Hello good peoples of the Elder Scrolls forums,

I like coming up with character concepts and playing them out in the lands of Cyrodiil. Sometimes though, I find it hard to do from a roleplaying perspective from lvl 1.

Say I want to play an old powerful but forgetful wizard. How do I get around the fact that this powerful wizard only has a Flare spell for combat at lvl 1? This of course goes for any type of character I come up with; the natural limitations of being level 1 creates a block for anything but "weak" characters.

I understand of course that I can just journey towards my character concept but that seems like the game doesn't really start for me until I actually get there and then what's the point.

Do any of you have some ideas how I bridge that gap?

Bonus Question: How the heck am I supposed to play with the Atronach Birthsign as a mage, I'm always out of magicka despite hording Magicka potions.

1) I guess the thing to do there would be to play a character struggling to return to that level of power? So for instance the mage has been in prison for so long that they've lost/forgotten most of their spells. Or perhaps the guards were a little too rough when they arrested him, and a blow to the head scrambled his memory where magic is concerned. Or in more general terms, work something into the character's backstory that explains their weakness.

If you want a way to get more powerful faster, then you're pretty much looking at power-levelling, which in my opinion takes all the fun put of the game.

As for the bonus question: Alchemy. Potions you make yourself work over time rather than in one lump like the store bought ones. The road from Skingrad to Kvatch has an immense number of flax plants, and flax seeds restore magicka. And because it's their first effect, you can get it from just having the character eat some. So brew as many restore magicka potions as you can, your best bet would probably be flax seeds + either http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Steel-Blue_Entoloma_Cap or http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Bog_Beacon_Asco_Cap, and the maps on those pages will show you which areas you can find them.

Nice idea about struggling to return to the level of power he/she had. I hadn't thought of that. It doesn't really solve the problem but I might use that idea in the future still. Thanks.

I was hoping to avoid using Alchemy for the particular Stunted Magicka afflicted character I'm playing currently but maybe that's the only way.

This, for me, is where the PC version shines. Because we can use the CS to shape our characters to conform better to our our ideas for that character. I often give my characters higher skill or Attribute levels (or lower, also), or more spells. I frequently give characters unique starting gear too. A lot of my characters carry heirloom jewelry or a sword that belonged to a parent, ect.

Over the years I've gotten pretty good at sensing how much extra power I can give a character before it begins to feel like "cheating" to me. It's a fine line to balance. On the one hand I want a character who feels more unique than the semi-blank-slate starting class allows, but on the other hand I don't want a superman character either. It's not unusual to have to do a bit of trial and error to find the right balance.

I don't know if that helps. But that's what I do.

Well, without alchemy you're limited to: Wayshrines, Welkynd Stones, Ayleid Wells, and the http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Telekinesis

I might just steal this idea.

Here's the way I'd do it (just off the top of my head):

First, obviously, I'd start with an old character.

I'm not sure what the build would be, but I would guess a pretty standard mage build, and I'm thinking that the birthsign would be something other than a magical one, since I think part of the key would be to keep his magicka pool as low as possible.

Then I'd go to work in the console. I think the way to do it would be mostly twofold - give him a bunch of very nice spells and (if possible) pretty healthy skill levels so he can theoretically cast at least the mid-range spells, but then gimp his intelligence to the point that he can only cast the simplest spells consistently - try to set it so that his max magicka is just barely enough to get off one or two of the mid-range spells, so he can't cast the more powerful ones at all. And gimp his strength, speed and agility to mimic age.

I'm not sure about the skill levels - I'd have to experiment with that a bit. I'd prefer that he technically qualify to cast the spells and just not be able to, but skill level has enough of an impact on magicka cost that higher skill levels might drive the casting cost down to the point that it would be impossible to make his magicka pool small enough that he couldn't cast them.

I think I'd probably start him at level 1 anyway. He'd still only have access to weak spells (though more than just Flare), but not because he hasn't learned them yet, but just because his ability has faltered to the point that he can no longer cast the powerful ones.

His progress through the game then would be his rediscovery of his old skills. It'd work much the same as a normal game, except that when he gained enough skill and/or magicka to cast a more powerful spell, he'd already possess the spell.

I'm not quite sure what to do with the mages guild. Either play it that he has to do the recommendation quests as some sort of "refresher" before he's reinstated in the guild or start him off as a ranked guild member, which would require dealing with the recommendation quests somehow, and I make it a policy to not use the console to mess with quests, since it's all too easy to break the game doing that.

I think I'd give him some sort of artifact - probably something custom - a ring or an amulet or maybe a robe. Something that gives him an edge to compensate for being old, slow, clumsy and forgetful, but not enough to make him particularly powerful. Something that fleshes out his character and gives it some context. I'll have to think about that.

Yeah - I'm pretty sure I'm going to steal this idea...

Callidus's first idea is what I would do in your situation, OP. I was going to say pretty much the same thing. You've got a character who was powerful, but now he or she is not. The way I'd do it would be to say this wizard had been in jail a long time. Back in the tablegames I used to play, a character who didn't use his / her skills or spells would eventually lose knowledge about these skills or spells.

Perhaps another wizard may have even managed to erase your formerly-powerful wizard's memory somehow. That's another idea.