Really sad they didn't make Destruction spells scaling with something like Magicka. That way you would have to sacrify health and stam in order to be as powerfull as melees/archers can be. You would have to find a way to survive with low hp pool while dishing some good damages with your spells. It would be very interesting. It would be a true mage.

I can understand that they don't want to give us too powerfull mages that roll over everything, that would break the game. Then i can't understand they made that possible so easily with melee/archery. I mean, we all want fun and various experiences but it's a little bit of maschism to take the decision to reroll a destru mage after a powerfull character.

In other words please make Destruction interesting in the long term.

I find Destruction to be OP. But that's just me.

have you used the Expert level spells
They are uber strong

I agree with this. It doesn't make sense you can roll your face over the keyboard and win while playing with Melee or Archery but as a Mage it just takes so much longer to clear even the most basic dungeon.



Uber strong compared to Novice spells sure. But compared to Melee and Archery they are really weak. My level 35 Warrior can take out a Draugr Deathlord in one Dual Wield power attack with two Glass Swords.

I just started a new character, Altmer Mage so I'll tell you down the road. However it sounds like the complaints are because you can't exploit destruction like weapons, it svcks.

The closest is the to be interesting one. The thread title throws it off a bit though. It isn't useless by any means, its just that once you get it to 100 there is no where to go and there are probably 20+ levels of advancement ahead of you, and the higher levels come slower so it feels even longer while staying the same power as your enemies grow in power.

Impact needs to be nerfed
Damage needs to scale
ALL higher level spells need to be more mana efficient for all schools, destruction just gets hit the worst due to needing to cast more spell as it uses them for damage.

If you look at the master level spells of every school, they're completely impractical due to the costs. Illusion is probably the worst, as a dual cast pacify(expert) is superior in every way to harmony(master).

Harmony: Creatures and people up to level 25 nearby won't fight for 60 seconds. 927 magicka
Pacify: Creatures and people up to level 20 won't fight for 60 seconds. 256 magicka


Dual cast doubles the effect of Pacify(which is also target-able and AoE), while Harmony(AoE centered on self) can't be dual cast. :/

What people don't get is yes, dual wielding can be powerful but guess what? You can use Conjuration, Destruction, Illusion, etc. You can sit and heal and kill without ever pausing, like you'd have to with potions for a warrior.

The main problem is when you combine the various schools together. This game does not offer much in the way of freedom when it comes to character creation, and you're very limited to a select few options that "work".

Illusion by itself is probaby the single most powerful school until around level 50. It's so powerful because it allows you to play a "stealth" class and do the insane backstabs without actually having a high stealth skill. If you screw up and are detected, no problem! Just cast calm to reset the enemy. It also has the Frenzy line which scales disgustingly well with difficulty. It's not so hot when it's just you and a single target, but that's what Calm is for right?

Conjuration would be a very close second runner up to Illusion simply because it works so well with practically every other direct playstyle, and later on it's so strong that you don't really even need to lift a finger other than to cast your twin Dremoras. This build starts to gain ground around level 50 because enemies do not have a binary "it works" or "it does not work" reaction to getting pounded in the face by your summons and other physical damage sources.

Now if Destruction is not truly bugged (which it seriously seems like it when you consider what NPC mages do compared to your character; which is a massive difference between the physical classes) and they intended it to work the way it does, maybe they were just assuming you were going to pick one of the above schools to go along with it, especially Conjuration. Maybe this is their "logic", but that "logic" falls flat on it's face when you replace Destruction with any other form of damage. The only thing Destruction offers at the higher levels is a stun. And you have people who like to go "lol who nedz dmg when u can stun till it dies?", except you can't really do that without exploiting Enchanting, while none of the other playstyles revolve around a similar exploit.

And please, don't start up with the Smithing + Enchanting + Alchemy nonsense. You don't need any of those for the physical classes to function correctly, and you certainly don't "need" more than Smithing OR Enchanting on the higher difficulties.

Guess what? I don't need to summon meat shields, quaff potions or use crowd control because I one shot everything and have 70%+ damage mitigation.

I've played two Mages at end game and currently my level 35 Warrior is stronger than both of those and he's only in mid range gear that isn't even Enchanted or smithed.

I'm aware, but mages have to play differently. A stealthy light armor guy can't just run in and smash things either.

Each type has different strengths and weaknesses, I have no problem with making Destruction stronger but just because a warrior is stronger doesn't mean a mage is useless.

At end game? Do you mean level 81?

What is a Warriors weakness? Playing as a Destruction Mage you have to constantly kite, chain stun with Impact, run around waiting for Magicka to regen early in the game and you even get one shotted by the occasional enemy. All the extra effort put into playing a Mage isn't rewarded at all. The horrendous early game doesn't lead to a powerful end or even a moderate one.

End game is anything over 55~ because that is when the game stops increasing in difficulty due to levelling.

The thread title is a bit overdone. Destruction isn't useless, but it is definitely in need of some damage tweaks and some fun injection.

I'm not sure what you're arguing about. He's talking about adding either Illusion or Conjuration to the Warrior you already have. Now think about that for a moment. Not everyone plays on Adept level either. Not saying that's a bad thing, but some people (many) play on Expert or above, so you aren't really one-shotting "everything" that's not your basic filler unit. You don't have unlimited stamina, even if a single power attack can kill most enemies. I'm not arguing that Warriors are not easily the most brain dead easy class to play either...because they are.



Until the latest patch it was NPC mages, specifically the one-shot shock mages as well as those who cast an insanely ramped up damage version of Ice Storm and then machine gun fire Ice Spikes at you while you're snared to 20% speed. This was easily circumvented with potions as well as gear with resists, but now it's not. Now, unless you are using a shield with the 50% elemental reduction (only resist mitigation that currently works), Mages utterly slay Warrior types. If the game was currently not bugged, then...not much can do anything against a Warrior at the physical and elemental resist cap (80%).

Precisely. You pointed the problem. We should not have to pause and browse the inventory to use a potion.It is a flaw in the game

I am not concerned. I never used destruction. I rely on stealth and potions.
You can't raise all skills, so I choose the most useful ones for my playstyle, and I almost never play a mage in any game.
As long as you can not cast a spell with a bow equipped I don't care about magic.

You can actually take damage from most melee classes, and unless you get dragon rend and aren't using bows are SOL with flying dragons. Basically you can never be hit with conjuration.

I have a friend playing as a level 40 mage and he claims it's so OP. I wouldn't know, I have a level 50 warrior who still gets knocked around. I'm playing on Expert.

I don't understand how people can be abusing the enchant/smithing so bad that being a warrior is always easy. My mace does 124 damage with a TON of smithing boosts, and my Daedric armor is maxed out. Are only enchants making it overpowered?

So what exactly are you trying to argue? You've basically jumped in this thread to say "HERPDERPDERP I PLAY ON MASTER DERPDERP". Which is nothing more than a exploit crafting/AI or die mode.

Do you know how much Stamina you need to do a power attack? I'll tell you. It's one (1) point. Regardless of how much Stamina you have or how much regen you have you can do a Power Attack every five seconds.

And yes I really am one shotting everything I come across.

I think you mean if you're down to one point you can power attack with 1 point.

Are you playing on Adept? Just curious, cuz on expert my warrior isn't OP at all even with maxed out stuff.

Also I'm sitting here swinging a dagger, and it is 5 seconds to do another power attack once it's empty, and so what? Who does nonstop power attacks?

No, you don't need Enchants to make it "overpowered". Smithing by itself does that just fine. Enchants are just overkill as is having armor above 580. Above that does nothing and the only thing making insane gear is good for is the weapon damage.



Get overly defensive for absolutely no reason at all much? And yes, Mr. Herpderp, I know it only requires a single stamina to power attack. You are the one who made the claim about one-shotting "everything". So are you suggesting that you just stand around until you get your one stamina back? If not, then you certainly are not one-shotting "everything".

One Mage on adept, one on expert and my Warrior is on expert.

I'm curious as to how you're crushing everything with a warrior on expert. How much damage do your weapons do? Like I said 124 +10 Frost damage with my Daedric mace currently, boosted by smithing/potions and apparel to boost my one handed, and perks in one handed.

Very well said. I have a lvl 48 battlemage and im playing on expert. I really regret putting alot of my perks in Destruction. I was forced to use one-handed after my constantly upgraded magicka bar depleted after single enemies and it quickly became MUCH stronger than any destruction spells I have (100 destr. but no master lvl spells yet). Even when using multiple fortify destr. enchantments (not quite enough to be exploiting) it still felt utterly useless against the deathlord filled rooms and constant ancient dragon attacks.

Some of the problem with mages is that a lot of good spells got taken away in order to make shouts more interesting. Case in point - Marked for death. I hope that in the next game we get to see shouts in regular spell form like in previous games. (Imagine if your mage could cast an alteration spell to slow time or move really fast, enervate and knock people around with destruction, or things of that nature.)

Stunlocking most enemies in the game is indeed powerfull. And so are two conjured dremora lords. Or a adept firemage thrall.

Without using alchemy/enchant loop my maces do 420 damage each, that's 840 damage when just dual tap the mouse. With dual power attack you add 50% damage with a powerfull combo and one shot Ancient drakes in Master mode at level 75 (that's with berseker but you just roll over it without it). No need to use stam with random opponents, you make them fly in seconds. No way you can reach that with Destruction, even after well enchanting your stuff. I'm not talking about exploit enchant/alch loop, just maxed out alchemy/smithing/enchantement. Ok we don't have to go that far but hell, that's a good motivation to aim to the best character and maxing that is just a step.