You're ingoring me because im telling you the truth, however its not something you want to hear. Very immature, I feel like im talking to my 6 year old right now.

Ahhh so now it's a "what if" situation.

The simple facts are this:

1) Unsupported anything is garbage not just destruction
2) Destruction only requires enchanting; possibly the least perk intensive playstyle out there.
3) Crafting skills are not exploits, with the sole exception of the enchanting/alchemy feedback loop(not used to get 100 cost reduction) everything done by them is straight forward and legit.
4) Impact is OP.
5) #4 makes the need for large damage unnecessary.

6) I'm on a boat.


I never claimed it was good design. The perk system is awful for a sandbox game like TES. It's full of perks that are nothing but noob traps with only a select few being really good.

1, everything is mostly fine except destruction, without any other skills to support it. The closest to destruction, archer, can function perfectly fine on its own in term of damage and survivability.
2, my conjurer needs nothing but a magicka bar and maxed out summoning trees with perks.
3, its exploitation of game mechanic. Major oversight from developer I call it.
4, impact is OP as long as you have a magicka bar. Once it depleted, you have nothing left worthy of 'defensive mechanism'. Forget those elemental cloak. So of course you got the best defense the game has to offer with unlimited magicka.
5, Game mechanis exploitation to reach complete removal of magicka mechanism is a work around, not solution..


Im ignoring you because you werent able to restrain yourself from using derogatory words repeatedly, which I dislike the most, plus the fact you have nothing relevant to the thread but decided to jump in nevertheless. To bad this forum doesnt support ignoring, but I ll try my best from now on. Last post to you

I don't understand why people are having so much trouble with pure mages, I like shoot evrything from far and almost instant kill evrything + dragons are rly easy to kill as a mage. I rerolled assassin because I thought mage was to easy and assassin is quite a bit more challenging actually imo.

you can build other builds if you like, but destruction is pretty awesome, dont listen to all the silly propaganda of people who either didnt like it or dont know how to play it, figure it out for yourself, or at least get information from more... witty... folks.

The biggest issue I have with a mage is that the early spells don't scale well, and you end up with a small palette of high level spells that you use all the time. I have 100s of spells in my mage's spell book but only ever use a small fraction of them. This is not unique to destruction, but all schools suffer from it. For example, Flames at high levels should be pretty powerful as it's short range and should scale better with your level, it seems that once you get past Lv10 or so, it gets less and less effective, the same with the other starter destruction spells. This means you have to switch to the medium and long range spells as their damage output is higher, which makes little sense, longer range advantage PLUS higher damage, erm...

Of course any high level summoning spell has the same issue. The early spells aren't scaling well either, at Level 40, you'd expect Summon familar to summon a Wraith Lord or whatever, at the very least summoning something akin to your level, but no, you still get a Wolf or whatever it is...

Why don't you use destruction as main tree and conjuration as a backup like I did on my mage.

Oh wow, really? Everything I'm saying is a complete lie? Which is why many people that play a pure mage will agree just how completely overpowered the combination of Alteration, Illusion, and Conjuration is right? Hell, tack on Restoration and you have a build so broken it trivializes the entire game and requires damn close to zero effort on your part. Now the sad thing is, you don't even have to abuse Smithing, Alchemy, and Enchanting (100% cost reduction is hard-set in the game, it was meant to be done due to high spell cost) to do it! Oh woe is me that everyone but you is just spouting lies.

But no, we are lying because we carry multiple sets of gear for magicka cost reduction in two schools and magic resistance, that we use heavy armor with high health due to not needing magicka.
So let's see, I tank physical damage as good as any warrior, I have 85% magic resistance so I take little magic damage while absorbing some of it (not like I need it), 2 permanent summons, a bound bow that does 386 sneak attack damage that I can shoot off just as fast as spells, I can frenzy/calm my enemies, plus my spells are silent. The only way I can die is if I did so deliberately.

But no, your right, myself and many others are full of crap and you're completely right... Not.

Get the hell over yourself. No one cares about your ego, so go stroke it somewhere else.

Edit - @ Kronpas: The forum does support ignoring. Go to Settings -> Profile -> Manage Ignored Users -> Type in name, check both boxes -> Save Changes

1- no, anyone who played the game to minimal levels and content (on master at least) will know this simply isnt true, even them ost independant skill of them all (conjuring, wich is based on spawning creatures to fight for you) will need survival and/or control backup in the 1-20 and 30-50+ ish stages of the game.
every other skill needs to be supported by either 1 or more other skills, all melee builds require support from smithing, any melee build needs support from armor skill and/or block skill, illusion doesnt work well at all on its own, neither does alteration... so on so on... theres offencive, defencive and supportive skills that are needed in synergy to each other.

2-play on harder difficulties and play more content of the game, not even with twin souls (wich you should get only in late stages of the game, unless you are one of the silies that uses console and then plays in the 1-10 levels content and feels "imba") will be enough to avoid you being shot from range, agroed by mobs or your sumons kiled.

3-agree

4-impact needs to be a proc rate I agree, but a mage resorts to downranking of spells to avoid going out of mana or when hes low on mana to keep casting if need be, aswell as staves, enchanted/poisoned daggers etc, a pure mage doesnt mean you can only use spells cast by yourself, you should also have long term buffs from alteration or low mana cost defences from ivnisibility etc

5- agree, yet I have no problems with mana from lvl 30-52 at all without exploiting, its all about itemizing properly, I do run out of manas, but only in very long/difficult fights, to wich I use pots or resort to my dagger staff, while mana recharges.


as for the constant missinformation being thrown around about destruction damage being low
FACT:
a smithing one handed daedriv sword does LESS dps than the base dmg spells (expert) of a destro mage.
two handed and duals, compete with it on long term dmg, but they dont come near destro mage burst dmg potential at all.
melee only surpresses it with exploitation of 3 crafting trees, and even THEN only in single target dps, a mage can sustain high dps on multiple targets.
not to mention specing for alchemy gives you pretty imba pots that boosts your dmg too.

Actually, magic resist caps at 80-85% more or less. Also, please stop using that unreadable color XD Light blue on white background hurts my eyes.

Aye, thanks for pointing that out, I posted the listed amount not the actual amount, corrected. As far as the text color, sorry it's so painful, I use it so it's easier for me to read. Though I am curious as to how your background is white while mine is black with Dohvakiin in the background. :confused:

waiting to play a pure mage UNTIL beth fixes the favorites menu and hotkey bugs.

switching spells can be a tough nut seeing my spells dont show up in my hands .....

Didn't read the other posts, but meh i think it's fine. Dragonflesh (Dragonhide?) + EbonyFlesh = 300 Armour and 80% damage reduction from physical. Being a Breton + Gear + Alteration = 80% magic resist, 30% magic absorb. Clicking lightning storm and firing my laser, priceless. Nothing kills me and i just watch health drain away. Even if it is slower than my level 30 (level 44 Breton) argonian fighter dealing more damage with his sword, it's still damn fun.

And this is coming from someone who never exploited destruction back in the old days (Weakness to Magicka 100%, Weakness to Magicka(2) 100%, repeat, and then death to anything).

Im kinda confused (and havnt tested it much) of how the absorb thing works in Skyrim, does it reduce dmg by that % additive or multiplicative to the "dmg block" perk? or just absorbs the mana?

I didn't look into it much but it's very probably the same as in previous games : a chance to nullify completely a spell and absorb the casting cost for yourself. Reason is that Conjuration spells often get absorbed by yourself when you cast them and nothing happens XD

Ah yes, because this is an FPS called Halo.

No.
This is an RPG.
And an RPG in which I cannot level past 20 as a mage unless Im 'having a problem', well that means it is broken, now doesnt it?
Sheer fact is destruction at level 50+ is useful only in a rare specialist occasions, and not as a main means of attack.

'Dont level past level 20 then', by Julianos how far can this malarky go?

I know right? Least not we forget we can't halt leveling at a level of our choosing even if we wanted to in Skyrim without cheating our way backwards in level.
I can see it now...

Ok, I'm level 20, time to stop leveling. *Speech increased to XX, Level Up* Oh god damnit!

FYI, I've changed my background too (you can do it at the bottom left of the page) because having a big picture of Dovakhiin would look quite suspicious at work. The light blue is nearly impossible to read on the pale background I have. Red would be a lot better...

Exactly. Besides I don't see what's more readable with that ugly light blue color in the other color scheme available than the default.

Yes, it is true that the other schools can make up for the fact that Destruction stops scaling entirely, while the game and all its content continue to scale away from it. Then again, you can go with the other schools, not waste points in Destruction, and do just as well if not better.

Damage skills:

1: One-handed
2: Two-handed
3: Archery
4: Destruction

You have to rely on one of these skills, or at the least the use of the weapons included in these skills, to deal damage.

Now.
Keep in mind:
ANYONE with ANY BUILD can cast ANY SPELL without ANY investment in mana, so don't even go there, arguing that destruction synergizes with other spells because you can use your mana pool for restoration because your destruction spells are cast free because a cap that obviously should have been there, isn't there: It works both ways; Any character in the game can cast any destruction spell, from sword and board to "destruction mages" -- and they all will have the same spell-power.

IF anyone could learn ANY destruction spell -- which I don't see any reason for them not to, when everyone can use any weapon -- why even invest heavily in destruction when anyone can cast the spells for free?
The only thing destruction has going for it is the fact that non-destruction-users cannot find or learn the expert level spells!!!!!!!
There should OBIOUSLY have been a limit to the reduction of mana cost at 50% or even 65% reduction; 100% is just plain silly.
Where are the 100% reduced stamina cost items that allow warriors to power-attack 24/7?

Now over to the synergies between the different classes.

First off:

Damage scaling:
Alchemy can increase the damage of:
1, 2, 3 and 4.

Enchantment can increase the damage of:
1, 2 and 3

Smithing can increase the damage of:
1, 2 and 3

Damage scales naturally, when used and leveled up, for:
1, 2 and 3

------------------------------------------

Back-up skills:
Conjuration can be used as a back-up skill for:
1, 2, 3 and 4

Alteration can be used as a back-up skill for:
1, 2, 3 and 4

Illusion can be used as a back-up skill for:
1, 2, 3 and 4

Restor...

...
We can all see where this is going.
There is NO POINT in discussing the 0 mana cost -- everyone can do the same with any other class.
There is NO POINT in discussing the use of potions -- everyone can do the same with any other class, the difference being that an archer can one-hit-kill the target with the arrow the mage uses to inflict the weakness to element potions with.

To use destruction effectively, you HAVE TO have cost reduction gear, as mana regen is useless in combat.
There is ONE destruction build that works: Destruction-enchanting
There is ONE destruction build that works on master: Destruction-enchanting-alchemists
Other classes, like the archer, can buy and find items that improve their archery damage.

They can also increase their damage PERMANENTLY while in town, BEFORE questing.
Destruction mages can only increase their damage temporarily WHEN in the field, and only because the game has been dumbed down from oblivion; You can drink 50 gallons per hour.

Compare that to the number of archer builds that work on master:
Archer-conjurers
Stealth-archers
Illusion-archers
archer archers
Archer archer archers
Light armor archers
Heavy armor one-handed archers... EVERY build with one type of defense (except blocking) + archery is viable. Every utility-skill + archery is viable.

Heck, I bet archery-pickpockets are more effective than destruction mages, where neither resorts to cheese like 100% reduced mana costs (which is the magic-user equalient of drinking a store-bought potion of enchanting before making gear to improve smithing for then to smith a bow after drinking a store-bought potion of smithing for then to enchant the gear after drinking a potion of store-bought fortify enchantment; Using what is readily available in the game for making better equipment.

Heck, using alchemy to increase enchanting and enchanting to increase alchemy is arguably LESS abusive than crafting 100% mana reduction gear; It is reasonable within the game mechanics and game world logic:
IF A can increase B, and B can increase A -- you have an infinite loop right there. It's not even impossible from a real world physics perspective (if you allow the harvest of finite but almost infinately abundant energy like the nuclear core forces), and ingame there's freaking MAGIC which breaks the real world laws of physics.

Gear paying the ENTIRE mana cost for an infinite amount of spells, however... is less likely.
In the real world examply, you get finite energy that is more potent than the energy spent on harvesting it.
With zero mana cost, you get infinite energy from a small investment, which is more unrealistic, even with magic involved, than increasing skills through magical enhancements of skills that increase skills.

Destruction is challenging...
But so is hand to hand.

I'm starting to see the problem, all these min/maxers that feel there is only a handful of "correct" ways to play and if you don't fall in line with that well damn you just svck.

Go back to WoW, where everyone ends up the same. Using all the same gems, enchants, buffs etc. because that is obviously your game. The Elder Scrolls is an open RPG, where you are free to play who you want, within reason, so if I want to play a Mage using Alteration, Restoration, Enchanting (without trivializing magicka costs) and use Destruction as my damage source then there is no reason it should not be viable.

With so many people providing well thought out, hard evidence about the kind of setup mentioned above, I can't believe anyone can make the kind of arguments I'm seeing. Destruction spells don't even scale! No scaling whatsoever! Does that sound right? Certainly not seeing as just about everything else does scale.

I'm sure someone will have something totally smart to say about this.

Use the other schools along with destruction.

There you have it, your smart answer :goodjob:

So uh, where did you get the magicka to cast a master spell at?