Bethesda shouldn't really bother with companions anyways, Obsidian did such an amazing job with them in NV, making them actually useful and with a good backstory

But, what I have always loved about Betheseda's games is that they give me...'meat' for my RP/imagination to ride upon.

And, you could have more than one companion following you in Oblivion. If I remember right, you could have up to 8 people following you. You had to get the companions for the guilds, and a few from temporary quests that I didn't finish in order to keep them. I often got Martin and Jauffrey by not taking them to Cloud Ruler Temple and not playing the MQ.

I never cared much for companions. But then I read how much control you have over them and seemed cool. I'm glad they at least give us this, why do people want an army to follow them?

There's one good reason: Not making battles into giant cluster[censored]s...

No matter how good the AI is, if there's too many people involved, it gets messy.

Also the game is mainly about having adventures ALONE. Having one companion can help things out, two is still okay, but the problems start to show with three.
No it's not the AI, you just cannot find a single enemy to hit, because everybody already fights one.

I see where your getting at OP. Having a couple orcs and invading towns soubds fun for RPing reasons. I think they did this so people would not get overpowered. Think about it. Your an Orc warrior. If you get hurt, a healer companion can heal you. Then you have an archer who would kill people ahead of you. Your pretty hard to kill. What about 2/3 healers? That would make you invincible!

The bad news will keep piling up until I don't want the game anymore.
-No character view in inventory
-Merged armor
-Only one companion
-Horrible UI+HUD

Bleh

Mods will change it. Either way, you really don't even need the one.

You don't think play balance is a good reason?

Or do you feel that, in addition to a multi-companion system, they should also make the level scaling system capable of going "Ok, it's a party of X people, multiply monster spawn difficulty by Y"? (which, of course, would actually be much more of a complex issue than that simplistic example).....



(And I'm sure this will aggravate some people, especially the ones who take the "do what you want" thing a bit too literally, but.... if you want to play a "direct an adventuring party" game, why not play a game actually designed for that? There are plenty of RPGs out there that are built around having a party of 3/4/5/whatever. The Beth games I've played so far have always seemed like they were better suited to "lone wolf" style play - the companions have always seemed to not work well in the framework of the game. But, hey - maybe that's just me. :shrug:)






Like I said earlier - I really disliked the companion system in New Vegas. Specifically because they were "deeper" and more developed - they had so much game content tied to them that I felt forced to drag the stupid things around with me, even though I really didn't want them underfoot. At least Fallout 3's companions were much easier to ignore.

Agreed. Companions would just get in my way while im using my spells~

Oh really...I thought the game was mainly about..."going wherever I want, doing whatever I want, and being whoever I want."

Oblivion provided the opportunity to have at the most, 8 companions. I mean, if I want to be a bandit leader with a group of 2 to 3, I should be able to do it. I mean, I'd be happy with 2 companions. That would have been much better, and I would not have made this topic.

This ^

Sad but expected. I would have liked to have more, but I guess it has to do with balance issues.


I hope you can at least have a human and a dog (or equivalent animal)

I actually like the limit of one companion, because when each person has to choose one among several options, it makes their experience different than everyone else's.

Though having companions at all is an improvement, it is kinda odd it only allows for one when Fallout 3 and NV are perfectly fine with two and yet Skyrim only allows one.

Well then, welcome to modding.

Don't cry when you can't hit [censored] or the game becomes too easy...

Yeah, it pisses me off. they go on and on about magnetism and making companions better, only to be able to get one?

I think it would be neat to be able to have more than one species of companion other than a dog. Then at your house, have stables to keep all of your companions but you can only have one out with you at a time. But I'm not complaining, there will be mods for stuff like that. :]

1. Get one companion to follow you.

2. Get a summon spell.

3. Summon the creature and get the companion to follow you.

4.?????

5. Profit.(maybe)

This also probably means no multiple summons, unless they already confirmed or denied that somewhere.

I think the companion system is being merged with the relationships in the game. You can marry "some specific NPCs", those being romancable companions. My guess of course, I could be entirely wrong.

Is it really about having adventures "ALONE"? Funny. I thought it was about roleplaying and being who you wanted to be within the confines of what is plausible within the gameworld

Next you will be telling me its ABOUT being a musclebound full blooded Nord, who fears and dislikes magic, relies entirely on his battle axe and has no desire in life other than cleaving skulls and ridding the world of Dragons. Except, WAIT! The devs specifially said the DON'T WANT anyone to feel forced to play that way.

Remember the time you could hire adventurers in Morrowind or Arena?

Neither can I...

I am not into balance at the expense of plausibility. If the balancing mechanic makes absolutely NO SENSE as anything other than a balancing mechanic, then it is a problem. If there is no LOGICAL gameworld explanation as to why your character cannot do thing A, or have thing B, and the ONLY reason that can be gleaned for the restriction is "balance" then it is just immersion breaking crap that favours the system over the player.

Necromancy will help you on that! :thumbsup:

Your gameplay should be different based on your general choices and prefferences, not based on forced either or decisions born out of completely manufactured restrictions.

I can promise you that, for all the additional things that Morrowind and Oblivion allowed you to do that Skyrim seems to be removing, there was still a vast amount of difference in the playercharacters that you would have encountered if you looked at every persons game.