Well, warriors are typically either really strong or really defense right?
How exactly are tanking mages different? Don't they just rush out and impale the enemy like they do with magic?
And also, as for agile fighters, like the ones that evade attacks, btw do class like barbarians do that since they don't have that much defense?
I mean more like those swordsmen from final fantasy. How come I don't see a similar "agile warrior" class in other rpgs? I mean I'm talking about a class that is pretty much like a rogue except they wield a sword isntead of a dagger.

thanks

I'm not quite sure I see what your question or concern is. If you can imagine a class, then you can build it in Oblivion.

Classes are just a bunch of skills. I guess you can say that just about any rpg, but it is specially so in TES. The 'evade' attacks you're talking about, e.g., would not appear to a Wizard or Fighter in NeverWinter Nights, but to Rogues and Monks. Conversely, Rogues cannot cast spells, nor ca Fighters (unless they multi-class).

In Oblivion, you can make a Barbarian that wears Heavy Armor, is excellent at Sneaking and can cast Destructive Spells (though the Armor will affect somehow the effectiveness). Oh, and he can Dodge too as ANY other class with Acrobatics at 50. And the skill does not even have to be a Major.

EDIT: Addressing your question more precisely, You want an agile warrior (or whatever), just make sure you pump Agility to as high as you can (100). That is all.

I think what you are asking is why can't you use something like a button to dodge aside from incoming attacks, rather than either use Block or just stand there and take the hit? With the idea being for the character to never be hit in the first place, even though they are in melee combat? In Oblivion there is something like that. When you get your http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Acrobatics up to 50 you get the Dodge perk. While holding the block key, press jump and you will leap out of the way. I have never quite gotten the hang of doing it.

Morrowind had this. Agility governed smaller blades I believe, its been a while so I would have to check.

There is no automatic dodge/evade in Oblivion, but there is the combat roll like many others said. As for the class itself, you can literally make any character you can think of; any race can be born under any sign, have any specialization, favor any two attributes, and focus on any 7 skills

Unfortunately, the Dodge Perk is horribly glitched in the game. If you are in melee range and even time your block+jump correctly it will not roll it will simply block and move your character slowly. On top of that once Acrobatics gets to 50 you will always do a power type attack in sneak mode which doesn't do any more damage than your regular sneak attack, but uses the same amount of fatigue as a power attack, and can actually cause you to get spotted and spoil the sneak attack.

However, if you are fast enough you can actually evade a lot of attacks just moving back and forth, but it is not very easy with multiple opponents.

"If you can dream it, you can make it."

By the three thousand Hindi deities... Things are worse than I thought.

Short blades attribute was speed. The skill your thinking of is sanctuary, was the bonus to dunmer instead of summoning a ghost (mysticism spell otherwise) and the thief sign gave a nice bonus to it as well.

As for other RPG's the classes differences actually stem from dice rolls. You need to make an action so you would roll a dice if you got +20 you'd probably do it successfully. To distinguish the characters somewhat they just gave different perks to other dice rolls for some classes. Most game makers tend to keep things the same as a tribute to other games in the best case, and flat out copy it worse case.
Like say you want to chop an orc in half with a mage you roll the dice and get enough to smack him with your enchanted flame staff that shoots fireballs you roll a +20 and successfully hit him physically on the noggin with the staff for 3 damage, should of used a fireball. Then it's the orcs turn he rolls a +5 and misses a swing with his axe at you or you evaded it. Your warrior friend rolls a +20 and chops the orc for 30 damage with his enchanted broadsword of shiny might. Equipment matters as much as skill perks classes get limited in equipment and skill perks to make a difference between the classes to make things more interesting I guess.
Where the dice rolls really come into play for characters is certain types get a bonus to their rolls. A barbarian might roll like a +5 on the dice so his score is 5 to dodge but he has a +bonus to agility like say 3 so his roll with the dice comes to an 8. That means if something wants to hit him with melee it has to roll a +9 or higher.
A tanking mage would be different because instead of dodging he'd cast a spell that increases his dice roll to dodge or reduce damage.

Elder Scrolls III was more of a dice roll type of system oblivion eliminates that since you can't miss if you aimed your attack right one of the reasons sanctuary skill is gone, although it was a lot better perk than summoning a ancestor ghost, unless you're using the antronach sign.

With high Agility and Speed you can just train your own fighting technique to include dodging rather than blocking. As you become faster and faster (by increasing Agility and Speed at every level) it becomes easier for you to evade enemy attacks by simply back paddling or running in corcles around your enemy. This is easier with slow enemies like zombies etc., so you have to be really fast for it to work with humans or Dremoras etc. I've just started using this technique myself at lvl 7 and I take a lot less hits than I used to. Which of course doesn't help increase my block and armor skills, but I like that style.

As for the pure fighter type character, why is it that you cannot exclude magic completely from your skill set? I don't just mean majors. Does every single person in Tamriel know magic??

They have to. There are no toilets, so destruction, alteration or illusion need to be learned at an early age. "Good baby, now make it go away!"

It just seems a little extreme. To me, magic has always throughout RPG been something you'd have to strive to learn. In some games you can't even learn in unless you're particularly gifted, but in Tamriel every Tom, dike and Joe from beggar to Emperor cooks up his dinner with Fireballs, locates his pet with Detect Life and carries his [censored] around using Ease Burden. It just kinda makes magic a whole lot less special to me than it should be. =(

No, the way I see it in Tamriel everyone has capability for magic but most people are weak at it. Very weak to the point where it's impractical. Only Mages, Necromancers, Cultists, and Priests have enough magic power to actually use it effectively. Proof? That's why there's so many warriors. Go to caves. The majority of enemies use melee. Even Goblins. Most Goblins use melee as well and are commanded by a single Goblin Shaman. The person above you was joking. Most people cannot effectively wield Magic. Also in morrowind if you started with no magic majors you don't even start with Magic. I could be wrong but I've always thought that since Cyrodill is the heart of the Empire, given the education, most people at least learn a minor flare and heal spell but more than that requires hard work and dedication. As well as being gifted.

Well, my real point was that it's impossible for me to create a pure fighter, even if I wanted. I would know at least a little bit of magic regardless, which kinda spoils the role playing part for me since I'm playing a fighter. Plus, I can't help but use it when I know it's there, although it feels a bit like cheating.

For my pure fighters sure I have flare and that minor heal spell but they quickly become obsolete. Much more comfortable with a sword and bow. Bow deals more damage than the flair anyway and can be poisoned. Sure you can raise your low minors but a Bow is just as good as destruction and don't got to worry about replenishing Magicka. That's how my fighters justify it. Not to mention "My destruction is low as a minor. Not good at it and my armor further reduces how effective it is. I'll just use my bow."

That's just the way the game is designed. The Elder Scrolls series has always focused on freedom, and that includes the freedom to defy the cliche that warriors must be slow and stupid and mages aren't allowed to sneak, which, frankly, I'm glad is the case. Although in Morrowind, the game didn't give you spells at the very beginning unless you actually chose some magic skills as major or minor skills. Although there was still nothing stopping a warrior from buying spells, and the only thing that might stop you from casting them was your magicka and your skill, the former of which could be increased by increasing intellgence and the latter by training, and in Morrowind, unlike in Oblivion, you could train as much as you wanted, as long as you could afford it. No "five sessions per level" limitation. But regardless, since the game didn't give you basic spells from the start even if you had no skill in those schools, it might be said that it removed some of the temptation for your characters with no magic skills to be healing themselves with magic. But the basic spells given at the start of the game were kind of needed due to the tutorial setup Bethesda decided to go with, as they intended to make it so that you had a chance to try out different skills before actually choosing your class, and the skills you use would then effect what class Baurus would think you were (Not that the class he mentioned mattered, since you could still change it however you wished.) I'd argue that the tutorial still wasn't able to fully allow players to use all skills before using them as it did not have a segment that demonstrated the speechcraft and mercantile skills, but I'm not sure how you'd include those using the escape through the dungeon's setting Bethesda decided to go with anyway. But regardless, the basic spells you get at the start won't stay useful later on, so if you want to use magic, you're still going to need better spells, which you would need to raise your magic skills to cast. All in all, it's a system where your capabilities are determined not by some overly limiting stereotype of what certain class archetypes can do, but by your actual skills, and your class is really just a set of the skills that, in theory, you specialize in. It isn't a perfect system, of course, but I wouldn't want Bethesda to sacrifice the freedom it offers.

Regardless, though, I've never really found it hard to resist using the flare spell given at the start if my characters don't focus on magic, chances are whatever weapon they specialize in will do more damage anyway, the healing spell is a bit more tempting though as it doesn't feel right to be constantly waiting to restore health after combat but I don't want to waste poitions when I'm not in the middle of a battle, but regardless, such a basic spell will eventually become obsolete, especially for warriors since they generally have more health, which means that the amount of damage the spell heals just becomes not enough to really be much use sooner.

I'd argue that the game makes it too easy to succeed at being a "jack of all trades" character, but that's a different issue. The game still doesn't grant you the ability to be good at everything from the start, you need to practice your skills for that, it's just that there really it's not that hard to maximize even your minor skills.

I have always had this basic feeling too. Nirn is a very magical world (and once upon a time was even moreso!), where using simple magic is within the grasp of every Tiberius, Decimus, and Hadrian. My take on it is that while everyone can use magic, without real training and practice you will never get beyond the Novice level. Which is to say beyond a skill value of 5 or 15. Sort of like someone today who can turn on a computer, surf the web, and use email. Basic stuff. But there is still a big difference between that and someone who can troubleshoot problems in a PC, rip it apart, put it back together. Or someone who writes code. The former are the ordinary folks in Tamriel, the latter are the professional mages.

The complication with magic for the "starter kit" is that once you have a learned spell (instead of using a scroll) you keep it for the rest of the game. The rusty iron equipment you find will be dropped, sold or otherwise lost, but the starter spells are yours for life.

The tutorial dungeon could possibly have just given you a lot of scrolls to use up like you do arrows, but then it wouldn't reflect the reality outside the sewers.

But like I've stated. It makes sense to start with two basic spells when you're in the heart of the Empire. You'd think being in the heart of the Empire you'd have a better education than certain other places and have learned basic magical defense and healing by the time of advlthood.

i think this is one of the single best posts in 2010.

I've always seen it the same way. In Arena, if you chose Assassin, you could neve use spells or generate magicka - not even by absorbing it.

Daggerfall allowas you to create a pure 'anti-mage' of sorts by allowing you to choose Inability to Regenerate Magicka. But you must choose the inability in order to, err, be unable to (and btw, even if you do not, you start with a lousy 0,5 * Intelligence, which is almost nothing).

Over the next chapters, magic became more mundane and in a sense, nothing special. Which I disapprove.

I'm not really interested in my character being a Jack Of All Trades, but an agile fighter/thief. It's just odd to me that you don't even have the option of excluding magic. You could just choose to start with 0 skill in magic and no spells, but still have Magicka and the potential to learn. Now I'm stuck with a character I feel it's unnatural to play and cannot be developed the way I'd like in regards to personality and role playing.

I like the freedom TES gives me over any other Computer RPG I've ever tried, but I don't like that I can't 'unselect' certain things. I suppose it goes back to my old RPG roots as I didn't grow up learning about RPG on computers.

Just complaining about it cause it's hard to find anything else to complain about I guess =) *shrug*