Three effects of magic in Oblivion was overpowered, chameleon 100 however this was most true for enchantments and in a lesser degree potions. The spell had very short duration until you got illusion up to 75, at this time you had decent timed command level 25 spells who was the other overpowered aspect, very nice to get goblin warlords to fight the other goblins.
Destruction with weakness to magic + weakness to elemental was overpowered.

In Morrowind magic was underpowered with the exception of cast on use items. Yes with fortify intelligence potions it was ridiculous overpowered

Did sombody say hate?

The reasons why we wizards are so awesome, and why rouges and warriors hate us, is because anything either of those two archetypes can do, wizards can do better. Wack me with a sword? Poof! Dead! Need to be sneaky? Poof! Invisible! Armor? Poof! Robes with an AR of 50! Need to open door or lock? Poof! Open! Need to persuade someone? Poof! Charmed!

See what I'm getting at?

Magic is not over powered. Magic is abusable.

Yes, I think some of the magic in TES is overpowered. Why? Not because I hate magic. Not because I don't like very powerful endgame characters. It's because the overpowered magic is so easy to obtain/use and is only used (effectively) by the player.

For example invisibility. The player can easily escape from all enemies instantly by using that spell. It's pretty easy to learn an invisibility spell, any mid-level character has access to it. You can circumvent any dangerous situation without any challenge. Now I wouldn't even mind a powerful spell like that, but why do NPCs never try to dispel it when they see the player using it? And why do NPCs not make any (clever) use of it? There are (only very few) NPCs who cast invisibility once the player has already seen them and immediately dispel it once they're close enough to fight. Doh. If they would use it like they player does I wouldn't have that much of a problem with it. If their health is low they should cast invisibility and run away until they're safe. Annoying? You wanted an overpowered spell, now here it is for everyone to use. If they see you they should cast it and take their time sneaking up on you. Not run in a straight line to the player like idiots. That would be thrilling, the way the AI handles it in Oblivion (and most likely will in Skyrim) is just idiotic and pointless.

Same goes for exploits like weakness stacking. I've heard many people who think this is a good idea for powerful mages. Fine. Then let NPCs do the same. Let them stack weakness spells on the player and then cast a 10k damage fireball on him. Instant death is annoying you think? Well, why do you want weakness stacking then. If you just want it as a cheat then for god's sake use a cheat or the difficulty slider. If you don't want cheats then live with the fact that other mages may be smart enough to make use of it as well.

I could go on and on. No one in the gameworld has 100% chameleon. And even if he has it's just a guy with a silly refraction shader on him. Add a powerful mage with a 100% chameleon enchantment to the game and let him be completely invisible while he's casting powerful destruction spells from all possible directions at the player. Oh...that's annoying? You will die and you have no chance to fight back. Again, you want a spell effect like that so live with the consequences.

There are other effects, like 100% resist magic, reflect damage etc.

If NPCs would use magic the same way the player does almost all people playing the game would be extremely annoyed by overpowered magic. If you only want your player character to be super powerful then use cheats or the difficulty slider.

To me a good solution to this problem would be perks with a requirement of level 50 and a magic skill value of 100. Put all the overpowered spells in these perks, like 'Grandmaster Illusion Spells'. The player can choose one of those 'grandmaster spell' perks as the final perk and thus become super powerful in the magic school he chooses. Your endgame character will have the power you want him to have and people like me who like to play games for a challenge would have fun playing the game as well. I even like powerful endgame characters. Endgame.

My buddy bunny understands it alright :batman:

I never play as a pure mage, but I know lots of people who love to. It requires it's own sort of in-game intelligence to make really powerful spells using exotic equipment and powerful abilities so no I can't imagine hating them purely. "Love to hate" them seems more like an appropriate way to deal with them then trying to nerf them for your own sake.

I would like spells to be more than just going to a trainer and paying to learn it. At least the really powerful ones, make learning a couple spells the same as getting a legendary weapon or something.

It was quite annoying that almost all mage enemies were so dumb. Ran into a couple enemies that did chameleon and was quite shocked. .It was a very nice change.

This is about the anger the player feels towards mage enemies, correct? Well, like someone said, enemies don't really utilize them - they're never overpowered IMO. Besides, mages who have studied their arts for many decades are supposed to be powerful bosses.

While I only played a pure mage once and for only a few hours I can tell you it takes some work to get it to work well, I don't consider any of the magic seen in oblivion to be over powered, some earlier spell that have been removed yes but those were removed because they very easily broke the game. Almost all of my characters have used magic to an extent it's very useful. I think peoples main complaint boils down to the quadratic wizard since magic gets exponentialy better at later levels while other forms of combat start off stronger and tend to be less powerful at higher levels, but this is balanced by making magic weak to begin with and requiring a special build to turn out well. I think a lot of the hate is jealously it kinda stinks fighting your way through a dungeon that a mage can just run through while being invisible.

NO :gun: :dead:

I like mages.

They make funny noises when you put an arrow through their heads.

Some effects were obviously broken, some redundant, and some obviously more or less powerful as a result of flawed game mechanics.

Really, I don't think removing some effects would be enough to fix the Oblivion/Morrowind style magic system, it needed a complete overhaul plain and simple. And that seems to be what they went for, so I'm happy. I expect a lot of the old effects will be absent, but I also expect most of us won't miss them once we've given the new magic system a chance.

I wish there was an anti magic group in the game. That I could destroy. With magic.

I'd walk into their midst as the most over powered mage in the world and kick their asses with my mind.

I love magic, and think there should be high powered mages

Mark, Recall and levitate were not in Oblivion and i honestly i never missed them

People hate mages? First time I've heard of this... I don't think magic should be "overpowered' per say but I do think magic should be powerful because honestly in my opinion a single sword slash to the chest should not do more damage than a fireball, or lightning bolt. But like I said things should be balanced so mages aren't blitzing through the game.

I know it would/should be like that in lore but it should be toned down for the game. Which is what I assume Bethesda is doing? I'm honestly not sure, I haven't kept up with Skyrim in quite a while.

This. Enemy cast's levitation then fireball... You cast levitation and then fireball ... He cast's invisibility... You cast invisibility... There's a moment of floating and thinking.... You remember he's an undead and cast turn undead... He flies away in fear over a deep crevice.... His levitation wears off... He falls... He meets the true death.