I just wanted to clear out some misunderstanding that I have seen while reading some of the posts on the subject.

Attributes have been a very controversial subject, and there is nothing wrong with disagreeing with the change. I just have noticed that some people seem to have the wrong idea about it, so I decide that I would make a thread with the info on the subject. After everybody has a clear understanding on Attributes' role in the game, then we can have a nice intelligent discussion on it.

After reading some of the post, I realize that people seem to get the idea that Attributes are out of the game completely. Yes, it has been trimmed down but the system is still functioning in the game.

As we know, the game has 3 attributes and 18 skills.........with 280 perks.
http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/04/18/skyrim-skills/Skyrim’s Levelling/Skills System Clarified
http://www.gameinformer.com/b/podcasts/archive/2011/02/03/toddhowardse.aspxpodcast interview
http://www.xbox360achievements.org/news/news-8115-Todd-Howard-Talks-Elder-Scrolls-V--Skyrim%E2%80%99s-Engine-Advancements-and-Skill-Streamlining.htmlxbox360achievements

Attributes
Health
Magicka
Fatigue

Their benefits are pretty much self-explanatory

“What we found is that all of those attributes actually did something else, so a fan might say, “You removed my 8 attributes!” and my answer is “Which ones did you want?” “I’ve got to have intelligence because it affects my magika!” “Well now we just have magika.” They all trickled down to something else so we just got rid of that. Now when you level up you can just raise your magika. In Oblivion you had to raise your intelligence, knowing that your intelligence raises your magika to cast more spells. We found that they all trickled down to some other stat.”
--Todd Howard

Perks

There is about 280 perks. The Perks are there to fill in the gap of the attributes they chose to take out. The Perks help improve upon the skills you want to focus on, and help define one's character.

Now that we have all this information out in the open, we can truly have a discussion on whether or not you like the idea.

I personally like the idea but I really want to play it first.

You certainly put some effort into this.

Unfortunately, if people can't read the dozens of other posts on the subject, they won't read yours. It's best to just let them fume.

Attributes needed to go. It's the best thing Beth has done yet. It's what we call "natural evolution".

Sweet! Thanks for the thread! :thumbsup:

^^^
@Frodo67
I know, I just fail to find any threads that educated people on the subject. So I decided to make one=P





Well, it's not completely gone. It is still there, just trimmed

But I only leveled my character's intelligence to make him smarter, not for magic!

Even though my character is as intelligent as I make him, this is DESTROYING SKYRIM AS AN RPG!

I actually like the change. not that the old system doesn't have any potential. It's just... I like trying out new stuff. I'm not sure if I'll end up liking the perk system, but oh well. they're trying out stuff so that we don't have Morrowind 2 or Oblivion 2, but TES 5. And it's their game. So they can try as much stuff as they want to, I'll encourage them

I hate when people say "this is the first thing I'm modding out of the game". Seriously, how can you say that you already don't like something that you never tried?

I'm not a die-hard wanting all the attributes or else, but they provided something that will be missing now as far as I can tell: reasonable commonality between grouped skills. If someone is strong and can wield a mace with great skill, are they a simple novice with an axe just because they haven't used it? Even if they weren't great with it, they should learn faster how to best use it because there is enough commonality. So, high intelligence would mean you gain skill faster in intelligence skills that are lower ranked than your highest intelligence skill.

Well intelligent is there for gameplay for the most part man

Well that's pretty much why they merged blade and blunt this time. Now, if you switch from an axe to a sword, you won't be AS GOOD, but you'll be starting off farther than someone who just picked up a sword.

As for magic... well I'm gonna have to see it before assuming anything

I think he was being sarcastic.

Oh really, my bad! I saw a serious comment about that and thought he was one of them lol

DING DING DING!

They've told us time and time again that attributes are still there just hidden, their functions are shown in different ways.

Then people came out and said that even though they didn't use magic, they leveled intelligence for RP purposes. No pleasing them, let them cry about such a small function.

What I dont get is how they will implement the attributes like agility and luck, which don't really fall under the three categories. Other than that, I really like the idea.

They want a guard to come up to them and tell them, "Well you look like an intelligent fellow." "look at the muscles on you."

280 perks? Was that in the podcast because I've never seen a specific number given to the # of perks, let alone 5 times as many as fallout3 had.

That's part of what makes me love it lol. I want to see how creative they can get in solving that issue, instead of just bashing them for not having them. They might discover something great from experimenting like that you know.

It is in several interviews

Alright. I'll bite. By quoting myself.

The argument is not that there will no longer be a way to increase your damage or the amount of your magicka - the gripe with the removal of attributes has never been about the effects. It's about their function to portray realism and provide another layer of complexity for character-building. By arguing from effects and redundancy, you could just as well remove magic because there are other ways to deal damage. Complexity and options are not redundancies to those who want attributes to stay.

Luck just gave you a small boost in everything. You can do that yourself by leveling everything. A bit more work, but doable. Agility largely covered stagger-prevention, which can be easilly handled by perks.


It was in the GI podcast, yes, Todd specifically says 280 (though I wouldn't doubt that number will fluctuate some, so maybe a few more or less).

they are going all out for Skyrim

I'm so hyped, one of the best thing I've heard is that we no longer have the horrible backwards attribute minor-skill grind system.

Well attributes are still there, and you increase damage using perks I believe. This adds the redundancy because the perks do the same think some of the attributes do. So they took out some of the attributes to use the perks

Todd says the new system is "natural evolution".

Hey, how about you just wait and see how it's all managed before saying they were removed. THEY SAID THEY WERE STILL THERE!!!! And you know, since Agility, Luck, Strenght, Willpower and Personnality don't fit in the 3 attributes we have now. that still leaves the majority of them "not implemented", which makes me think that they would have said they were replaced if they weren't implemented some other way.

WAIT AND SEE

People need to understand that perks are there to improve the skills of your characters. Basically what a lot of the attributes did, and I think that is called redundancy