Arx Fatalis walkthrough level 1 - Yellow Tulip Tavern, Human Outpost, City of Arx, Palace

Our Notes:

You can rob Tafiok's chest while he is in his home and he does not react.
He stays here from the time you report the outpost attack to King Lunshire, until you return the Troll Idol to the Troll King Pog AND report back to King Lunshire.
Prior to you returning the Troll Idol, you can use Uncut Gems and Gem Dealer Licenses on him, and he pays 180 gold for each.

While he is here, his shop is locked, so that is the only time you can lockpick that door for XP.

It is very hard even at Skill 85. If you don't have enough lockpicking skill, you can try lockpicking your way down into the Crypt, and from there exit to [level 5] and the traders there to buy the Stregum Rune necessary for Bless (Mega Stregum Vitae).
Each time you re-enter this area, the door locks and you can pick it again for XP. Since it is so hard, you are unlikely to realistically get that many attempts unless you simply reload to avoid Durability loss on your Tools.

[5 Maria's General Store] After Shany is rescued, returning her and opening the door to the shop starts a cutscene dialogue. Despite what Maria says, the reward from the shopkeeper is 2 potions given during the cutscene. You cannot take anything from her store inventory for free.
[7bis] You do not actually need the book to trigger the cultists at the rendezvous point.
[9 Smithy]

The smith does not appear until report the outpost attack to King Lunshire. This is your opportunity to lockpick the door, but at this early stage of the game you will have to invest heavily in the skill to do so (even at 60 skill, it is "too complicated" and you have no chance at all). See note at [4bis] about how to try to get around this.
There are three unfinished swords. You can finish crafting them and take them or sell them to the smith. Put them on the forge, use the bellows to heat them up, then use a blacksmith hammer on them while they are glowing orange-hot.
Try to stack items and use space in the store chests efficiently as you may sell a lot of items before the store resets its inventory and clears out all the items you sold.
Intuition has no effect on repair price when you use an item on Miguel to have him repair it.

Prior to ending the Troll Strike, you can buy Mining Shares here at a reduced price. Once you have ended the strike by reporting it to Goblin King Alotar, you can sell them at a greatly increased price, BUT you must sell them back to the chest they were initially stored in.
Even if the Banker is not in the Bank, you cannot rob the store inventory chests -- opening them starts the buy/sell interface. If the Banker is not there, however, you are still trespassing and city guards will try to kill you.
If you are standing inside the enclosed vault area (left side with two trapped chests), you are typically not visible to anyone outside of that area. So you can pick up gold from the table and loot the chests without needing to be invisible.

[13 Arx Castle Main Hall] As part of the main quest, you will be met by Sister Chinkashh who gives you Mega Spacium runes and teaches you that spell to activate the teleporters -- but only if you haven't already activated any of the portals.
[19 Research Lab] Prior to receiving the quest to investigate Falan's death, you can lockpick into the lab and speak with Felnor (and after the cutscene, the chests in that room unlock; they cannot be picked). Felnor gives partial dialog related to the quest but the quest itself does not appear to be broken by doing this.
[36 Crypt] At a relatively low Skill you can lockpick your way in early and get the Shield of the Ancients, which has no requirements to wield and is indestructible.
[39 Drawbridge, 49 Ortiern] Both these guards will die once you have the Gem Dealer's License from Ortiern and you leave the outpost for the first time. You could kill them first for XP. Trying to heal them with a potion apparently makes no difference.
[41 "Yellow Tulip" Adventurer Inn]

To complete the side quest you need to buy him a beer from the innkeeper downstairs. If he disappears but you can still hear him shouting at the innkeeper for beer, just put the beer on the table in front of him anyway. The beer should vanish, indicating that he drank it. The quest continues normally.
The wall on his left has the first hint for Oliver's quest.

The wheel of fortune gambler at the inn leaves after you win twice, no matter the amount. You can reload-to-win a maximum of 600 gold by placing all three tokens on the same number, and spin / reload until that number wins twice.Since you will shortly get so much money in the game (as long as you diligently pick up every weapon and armor and sell it), it is pointless to really waste your time doing this.
The innkeeper has a key to the metal door leading to the cult area. You can thereby gain access to this area quite early, but will probably make the inn hostile to you unless you pickpocket it from her. You cannot lockpick the door.
There is a Ylsid right behind the metal door that requires a password.

He cannot be lured out with spell damage thereby tricked into opening the door for you. You can use this to your advantage by casting Aam Yok Spacium from the outside and burn him to death behind the door for an easy 500xp (although he CAN chop you from behind the door if you stand too close).
If you want to gain entry the "normal" way with the password, you must not kill the Ylside so as there would then be no one to talk to or open the door for you. Once inside and down the stairs, a level 1 character strong in magic (70+) can clear all the priests quite easily with Magic Missile or Fireball, both available by the time you exit the Goblin Prison.
If you give the password, the Ylsid does not attack you. When you enter [level 2 area 37 Meteor Chamber], the Ylsid disappears.

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