For all those people out there who haven't played yet and have read "spells don't scale" a million and one times, it's not completely true. There are perks for leveling up fire, shock, and ice spells and there are two levels of those perks. So they DO scale...to a degree at least. You can get better spells: apprentice, adept, master, and expert, and there are perks to make each of those levels of spells cost less Magicka.

the op is a tiny bit to upset about this issue. I play a spellsword Argonian and my magic works just fine. If you want your spells to be stronger maybey you should put it on a lower difficulty, just sayin. Theres no reason to troll and state that others are wrong because there enjoying there mage class. your 100% right facts are facts, fact # 1 Its a video game.

You say that, but what you've done is actually point out a few factual things that have been removed in conjunction with an entirely subjective roleplay-nerf, and then link it to mages being weakened in a subjective sense. There are plenty of people who play as mages and have no problem with the current system. If mages had factually gotten the shaft that couldn't be the case.

News to me, my Breton and Altmer beg to differ.

now you'r e both using faulty logic. Yay forums.

Oh boy here we go again. Melee attacks have perks too, yet they scale with your melee skills in addition to those perks.

I honestly don't care about the attritubte loss, most of them were redundant and did not effect much to begin with. There is, however, no excuse for the complete and utter destruction of the mage role. Not only did they remove most of the really nice spells (unlock, drains, real invisibility, weapon destruction, waterwalking, DOTs and poison related damage from spells, and from Morrowind to Oblivion already removed some awesome ones like levitate and recall) but they have taken out any aspect of roleplay within the mage class. All that is left for a mage is weak offensive spells. There is no more utility to being a mage.

You no longer feel powerful or mage like. You know longer feel like you are anything different than the 12 year old's character next door in heavy armor, with one handed and a fireball. Except you feel A LOT weaker. There is almost no incentive to wear robes for mages, seeing as heavy armor can be enchanted with the same bonuses most robes come with and beyond that there is no incentive. The destruction spells don't scale and you end up becoming the equivalent of a snow ball chucking bully by mid game. By then, warriors and assassins are one shotting just about everything and in better armor.

When confronted with a lock, what is my MAGE forced to do? Whip out a rusty lockpick! Why? Because Bethesda took out all the non-combat oriented spells! But hey, at least I can still cast magelight..... However, I'm sure that will be removed in the next TES game, so don't get too attached.

This game has turned into a hack and slash, sorry to say it but that's the facts. And it really makes me mad to see Bethesda alienating the core group of RPG fans that made Beth what they are today.

I still don't see how I'm using faulty logic

nobody said anything about 1shotting. Many mentioned that the mage should have more utility spells actually.

that said, i don't know why i am all over this thread since i dont play a bloody mage.

Trolling is not at all what the OP is doing. Trolling would imply that this thread was started in an attempt to harass, belittle, or otherwise inflame the people of this forum for the purpose of self-serving pleasure. However, I do have to agree, the angry tone very seriously diminishes the validity of the claim... and the outright attacks on those who disagree is unacceptable.

Still, his anger is not unfounded... and there are a number of folks voicing many similar complaints

So perhaps it would be wisest if you simply be glad that you can enjoy the game... and leave the complaining to those who have complaints to be voiced? Alas... this is the internet, and so no such logic can be assumed to exist here. Pity...

Okay, people have been going back and forth about this, so I've decided to sum up the difference between the two in one post. Note that I'm impartial; I have never played a character that uses destruction magick, and therefore have no opinion on it. But these are the simple STATS about their damage.

To start, allow me to adress the people that claim the issue can be solved via -100% destruction magicka cost.Allow me to translate this suggestion into an oblivion context:

Person 1: "I cant tank enemies, they hit me a few times and I die. Isn't armor underpowered?"(Not really, just an example)

Person 2: "Can't you enchant your armor for 100% chameleon? Why are you complaining?"



The reason is, obviously(to some of us), that is no different from typing 'tgm' into the console. Why even play if the entire basis for the end game is essentially a tweaked way of accessing a console command?



Now, Moving on to the stats:

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Comparison:

One handed Perks: Armsman(100% damage), Bladeseman(20% chance of doing more critical damage(assume 100% extra damage, so equates to 20% damage increase), Dual flurry(35% extra damage) dual savagery(50% extra damage), Savage Strike(25% damage), Fighting Stance(25% more effecient power strikes). Oh, and they can also do power attacks, that about doubles their damage while they can do them.


Destruction Perks: Destruction(50% more effecient), Augmented Fl/Fr/Sh(50% damage), Dual Casting(20% damage boost, 25% less effecient.)

Culminating in...

One Handed: 400% damage, 1200% damage when using power attacks, and 75% normal stamina usage And did you know you can power attack with even one stamina?


Destruction: 180% damage, and 70% stamina usage.


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One Handed Novice Weapon Stats(first perk used): Iron Sword x2: 17 damage per dual strike with no stamina use, ~25 damage per dual power strike.

Destruction Novice Spell Stats(first perk used): Flames x2: 16 damage/second with 12 magicka/second. No power attack available.


Add a second perk, and we get this:

One Handed Novice Weapon Stats(first perk x2): Iron Sword x2: 20 damage per dual strike with no stamina use, 30 damage per dual power strike.

Destruction Novice Spell Stats(Novice Destruction, Dual Casting): Flames x2: 19 damage/second with 17 magicka/second. No power attack available.


Now, let's jump to the endgame, and no enchantments(single skill only.)

One Handed Mastery Weapon Stats(All Perks): Daedric Sword x2 (100 damage per hit, 300 damage per power strike, power strikes now take 75% of previous stamina and stamina meter is much larger. Assume 500 stamina(most points into stamina) Assume 10 power strikes before depleted: Total damage before depletion: 3000 damage, then damage drops to 100 damage per second)

Destruction Mastery Spell Stats(All perks): Lightning Storm Dual Casting (112.5 damage per second, 59 magicka per second. Assume 500 magicka(most points into magicka), lasts for about 10 seconds, for 1125 damage. Magicka regenerates at 3% per second, base, resulting in 28.125 damage per second once magicka is depleted.)


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Now Include Support Skills(Armorer, Enchanting, Alchemy), but all separate(to avoid absurd alchemy/enchanting stacking)

One Handed Boosts: Legendary Daedric Sword+Smithing= 75% damage boost = 175 base damage, 525 power attack damage. + Alchemy = 30% damage = 220 base damage, 680 power attack damage, + Enchanting = +75% damage = 370 base damage = ~1.1k power attack damage.

Destruction Boosts: Smithing: None. 112.5 damage per second. Alchemy: +30% damage, = 146.25 damage per second, Enchanting = zero magicka cost, making this damage perma.



Final Conclusion, with all forms of enchanting:

One Handed: 370 constant damage, ~1.1k power attack damage every ~3 seconds. Average: 613 damage per second.

Destruction: 146.25 damage per second. No power attacks. 146.25 damage per second.


Final Conclusion, without (possibly broken) enchanting:

One Handed: 680 damage for 10 seconds, followed by 211 damage, with 680 power attack damage, average 367. With stamina potions stabilizes at 680.

Destruction: 146.25 damage per second for roughly six seconds, followed by ~28 damage per second indefinately. With magicka potions, stabilizes at 146.25 damage per second.

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These are the stats. Please use them in the future.


EDIT: Final note on one handed; Because the one-handed skill boosts damage itself, but what it does isn't stated anywhere, i didn't include it in this calculation. Theoretically this could mean it does significantly more, but not less, damage than is stated here.

I'm not very far into the game yet, but I'm playing a Level 7 Breton mage, Emperor Palpatine, and I'm doing quite successfully. I use magic 80% or 90% of the time, and use my two-handed sword whenever I'm out of it, so there is a slight battle-mage element to the character. If you want to know, my Destruction is somewhere between 35 to 40, and I use primarily lightening shock attacks.

All those numbers say is that other things (1H and 2H) are stronger. Does knowing those facts make me want to be a mage less? No, I love magic. When everyone whines that 2H or 1H is so much better do I suddenly yearn to go out in heavy armor and wield an axe? No. If my choice is magic the way it is or no magic I'll take it the way it is. I suppose you want everyone to tell you that you are absolutely right and it's a terrible tragedy and, well, I don't know what else. But I can't do it. I know mods will fix a lot of it for those of us who play on the PC and want that, I don't know if Beth will ever do anything about any of it, but I'm not going to take my ball and go home because it's not exactly the way I want it to be. I'm going to play the game the way it is and make the most of it.

Level 48. Master. Kill most enemies in ~4 seconds. Pure mage, using only mage skills.

My mage spells are just as strong as yours. I don't get it, is 4 seconds too slow or something?

It's guys like this that make me question why all the tears...

now you'r e both using faulty logic. Yay forums.

Guys like that are full of sh*t.

What would satisfy you, a video?

The only things that take more than 4s are dragons. I mean really, I'm at the end of the leveling curve. Hardest difficulty. Spells do not scale so mine are exactly as strong as yours.

This isn't skill we're talking about here. I'm not bragging. 4 dualcasted Incinerates kills nearly everything, 2 for most. At range, With a stun. How is that weak?

Lol my logic is faulty? I'm simply pointing out that I'm trying to follow the logical progression provided to us and it doesn't work.

Sure a few things have been removed, but if the reasons are as 'factual' and 'valid' as professed, then there could not be people who are in disagreement over the current system. Also, an arbitrary nerf of an inability to roleplay is neither factual or valid.

Ditto. If anything I am glad that destruction magic isn't overpowered. Watching youtube videos of dual wielders 1-shotting dragons DOES NOT make me want to dual wield with OP weapons and enchantments.

So heres the thing, I DO want to use alchemy and enchanting to the maximum potential, but I don't want it to stop the game from being challenging. Thats the problem with melee + tradeskills is you have to use self-control in order to keep the game challenging.

We don't have to worry about getting 32k crits with our bolts. We can throw out around 600 damage bolts if using all our advantages, and against enemies with 3000 health, i'm perfectly ok with that. (Oh no this boss fight lasts a whole 10 seconds compared to melee's 1 second gib)