So I'm going to come back to Oblivion after not having played it for quite a long time. I decided the type of character I want to play, and that is a build I originally made for Skyrim. I have a feeling it'll work just as well, if not better, in Oblivion.

The character is a fighter-mage, putting a bigger emphasis on melee than magic. His magic is mostly for healing and utility spells such as Detect Life, Light spells, etc. As a warrior, I feel my character is somewhat unique in that the only armor he uses is a shield - that includes magical armor. So if I need defense, I will have to block or move out of the way. As a role playing factor, he also has a vendetta against rogue mages, so I built the character with high magical defense and spell absorption.

Hopefully I've outlined the build pretty well for you guys. As I said, I haven't played for a pretty long time so I'm a tad shaky on game play mechanics. Any help will really be appreciated!

Although I'm not much help, I would like to say good luck with your adventure! This seems like an extremely interesting build, can't wait to see how it pans out for you.

There are many ways to do this. You can get spell absorption through mysticism spells, enchanted objects you can find, enchanted object you can make with sigil stones and the Atronach birthsign. My personal favorite is the Atronach birthsign. It gives you permanent 50% spell absorbtion plus a bonus of 150 magicka, but the downside is that your magicka does not regenerate at all. You will need to use potions, absorbtion or other means to refill your magicka. The Atronach is one of my favorite birthsigns but it is not for everyone. It can be tough going in the beginning because it can be hard to refill your magicka. At higher levels, however, you will have no problem and Atronach becomes easily the most powerful birthsign.

Spell absorbtion does not interfere with your summons in Oblivion like it does in Skyrim, but it does interfere with your ability to receive blessings at alters and your ability to cast telekenesis. This means that you may need to rely on potions to cure diseases and restore attributes. But it also means that you can refill your magicka at alters when you absorb the blessing. Once your mysticism skill is high enough you can also absorb your own telekenesis spell and replenish your magicka that way since you will absorb more that the spell costs to cast with high enough skill level.

Spell absorbtion will also absorb the enchantment from weapon strikes when you are hit by enemy weapons. The only thing it won't do is absorb your own reflected spells. Only resist magic will affect reflected spells.

There is no birthsign for resist magic. Bretons get 50% resist magic as a racial ability. Orcs get 25%. You can also get resist magic from found enchanted items and ones you make with sigil stones. There is a Restoration spell for resist magic but it is a fairly high level spell and it is fairly magicka intensive.

If you have a high spell absorbtion, then resist magicka is some what redundant because the resist only kicks in for spells that are reflected or those that bypass your absorbtion. Since 100% spell absorbtion is easily achievable with the Atronach birthsign I don't usually worry too much about resist magic with an Atronach character but it can help on certain situations.

As for skills, if going with an Atronach birthsign, I might suggest the following major skills

Blade (or blunt)
Block
Mysticism
Illusion
Restoration
Alteration
Armorer

Magic specialization and Strength and Endurance as favored attributes. You will use alchemy as a minor skill but it levels quickly enough that it won't be a problem. You will need to raise it to 25 before you can make restore magic potions. Just go to an Inn an buy all the food and make it into restore fatigue potions am sell them back. It will only take a few minutes to get your alchemy to 25. Then you can start making restore magicka potions and just level alchemy naturally from there. Or you could substitute alchemy for armorer or alteration as a major skill.

Don't take willpower on level up as an attribute bonus unless you are doing it for roleplaying reasons. With stunted magicka, willpower won't do much for you. Contrary to the loading screen message, willpower does not provide any magic resistance. It only affects magicka regen speed and total fatigue. If you go with an Atronach birthsign your magicka won't regenerate no matter how high your willpower is.

A totally different option would be to focus on either resist magic or reflect spell instead of spell absorbtion. Then you could take the mage birthsign or any birthsign really. You can get reflect spell as a spell and through found enchanted items but there is no birthsign or racial ability for reflect spell. But with just a few found items it can be pretty easy to get spell reflection to above 50%. There is a certain deadric quest reward shield you may be interested in . . . It might be more punishing for those rogue mages to send their spells flying back at them then to absorb them. Of course you can mix and match absorb, reflect and resist as you see fit.

Good luck!

wont you get your butt kicked trying to fight some tanky nord with just a shield?

Maybe the shield is the Escutcheon of Chorrol. If you have enough of that kind of enchantment, you don't even need a weapon.

I think the OP went back to Skyrim. Hopefully with his shield and not on it. It's been a week since I gave him a slew of advice about how to convert his Skyrim character to Oblivion and we have not heard a peep from him since his OP. Or, maybe he took my advice and he's now lost in the planes of Oblivion.

All this talk about spell absorbtion and the Atronach birthsign has me wanting to start another Atronach mage that really focuses on absorbtion of all kinds. My last Atronach mage was focused more on how to keep the blue full so he could blast away with destruction.

Turija, I learned so much from that, not all wasted

Either be a Breton or a altmer (high elf) and join the mages guild and you will be fine.