Discussing the game is one thing, you were claiming your way of playing within specific conditions to maximise taking advantage of a particular mechanic is superior despite well formed opinions to the contrary and suggestions of situations where your own preferred playstyle is in fact not superior.

The quality of the coding is immaterial, it is a staple of Morrowind and Oblivion both that you could turn your character into a veritable God with the right equipment. Can, not have to. Doing so requires one to go out of their way to break the game mechanics and it is the case in many games that a subsection of those who play it will take every effort to break the game.

A broken restoration spell is a reason for your stealth playstyle to be superior to a destruction mage or a warrior in a narrow corridor when confronted with a mob?

If your claim is that overpowered in multiple circumstances makes a character "the best" then I am sure other posters can come up with several other builds that are equally overpowered in terms of DPS or damage sponging.

Even if we accept that a stealth vampire using archery is the only "empirically correct" answer for the most powerful combat build (which is something I don't think is nearly so simple), wouldn't a high-level regular bow with smithing end up with a much greater damage output than a bound bow?

Ok so you suppose other builds can do more damage but I've tried everything and here's why im right.


bows, magic and melee were attempted to be balanced.

Magic bow right off the bat benefits from more perks. Amplification of magic through vampirism doesn't effect to the same degree.

If you wish to prove that you're right "empirically", we require the numbers, not just "I'm right because I say i've done everything it is possible to do"

Please, do provide. Or someone else can if you're unable.

This may seem like i'm going after this a little too doggedly, but I find it irritating that other regular and respected posters attempted to discuss the matter only to have the conversation shut down with "I'm right, you're wrong because I played 3000+ hours over 2 years ago."

So accept my apologies if this seems personal, but if i'm vexed I tend not to drop things until I see the proof of why I should.

"kind of"


Base damage is higher plus the enchant damage but the instant killing of summoned creatures outperforms it since you face so many necros and mages. Having free daedric arrows is always fun.

Something to keep in mind for all is that "most overpowered" does not imply only highest damage. Being immortal in every practical sense is also a role to take during combat and is definitely overpowered. If you cannot die, you cannot lose, no matter how low damage you have. And with the build I listed earlier, you won't have bad damage. And you are immortal in every practical sense in the game of Skyrim.

considering the negative response im not going to bother spending more time on this. Take it or leave it.

Only pure damage? Sorry, I misunderstood the purpose of the thread. After all, the title talked about power not "statistically the highest DPS output" or whatever....

If one 'calculates' power in a video game that 'dryly', errr, well, that's too dry for me. Might as well play Microsoft Excel.

Not all responses were negative. And in any case a claim was made by someone, in this case you. Normally 'burden of proof' is on said person.

Anyway, I don't need to be in this thread anymore.

"I am no longer here." - Draracle.

END OF LINE.

Spreadsheets are the tools of a true warrior!

Nerds rule the world, just look at Bill Gates.

You mean like the warriors of the https://vimeo.com/111458975

My most overpowered combat build: Resist cap on magic and all elementals, 2 daggers (both with 20 points absorb health and 25 points absorb stamina).

Non-stop flurry attacks and come out of any battle with little or no damage or stamina loss, while wearing light armor that he had not put any perks into. With 100 in stealth he could be in a room in the midst of several NPCs or other targets, start attacking and kill half of them before the others had a chance to react.

If he didn't feel like doing that, he could always pull out a Dragonbone Bow (bow upgraded while wearing an outfit that gave him another +125% to smithing). The bow also had 62 points worth of added damage with his elemental enchantments on it, not to mention the several pieces of equipment with +40% to bow damage. Needless to say he could one-shot just about anything from stealth (oh yea, he has all the stealth perks in sneaking except for shadow warrior which seems OP to me).

But that was a really boring way to play. So now he uses "weaker" equipment and I have a lot more fun with him. He can still one-shot most of what he runs across with a bow but there a some surprises now and again, and that's when things get interesting . Plus I've lowered his resists and given him daggers with weaker enchants, so while he can still be dangerous I actually have to pay attention in battle so he doesn't get slaughtered.

I guess all that was just an example of what others are saying, ANY build can be overpowered. Personally I find overpowered builds to be boring, if I'm going to do that I may as well toggle "tgm" on and if I do that I may as well stop playing.

Ha....great punch up!


I have to say (and don't I always ) that if you are going to such lengths to get an overpowered build......then frankly you might just as well go down the FortifyResto Loop exploite route heh! Award yourself 100K damage and the same armour.


Or


Take the barely more honourable route of using consol controls on pc to just dial yourself a god mode.


But the GLORY of besting bad ass bosses in FAIR fighting and knowing HOW to fight in Skyrim THAT takes real cajones. KEEP your worthless dishonourable God mode.....it gets OLD very very fast.


I know a girl (SAH) who has just been through Forelhost(very hard) on LEGENDARY....Level 80.....WITHOUT getting killed once....WITHOUT potions...WITHOUT magic....WITHOUT a follower and using ONLY a shield and a good mace. NO ARMOUR....No pauses, no reloads.


In comparison to this feat......any super OP God mode Unbeatable BOREDOM BUILD is utterly valueless...(Oh and for mr vamp archer...might as well go the whole hog and select Novice play as well...just to be sure (shrug).)


Was that a bit too...y'know ott

Nah, not over the top at all

I was going to say in my post, install ASIS, up the spawn count, then try to sneak across an open area with no cover towards a large group of bandits in the middle of the day and tell me how your stealth build who only has a bow does then. Oh .. I guess I did just say it

Don't get me wrong, the stealth ambusher is my all time favorite build for Skyrim and while there is an absolute ton of alpha damage on an attack I'd hardly call my character the most powerful. There's always someone better ... granted it's usually another player, but I'm ok with that.

Pretty much this. You and Sah make the game interesting by maxing out the difficulty. Others of us do it by severely limiting our characters, or by modding up the danger. Either way, we make the game more interesting by making it more challenging.

I've got a naked Khajiit who took on two dragons at once (default difficulty) with nothing but her claws, a looted flame staff, and Fus Ro Dah...and won.

Well, another player being better is better than the game doing it....

That's why I love Bethesda games. We've all seen a lot of posts where people complain about Bethesda's games being so unbalanced (usually not the regulars). But I love it, the way Bethesda games are "balanced" allows you to decide just how powerful, average or weak your character is going to be. I love the creative freedom this allows. Personally I hope this never changes, if Bethesda comes out with the perfectly balanced game (if that's even possible) I'll probably find another game to play.

Eh, after this many years (I started playing CRPGs in 1985) I really think there's not ever going to be a "perfectly balanced game". Truthfully, that works for me. I think "balance" is in the mind of the beholder.

It can be just as bad You can upgrade weapons to deal 30k damage and stuff.

................ you forgot the compass .......no compass ........giggles

Rick thanks so much

I beat the game using a knife and fork and a chef hat/blacksmith apron. I can appreciate using an underpowered build.

What you eat your way through draugr? (Shudders)

Freeze dried meat is awful

Just to clarify, I wasn't suggesting the resto loop. My original post stated that using enchanting, alchemy, and smithing together can make any PC over powered - which he then stated was a game breaking exploit.

One does not "beat" Skyrim.

Yep. As Pseron always says: "You don't beat an Elder Scrolls game. You live it."