating, and taunting them. Listeners are more willing to divulge information or to entrust important tasks to the skilled speaker.

Character Creation

The following races receive bonuses to their Speechcraft skill:

• +10 bonus: Imperial

The following classes have Speechcraft as a Major skill:

• Agent, Bard, Healer, Knight, Pilgrim

The following classes have Speechcraft as a Minor skill:

• Acrobat, Rogue, Thief

Factions

The following factions include Speechcraft as one of their favored skills:

• Blades
• Census and Excise (not joinable)
• East Empire Company^BM
• House Hlaalu
• Imperial Cult
• Twin Lamps

Trainers

The Master Trainer of Speechcraft is Skink-in-Tree's-Shade at the Mages' Guild in Wolverine Hall. However, he only offers training to members of the Mages Guild. Other trainers of note are:

• Ruccia Conician in the Grand Council Chambers in Ebonheart (up to 75)
• Caius Cosades at his house in Balmora (up to 70)

See Speechcraft Trainers for the complete list.

Books

The following books will increase your Speechcraft skill:

• Biography of the Wolf Queen
• The Wolf Queen, Book V
• 2920, Second Seed
• The Wolf Queen, Book VII
• 36 Lessons of Vivec, Sermon 27

Persuasion

There are four means of persuasion available to you:

Admire

This is usually the best way to raise someone's Disposition towards you, provided you're skilled at Speechcraft. If you're not, this may have the opposite effect, to the point where they may even attack you. On the other hand, if you want to get attacked, but don't have the skill to taunt effectively, this may be a possible alternative, but it can take some time.

Intimidate

If you can't make them love you, you can always make them fear you instead. This technique may be more effective if you're significantly stronger than the target. Some people may not be impressed, however. Lowers Fight and raises Flee. Disposition raised by Intimidate will lower to below its starting value after the conversation ends. It is not recommended to use on NPCs you will interact with much afterwards.

Taunt

This technique is the best way to get people to hate you. Successfully Taunt somebody enough times, and they will rise to the bait and attack you. This is a good way to have an excuse to kill somebody in front of witnesses, because if they attack first, it's considered self-defense. Raises Fight and lowers Flee.

Bribe

If you lack the skills to either Admire or Intimidate somebody into doing your wishes, a well-placed bribe may do the trick. The larger the bribe, the more likely it will work and the less skill you need. Like the other methods, bribery can also backfire and result in a decrease in disposition.

Notes

• In addition to your speechcraft/Personality scores, chance of success is also dependent on the Disposition your target has towards you, as well as their own speechcraft score. Even at 100 speechcraft/Personality, you're very unlikely to successfully persuade someone at 0 Disposition in any one attempt - especially if they themselves have a high speechcraft. Try Charming them up to around 50 points first, then Admire them to higher levels; they'll still be friendly once the spell wears off.
• It is possible to make a very strong yet very low cost Fortify Speechcraft spell that lasts a mere 2 seconds, which will be very effective for any desired purpose. If a Fortify Skill effect proves hard to come by (as there are none in the base game), a Fortify Personality spell will also work, albeit only about 1/5th as effective.
• If you need to kill somebody, but lack the skills to Taunt them into attacking you (Taunts are much less effective once their Disposition goes down to 0), you can repeatedly bribe them to raise their Disposition and then Taunt again. Eventually you should be able to get them to attack. And after you kill them, you can take all your gold back again.
• Some NPCs will refuse to talk to you, making persuasion impossible. They may respond if you continually try to converse with them, but if not, there is still a trick to get around this: Strip naked - remove all armor, clothing, and jewelry, and then talk to them. You'll get the "Cover yourself! Are you mad? Have you no decency?" response in place of the usual belligerent shove-off, and you can then continue the dialogue as normal. This does not work on Argonians or Khajiits, and it is not guaranteed to work on all NPCs, but in most cases, it is a sneaky way around this problem.
• You can train Speechcraft quickly by intimidating the same person several times. This is more effective if you are a high level, and they are a very low one (try it on commoners). On the PC you can speed this up by moving the dialogue window's "Persuasion" button directly underneath the "Intimidate" button. Fast clicking can beef it up nicely.
• If a person has 0 Disposition towards you and your first successful persuade attempt fails to raise this, then all Disposition points you do manage to gain during that conversation will be lost the next time you talk to that person.
• An optional patch included with the Morrowind Code Patch causes the speech menu to stay open when selecting any of the speech options, saving a great deal of time navigating back and forth between the dialogue and speech menus.
• Maxing out Speechcraft organically is unlikely, even as a major skill, unless one plays as a pacifist. There are few instances where Speechcraft itself is needed, usually Disposition matters and it's affected also by Personality and Reputation. Also at high level fewer attempts at admiring are needed, as each can easily gain 30 disposition points.