I've gotten to level 30, and so if I were going to figure them out, I would've had them figured out by now, so, yeah, asking for spoilers I guess.

1) I can't figure out which potions to combine to make the purple one (elixer, that raises your resistances)

2) WTF are ropes for? You can pick them up, but they don't show up for sale. If you can pick them up, it seems they must be for something.

3) Went deep into sewers un Rivertown, and found a doorway, and it led me to the StormCastle treasure room. Where I was "imprisoned" (the doorway back was blocked). Anyway, I did everything necessary there, and Zandolar teleports us back to the Dwarven Bread and Inn where, well I won't tell that spoiler since its not important to my question. After which though, Zandalor says he is going to take me or do something to me about the "divine one".

At that point, I got nervous, and restarted from an older game. I was afraid that was moving my toward the end game, when I'm not ready for that yet. Was that the case? Or did I overreact?? Now I wish I had done what he said and THEN reloaded, but nooooo, I didn't think of that.

4) Is there ANY single handed swords that are at least somewhat comparable to the two handed ones in terms of damage dealt?? If it were just close, I would choose the single handed one because then I would get the advantage in my armor of shields (which is a pretty major part of your armor rating). But I can't seem to find any that are even relatively close, thus rendering shields in this obsolete.

From Alchemy Spoiler Thread, mixing stamina (yellow) and restoration (white) potions will give you resistance (purple) potions.

The only ropes that have any use in the game are in the easter egg area (Silver Armour and Treasure Maps) and can be used shortly after they are found. It is better to ignore other rope, so they don't end up stacking together with the 4 that are useful.

When you say you are ready, Zandalor will teleport you to a new area that needs to be cleared. While you have to finish off a level 29 boss type opponent there before you can leave, you shouldn't have too much trouble at level 30.
You get the next main plot quests in the new location (as well as getting your teleporter stones back), but it is not a point of no return, and you can return to other things before continuing with those quests.

The best one handed swords that can be found have up to 71-100 damage; apparently purchased swords can have a 110 max damage. I used a two handed sword through the middle of the game, switching to the holy sword relatively late (more for the bonuses on my dragon shield than the extra armour) and then another unique one handed sword in the final area.

Thank you again Raze. You're really amazing the way you help out folks here.

I thought I had tried all combinations of potions, but just to make sure, loaded up my game and tried to mix Stamina with Restoration and got the standard "It doesn't work with that"
Maybe you have to be level 5 on your alchemy skill??? EDIT: Oops, I just tried again and this time it worked. Maybe it was me being colorblind and trying orange and white instead of yellow and white last time, but whatever the case, it DOES work now. THANKS!

And that's for telling me about the ropes without divulging too much, I really like that. And I am no longer going to pick them up.

As for the one handed swords, I had totally forgotten about the possibility of "special" ones that would likely be close, LOL. I was just going by the stuff I had seen so far, and so far none are all that close to my Swinging Blade and Blade of Chaos. I understand that one handed ones SHOULD be weaker so as to give the player an interesting choice: Sacrifice some damage to get better armor? Or sacrifice some armor to get better damage" If one handed ones did as much damage as two handed ones that decisio becomes uninteresting because it's then a no brainer

Anyway, thanks again.