When the perk system was announced I was neither concerned or pleasedy about it, but watching it in the video raised my eyebrows to say the least.

- Boring perks
Shield wall in the video increases amount blocked by 25% and has 5 ranks.. Really? 5 ranks into this when I can get awesome stuff like Shield Charge or Resist Elements.. 5 perks out of 50 possible to get the max block amount? How does Beth mean to manage perks that change gameplay vs perks that... well, don't? Seems that a lot of those 280+ perks are just going to be like this..

- Artificial perks
Or perks that should have been a part of the game from the start. Looking at the same Shield wall perk I have to wonder what is my shield worth without that perk? To my understanding it should me modeled that either I time my block or I don't.. Either I get bruised (small hp and stamina loss) by the force behind the attack or I don't.. Either my shield gets damaged or it doesn't.. And get perks that allow me enhance those things (less durability loss, less bruising, less stagger). This is leaning too much a mmo where you have an attack for 100 and you block 40.. If you are moving forward from attributes, classes, birthsigns then move forward from shield block value.. Same can be said for axe cut perks.. Give us bleeds by default and make perks do MORE bleed instead of the perk allowing the bleed in the first place..

- Leveling stall
I understand that perks must have requirements.. If I was designing the game I would make it like that.. But I have to warn you what could happen is that people will again have to micromanage their skill gains not to level up when they don't have access to a perk they want.. Ex. I level to 10 and realize that the next level I will not meet the requirements for a desired perk unless I "farm" that skill and only that skill for the next level.. Now I know you are going to say lots of skills, lots of perks but it can still happen..

Thoughts?

I want the choice of taking no perk.

i get your points. and i agree with what youre sayin on artificial perks. stuff like bleeding should be default, and for all wounds, not just those caused by axes. on the leveling stall bit: i think most requirements will be pretty low. remember the guild advance requirements in morrowind? i was never even close to not qualify for those

I get your point but when he was describing axes maby he ment the weapon more than the perk? Also I am going to sit back and watch I have faith in the devs. Sad to say it but if we have to lets just get a mod. We shouldnt have to but still.

I'm not saying requirements should be low.
I'm saying that the perk system needs to be designed so that no perk feels unatractive for a player (within chosen skills).
I'm saying drop the number of perks to 100 if needed but make each of them count.

Don't make me take more block just because at that time I don't qualify for Shield Charge..
Make each perk worth it.

I like the perks makes the game harder, you shouldn't be able to block 100% damage that easily, like in Oblivion.

If you've played any of the Fallout games, you'd know how well a perk system can add complexity to the game.

In Skyrim, it seems to be in place to pick up some of the slack left behind by removed skills and attributes.

It adds another level of character customization.

Axes maim and have gaping wounds much more than other weapons. I agree with the sword crit due to swords being slim and finding gaps in armour. That is generaly how they are used to find gaps and weak points. Swords cant hack through armour like an ax or smash it like a mace. But they can stab through it or find gaps or a weakness in the armour and with a skilled user you are done!

I don't mind if 50% of the perks are passive abilities or as u like to call them "boring"

its impossible to come up with 280 ACTIVE unique perks its just not possible, unless you expand the world of ES beyond its normal parameters

Huh?? I don't understand?? Just don't choose block as a perk until you have access to Shield Charge? I don't really understand what you're trying to say about the perk requirements?? It's not as if they are only available at level 20 and only level 20 or something like that.

They already said well back that the lions share of the power is in the perks not the skills its how its supposed to be. IF you want a fully powerful shield defnesively your gona need likely 8-9 perks to do it. Otherwise just get 2-3 or just 1 in that perk and move to other perks.. ITS YOUR CHOICE.

I don't ever see this being a problem. As fen mentioned, the requirements are quite low. Also, you have 50 perks to choose from (which will allow you to completely max out 3-4 skills). If you can't get the perk you want this level, it will still be there next level, and you can take one of the other perks that you want. This will only be a problem if you are taking perks in skills that you aren't using (and why would you do that).

I absolutely agree.
It was my fear all along that perks would be a poor substitute for things attributes and skills used to do fluidly and naturally, and with these amazingly dumb shield perks it seems I was right.
These things belong in the block skill, not in perks.

I also fear that there will be numerous 'light' perks. You know, the kinda thing they come up with at 3 a.m.
Like the wild wasteland perk in Fallout New Vegas. Fun? Exactly once.

But the perks are in the block skill. You won't be able to get them if your not very good at blocking :\. The difference is this time around you have to choose whether you want to be good at blocking or something else.

I mean that this should be in the block skill, not in a perk.
When you get level 50 or so you should be able to bash automatically, it should not be reliant on choosing a perk.
Its ridiculous, gamey and makes no sense.
If perks are just there to do what skills and attributes used to do in a more fluent, organic and logical manner than this will be the very last elder scrolls game I will ever buy.
Already I am not going to buy it on release date anymore because frankly I am pissed off at the action/ adventure direction this game is taking, moving even further away from what made elder scrolls great than Oblivion did.
I thought that after the massive feedback on that game they might move away from that kind of drivel, but I guess I was wrong.

But that's the point. It's still a perk. You just don't choose it and can max out every skill and be super dooper awesome. This way you actually have to decide what you want your character to focus in, or if you just want him to be a pretty lame middling guy.

But if I dont choose it then my block skill will be woefully underpowered even at level 100.
Which makes no sense.
Perks should not be a replacement for skills and attributes.

So you would rather have it so that every skill and attribute can get to 100, making all end-game characters the same? The other option is to limit how many skills you can raise/how many levels you can get (and you would stop gaining anything after 50). This would cause the same thing as not getting every perk. You dominant skills would be great, and you less used would be very weak.

Huh? I thought those aren't exactly what were his sentiments on this issue.

About the points raised on the OP, I might get your message wrong on the first bit, but I assume that the you don't have to take all 5 points of the "boring" one to unlock the "more awesome" ones (as you put it). I dunno, I can be royally wrong here. I just hope not. Perhaps at the very least one perks below and/or a certain level of skills (but not too high), though I can see how some will see this as restricting still.

Agreed on the second point. Some effects should be there by default (like a small percentage of bleeding damage from an axe should be an innate effect that can be increased with the additional perks). Lastly, about the leveling stall, I see the possibility on that too, and hope the devs notice this, as it would be in their interest to avoid such thing happens.

Yes, why not?
Its not like all of my characters will end up a level 70 anyway.
By that time in Morrowind and Oblivion I have over 300 hours put into one character.
Why, after 300 hours and saving the world cant my character be superhumanly good at everything?

I am much more concerned about the dumbed down character creation, making all starter characters exactly the same, than I am about endgame characters ending up samey after 300+ hours playtime.

Well that's the point. Why should your block be overly powerful at level 100?? It just means you've blocked more attacks. Doesn't mean you've particularly got a lot better at blocking attacks or learned to shield bash. Sure you'd get a bit better (which is how it will work), but you have to actively choose to become a lot better at blocking (leaning new techniques, holding the shield better etc. etc.).

If someone only ever uses his shield to block and never ever even tries to swing it once in his lifetime, then he′s not going to be so swell at shield bashing correctly. Just like you can spend years playing football and become really good at it yet never learn how to juggle the ball in the air if you never try. And opposite to that you can spend all day juggling a ball and then be crap at playing the sport itself.

It may be a bit extreme since even a 5 year old can perform a shield bash on its first try, but it′s not going to be a very good one unless it practices shield bashing. So perhaps what you′d like is being able to perform a shield bash from the start despite skill or perks, but just not be any good at it. I personally have nothing against being unable to shield bash however until I take a perk in it.

As for the opening posts concerns about there being boring percentage based perks, I don′t mind them either, they help me specialize and I wouldn′t be surprised if the very first 5 perks I take are in blocking since it′s something that appeals to me. Perhaps there will be a similar heavy armor perk that lets you take 5% less damage times 5 and I′d take that too. Nothing wrong with spending 10 of your perks on such stuff if you want to, and if you don′t then you can pick different perks.

But that is exactly what the block skill used to do.
So why do we now have boring and gamey perks instead of a natural and fluent system?
I dont see Bethesda's reasoning in alienating long term fans like this.

I agree that the initial character building should retain some depths to it, but completely disagree on keeping on the simplistic character development from the previous series throughout the play time. I'd rather have earlier phase to be "dumb" rather than having the whole game.

edit: So you're saying that I'm not one of an old time fans, just because I'm not particularly bothered with the inclusion of this system?

Because this way not all characters can become super awesome. So every play through you can have a massively different experience, rather than the first few hours being different then gradually converging on every character being the same.





So you'd rather all characters end up the same for a larger amount of time than the few hours in th game where your character is drastically different?? It's not like all the races are going to have the same stats. Orcs will still be good at combat, and Altmer will still be good at magic but not so much at combat.