I last played in May '03 and only ever completed the base game once, using a Breton 'mage with a bit sword' type character, I never played the add-ons.

I remember little of the main quest or most of the guild quests, etc., but have a good memory (refreshed by reading here and the UESP Wiki) about the mechanics; I have a good memory I think of the leveling mechanics in particular.

So, with that background, I've come up with a build for a 'stealthy' type character unlike anything I usually play in RPGs and wonder if there's anything here that won't 'work', by which I mean anything that'll paint me into a corner main-quest-wise (eg. "you'll not be able to finish because you have [not] got suchandsuch") or will cripple my leveling. This is my current build plan:

Race:
Khajiit Female

The Lady:
Character receives +25 to Endurance and Personality

Primary Skills and Specialization:
Strength, Luck, Stealth

Major Skills:
Spear, Alchemy, Illusion, Light Armor, Short Blade

Minor Skills:
Athletics, Restoration, Acrobatics, Security, Sneak


I'm taking Luck only because I never did before, it's hard to do in some ways because +10 elsewhere would make a more obvious contribution, but I assume Bethesda put Luck into the game and made it of some use.

I have Spear for leveling END as well as a secondary weapon type, Illusion for I think the obvious support spells, Alchemy for everything else magical, Light Armor and Short Blade being her main gear; both Armor and Blade will start at 40, giving her decent defense and attack right at the start, with some 'easy' initial leveling.

All the minors are either 'obvious' skills for the character type, while Restoration is there because I always like to have 'cure' spells and healing available in spell form as well as potions/scrolls.

Would appreciate any suggestions for possible changes.

I came back to MW after some time and like you decided to play a sealth based character and started with a Khajiit too!. I was very pleased I did and I think the game plays very well stealth based (lots to do, many ways to get stuff done etc, and after all you are supposed to be a secret agent!). However I dropped the Khajiit idea when i found out I couldn't wear boots or helmets and there didn't seem to be any meaningfull compensation for it, besides I wanted to build magic capability as the game went on so wanted the extra enchantement capability to buff interlligence. Instead I chose Dunmer since I figured that went well with the story.

I remembered that END was a big deal in MW otherwise you couldn't run anywhere or fight toe-to-toe for any length of time. So I chose END rather than STR as primary as I figured my long sword would look afeer STR. Luck and stealth same as you (I also went with The Lady). I used ill-gotten gains early game to buy training in spear, heavy armour etc purely to build END further, and I did that in 10 batches to make them count too. It's good to able to run around easily! So I took marksmen as a major (rather than spear) and once my stealth got up high I found it excellent for raiding daedric shrines etc for top class weapons. Took 'em down one at a time with bow or snuck up on 'em and slit their throats, either way high exitement, danger and top class treasure early game.

Which brings me to weapons - I went for long sword and short sword. Short sword early game for agility to build speed which makes a lot of difference for a stealth character IMO (escape/hide), as well as making it much quicker to get around. Long sword for big beasties later on and again I'm glad I did 'cos I would have been sick as a parrot looking at my beautiful pair of daedric dai-katanas and not be able to use them. I'm glad i found a second one before I acquired the werewithall to do some serious enchanting though because I enchanted one of them with 1-100% weakness to shock + about 20-45% shock damage and found that I just had to wave it at people and they either dropped dead in one swat or ran for their lives - no good for building up my STR or sword skills! So I left that at home mostly and used the other one the hard(er) way mid game.

I took Alchemy too, IMO a solid choice. I didn't take restoration though, I figured I'd use that plenty anyway and with good Alchemy I always had sufficient potions anyhow. I took Mysticism, Alteration and Illusion which I was happy with, giving me a good range of support magic. Things like levitate, water-walking/breathing, night-eye, chamaeleon, soul trap are very usefull. I found enchanting trinkets to cast these spells is more powerfull but it had two irritating drawbacks for me: if you use one it replaces whatever ring/armulet you were wearing so you have to remember to keep putting your primary buff jewelry back on, and secondly you don't raise your magic school skills that way. Getting magic skills up to advancement requirements for the mage's guild was hard work for me. I confess to having had to buy a couple of 1 cast point spells to grind them up, lame!

My only comment on this build is that while Athletics might be a good RP choice, you're always going to be chasing it in terms of the levels of your other skills. Everyone always runs everywhere. Even as an unselected skill, it will still raise over its governing attribute (it's simply that you can't train above it) and you will still be fast. At least, I think that's the case. I'm just coming back myself.

Instead, I might go Alteration or Mysticism in that spot.

Thanks for the ideas.

Well, Alteration and Mysticism were also on my 'wish list' and I tried several builds with those in, using the character generator tool I built myself way back, so I don't need convincing of their usefulness. :happy:

My reason for taking Athletics as a selected skill was for faster initial leveling, I have no great attraction to it from an RP PoV so it can be replaced with something else if leveling isn't a concern.

I chose Restoration largely because I have no experience of Alchemy (my first time through character didn't take it) so I don't know how early on I'll get to the point where I can make worthwhile restoration and curing potions. If I don't have to wait too long then that too could give way to something.

My only concern I suppose would be that taking 3 magic schools without re-speccing to boost Magicka would greatly slow down my early leveling since I'd not have the Magicka pool large enough to do much worthwhile casting; that's the reason in the end I chose just one school.

Any thoughts on this?

I wouldn't worry about your mana pool if you are just going with utility spells. The only time mana is a problem is when you run out of it in battle and your build is based around combat spells.

You can carry mana potions if you like or simply rest when you're low. Most of the situations you are in should be "no hurry". As for leveling them, well with magic you can practice. Just cast a given spell in to thin air and you'll get credit for it. If that's not gamey enough some even go so far as to create a spell that will do the same thing in terms of leveling but only cost one mana point to cast. And you can always train.

As far as athletics goes, I guess a lot will depend on how you will handle battle situations. Lots of times a khajiit build will be constructed towards escape rather than confrontation. If that's the case (and it does not appear to be), then keep it. If not, then you are going to be facing higher level monsters based on speed rather than combat ability. Athletics will raise very fast.

As for alchemy... depends on how long before you want it to be useful. You need to get to 60, I believe, before you can see all 4 potential attributes for a given ingredient which is, of course, ideal. You are obviously further away from that when starting alchemy as a minor. However, you can level quickly with mushrooms from the bitter coast (as long as you can see at least two attributes which would be level 30). You can farm mushrooms from the bridge near Vivec all the way around the Southwest part of the coast to North of Hla Oad. Don't forget the islands! Grab the pod spores from the green plants that have bulbs on them too (forget what they are called exactly).

I think if you take alchemy even as a minor I think you get to see two levels of effect per ingredient and IIRC that's sufficient for restore magicka/health and the ingredients for those are easily avaialble in Balmora (stocks instantly replenished too). Each does have one expensive ingredient that isn't easily found in quantity though however with alchemy you will want to wander round collecting stuff to make potions both for skill raise and also for making money to pay for restore health/magicka ingredients. The biggest hassle early on with alchemy is the failure rate in making them - that makes you want to practice plenty

+1 don't worry about magicka pool for support magic

RP-wise, I have no problem casting spells into thin air at bed time - it's what novice mages do. Think the university in Oblivion - all the novices do all day is cast spells at boards. Especially with support magic 'cos u level up so slowly in those schools.

With alchemy + sneak + lockpick you can earn lots of extra money so early game you can easily level up on the back of training 'cos you can always afford it.

Your build will work fine. It's like a cross between Acrobat and Nightblade, and I've finished the game with both those classes - I figure a hybrid will work as well as either.



Alteration as a minor skill wouldn't hurt things for you on that front. The only useful spells it has are the movement spells - Waterwalking, Water Breating, Levitate. Open isn't useful to you because you have Security. The movement spells all have very low magicka costs, you can get a 1pt Levitate for 18 secs spell that costs like 2 magicka and it's all the Levitation you'll ever need.


Illusion as a major skill is a good call, it's much more useful there.

I take the point about Athletics, Scrogdog correctly say I'm not looking to make a character who uses speed as a battle tactic, it's entirely mundane travel with the occasional "get out of Dodge quick" , so changing that for something else is fine.

I hadn't looked into spell costs, I seen 4LOM's point that casting utility spells is pretty cheap so even a Magicka pool of 40 or so can provide for some useful practice sessions.

I'll make a few tweaks to my build plan then hopefully set off on my re-visit to Vvardenfell over the week-end.

Thanks to you all. :thumbsup:

Good luck! Looks like a fun build.

One last thing, you can fall in to the Athletics trap with other skills too! Let's say you are heavily raising speechcraft because you are sick of people not liking you or whatever, but are not raisiing your associated combat skills at the same time. That means that sooner or later you'll be facing a higher level monster with combat skills not ready for it.

In other words, high speechcraft isn't going to allow you to talk creatures out of attacking you.

That doesn't mean that you don't take speechcraft. It means simply that you need to keep your combat skills on par with your level while at the same time raising speechcraft.

Athletics is a special case even so simply because it raises so fast. There's pretty much no way to control it (except for not running... yeah not happening ) and you'll be practicing and training so much trying to keep up that you will spend much less time having fun.