i found it stupid how in oblivion material types for weapons were just grades!! a glass longsword being very inferior to an ebony longsword for example



i think materials should influence weapons a little more than just damage and weight


for example.. glass and ebony could be considered equal but different (ebony would still cost more due to its weight, but otherwise they are equally effective overall)
glass weapons are light, so they would be faster and require less stamina to swing. because of their lightness they would do extra poor against heavy Armour and would not push blocks very much
ebony weapons are heavy so they would use a lot more stamina to use, be slower but would be able to smash blocks and heavy Armour more

(elven and dwemer could probably do the same thing as ebony and glass)


bows should also do this by diversifying more

an orcish longbow would have a very powerfull draw and would use much stamina, a light orcish bow would not but both bows are equal in effectiveness (in general)

In TES3 there was tradeoff between weight, durability, enchantment capacity and actual damage
(glass was light, did good damage, but degraded faster than ebony, ebony was heavy with good damage and durability)
If they return various durability and enchantment capacity it could make more sense to have more weapons and armor than just daedric.

this

I agree with you, there did this horribly on Oblivion(Didn't notice it in Morrowind). It was even worse by the fact that they told you what was strongest through level-scaling.

I totally agree with is. All weapons and armor should be useful in some way throughout the life of your character.

You have a point here, but you also have to consider the fact that the way Morrowind does this is slightly unrealistic. Even if I am bad at using a sword, that doesn't mean I can't hit my enemy with it... I just don't make that much damage because I am a new player at it.

Daeric had the highest enchant potential in Morrowind with the exception of the ebony staff and some items in expansions.
However you are right that glass items had low weight and durability for its damage, the system was not so completely linear as the system in Oblivion.

This all the way. I really do want tradeoffs of different weapons. For example in my (current) Oblivion save, I had a silver longsword and I loved it, but eventually I found a dwarven shortsword that did as much damage as my silver longsword; whats up that?

Agree such parameters can be really good in Skyrim as well ability tweak them with new Smithing skill will really interesting.

Daedric? I allways thought that silver weapons/armor had most ench.capacity. Or maybe I'm thinking about TES2. Need to check.

This was one of the lesser things that really irritated me about Oblivion - not as much of an issue as the magic GPS paired with the complete absence of in-game directions, for instance, but still an issue. Every single weapon and armor material is exactly X points heavier, Y points more durable and Z points more effective than the previous one. It's the very definition of "spreadsheety" - just a strict, linear, dull, dull, dull progression up a ladder. I thought it was horribly unimaginatively done, and disappointing.

"Oh look.... Dwarven's started to drop. Time to get 2 more points of base damage for 4 more points of weight. Oh hey... now Elven's started to drop. Time to get 2 more points of base damage for 4 more points of weight. Whoa - glass is showing up now. Time to get 2 more points of base damage for 4 more points of weight...."

The materials should actually mean something. Elven, for instance, should be lighter but less durable than Dwarven while still doing as much or even more damage. That's the trade-off - it weighs less (and c'mon - look at it - how could it not weigh less?) and potentially even does more damage, but it's less durable. If weight plays a part in stagger possibility (as it should) then that'd just be another trade-off - Elven would do more base damage but Dwarven would have a higher stagger potential. That'd make Elven more useful for things like daggers and shortswords and Dwarven more appropriate for things like claymores and warhammers, where you want the extra weight and extra durability. And do that across the board. Glass should be one of the lightest materials and do quite high damage, but should be very fragile. Ebony should do decent damage, be fairly heavy and be very durable. Daedric should be punishingly heavy but do enormous damage. Silver ignores normal weapon resistance, but it's a bit heavier than steel and actually a bit less durable. Everything should be a trade-off - not just a dull climb up a rigid ladder.

my personal preference would be for each piece of armour to have 3 factors in its makeup
1. material eg iron, steel etc
2. type eg plate, chainmail
3. style eg Elven, Nordic, Orcish
each material, type & style would have different properties
eg plate protects better against slashing and piercing weapons, chainmail better against blunt
Elven would be light, give less of a penalty to speed, but be less durable, Dwemer would be the opposite

Absolutely - without a doubt. There should be fundamental differences between chain and plate, for instance (and should be mid-range combinations of the two). Better or worse protection against various types of weapons would be a great addition. And I love the idea of different styles of the same basic materials - Orcish steel would be particularly well made, thus durable (they are held to be the best armorers in the realm, after all), while Nordic steel would be solid and practical - maybe a bit better protection, not quite as durable but a bit easier to repair. Elven steel would provide decent protection and be relatively light (and have additional abilty to be enchanted, if variations between materials make a return, as they should), but would be less durable and less protective overall. And so on. And there needs to be a similar range of cloth/leather "armors" with their own pluses and minuses. Extraordinarily light, not a lot of protection and actually a bit more durable, in a sense. I've never been satisfied with the notion of leather armor "breaking." Plate can break. It should take quite a lot to accomplish that, but it can literally break. Leather can't break. It doesn't matter how many times you hit it with a blunt weapon - all that's going to do is scuff it. Cutting it would obviously cut it, but then it's still leather armor - it's just got a slice in it. It would obviously be less effective, but it's not going to "break."

I went through Morrowind years ago and changed lots of things about the armor, just to get them to balance. While it's nice that there are as many options as there are, they still don't make full use of them. Light is the most obvious one - there's really just about no reason to wear anything other than chitin, then glass (or, with Tribunal, DB, then glass). I made it so that chitin still provided better protection than netch, but was actually a bit less durable, so netch is actually worth wearing if you're concerned about durability. Newtscale is more durable, provides about the same protection, but has much higher enchantment potential. But it weighs more. In mediums, bonemold is very durable, decent protection, lighter than it was by default. Adamantium provides better protection but is actually less durable while weighing about the same (almost all of the default medium armors are too heavy), Dreugh is relatively fragile, but quite light and has a high enchanting potential. Nordic chain is a bit heavy, very durable, decent protection. And so on. What that did is make just about every armor item in the game worth wearing, just depending on what the character valued. Want light weight and high enchantability and willing to trade off protection? There's an armor for that. Want maximum durability and decent protection and willing to trade off increased weight for that? There's an armor for that. Want maximum protection and relatively light weight and willing to risk lower durability? There's an armor for that too. That's how it should be.

Hopefully that's how it will be.

no thanks i prefer the classic grade system.

...What? Why? Not sure if troll or not...

Hopefully, each type of material could have it's own bonuses. Iron and Steel, being relatively common, could be cheap to repair. Ebony armour could be extremely resistant to blunt attacks. Glass armour is expensive, but offers the wearer maximum speed. Daedric could boast magic resistance, etc...

Indeed. Especially in regards to weapons, I really thought Oblivion dropped the ball... I think it's fair to say Morrowind Handled all aspects of equipment better than Oblivion even dreamed on the best day though, hopefully the worst we get, is Morrowind's direction superimposed on Skyrim, though Morrowind's equipment was far from perfect, and left a lot of room for improvement.

I agree mostly with what others have said. I don't really want for there to be an absolute best set of armor. I want for varying sets to be judged based on how well they compliment your character's playstyle/skillset.

Interesting concept. I wouldn't mind seeing something like this implemented, if it was done well.

Of course, if you take a more realistic approach, you introduce other problems. For instance, glass armor is supposed to be made of volcanic glass; basically your armor is made out rock. That in no way qualifies as "light." I'm not entirely sure what is supposed to separate it from ebony or Daedric, which are made from the same material. Maybe it's tempered differently?

Actually glass is more or less pure silicon and it is almost 4 times lighter than iron, so it does make sense (unless glass is something else in TES)
In real life Ebonith is heavily vulcanized rubber, what it is in TES universe I have no idea, but it is mined like rock, so it could be heavy and hard (maybe somehow similar to granite?)

good idea and you eventually ended up using artifacts instead unless that armour and weapons you mentioned had some cool enchants

Agreed, but chain mail is designed to protect against slashing, not blunt strikes.