DocClox.....if you wish, thats fine........but I think you are missing the entire point of why I gave that example.....so please read the foregoing discussion, or at least post #45......or at least some of it ! !


The exact means of the Destruction mage was totally irrelevant......the POINT was that they personally engaged their foes unlike the "fire and forget" conjouration specialist who kept running off.


But.......If you really want me to fabricate a scenario to more accurately reflect the need for the mage's actions then fine.....lets say an iron gate had dropped down behind them so they could not leave the room....e.g. Shroudhearth Barrow. Like I said its entirely beside the point.


I am amazed.....really......this makes misconception (or failure to even read the discussions) number three!


I gotta go an take lie down


Excuse me......(wanders off shaking head)

If you're using Destruction magic to fight, you have block, dodge or survive your enemies attacks long enough for you to kill them and make sure you don't run out of magica. If you use Conjuration, all you have to do is stand back and let your thrall/familiar/Atronach/Dremora do all the work.

I'm not trying disparage Conjuration users or anything but I'd argue that clearing an area with Destruction requires more skill than relying solely on summons.

To each their own but that's exactly why I never use the Dual Casting or Impact perks for Destruction. Combine them with 100% Destruction cost reduction (which I do use) and it makes the game way too easy. And to make magic playthroughs tougher, I also use clothes instead of armor to put my magica reducing enchantments on. Even on Adept or Expert, tougher enemies like Draugr Deathlords can one-shot me if they get too close but that makes things more interesting IMO. Although, I never play DID with that set up for obvious reasons.

Frost Moglin...EXACTLY.


Gods! One tiny glimmer of light in the void.

Thank you for saying in a few lines what I had been trying to get through in umpteen paragraphs.


I think I am beginning to understand what goes wrong here......I write such long pieces in such detailed explanation, that by the time anyone has read it they have forgotten what I was on about......


Or alternatively it looks SO long......that they just don't read it at all, and jump in with a quick response to any small part of it that caught their attention.


So its all MY fault then.....figures

In light of the above conversation, I find it very interesting the one single spell the level designers made sure every character has (and is aware they have) is the "throw stuff back out of battle axe range" spell/skill/shout.

In my mind the only difference between a firebolt, an arrow, and a shot from a blunderbuss or AK-47 is the graphic on the screen. They all do exactly the same thing.

@Rick

Ah, thanks. And I thought your post was fine BTW.

When I used to play vanilla, I would never take dual casting or impact for destruction either (those perks are changed quite a bit in my modded game). It makes it too easy and frankly boring to stun lock your enemies all the time.

Same. I always felt that perk should have been "a chance to knock an enemy back" rather than what amounts to an exploit, I don't remember if it works on dragons but if it does it shouldn't.

Because I can't smith heavy and I've not found anything Daedric that isn't 2h.


Ebony is just ugly, though I might pop over to Solstheim and see if I can't find Stalhrim on the Smith there.

I find atronachs just get in my way.


Current character I have my follower using a bow, extra things in melee range get in the way.


I do sometimes like sacrificing a dremora Lord to the NPC softening gods early but that requires me to get Sanguine rose early.

It does.

I personally never felt especially underpowered as a mage once my skills had a bit of investment, such as the perks increasing elemental damage, but never really managed to stick to pure mage....always ended out as a spellsword of some sort.

So far as the ongoing argument is concerned;

Fighting all your battles through use of a summon/follower/zombie (and hiding while the fighting happens) does not take a huge amount of skill and thus will not garner much respect amongst some players. However, it IS a single player game, you're free to play as you wish and if you want to roleplay a summoner who does not engage in the fight directly, go right ahead but do not expect a pat on the back regarding combat prowess.

For the most part, I think most would find it a playstyle that gets old relatively quickly. For proof of this, I recommend Gopher's Stiv let's play on youtube. Stiv begins as a pure support/summoner character but quickly dispenses with this and joins in fights by punching and/or macing enemies.

Any individual mechanic taken to it's extreme can be made to be unbalanced (stun-locking everything with destro spells for example), but they are largely balanced by other mechanics.

I'm not getting drawn into an argument though, just sharing my thought on the matter.

And that was all I was trying to say!

*Walks in, looks at the crowd and gives everyone a round of Whispers something to the bard Simon and sits back to listen to his request.

*queue music*

"The problem is all inside your head" she said to me

"The answer is easy if you take it logically

I'd like to help you in your struggle to be free

There must be fifty ways to play your mage"

She said "It's really not my habit to intrude

Furthermore, I hope my meaning won't be lost or misconstrued

But I'll repeat myself at the risk of being crude

There must be fifty ways to play your mage

Fifty ways to play your mage"

You just slip out the back, Jack

Make a new rune, Zoon

You don't need to be Cold, Fjold

Just get yourself free

Hop on the Ice, Bryce

You don't need to discuss much

Just drop off the Flames, James

And get yourself free

Ooo slip out the back, Jack

Make a new rune, Zoon

You don't need to be Cold, Fjold

Just listen to me

Hop on the Ice, Bryce

You don't need to discuss much

Just drop off the Flames, James

And get yourself free

She said "Why don't we both just sleep on it tonight

And I believe in the morning you'll begin to see the magelight"

And then she kissed me and I realized she probably was right

There must be fifty ways to play your mage

Fifty ways to leave your mage

You just slip out the back, Jack

Make a new rune, Zoon

You don't need to be Cold, Fjold

Just get yourself free

Hop on the Ice, Bryce

You don't need to discuss much

Just drop off the Flames, James

And get yourself free

Ooo slip out the back, Jack

Make a new rune, Zoon

You don't need to be Cold, Fjold

Just listen to me

Hop on the Ice, Bryce

You don't need to discuss much

Just drop off the Flames, James

And get yourself free

Disclaimer: Brambleberry is not responsible for the sticking of a tune inside anyone's head.

Yeah. And if both mages rely entirely on their speciality school of magic, they both get swarmed and killed. My current char would go invisible, crouch, roll and find a sheltered spot and then probably try harmony to see how many of these things he could peace-out before attending to the hardcases. But if all they're allowed to do is cast from School X, they're both going to die.

That's the big problem with you're scenario, really. It assumes that the conjuration mage only knows how to run and hide while the destruction dude can also run, dodge, sneak ... It's unfairly stacked.


Yeah, I can see where you're coming from. I tend to level enchanting last, so by the time by characters can do 100% destruction reduction, they're level 100+ and the game broken anyway; the unending stun-lock is pretty much a reward for hard work by that stage.

Below that ... I find running out of magicka to be sufficiently balancing. My mages tend to ave about 4-5 impacting blasts in them before they run dry. I could probably improve on that if I went for an Altmer build with the Atronach stone or some such, but I'm not a big fan of that sort of minimaxing. I do generally have plenty of restore magicka potions, but my usual sequence is to run out, miss a beat in the stun lock, open inventory to quaff a potion and then get breathed on or one-shotted by whatever just recovered from the stun-lock.

I suppose the point to take away is that tactics that would be abusive give one person's play style are not necessarily so given that of someone else.

Was this not the crux of the argument? That a pure conjuration character reliant solely on spells was lacking in skill? The only reasonable comparison to this would be a pure (insert skill) character, in this case destruction was chosen.

I'm not taking anyone's side, but this was the way I understood it.

To throw out a real-world parallel....what takes more ability? Sitting in the back seat of a car being driven to your destination or driving the car yourself?

I wonder about those who are suggesting that playing a summoner doesn't demand skill.

Have you actually tried it? Have you actually tried playing an unarmored pure Conjurer?

That tactic (throw atronach into chamber with bad guys and hide) works maybe 80% of the time. The other 20% of the time, something goes wrong, and a bad guy gets past your summon and comes after you. A lot of times it's just that the dungeon or the terrain make it unworkable. Or your atronach decides to go chasing one enemy, leaving you to deal with the others who are actively seeking you.

What do you do then? You're an unarmored squishy mage, and the Deathlord has a big axe with your name on it.

You'd better have an alternative fighting method. And that's why your criticisms of the technique are misplaced. It's no sneakier or more cowardly than shooting a poisoned arrow from the shadows. Because you still need to deal with the unexpected. You need alternative skills, just as a stealthy archer needs armor and an enchanted dagger. Because things don't always go the way you planned.

We're talking about weapons and armor here. A sword is a weapon. A shield is armor. A frost atronach is a weapon and armor.

I think I'm in agreement with glargg here. It's kind of not as cut and dried as some are trying to make it out to be. I'm not a big conjurer player when I play mages but I do love necromancers so my tendancy leans that way. When I can achieve it reasonably and it works that is . I did play one conjurer who worshiped all the Daedra and that was a fun play through. It wasn't this game though. I can't recall too many instances where I was totally reliant on summons and didn't have to intervene to save my own hide. They definitely have minds of their own and can often times get you into as much trouble as a follower can.

I'll tell you right now, up front, my "combat prowess" svcks horribly and "pats on the back" for whatever all that means really kind of means nothing? I'm not really sure I understand that part of the whole conversation.

You might be right. The impression I got was that pure conjuration character was lacking in skill because all they had to do was run and hide while the pure destruction mage would run and jump and dodge and fire skilful fireballs all over the place.

I have no argument with the notion that any single-skill character is inherently limited, but I really didn't think that was the original point. But I've got the wrong end of the stick before, and I apologise if I've misrepresented anyone's views

Apparantly chucking a summon in a room and running far away until everything is dead IS absolutely as difficult as facing your foes with contact weapons or face to face magics.


Your impression of my view DocClox was correct....I am saying indeed that a destruction mage in the heat of battle, aiming and firing his magics, managing his magicka drain, avoiding enemies and being fleet of foot IS more skillful than just firing off a summon into a doorway and legging down the corridor...IRRESPECTIVE OF ANY OTHER SKILLS THAT MAY OR MAY NOT BE AVAILABLE.


However, according to several here....


It looks like I was completely wrong then doesn't it.



(Yes glargg, I have tried it when Skyrim first came out.....and a Lot in Oblivion. And id say working 80% of the time is pretty good then isnt it. Plus is easier to run further back down the passage to escape when your already half way there.)



So next time someone says how they clear dungeons easily with two Dremora Lords and they don't even get a scratch......I will know its only because they are SO very skillful at summon throwing and running like the wind.


And what do I say to our poor destruction mage/archer/warrior who actually bravely faced their foes down.......well their so called tactical manoevreing skills are obviously no big deal then huh!


And yes I do know there are times a summoner needs to actually fight....just as there are times other mages or warriors need to retreat to stay alive. I never said otherwise....that was counter arguers trying to push the principle to its nth degree.

So...

DocClox...theres no problem with my scenario, because I am not doing any assuming about any other capabilities of either the summoner or the destruction mage...you were actually making those assumptions for me. I just said wheres the great skill in throwing a summon into a room and letting it do all the hard work while you relax with a coffee behind a big rock until its finished.


And....


I never said a summoner couldnt't ever lift a bow or fling a fireball if need be.....I never said a warrior couldn't ever fire an occasional atronach if need be. The argument hinges around using summons as your PRIMARY weapon.


And like I say....apparantly....according most here running and hiding while your summon ( or any followers come to that) does all the dangerous bits for you is actually a very skillful way to play.


Sorry I just do not see that....and when,...as it will in time,...the argument swings the other way....and each of you counter debaters here, are saying how super skillful a destruction mage has to be in the heat of battle......i'll be reminding ya nicely of all this.....fair enough?


Until then my friends.....However you play, enjoy your day

Ok maybe I'm just tired. I just read back through the posts and I don't understand or see where anyone said mage/archer/warrior OR a dedicated destruction mage weren't skillful? They all have to be very skillful to get through some of this game especially on harder difficulties. Like I said maybe I'm just tired and missed it.

Sure. But in the case where the mage is trapped in the room with no means to escape, the only reason the destruction mage is more skilful is that you've previously described the destruction mage ducking and dodging while the con juror presumably has no such skill.

If we assume equally unbalanced skills for both mages then they both fail. Yet you seem to imply that the conjuration specialist (or their player) is in some way inferior. And I don't think you've sufficiently made that case,

It is not that a conjourer has no such mobility....of course they have...you keep presuming stuff I have not said! And you are the one who wanted to consider that a mage would automatically run back down the passage to better utilise his abilities., or funnel enemies into a doorway. So I said then consider them trapped in that room to remove your supposition.


But I will humour you......consider a destruction mage (DM) in an identical tomb room to a conjourer mage (CM). Both have essentially equal builds but the destruction mage is better at fireball flinging and the conjourer is better at throwing a summon. They share there respective rooms with several draugr. The DM has to AIM his weapon while on the move....the CM also running for cover only needs to aim at the floor for a second. The summon will keep several draugr busy....while the DM has to take most targets individually and plan his next targeting on the move. The DM has to have line of sight making him visable....the CM can fire off his portable play mate from a fully concealed position and the summon will go find the foes. Or have I got that wrong?


However that is all very nitty gritty and there are many variations on a theme......bottom line for me I keep coming back to is that a summon will go and do its business autonomously until it expires allowing the caster to escape and in some case not even see their enemy at all. Other mages and fighters have to get INVOLVED which is far more dangerous and requires good player real time skills to manage. Plus btw....other mages and fighters have to actually hit their enemies to raise build skills...conjourers merely need to pop them out while the red dots are showing, how easy is that? You can even pop off a summon over your shoulder as you flee to slow down your persuers. Where is the destruction mages equivalent of that kind of easy cop out?


(BTW.....I used summons for years in Oblivion....esp Clanfear and storm atronachs. They always made defeating enemies a piece of cake and I got bord of the challengless play. I crafted destruction spells after that and it revitalised the combat for me.)


Note...where I refer to skills...some people may be thinking I mean build skills.....I do not. I mean the tactical combat skill of the player.


The whole thing is even more clear when you look at higher level well perked summoning.....long range summon casting can put the player far enough back to not even need to run! While twin souls.....well...do I need to say!


Oh and before it gets said.....I have NOT assumed that a player who chooses to take the easy option of throwing summons around is therefore not well skilled during other styles of combat. Its a choice....its all a choice.


And my choice now is bed time

Regarding choices, please feel free to choose to read/re-read post #63. Hummmmmmm along, sing the song and you will see that all play styles are just a dance to a different song!

Edited because my typing is getting worse!

You mean post #63 Bram......yeah it was good mate....made me smile....nice effort

Heh. Bram, that was very well done! I was in my mid-20s in "that era" (of the song) and I remember it fondly. I could hear it just right in my head with your lyrics!