Hi everyone!


Say, I have several hundred hours of play time in but have never played the main quest line. Recently however, I decided to do it and cannot get past “A Cornered Rat” on PC. I have tied all of the console command codes out there but none of them work. Sure, I can bypass Esbern and the “Cornered Rat” in the Ratway and go directly to Alduin’s Wall: However, after we get there and my player "has to" talk to Esbern all he says is. “I am not opening this door” and the rest of the dialogue in the “Cornered Rat.”
My question is, “How do I active the quest?” Is there a command code to active the quest --that places it in your journal? thANKS.

Read the wiki , that's usually sufficient. It,s helped me a lot, no need to cheat.

I have read the Wiki several times, in fact, and still nothing works. I reluctantly tried joining the Thieves Guild. That didn’t work either. And, forget about talking to the barmaid in the Bee and Barb. That doesn’t work either. As I stated earlier nothing works: and, I mean nothing. Therefore, doing it properly as you say doesn't work period: and, I mean no disrespect.

OK. I don't get it. You have the secret phrase to say to Esbern or not? Is it that the phrase doesn't work or you can't say it or something else?

IIRC the sequence is you leave the Thalmoor place, go back to that chick in the Inn at Riverwood and get the phrase with the mission to give the phrase to Esbern. Is that what you did?

Getting the phrase isn't even necessary you can go directly to Esben after the Embasy and tell him your dragonborn he'll open the door.

I have everything like the phrase, "What were you doing on the 30th of Frostfall". But, when I get to the door all Esbern says is-- paraphrased-- "I am not opening this door!" And, that's all he keeps saying. I cannot engage him in a conversation. If I click on the "E" again to talk with him he just repeats the same stupid phrase. The problem is that I can't even get Breynjolf or anyone else to talk about Esbern to activate the quest in my journal. Therefore I cannot get Esbern to respond. Plus, none of the so called fixes work. Somehow, I need to get the Quest to activate in order to talk with Esbern. Sure, I can advance to Alduin's Wall --setstage mq203 5-- but Esbern when you try to talk with him still repeats the same stupid phrase from the Ratway.

Does

setstage mq202

help?

I didn't not know about that one. The only one that seems to work is the one I mentioned above. While at Alduin's Wall the game indicates that you need talk with Esbern --as well as after you talk with Paathurnax, he tells you to talk with Esbern. However, when you return to talk with Esbern he still repeats the same phrase from the Ratway.

Forget skipping the talk to the guy. Try that console command and see if that kicks things into gear.

Alright. Just as soon as I start a new game I will.

Console code "setstage mq202 1" doesn't work.

Best I can suggest is you try mq160 and 170 if you haven't. You may have to face that your game is munged beyond repair by console commands perhaps by a mod or a corrupted save file. If so, the only thing I know of is to wind the game back and redo the lead up to this stage and hope that you went back far enough to have started with a clean save file.

Done those too and nothing. That would be restarting the game with zero mods then.