That has nothing to do with the classes themselves and everything to do with the broken enemy scaling system

Because channeling a spell with both hands is overpowered? Because mages apparently destroy everything instantly? They apparently need no defenses!

I already said you can balance levitation to be in the game and that I was only arguing against Morrowind's system. Mages usually do destroy everything extremely quickly instead of the drawn out battles that warriors do. Either that or they can hit and run with invisibility or pump themselves up with buffs.

I think we should have levitation. for those saying it makes the mage untouchable or w.e cause he can fly away shooting spell after spell, that could easily be fixed by increasing the amount of magic that levitation takes so that as a weaker mage you cant really do much combat magic while levitation, you can only use it to escape or move to a more strategic position. on the other hand if you devote all you skills to magic then i think you should be able to cast at least a couple spells from flight because as a pure mage you need the extra tricks to be able to defeat warriors and what not. and for the people who say its not balanced, mages = pure dps, little to no health, warriors = low dps but can take a [censored]load of dmg, and stealth = in between health but also has some tricks to help take the bigger guys down, like backstab and stuff like that. so warriors can take a mage no problem in mano e mano which is why mages need levitation, invisibility and face melty fireballs. warriors can also take stealth characters no problem if they can get to them, which is why stealth characters attack from a distance or from behind so the warrior cant defend from it. and in a fight between stealth and mage its whoever sees the other first really, whoever can get the first shot in. so its all balanced.

off the fighting angle, on the exploration side of the argument of mages can get places others cant, maybe they could add a climbing skill with agile rogues climbing up fast and slower warriors not so fast and mages the fastest with levitation.

its like nature. the warriors would be bears, big strong, not so fast, not so bright, but if you let them get close they will wreck your [censored]. rogues would be like panthers fast, agile, lightning strikes before darting away. and mages would be like man, not fast, very fragile, yet smart, using their wits to survive, except in this case their wits let them call up balls of fire and float through the air. the only difference between this and nature is that all three are men so they can all think and reason through and defeat any of the others if they use their brains a little.

I don't recall seeing anyone seriously say Morrowind's system was good, so there was no reason to argue against it.


Pumping themselves with buffs is generally pointless unless they have a weapon skill. The only really good buff was always fortify intelligence for exploiting Alchemy (which, by the way, should probably be fixed. Alchemy has been overpowered since Morrowind).

Once again, what is SO bad about a SINGLE extra defense, considering their other defenses blew ass? I understand mages are very offensive in nature, but that doesn't mean that they shouldn't have options available. In Morrowind the main option was basically "backpedal while casting the same spells over and over".

I completely agree with this. Mages should be able to fly if they focus their leveling up towards that, then they should be rewarded to be able to get places other classes cant get to. And in regards to flying away from a warrior and shooting spells at them, well for one: if that warrior cant hit that mage and cant survive till the levitate spell runs out (which levitate should take alot of mana and need alot of skill to use in the first place) then the warrior should run, and use his wits to kill the mage. For example, the warrior could run into a cave luring the mage into a monster infested cave where both the warrior and the mage will end up getting pre occupied with fighting these monsters and surviving. The mage could either get overwhelmed by the large amount of monsters in close quarters, or the warrior could risk running through the monsters and taking the mage out from behind while hes fighting the monsters. Theres many possibilities, the warrior could run and find some of his friends and team up on the flying mage. But overall, mages should be able to do the most "godlike" stuff in the long run. You see it sort of as mages are harder at lower levels but once you get a mage toward max level, they will alot stronger then a maxed warrior or rogue.

And in regards to that video of the guy beating morrowind in 15 minutes. Well you dont need levitate to beat the game in 15 minutes. You can fast travel using the silt striders and you can goto caldera, and walk 5 minutes to ghostgate, open the ghostgate and run up the mountain, grab both the sunder and keening, then go into dagoth ur and kill the heart of the god. All you need is alot of healing potions to keep healing when the sunder and keening are killing you. Ive done it that way without levitate.

The problem with that fix is that a high level mage would be able to do what you propose to fix while a high level warrior would still be on the ground and unable to reach.

So I find it necessary to quote another post about the same subject regarding levitation....


"Look up in the sky, its a bird, its a dragon, not its..... a..... gimmick!"

No levitating myself please. I'll happily wait for the 100$ DLC.

Perhaps we can meet in the middle and make levitation a thu'um ability? That would let everyone levitate.

What about the high level warrior NPC's who can use dragonshouts? That ought to knock a mage out of the sky. And considering that they have to develop a combat AI for warrior NPC's to fight a dragon, which can fly, they shouldn't have a problem implementing a warrior AI to combat levitating mages, assuming its balanced like we all propose.

And if mages were tweaked as I proposed earlier, requiring more effort to level, then it shouldn't be an issue, because the high level mages extra power is explained by the extra effort.

I was arguing against someone saying that it was ok to have OP things and that Mages deserved to be OP. In line with that I used the OP Morrowind levitation as an example of an OP class specific ability.



You can buff health and shield to sustain more damage or you could buff offensive abilities and conjure a sword. If you want extra defense just get an armor skill

Works for me. As I said in one of my first posts, as long as they classes are evenly OP it is fine because there is no reason to take one class over the others besides personal preference. I don't mind OP mechanics, they just need to be cross-class so that people who want to play another class aren't getting the short end of the stick

How much can you actually buff health? 100 points for 30 seconds is ridiculously hard to do. So a mage with 150 hitpoints might be considered a lot, at level 50 that won't last more than 3-4 hits. Those buffs hardly make a difference. Shield spells don't make a difference until you reach a high level, and they can run out in the course of a battle. Not to mention you start that battle with low magicka, so you can't get right to combat.

No class is supposed to take extra effort to level. They are all supposed to level at the same pace.

I wasn't aware of them developing NPC AI to fight dragons, doubt it's relevant because Dragons land. Giving warrior NPCs means to damage or disable flying attackers would serve to balance the issue, yes.

I'm trying not to be biased as I read this. The first defense for the former should be to protect himself, then impede the enemy in some way and lastly use destructive skills depending on inclination. If a mighty warrior charges the caster won't even have time to scream, hence why I liked levitation. Take that away it will be much harder to play a pure mage-class, like in Oblivion...(I mean pure, without weapons or armor)

Yeah the dragons land. Much like a levitating mage would have to land if it was balanced properly. That's a point I made a while ago.

You're equating this all to Oblivion's broken enemy scaling system, which is a fallacy.

As I already mentioned, we don't know how Dragon combat works. From the trailer it seems that they have to be close to hurt you so it's really not an anologous issue. As long as Mages can't attack from the air, NPCs can all attack at range, or there are similarly OP abilities for the other classes it's a non-issue.

EDIT: Actually making it high level could actually work as well considering most people won't feel cheated upon choosing another class by something that happens late-game (as long as enemy scaling isn't broken this time around)

You keep throwing around that word, overpowered, but if all classes have it, its not overpowered. In fact, the ONLY THING that made levitation so powerful was Bethesda's [censored] AI. As someone pointed out, they're going to need better AI for fighting dragons in flight, so that same AI can be used to fight levitating people in much the same manner. Either take shelter until they come down, or shoot at them until they die.

It's still overpowered if all classes have it, it lets you progress through the game with much less difficulty.

I can find no way for them to set up the A.I. to get around Morrowind's levitation unless they either give all NPCs marksman skills and a bow or put a cave every 500 feet.

I already spoke to the dragon combat issue.

Then we're at an impasse, because I completely disagree.

At the very least we can agree that a Thu'um for levitation would be a good compromise if levitation were included.

I like the idea of levitation that it brings an extra element of satisfaction when the player searches for every nook and cranny and suddenly finds himself an epic treasure or a funny note on a rock platform near the ceiling. You have to understand from a game design point of few it is a crucial system of 'punishment and reward' that has to be kept maintained throughout the moments of your game play experience

How many of you stopped looking in the boxes and craters because your 200+ previous attempts on various locations didn't end you up with more than wheat, apples and spoons in your inventory? It's because you were never rewarded enough to keep looking enough that it would be possible you might find an epic knife or a rare silver ware worth more than 500g's in the shop

The same principles goes for the concept of exploration of dungeons and caverns only the difference here is the reward is the surprise itself. How many of you guys were struck with that level of surprise by the design in Oblivion's dungeons? Let's put it into perspective... how many of you by your were struck with that level of surprise by your 6th Oblivion gate?

It got a little two-dimensional and dull didn't it?

And a game world designed with this in mind makes the player want to explore the most out of the world. Anything else can be worked around with and there have already been some brilliant posts on how to tacle this 'overpowered' spell.

One of my best experiences with levitation in Morrowind was the tinle of curiosity I felt when I didn't have the proper skill enolgh to fly up Telvanni high mage towers.

Concerncing Skyrim, I think what it currently boils down to what this gentleman said right herecause everything else has been said.

Never really liked it and in Morrowind you only really needed it at like two times in the game. Personally it helped a tad in some of the odd caves of morrowind.

I like levitation power for mages. I was a major power abuser in Morrowind. I was the 100% chameleon, permanent effect levitation, constant heal clothes wearing wielder of sudden death.
Watching the triceratops creatures run in fear, then immediately turn around to attack, having forgotten that I am levitating, then return was quite amusing.
I found that guards always shot me full of arrows, so I used the permanent effect summon cheat to create meat-shields, but the guards insisted on shooting me, the invisible mage of doom.
It was incredibly difficult to fight melee opponents in Morrowind, as they kept running everywhere, too hard to aim and kill. It was also extremely difficult to kill strong magic AI, having to always hide behind a pillar from their perfectly-aimed-regardless-of-chameleon fireballs and frost spells was not cool.

On the note of view distance, all they have to implement is to create an annoying cloud that follows you around no matter where you are levitating to. Annoying yet perfect fix for levitation view distance problem for when you get too high up.

I agree that levitation should not be implemented like in Morrowind.
--Low level levitation should make you hover close to the ground. It is very well implemented in vampire games as a smoke that comes out of your mage's robes. In tight areas such as indoors, if you are using too strong of this spell, the smoke could choke you up, making you unable to maintain the spell longer. I personally hate the sound of my character running, the rasping breath reminds me of advlt content and I don't want people outside my room thinking I am watching an advlt movie.
--Mid level smoke hovering speed and height should be boostable, and power drain should be related to your encumbrance. If you weigh too much, no liftoff, ground control.
--High level smoke levitation should be unstable, resulting in failures with the usual Oblivion ragdoll physics making you fly a short distance like a rocket, then landing hard. Using levitation too strong indoors would result in getting hit on the head on the ceiling, which is usually rock or hard wood, resulting in a paralyzing stun and loss of health, not to mention falling to the ground.
--There should also be a levitation implemented similarly to in the cartoon "Ben 10" where the female hero creates glowing steps. Greater skill, more glowing steps, last longer.

Now to balance this with the other classes: First, similar skills:
--Your super strong warriors don't like heights. They often feel sick on tall horses, and thus, horses went out of style. Just messing with you. Everyone knows warriors are too muscular and heavy to fly, silly.
--Stealth characters should get a special cat suit that has webbing on the arms and legs, climb to the top of a tree or top of a roof or wall and jump off, gliding long distances on the wind.
--Acrobats should be able to jump really hard and literally bounce off of any surface, based on the direction of the surface this could vault you high into the air, or into a cart of cabbages.

Next, the counter-levitation effects:
--Large cities should have large defensive crystals that drain magic or limit maximum magic or magic strength to protect commoners. Mournhold already had levitation negation in effect for Morrowind.
--Special mage traps such as curiosity traps should exist in dungeons. You would see a shiny area, levitate up and see its a "ha ha svcker" easter egg, and trigger a trap, which stuns you and you fall all the way down, into a weak part of the floor which a warrior would never be aware of, into a pit of enemies, or spikes.
--Super strong warriors should be able to hide behind a rock or something and wait for the mage to come around the corner after you, then hit them with your huge axe dead in the face, or tear tree trunks out of the ground and swing them around to swat at mages.
--Stealth characters should be able to crawl under the thin film of smoke that the hover levitation creates, or hide perfectly in the shadow of the levitating steps right below the mage. They should also be able to throw smoke screen bombs, and skewer the mage in mid air with the sharp end of the grappling hook, swinging them to the ground.
--Of course acrobats should easily be able to out run and possibly jump onto objects to get high enough, and leap toward the mage.

A note should be made that if a mage is hovering pretty high, they probably won't be able to see you to attack you, unless you are stupidly standing out in the open, in which case you are asking to get hit by lightning.

ETC: People have also said chameleon is overpowered. One way to implement this to get your 100% chameleon would be to have the obvious putrid looking smoke of chameleon to stink like rotten eggs. The stronger the chameleon, the more putrid the stink. Some people will not be aware of their sense of smell as much, such as a commoner. Many animals rely heavily on sense of smell, which would drastically reduce the overpoweredness of this spell.

Also, I would be GLAD to pay $100 for this! But first, please give me your credit card information, mothers maiden name, and secret words, and deposit will be made shortly

I'm neutral on having levitation but at least give us something to climb on, Oblivion was rather flat feeling, other than the oblivion gates. =(