I know that this has been discussed before but I'd like to give my perspective as someone who's never played a mage.

I'm level 60. I'm bored. I've beaten the ebony warrior on legendary and despite my best efforts the game is going the same way. I'd thought to beat 'Ebony-Bonce', as I call him by using deathbrand armour and dual-wielding my best swords, since I'd not done that before, but somehow it wasn't enough....

...so I decided to put my enchanting and alchemy skills to good use and learn magic! After all, I am the Arch-Mage of Winterhold. After a lot of premature deaths I got my skills up in destruction, restoration and illusion (so I could get 'silent casting', critical to my sneaky way of playing). I then double-enchanted my gear, stepped out of Heljarchin Hall and had fun.

OMG, it was fun. Spells in destruction and restoration cost nothing. Some of the stronger opponents managed to drop my health, but most didn't. I had Serana with me and for once, I wasn't feeling like a spare part, or jealous because she was killing the enemies and stopping me from levelling up. ..it was a ball. I even stepped up to 'master' difficulty but nothing changed.

Zap! Zap! Roast!! Singe! Sparkle!...marvellous.

I'd like to play a mage from the start, rather than taking it up when I had the toys to make it easier.

I'd certainly say that at this level (60-ish) Magika is most definitely not underpowered.

I am saying that I wish I'd played as a mage before.

Eh, I don't like magic in TES games. Never have, never going to. So - um - glad you like it, and maybe start a new character as a pure mage?

I'm with Serethil on this one. Especially since they gutted the magic system for Skyrim. But if it works for you - awesome! Start a mage and see how you do.

That you have to commit crafting abuse to get Destruction to be cost-effective to begin with is proof that it is underpowered.

The only spells I think are underpowered are the Master level Destruction spells. Lightning Storm is OK I guess, though the lack of mobility makes it kind of pain. I don't even bother with Blizzard or Fire Storm. Other than that, I love Skyrim magic.

Destruction alone is arguably a bit weak. Destruction paired with Conjuration and/or Illusion is not weak at all.

Magic in Skyrim is no different from Combat, in that you need a combination of several skills to be effective. You can't expect to run around naked with just a big hammer and survive; nor can you rely on one magic skill.

A warrior needs a melee weapon, a ranged weapon, the ability to block, and a set of armor, and preferably everything tempered up (Smithing).

A mage needs Destruction, Alteration, Enchanting, and Conjuration.

I'd say so after playing for a decade.

Maybe not underpowered, when you take conjuration and illusion into account, but certainly a bit underwhelming. Not many spells compared to prior games. Mods fix this though. You can also make destruction scale better and get rid of that silly 100% casting cost reduction.

Absolutely not, I recently played a pure Mage DiD character and felt incredibly powerful. Although he did die (at level 30) it wasn't because he was underpowered.


Combining schools is very powerful, like others have said you can use conjuration to add a distraction, illusion to go unseen and make the enemies fight each other. However even if you went pure destruction I think it would still be immensely powerful. This is due to the impact perk, enemies just can't get near you, dragons can't use their breath attack, Deathlords can't shout.


You also don't need to exploit enchanting, I never had any custom cost reduction gear (only the appropriate level of Mage robe) and was able to fling around a whole load of magic in each battle. You do run out of magica occasionally but that is not a limitation. It just requires you to be more tactical with your magic. If I was running low I had a few options - conjure a summons to take the heat for a while so I could back off a bit; use shouts to give me some room; summon bound weapon so I can block attacks.


There are some really cool destruction spells also, although they are all just limited to fire, ice, lightning. I never got to master level spells so can't comment on them but chain lightning is really cool, able to kill whole groups in one go and ice storm is amazing. Dual cast it creates a cloud that will stagger anyone in its path so great if you are facing groups.


The early levels can be tough to survive as you have no armour etc so to that end I recommend playing as an Altmer. Their increased magica plus the mages hood you can get in Helgen gives you a great early magica pool meaning you can put the first few level ups into health and make yourself more survivable.

Not so much underpowered I'd have said, as boring. Most of the interesting spell effects were either removed in Oblivion to make life easier for the level designers, or else they were turned into shouts so fighters could have more interesting fights without having to use actual magic. Because magic would be cheating, but shouting is just being loud, which is apparently acceptable.

You can still turn invisible (assuming you're willing to invest about 10 levels of perks to make it affordable to cast and so it actually makes you harder to find rather than easier). Aside from that there's not a lot that can't be done with a shout, or with weapons and armor.

My mage characters tend to level alchemy to fund the R&D, then enchanting to make the gear, then they make a 100% cost reduction set for both destruction and illusion and work on invisibility with quiet casting and thunderbolt with impact. That's basically what an effective Skyrim mage looks like to my mind. The Illusion master spells are fun too - Mayhem or Harmony from hiding in an enemy lair can be entertaining. You need perks in a second attack element for shock resistant types. Beyond that ... runes are tactically useful on occasion I suppose, I've never got much mileage out of summoning. Using Alteration for the damage resistance and Conjuration for the bound weapons sounds fun, but if I want to be armoured and hit things with swords, I'll probably go for a warrior build and save the perks.

There's no Spellmaking, Alchemy is best used to generate income, and Enchanting is heavily restricted compared to earlier games. In Morrowind I could have fun designing spells for particular situations or strategies. Even in Oblivion as Arch-Mage I could max out the spellmaking and make a spell that let me run from Imperial City to Cheydinhal in about 20 seconds, leaping over ogres on the way. In Skyrim I can turn invisible and stun-lock monsters. It's bland, and flavourless and there's very little you can do as a mage that can't be done as well or better by shouting. It's all a bit depressing, really.

I like the magic. The spells they have are so much better done than previous ones that I feel very wizardly. However just like vanilla combat, it needs to be tweaked to really shine.

As someone who has favored magic since Morrowind I'll give my opinion. As far as damage and survivability late game mages can do very well against most enemies, archers being the bane of my existence. However as said above the magic system has been gutted from the previous 2 games making a vanilla mage feel very bad at magic from a roleplay perspective as you can only learn variations of a few spells. I very much miss levitation, wizards fury,spell crafting, the many different summons I enjoyed in previous TES games, and the mages guild in general was a loss for me. I have my magic system very heavily modded to compensate and I'm hoping TES 6 takes us somewhere more magic oriented and brings back a much deeper system.

You know my answer cumbrianlad. Magic damage is completely fine and probably stronger than melee. The problem start with the huge bonus melee get's from smithing let alone from smithing enchanting combination. The default high level magic weapons the game throws at you can be comparable with the damage a high level spell does. Of course you can't just fireball your way out of every situation that's why you have conjuration illusion and alteration. The same for melee, you can't expect to slash your way out of everything without using block or armor.

Long story short, magic works great and can be quite op at times. Unleash two dremora Lords, throw some fireballs here and there and you can clear a whole Falmer dungeon quicker than any fancy fighter can.

My experience has been that magic is a bit touch-and-go in the early levels, and takes some perk investment before it begins to pay off. Even Novice spells are expensive when you're playing with 100-150 Magicka until you get the cost reduction perks, and different schools have their own "key" perks that can really change the game (e.g. Impact for Destruction, Regeneration and Recovery for Restoration, etc.). To make matters worse, some spells (most notably in Destruction) don't level their skills up as much as I'd like... In any case, I expect to duck, dodge, and run a lot when starting a new mage, even with a follower.

However, my mages are reasonably powerful by their twenties, and definitely overpowered by their forties (even my Destruction/Alteration mage). I'd agree that mages benefit from some breadth, as has been mentioned, but I'd disagree that any particular college or skill is ever required. Useful, sure; game-breakingly powerful sometimes, yes... but I never really got to the point of feeling like I needed any given skill to do well as a mage.

A quick disclaimer - I generally play on Expert, so I can't really talk to magic's effectiveness at higher difficulty levels.

You pretty much have to abuse crafting and you have to use multiple schools. Destruction on higher difficulties pretty much results in Impact stun locking for kills. I find this incredibly boring.


And I hate conjuration with a searing passion.

I haven't gone beyond level 50 on any character, but I find it easier to rely on magic in combat in Skyrim than in Daggerfall or Morrowind, especially the latter.

It svcks offensively, Enchanting and conjuration are the only offensive ones. Destruction without impact + enchanting svcks.

Well, what can I say?

There are loads of opinions here and plenty of good advice.

I don't consider using enchanting skill to get my magicka cost to zero as a cheat. It's there so why not use it? I've earned it, after all.

I'd love to learn how illusion and conjuration is the boon that everyone talks about but that's for another game, I think. For now, a combination of 'greater ward', 'Grand healing', 'Steadfast ward' and the various destruction spells seems to work, especially with a few nicely crafted 'Fortify Destruction' potions, when the going gets really tough.

Glargg, I agree entirely. Playing as a warrior or mage requires multiple disciplines. Too many mages poo-poo warriors, forgetting how they craft weapons for each type of opponent. Likewise warrior types can be disdainful of the skill required to both select the right spell and deliver it adroitly. I'd say that each method is equally valid and using what you have at your disposal is not to be sneered at...it's only using your brain.

By the way, I got totally wasted by a particular mage but learned which spell/potion combination worked, after a few trials. This just shows that the balance is about right. I'm still playing on master but I think I'll try legendary difficulty for a time.

Sakiri.....with my limited experience in magic in Skyrim (though I was very very mage in Oblivion) I agree. To me now more than ever, the idea of firing off summon after summon while waiting safely behind a big rock for the screams to die down is just a gameplay cop out. People who use this tactic to get through everything earn zero kudos in my book. I will doubtless incur the wrath of a dozen conjouration specialists for saying so, but which ever way you put it.....if a summon is doing practically all the work...or most of it....well you get my point....


Yes yes...all you riled up conjourers out there, I know, I know, you wanna have me torn apart by angry atronachs. Play the way you like...you only play for fun, yadda yadda blah blah. Oh and yes I have dabbled with twin souls...double Dremora and Sanguines Rose AND I have used a very occaisional flame atronach so I'm not spouting from a point of total ignorance......only partial ignorance OK....


However you play, enjoy your day

I think I will roll a mage for my next RP. I've never done a pure mage build or even taken advantage of Illusion in a stealth build. I'd love to see that side of Skyrim after four years of melee specialists.

I don't think 100% casting cost reduction is a "cheat" since it's clearly an intended mechanic. I don't like that mechanic for two reasons. First, it removes the need to worry about investing in magicka or putting perks into character skills, thus removing options for making diverse characters that okay very differently from each other. Second, it removes the need to manage a magicka pool, which I view as one of the defining features of mage play.


The reason illusion and conjuration are so powerful is, unlike destruction, illusion and conjuration are unaffected by the difficulty slider.

To be fair with the combat mods I run you need to take every advantage, because even a pack of feral wolves will end your day the first quarter of the game, dragons will send you flying when they land, and bandit chiefs are never easy kills. However if I do use conjuration it is very dependent on my characters combat style, for example my rangers will use druid summons, my pure mages use melee type summons while they use ranged destruction, and my dark paladins will use ranged summons that allow them to fight close quarters.

Yeah see, now I could live with the idea of summon "support" a battle buddy.....its just the fire and forget tactic that I couldn't condone. Not that anybody gives a dried fig for what I think, but y'know, jus' saying......cuz I can

I don't have an issue with the fire and forget tactic of using summons, but I have never thought it was a lot of fun to play that way. I prefer to be more active.

At least destruction magic is pretty useless when you start a new game ^^

An enemy that goes down within seconds with a normal one-handed sword will drain all your magicka and still have tons of health if you decide to use destruction magic instead

I can't imagine it being possible playing a complete destruction-magic type of character... you would have to run away from basically every single enemy that is not a wolf, when playing on Expert or Master.

Not to mention when you get to fight against a bear and can hardly drain 5% of his life, while you lose all of your magicka

Conjuration and Restoration on the other hand are somewhat viable and can actually help you a lot in combat at the start.