Her recent defeat at the hands of Eradur-Vangaril has made Nykteria realize that it is high time she got herself a staff. I found her one from Armamentarium Staffs, and http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v90/subrosa_florens/oblivion/Oblivion610.jpg to http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v90/subrosa_florens/oblivion/Oblivion611.jpg But now I do not know what to enchant it with. I have several ideas, but Nykteria cannot decide which (or which combination) to use. So I thought I would throw it out to the gallery, and see if anyone can help her make up her mind, or has any other ideas that she might approve of.

Right now I am thinking of using any of the following effects:
Drain Speed (I have found from using Hatred's Soul, that even just a little of this can freeze some enemies to the spot, and make it very hard for the rest to ever reach you).
Paralyze (always handy in a pinch.
Silence (her chosen enemy is Necromancers, so an obvious choice. But I cannot help but think that Paralyze is better, as it is useful against all types, while Silence is really only good against magicians)
Weakness to Magikca (being that she is a spellcaster, this would be an excellent set-up attack. Perhaps when combined with Drain Speed this might be the front-runner).

Paralyze or Weakness would be my choice.

Demoralize + turn undead + a persistent shock effect can send a foe away to die or at least take damage. It can serve as a form of crowd control as well, controlling who you deal with and when. Shock damage of course, is resisted by few, travels fast and looks kewl.

Since you have the modded ability to self-enchant multiple effects onto a staff, I would normally recommend adding a brief (and cheap) soul trap effect as well, but I believe you use a mod where you directly recharge weapons by spell.

I prefer to administer weakness in advance by spell. Pairing weakness with a strong drain speed effect on the same spell lets you prep your target without alerting them to what is coming - a mage's sneak attack if you will.

I tried the Demoralize, turn, shock, and did not really like it. I don't like spells that make the enemy run away. Then I have to chase them. That is what can be frustrating about fighting necromancers and conjurers. Although granted, when it is only a 10 second effect, you don't have to chase them far. I did try it out to see what it was like, and opted against it. It is just to easy to constantly shoot people in the back and then make them run again. I don't use the 100 point drain speed for the same reason. It is just too easy, and feels more like just exploiting a loop hole in the game rather than something believable (why does making me slow also make me forget that someone just attacked me?).

Last night I experimented a bit with 100% weakness to magicka and a 20 point drain speed. I can see what a difference it makes when Nykteria uses her flare spell afterward. I may just drop the drain speed part, since Old Meat acts as a good meat shield anyway.

But since she is a proficient destruction magician, she might indeed want to just use a spell for administering the weakness before hand. Or do as most of my other mages, and simply build it into all of her attack spells, so it works on the successive strikes.

I always have this problem with staffs. I can never decide what effects to use with them. If Absorb Magicka would work at distance, I think it would be perfect. But alas, like Absorb Health, it is touch only.

I′m somewhat in line with Acadian here. Using the staff in conjunction with a spell could give some devastating results. Try having a weakness spell, to magicka for example, and follow it up with shock damage and damage health from the staff. Staff damage should have short duration, allowing you to spam instead of sitting around and wait for the result.

Worth a try perhaps?

I might try something completely different. One of the things I do not like about staffs is that they can only be enchanted with offensive effects. I would be happy if it instead gave me shield effect, and maybe a fortify block. And then it would just be a defensive item. I should be able to do that with a script, so I just might try that. Being able to physically strike with it would not be bad either. Although with her spells that seems redundant. But I might try combining it with one of those hit with your staff mods.

While it is somewhat vexing, things like this are why I enjoy Oblivion so much. Even after playing it for years, I am still finding new ways to play the game.

I looked at a mod called Staff Overhaul some time ago. I believe it had provisions where you could enchant a staff with 'on self' effects or on target effects, as well as a selection of unenchanted staves. That might help point you in the direction of a defensive staff.

Sounds interesting having the staff for defense rather than attack. And there′s no excuse not being able to use it like in Morrowind where it was more of a melee weapon.

I have no idea. I'm just shocked to see SubRosa start a thread here in OB General. :spottedowl: Don't think I've ever seen a SubRosa thread before.

I whipped up a simple script to do the job of making the staff defensive. It works even if it is on her back, which I might try to look at changing. Although I am not sure if that is possible. It depends on if there is a blocktype for having a weapon in your hand, rather than the onequip one (which I am using now). Maybe the OnActorEquip?


This is the second one in the past week! I think I might have five or six total now, not counting the fan fic ones.

I′d be surprised to see Acadian start one :wink_smile:

*double-dare*

I know about your fanfics, just haven't had the time to read them yet. And see, once I start reading I'm gonna wanna keep at it for a long time, so I have to set time aside. But I've never seen a SubRosa thread in General! :twirl: matter of fact, I can't remember the last time saw a Savillian or a Thomas Kaira or a Decrepit thread either :blush:

Good thing for flowerboom for keeping the "old guys" on track. :laugh:

I like the defensive staff. Like Darnand's fictional staff, it's kind of a magely shield.


Edit: Forgot to finish. :blush: So, a shield enchantment.

I was actually thinking something similar, but instead of yourself, make it buff whatever you shoot it at. So you could summon Old Meat and then buff it with strength and shield. I don't know if it's possible though.

If you want to use it in your game, I can paste the script I used to add the effect. Then all you have to do is create the staff in the CS, and add the script effect to it. It was really very simple to do.



Old Meat is plenty tough already. But I could buff him with a fortify speed! He is slow as molasses in wintertime. Imagine a zombie with the speed of a lion? Muhahahahaha!
Edit: I tried it out. Even with just a 15 point fortify speed, Old Meat is taking off like a race car. It is kind of funny watching him go, since he still has that same lurching, jerky, zombie walk. Only sped up!

I think that fortify health could be helpful with summons - and cheap, as it only need last for as many seconds as the summon.

Oh, love the avie of Nyki! :happy:

Just to give folks an update, after much experimentation, I went with a 100% Weakness to Magic for 10 seconds for her entry level staff. I think she will be upgrading to the 2nd tier staff soon, which will probably have the same, plus a 100% Weakness to Poison thrown in as well. I found it does indeed work excellent as a prep shot, with some fire coming close behind. Doing the weakness with a spell was just way too magicka costly to be worthwhile, at least not at her current level of Destruction. However, I am happy to say that Nykteria has fully integrated her staff into her repertoire. None of my previous characters have ever used a staff so much as she does.

http://youtu.be/T3lFqI3jk-g is a sample clip of her in action with the Staff of Evening Shadows. Also making an appearance is her new zombie, Mystery Meat.

That works so well! Now she will never need to get her dress dirty. What a great idea!

Sure, I would love to make a staff for Darnand, thanks! I rarely let him out to play, but he would be much more fun with a Staff of Awesome.

That weakness to magic staff is great because of its flexibility. You can 'chase' it with any type of magical attack and it will be helpful. Good choice!