i think ive read this somewhere. i cant remember where though, you have to utilise a skill to be able to pick a perk from that skill's perk tree, but you level in real time, (no more stopping time to level.) and you chose one perk per level.

So there might be perks for attributes then. And is it possible those new skills are related to jumping higher and running faster? If they chose to make agility a skill, or a skill called dodging. Such a skill could easily have running faster and jumping higher as perks.

Yeah, but that could be done by having skill requirements on perks. I think this is the quote you're talking about:


That doesn't really imply that you can only choose from a skill tree if you used that skill to level up.



The new skill is enchanting, I think that's the only one that has been revealed so far (other than things like the reorganizing of blade/blunt into one-hand/two-hand, the renaming of marksman to archery, armorer getting replaced by smithing, etc). But there are only 18 skills in the game, meaning at least one more skill besides mysticism, athletics, and acrobatics needs to be scrapped or combined with another skill just to make room for enchanting. I doubt they would have an agility skill.

No, I'm saying that there is almost no chance that perks affects the new attributes as all perks are bound to skills. Also, it's all but confirmed that there is no new skill that increases jump height or run speed as athletics and acrobatics were cut, not merged.



I don't see the point of needing variable running speeds anyhow. All it breeds is really is the chance to exploit your superior speed over NPCs. Really all the movement speed was supposed to be for is getting around and running away from enemies. The getting around is still there with a set movement speed and getting away from enemies, you have sprint for. Yes, they will probably have sprint also but depending on if you decide to spend your attribute level up when you level on stamina, you could have long stretches of sprinting. I don't get the need for speed in a character, but that's just me, as long as my character moves at a decent speed so I can get around, I'm good with it and sprint adds a little extra flexibility and interesting strategy in combat as you try to conserve stamina and decide when you need to sprint and for how long and so on.

However, increasing your movement speed hasn't been confirmed out as Todd said that everything the old attributes did is still in the game. Speed was an attribute. Stamina may increase movement speed directly (doubtful as I think it increases encumbrance) but it does directly increase your speed by allowing you to sprint for longer periods of time. What alot of people that want speed increase seem to overlook is that Sprint is speed increase incarnate.



It's all but confirmed that you only get to choose a perk from a skill tree if you used that skill to gain an overall level. I think what he was thinking is that when you level you can choose a perk from any tree of his choice, which is almost certainly not how it works.

Where is that all but confirmed? I haven't seen a single thing suggesting that, and I've read tons of articles. In fact I'd say there's one piece of info that might suggest the opposite: Todd said that at level 50 we will have 50 perks. So unless we start out at level 0, you will be able to choose a perk at the beginning of the game, even without using any skills yet.

Actually Speed DID govern Athletics so leveling Athletics DID contribute to your lvl up multiplier for Speed as did Light Armor and Acrobatics. I can see a reason to scrap it just on those facts alone. Three skills that don't all fit neatly under the Speed attribute. How does getting hit in light armor make me faster? And how does my Speed make me jump higher? Acrobatics should have been governed by Agility. Damn this attribute system is so freakin convoluted no wonder they scraqed it and started over.




It's a given really if you think about it. Why would Bethesda further refine and promote the whole "you are what you do" game mechanic just to negate the whole thing by allowing you to pick perks from skills you haven't trained? To assume that Bethesda would do this or basically any of the other hair brain assumptions running rampant on this board is basically saying they are horrible developers or worse, liars.

No you do not need to have gained skill in a skill to get a perk in that skill on l;evel up sheesh people.. You DO need to have enough skill to get higher up perks.

What wintermane said ^^^

In a given perk tree there could be perks that require skill level 0, 25, 50, 75, 100, or even other increments. So anyone can get level 0 perks at any time, but if you want, say, a level 50 alchemy perk, then you have to use alchemy enough to get it to 50 before you can choose that perk.

Alright lets say that every level up you raise alchemy once, and various other skills many times, but then you only choose alchemy perks. By the time you have all the available alchemy perks, your alchemy skill would still be pretty low. So then let's say you do nothing but alchemy, raising it several times until you level up. Now the only perks that would be available are alchemy perks, except oh wait, there are none left to choose. If it worked like you're saying, there would be cases where you can't pick any perk for a level up where you only used one skill, which happens to be a skill you've already gotten all the perks for.

Pretty much this.
@OP,your just going to have to get used to it,like i've said before,many times,they've have done it for a reason......is there an echo in here?

Oh okay, then I agree with your assessment. A lot of people don't realize that the parts of Radiant AI that had to be cut from Oblivion are now in full in Skyrim and even improved upon over the years. So yeah, Skyrim will most likely make Oblivion's AI look archaic in comparison (even though Oblivion will still have one of the best game AI even after Skyrim comes out.)



I think you might have missed some information then. However, the piece of info that suggests the opposite doesn't do so. You will have 50 perks at 50 and yes, you would have to choose a perk at level 1 but most likely, you will unlock that perk after doing a tutorial like run through which you will have increased skills and gone through the basics of the game. So like I said, it's all but confirmed that you will only be able to choose perks from Skill trees of skills you leveled to gain your overall level up.

I have to agree with that man,well said.Oblivion takes such a bashing sometimes,And some people go over the top about saying how bad AI was....when it wasn't all that bad at all.

Do you know which article it might have been from? If you can only choose perks from skills that you used before leveling up last, that leads to problems where you might not be able to pick any perk at all, like I wrote in my previous post's edit. Here:

Alright lets say that every level up you raise alchemy once, and various other skills many times, but then you only choose alchemy perks. By the time you have all the available alchemy perks, your alchemy skill would still be pretty low. So then let's say you do nothing but alchemy, raising it several times until you level up. Now the only perks that would be available are alchemy perks, except oh wait, there are none left to choose. If it worked like you're saying, there would be cases where you can't pick any perk for a level up where you only used one skill, which happens to be a skill you've already gotten all the perks for.

Not nessecarily. you need to USE a skill and level the skill up to level up overall

Edit: i posted a little too quickly, i can see the issue. But why would you go around only using one skill out of 18, that all effect you leveling up?

Yeah, so what happens when you gain a level up using only a skill that you've already chosen all the available perks for?

Why you would do that, well it wouldn't be something that many people would do, but it is something the devs would need to take into consideration. Anyway I remember several times in Morrowind and Oblivion where I would have stockpiles of ingredients, and turn them into potions, gaining 10 levels of alchemy and leveling up on alchemy alone. And it wasn't like I was trying to power level or anything, I just horded a bunch of ingredients and decided to do something with them.

Yes from their natural attributes also, Zorro has high agility and speed while Conan has strength and speed, for one skill can be more then just one governing attribute, thats one of ways to fix flawed implementation of attributes, both has high skills in blades, but one has specialization on broadswords and great sword while another has specialization in rapiers (perks was applied) also take a look at
Governing Attributes
http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=24281


Well certain Birthsigns was also way too optimal for certain playstyles? So devs decide remove them also because some newbs will take a mage for their barbarian?
Thats was before also certain races was better suit to certain roles, and if orc mage wouldn't be optimal because he will never be as good as an Altmer mage seems reasonable is this not?
Orc will never equal to Altmer their cultures has to many differences as well as their religion thats both have impact on their ability development
About caps you are wrong, caps needed for example naturally you cant rise abilities over some limit thats not ultimately better as average for example to 70 all what above will be unnatural actor to has such attributes and can be risen by mystical ways, but certain races have racial bonuses thats apply over limit so Orc mage will has 70 as maxed Intelligence naturally if spend his life for studding magic, while Altmer mage will has 80-90 if spend his life to study magic, all over above can be achived from mystical sources, bot Orc and Altmer start with some points in Intelligence but altmer will has +10 Intelligence as racial trait, all races in TES has equal attribute points sum 320 points just spend in different way, nice if can change and lower minimal starting attributes and invest spare points into another attribute, to simulate even more how hard thats was to character of different race to walk on unusual for his race way of specialization.


Did you read well my post?
Thats good thats premade spells become useful, and thats will be really bad if such spell mechanic will be hardcoded so we cant edit them for balance or create new spells similar to such unique ones.

Another problem is reduction of spell effects in game since thats strike on variability and modding potential, Todd say classical magic was too "spreadsheety" thats apples only spells from ingame spellmaking and premade spells what developers add to game.


Maybe, there is no much info thats can disprove or confirm many aspects thats tied to removed features, Skyrim will be surprise for me only good one or bad one I don't know, I hope it will be good one.

If they will not abble replace attributes in proper way with perks, skills and parameters thats will be dead end, like the same what Arkane Studios put them self when change Arx Fatalis 2 into Dark Messiah, but since Skyrim still has Open world and Modding tools, death end will not the same horrible I believe.

the point of having the system the way it is, is to encourage the use of multiple skills, not just one.

But I see it being possible for the same thing to happen when you use 2 or even 3 skills between level ups. If those skills were ones that you've already chosen the available perks for, you run into problems. And since I seem to be playing a game of edit-tag:

Why you would do that, well it wouldn't be something that many people would do, but it is something the devs would need to take into consideration. Anyway I remember several times in Morrowind and Oblivion where I would have stockpiles of ingredients, and turn them into potions, gaining 10 levels of alchemy and leveling up on alchemy alone. And it wasn't like I was trying to power level or anything, I just horded a bunch of ingredients and decided to do something with them.

Well if you take into account that there will be 180 perks, and you take 180 perks and divide that by how many skills there are.. (18)
you get 10. so 10 perks per skills roughly.. so if you went about it only playing it like that and specializing in only 3 skills, you will hit this roadblock at roughly level 30.

so having said that, i highly doubt throughout your 30 levels of leveling you will only use 3 skills.

I believe the GI magazine article was the most in-depth about perks and how they relate to leveling. Most of it was implied so your not going to have it say it right out but that's why I said it was all but confirmed. But yes, it has been heavily implied that is how it works.

Now to your example, that probably wouldnt be an outcome because you have to take into account that several perks have requirements, like maybe a skill level requirement and also perks have leveled versions as well, so there are multiple tiers to each of the perks as well, so yes, they could pick a perk each level by only leveling alchemy once but they won't be able to pick every perk while having their skill low. The system is meant to reward you for specializing in a few set skills, though it's possible for you to level a lot of skills at once, it's more difficult to do and will hamper your progression and only focusing on one skill will probably shrink your pool of choices for perks in that skill as well.

aprox. 280 perks actually, not 180.

it would be roughly 15 to 16 perks per skill

so the "roadblock" for using only 3 skills would be between 45 and 48. considering that perks are only given until lv50 i'd say it's pretty balanced as you're bound to use more than 3 skills when taking mercantile, speechcraft, smithing and other non combat skills into consideration.

Not 180 perks, but 280.

EDIT: ninja'd

Thank you for the correction, i wasnt 100% sure the amount of perk off the top of my head, but makes my argument that much stronger..

280/18= 15.5556 (lol)

so about 15/16 perks per skill.

Some will have less some will have more. Todd said 12-20.

Unless, of course, you actually can get better at running, jumping and carrying stuff, e.g. by increasing your Stamina and/or Health, or an actual skill such as a potential successor to Athletics and Acrobatics, called "Fitness" or similar. The same skill could potentially include Heavy Armor as well (while a "Stealth" skill includes Security, Sneak and Light Armor) due to the new perk system.

Remember that the Skyrim perks works similarly to Talents in WoW or Feats in AoC.


1) - In Skyrim, you're heroic. You start out as someone who got above average survivability.
2) - In Oblivion you had to run all the time because walking is reaaaally slow, and even then running was really slow and draggy until you got max skill.
3) - In skyrim, your running probably starts on a level equal to 50 Athletics, and Sprinting is probably twice or three times faster than that, as it often is in FPS games.
4) - Athletics and Acrobatics did feel rather grindy, at best.
5) - Almost no other RPGs have running or jumping as a trainable skill, and yet I don't see people complain about that.
6) - Most importantly, having to use hours on increasing skills just to be able to run decently is not very good game sense. Running isn't that interactive, but sprinting can be (because of how its speed can be utilized in the game world (long jumps, etc), potentially).


You basically summed it up right here. Plus the devs have already talked about why they do the things they do.



Bethesda did *NOT* make Fallout New Vegas!!!

Sorry, just felt like pointing that out. :celebration:

I see attributes, skills, and roleplaying already in Skyrim.