So I joined the TES Series from Skyrim... And after playing for a few months, I bought Oblivion to try it out. Anyway, it's obviously very different from Skyrim and especially the magic system. I ended up playing a mage, my 7 major skills were all the schools of magic, alchemy and blade I think.

I ended up doing a lot of Arena fights and my character was basically wearing Iron armour with a big claymore and using some frost spell I started the game with. But my magic didn't seem very effective, and it felt very... non-mage like to be using a 2 handed sword? I mean, if you can't hold spells in your hand, what else do you put there?

So any tips would be greatly appreciated. I think I might restart and put any tips I get given here, into that game.

First of all, if you plan to use magic effectively in Oblivion, you should probably ditch the armor, as it reduces your spell effectiveness. It's a problem that will get worse as you level up, so you're better off not being dependent on armor from the outset. The usual remedy is to enchant some clothing with shield effects, and use effects like Reflect to bounce the enemy's damage back on himself.

The exception to that is if you're role playing a "hybrid" type of mage, like a Battlemage or Spellsword, but those are played a bit differently from pure mages.

Secondly, a claymore is not a very effective weapon unless you take advantage of its reach. It's too slow to do much damage over time, which is why mages usually will carry a dagger (preferably enchanted and with poison on it.)

A proper mage is going to try to maintain distance if possible. Targeted spells, conjured "helpers," invisibility; these help the mage to avoid being hit. If you are forced into melee, you can use a weapon like the above-mentioned dagger and cast on-touch spells at the same time. Restoration's Absorb Health is perfect for this, because it hurts your enemy and heals you.

Also, mages usually need two or more different magical skills, paired together. Destruction pairs with Restoration. Conjuration pairs well with Illusion. And Alchemy provides powerful tools from all the magical schools.

First time I finished the MQ was with a preset Sorcerer (Heavy Armor plus all magic skills except Illusion), so a Heavy Armor caster can be effective. With my Sorcerer the endgame spell effectiveness was 93% in full armor, so the reduction wasn't a big deal. Having said that, the armor really wasn't all that useful. The character used summons as a shield and spammed destruction spells from a distance, so the armor protection was rarely even needed, and even if it had been, I could have done just as well with a Shield spell.

Yes, this is what I was getting at. And the problem is that if you get lazy in the beginning, and start relying on something that really belongs to another "class" of character, you'll end up with a "hybrid" in the end.

The Elemental Shield effects are perfect for a mage. You can get 75 points of Armor effect from three pieces of clothing enchanted with Transcendent Sigil Stones, and 25% reduction of each form of Elemental Magic damage, at the same time.

Or you can go with conjured Bound Armor, and get full armor protection temporarily, with no reduction in spell efficiency.

Oblivion is set up to try and get you to play pure mages with no armor, wielding a staff if possible, and possibly a dagger as backup. As others have said, the armor will reduce your spell effectiveness, and there's not much point to it when shield (or better yet elemental shield) spells are available. You'll get a staff in the course of the game anyway, but you can buy or find your own; they make good backup ranged weapons when you're silenced or running low on magicka. Some of the better staffs can one-shot a lot of enemies. Another option is to just fight hand-to-hand. I use that with a lot of my "tougher" mage/monk characters; it's rather enjoyable.

You can of course play sorceror or battle-mage type hybrids, but that's purely up to you.

Listen to glargg.
I am a mage. Altmer Apprentice.
I use a bound dagger if I need it. Usually roll with no weapons.
I use a staff for blocking.
No armor.
I rain destruction on my foes. And make buddies to distract people. The beauty of my character is that he is very easily killed if I don't watch out.

Whatever birthsign, blah blah blah you choose, the early and teen levels will be very hard. I have run away from a lot of enemies during those levels, only choosing to attack when I have an advantage. But just hang in there, and then soon, you will turn into a beautiful butterfly.
Weakness spells, cast before your killing spell, no matter how lame they may look, are your friend.

pure mages really don't need armor, (actually no one really needs armor with the sigil stones that can get you up to 75% armor rating) i tend to use summons as meat shields to distract enimies, at low levels zombies work well, and at later levels i like the clannfear (especially for taking out mages). That said i keep a dagger or longsword that is heavily enchanted as a panic attack for up close situations when i'm low on magicka. Plus i use a shield...just cause it seems stupid to not block an attack, and it gives you one more thing to enchant

I have one panic spell for when someone is right there in my face. It takes all my magic, but it is a guaranteed kill. And then I RUN AWAY.

Acadian's character,Buffy, uses the serpent stone as a once a day panic button.

There are several ways to do this, depending on your character type. Illusion characters can have Invisibility hotkeyed; just disappear and run to get distance between yourself and the enemy. My glass-cannon Altmer, Silvonwe, has my three easiest to hit hotkeys (1,2,3 on PC, for me) set to Invisibility, Summon Dremora Lord, and a massive targeted Weakness spell keyed to the staff she's carrying. She automatically switches back to the Invisibility after casting either of the other two, even if she's not planning to cast it right away.

One of my other characters uses Paralyze the same way.

The big danger with a massive Destruction spell as a panic button is the possibility of getting hit with Reflect. One way of making sure that doesn't happen is to add a strong Dispel on Self to a touch Destruction spell, and having that set as the panic button. That trick only works with touch spells, though.

The problem of not wearing armor is how we want to get +5 Endurance points in each level up?

Block with your staff. Repair everything in sight to raise your Armorer skill.

My pure mages never go out of their way to try to raise their Endurance though. They might use a raise if they have a good attribute bonus that level from doing the two above, but I don't go looking for it. As Mr. Miyagi said: "Best defense, no be there." There are a lot of ways to do that, from invisibility to summoning meat shields to hide behind.

Mhm!
Well for me mages are not suppose to have Endurance anyway.
Meat Shields are extremely helpful, although my own mage never used them, I had several panic buttons, usually caused my enemies to flee from me, sometimes a AOE paralyze, which will of course drain all my mana, but it gave me plenty of time to get my mages green [censored] out of there!

You don't need that at all. My level 20 mage Silvonwe has Strength of 32 and Endurance of 39 (boosted to 47 by the Escutcheon of Chorrol, which she carries but does not "use," since she has a staff equipped.) She has 85 points of armor (enchanted clothing), 37 points of Reflect Damage, and 27 points of Spell Reflect, in addition to whatever she does with Alchemy as needed. But she rarely gets hit at all, because she's invisible most of the time.

i do blocking and repairing, but mostly will get +3 but if wearing armor i can get +5


I don't know, maybe my playstyle, i need high endurance, Breton have 30 base Endurance, so fragile. I must choose Warrior birth sign to add extra 10 and Endurance as favorite attribute to get another 5. So make it 45.

Endurance is important for any character since it determines your health. I'd consider it the third most important attribute for a mage after Intelligence and Willpower. When playing a mage I pretty much put in all points to those three stats until maxed out.

I don't bother with that +5 Endurance stuff. My mage still has his starting stats in strength and endurance. Hence, the one-shot kill aspect of my character. I also don't go elemental sigil stone route anymore fully. What I mean is: if the character actually does the MQ, he gets one sigil stone for the elemental shield. He gets to decide which element. And then that's that. Max AC of 25 forever. Any other sigil stone cannot be an elemental shield.

As for the panic spell, my mage knows how much damage the spell does in reverse, heh heh. He doesn't cast this spell if faced with those particular enemies who can reflect. He goes to a different chapter of the playbook spellbook.

If you're needing to build Endurance, you're not really playing a Mage. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but a true mage does not rely on high health or the ability to absorb punishment. You have spells and potions to take care of that.

This. If you invest in Endurance, you're going to find yourself walking into battle, blasting everything out of the way and hardly taking any damage. I think it sort of ruins a Mage. In my opinion, you should focus on intelligence and willpower, and then share your final 'point' to luck or personality or something.

Pretty much, as a pure mage you have so many types of spells at your disposal, charm, fear, courage, paralyze, absorb, poison, weakness to, just plain old damage, when you get the correct combination in the spell altar you can pretty much nuke everything, I was never good at combinations, the types of spells I created was for RP instead of practical use.

True, but I like to have high health just in case. And besides what else would a Mage increase apart from Intelligence and Willpower? You need to increase 3 attributes per level, and so for me it makes sense to go INT, WIL and END. In that order of priority.

Personality, for the illusion boost. Also, a Mage would prefer to be luckier, more likable and faster than they would to be stronger, so luck, personality and speed would be more appropriate

None of those really help you survive. its nice to have a decent amount of health if as a Mage you find yourself cornered or silenced. You could then at least survive long enough to get back on your feet.

The higher my luck the lower the cost of my custom spells. This works for custom spells only. If you are maxed in a school of magic, you can lower costs even further by adding points to Luck, it lowers the cost for about every three points you put into luck. Obviously, this is pretty costly, but a good route for some mages who rely extensively on custom spells.

Invisibility and running like hell, is one way I go.
One of my panic spells involve an AOE paralysis, so I can get out faster if there is more than one enemy on top of me. I do this, then summon a buddy, then run. It's just my way of playing; having to use my resources effectively, or die trying. Each to her/his own.

I didn't know this - thank you! My character finds herself overwhelmed by large groups of tough enemies - she fought five or so Skeleton Heroes today. She can deal with them with about three blasts of her custom destruction spell, but she doesn't have enough magicka to do so for more than one enemy. I'll have to put more into luck!


I invest one, perhaps two points into Endurance per 8-10 levels, but I try to avoid it. I'm trying to avoid becoming overpowered, which would ruin the game for me. And trust me, each of those have their uses - agility for running away from impossible foes, for example.
Still, what you do in your game is your own decision, I'm just voicing what I do in mine