People seem to be caught up on the fact that they are called "birthsigns" rather than "constellations." By what I can glean from the article, you are not choosing a birthsign, rather the powers associated with a certain alignment of stars -- or more accurately, doomstones.

The stars will be under our control, what else shall we master the universe will be ours!!! :chaos:

I updated the OP with info I personally haven't heard, or have heard but with a bit more detail.

:brokencomputer:
thank god it isnt in the magazine!

:shrug:

What isn't in the magazine?

What he said is fact, it's just worded in such a way as to imply they are replacing birthsigns with Doomstones, when we've always had them in oblivion. I don't think they lasted forever in oblivion though, as seems to be the case in skyrim, until you get bored of it.

I for one would rather have a normal birthsign, with temporary doomstone effects(even though I never used them )

These are not exactly like the oblivion ones.


These are permanent skill boosts and also include special powers. They are like Births-signs and Doomstones combined.




And it is in the magazine.

Fixed the title for ya.

Hence the quotes....

He's just quoting the magazine.

I gathered that. I just really wanted to drive that point home, and though I knew that cliche could be taken personally and that wasn't the way I intended it, I thought it would serve well to make the point that birthsigns are in fact out, still, and what was confirmed is doomstones. The claim that "birthsigns" are in is then clearly misleading, since doomstones are a separate thing that already existed in Oblivion.

I'm glad to hear that there are 2handed staffs.

yes it does
you hit the rock you get the sign power
didnt say it made since as a replacement for birthsign thing like the past games
just as an actual concept it isnt hard to understand
again, you hit the rock you get the power, not hard to grasp

Not if its represented as a celestial birth sign, signifying the month that the PC was born, and supposedly affecting their personality, aptitudes, and or abilities as a result.

I smell a mod.

Just imagine that you were always born under that sign, but the stone gives you the ability to tap its power.
At least that's what I will do.

This was in Oblivion, you could choose any greater power from Birthsing stones, but they'd replace eachother.
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Doomstones#Doom_Stones

Hmmm, 300 hours, that's 112 hours a week, getting 3 hours to sleep each night along with work, spending 2 minutes or less bathing and using the bathroom, eating while playing...... there goes about 19 days straight of my life.... hahah. :tes: :tes: :tes:

Does that mean COMBAT staffs, or "magiky" staffs with which you can't touch anyone? I'm hoping for a good something with which I can swing, sweep, and thrust my opponents backwards.

Oblivion 20 hrs MQ 100-200 all game?


Skyrim 25-30 hrs MQ 300 all game?



[censored] lol

bethesda can change stuff if they want
signs werent that big of a game changer in the first place
'yay im born under the serpent, now i can poison one thing every 24 hours'
guess they just figured ppl would want to change them around after a while, since its not like any of the signs granted uber spells or anything

That's great that you can "change powers," but what we mean is that it's rather stupid to be "born" under a constellation, then going to CHANGE the constellation under which you were born. This ain't Timeshift. You ain't no time-traveler!

The Doomstones were already in Oblivion. They offered a greater power themed off of the Birthsign (well 13 of them). Unlike the heaven stones you could only have one of the powers at any given time. We will have to wait and see how these play out. They are not birthsigns and should not be advertsed as such. What I would like to know is will they be the same sort of once a day power (a spell and/or a atribute boost of some sort), or will they be a permanent boost (Such as using the Steeed stone and having your running speed boosted by 10%). Next question, are the Heaven Stones around as well?

What disturbs me about this is the tendency to take something that was already in Oblivion, make a slight change, rename it, and then claim that it is a great new feature replacing some previous function that many people liked. This tendency worries me much more than the actual changes and makes me fear for the future of the series.

Edit: 2 of the birthsigns Apprentince and Antronarch were fairly significant in their effects on the game. Both gave a massive magicka boost at the expense of a side effect, several others were permanent stat boosts. The others were spells, but while not particularly powerful could be useful in the early game.

Nope. Circle and R2 are buttons on the PS3 controller. B and RB correspond to those two on the Xbox controller.

same here...

You can block with them, so I guess there is some combat quality. :shrug: