Shroud Hearth Barrow Is Skyrim's Greatest Dungeon

thegamer.com:

I love a good dungeon crawl. Plunging the depths of an ancient, forbidden place, unearthing its history, battling the evil denizens lurking within, and plundering their treasure. I also love that feeling of emerging back into the daylight, battered and bruised, levelled up, with a sack full of loot (and junk) to sell. You head to a cosy tavern in a nearby town, rest, regroup, and dump your spoils on the counter of some lucky merchant. It's an important ritual in any good medieval fantasy RPG, including Skyrim.

There are just under 200 dungeons in Skyrim, but not all of them are good. For every memorable one there are a dozen repetitive Draugr crypts, Dwarven ruins, or Falmer hives to slog through, with no interesting stories to tell. The level-based randomised loot also means that they can feel anticlimactic too, especially early in the game. You defeat a powerful boss, reveal a comically oversized treasure chest, and excitedly open it, only to find an iron sword with a weak enchantment and 56 gold.

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But there's one dungeon in Skyrim that stands above the rest. If you travel to the sleepy town of Ivarstead, nestled at the foot of the Throat of the World, and head to the Vilemyr Inn, you'll meet a fellow named Wilhelm. He's the proprietor of this fine establishment, but his business is suffering. Spirits have been sighted at the entrance of a nearby tomb, and it's making his patrons nervous. "Who'd want to rent a room near a haunted barrow?" he laments, triggering a quest called Lifting the Shroud.

Straight away, you're invested. You want to help Wilhelm, because he seems like a decent guy, but you're also intrigued by what's inside the barrow. It's a great setup for a