What the hell is this? I'm on PS3 and have been clearing every dungeon with pure Destruction from the start lol. It's been on Expert from the start. And my other destruction/shield character has gone through the first few dungeons on Master no problem. Why is everyone saying destruction is bad? It's not lol.

what are you even talking about? destruction blows, buster

That's the sheeple answer and doesn't explain why destruction ITESELF is fine. Having to rely on other skill for it's damage output is hardly fine... Having to abuse enchanting in order to simply cast more than 3-4 high end spells is hardly "fine". YOU are just ok with it, THAT is what you mean to say.

Are you STILL talking??? Go back to WoW!

And I think it's extremely noticeable because everything that scales and adds together for warrior builds is very easy to do and comes in essential a many benefits in 1 Skill. This helps immensely in dealing with not running into temporary scaling walls as a warrior build. Smithing is A. VERY easy to level. B. Assists both defense and attack capabilities. without requiring resource management like you have with mages. Combine relatively easy to get One Handed/Two Handed % to damage enchants AND the Skill Tree damage enhancements it becomes VERY VERY easy to accelerate your damage output without skill dumping too much to level a ton. AND you have really no resource management to deal with except for Stamina and it's not tied so directly to damage output the way magicka is to mages.

Combine that with highly limited ways to scale damage spells and it gets ugly quick. Destruction probably needed a % based overall damage boost perk like the One Handed/Two Handed trees with multiple purchases though probably scaled differently along with % to Fire spells/Frost spells,etc enchants to supplement with the utility/tanking,etc benefits of the other magic schools.

I prefer playing warrior/assassin types in most TES games but after playing quite a number of characters on Skyrim so far the gulf has been noticeable.

Thank you for mentioning the % damage enchantments, because I forgot about that as well.

There is currently no way under enchanting to increase the damage of any magical skill. So melee characters have smithing, enchanting, AND alchemy to increase their damage. Mages only get alchemy. In addition, %cost reduction enchantments do not increase DPS, they only maintain it. So whatever you damage before your %cost enchantments, is what it will be after your %cost enchantments, only you can keep that damage going indefinitely, which doesn't make that much of a difference because your damage, either way, is still not scaled and thus is abysmal.

In fact, the only thing that the %cost enchantments REALLY allow Destruction to do is abuse the Impact perk. You don't kill someone with supernatural elements so much as cover them in infinite wet paper bags (in the form of Impact stuns) until they run out of the energy required to break them.

So not only do weapon skills scale normally, they also scale artificially through enchanting, smithing, AND alchemy, while destruction does not scale and only gets a damage boost from alchemy.

Since everything is percentage based instead of simply additive it's very evident since every melee boost feeds into each other. Better gear=better base damage=exponentially increasing benefits from % to damage boosts. A DLC or something REALLY needs to add balanced damage scaling to Destruction. I would also say maybe to Conjuration based summons but I'm not sure how well the boosts in the Skill Perk tree scale to enemies.

what you do is dont spam a single spell or school

Go try 1h/2h or archery without ANY other skills. Tell me how that turns out for you.

The OP seems to be asking about using Destruction as a primary source of DPS, so why are other classes even mentioned? They may have superior damage to a 'pure' mage class, but I'm finding Destruction to be entirely viable and very fun to play. I'm also playing against the game, not TES:V Multiplayer. (Keep in mind I'm only level 30, so I could be in for some unpleasant surprises later in the game. )

Granted, I'm running around in jumped up bathrobes and low level creatures can be extremely dangerous, so I must exercise some caution while pillaging Skyrim of it's most valuable and magical goods; therefore, I am very sneaky and hard to detect. Close combat usually results in a lot of pain, so I carry some potions to heal myself in emergency situations, and some restore magicka potions for the same. I rarely use them and don't craft potions, although I packrat like mad in case I decide to later..

I'm Dragonborn so I shout a lot. Projecting a whisper into the far corner of a cavern is a good way to provide for some misdirection. Power Word: Kill (heh) is a means of softening enemies up before I finish them off. Fus Ro Dah is often useful for additional stunlock if necessary. I rarely need anything more powerful than Firebolt to stagger and kill enemies, and low level mobs usually die in a couple of hits.

I do take time out of my busy schedule to trap souls, and in between tavern visits in town my hobby is enchanting Iron knives to amass wealth and skill.

The other schools of magic--sigh, I do use them. Healing while hidden has proved useful from time to time. Summoning a globe of light helps me find loot. Trapping souls for fun and profit--I've already mentioned it. Summoning atronachs is occasionally useful as a diversion (especially with Falmer), but I'm disinclined to share my company with others. I *am* starting to feel guilty about the dark looks Lydia has been directing at me lately. She's been gaining weight, what with all the cinnabuns she's been eating in my humble abode.

Eventually my labors with Enchanting will result in some seriously nice gear--I think I'll keep my Archmage robes--and Skyrim will learn the horror they have created when they tried, and failed, to put yet another Dunmer refugee to death.

I am doing what amounts to an "Oblivion like under-level" build where you only really increase destruction you don't have to use enchantments, however I do use alchemy to regen my magic and regen health. I don't think destruction mages can compete at higher levels when compared to the easy of use of a rogue or warrior but this character will never be level 40 but this works for me and is an alternative that other destruction mages can do until Bethesda releases a weakness to magic/x spell.

EDIT:"(Keep in mind I'm only level 30, so I could be in for some unpleasant surprises later in the game. )"

It gets noticeably different at +40 you can't kill things off fast enough

atleast they have a choice of skills and builds, and dont' have to exploit.

See my post:


No one said that they wanted to use ONLY destruction, but we DID say that destruction, being the ONLY DIRECT DAMAGE SKILL FOR MAGES, should be able to HOLD ITS OWN. Why is it that a warrior can use armor and a single weapon skill and be able to do just fine, but a mage using, say, conjuration and destruction CAN NOT COMPETE WITH DESTRUCTION? I do use other skills, but destruction is STILL my only way to do direct damage as a mage. So as much as I hate to go back and use it, I am FORCED TO because I don't have ANY OTHER OPTION.

I would also note that the other Skills don't seem to scale well either. Conjuration has a lot going for it but on my initial observations certain spells get outclassed fast. That said it's still a fantastic tree if not THE best of the mage skills. Bound weapons with perks are great and I found the duration and distance perks for summons to be good so far. Though the rate stuff like familiar gets outdone is fairly said. Even flame astro. gets outclasses fairly early on even against some enemies vulnerable to fire. Illusion's Fury line is good though it requires a lot more investment to stay relevant than say weapons do. Resto is fine, it does what it's made to do though I can't speak a lot yet on the utility non healing in the school yet so anyone else got observations on that please share. Wards are horrible though and shares the same resources issue as Alteration does. Not sure how much better that gets with Alteration high end perks yet though.

The biggest issue is really almost all of the trees don't scale or transition well(from Novice up,etc) very smoothly.

Destruction, useless? Since when? I've done nothing but kick ass with it.

Destruction is messed up because as you advance, the "low level" spells are no longer used. And some of them (flame, spark, frost) are really cool spells that just have no application outside of killing skeevers at later levels.

It's a completely messed up skill, and it deserves more thought than has been put into it. (Note: I am not saying it needs to be more powerful, it needs to be fixed.)

Does magicka even affect spell power or damage anymore? In Oblivion and MW one of the side effects of a huge magicka pool was your spells became godly. In Skyrim there is no point in putting points in magicka past a certain level because with enchantments you get free casting and no damage boost.

Also, in Skyrim, as you level up you leave the old weak spells behind and use the new ones. Seems backwards, as a mage's spells should ALL be useful as he/she learns the arts.

If you want to be a glass cannon, enchant 4 items with 25% Destruction spell cost. Every spell will cost 0 magicka.

Wear glass armor, hold back before contact and pull out Lightning Storm, and nothing will touch you. There, glass cannon.

I just killed an Elder Dragon by holding down one stream of Lightning Storm on it until it was dead.

Destruction can be overpowered if you want it to be, even on Expert or Master difficulty at level 40. You just need to get a high enchanting skill, put in the effort to get the best spells, and come up with strategies for each enemy. Curious how well Lightning Storm will work at level 50 without damage scaling, but guess I'll see.

LOL

Another odd this is that some spells, like the runes, are bad the moment you buy them, but because of their insane cost, you can't even use them until you get the perk for them, even though by the time you're high enough skilled to get the perk, the enemies are scaled too high and the rune does crap damage for the mana cost compared to spells like Lightning Bolt.

READ the post! What other skill do you need other than your weapon of choice to deal viable damage? Don't say smithing and enchanting because you don't.

Destruction is great fighting against mage users who can one-hit you with a weapon. Use the ward mana restore perk and you have loads of mana to fire destruction spells. Destro isn't so great against multiple 2 handed enemies but you can always use another tree to combat this. Conjuration helps a lot.

Some ppl including me have problem with zero magicka cost builds or builds that focus on carrying around bow and number of pots. I think destro is nice utility school of magic when you couple it with other dps style, but alone with just support skills it has issues.

Sigh. Another thread like this?

I'm a level 29 destruction/conjuration mage with no problems. And I'm not playing with mods. I play on Expert and sometimes Master.

My advice is two-fold:

1) Summon an atronach that matches your destruction school so they aren't damaged (while using a frost atronach, use ice destruction spells, fire with fire, etc)

and

2) Get another mage companion because then you don't have to deal with AoE issues with your spells since they are ranged and hang in the back. Another conjuration mage from the college and you are nearly unstoppable.

Sigh ... another reply suggesting to use companion and conjuration. With companion and conjuration you don't need destruction, you just need to sit back and chill out.

Nope you have to be active in combat as well. If I don't watch it, I die. Why would I play the game if I was just chilling out?