I don't know how many people frequent these forums anymore but I figured I would give it a shot.

I was or am attempting to build some sort of assassin/ nightblade character so that I can finally try out the Dark Brotherhood/ Thieves guild and all the daedric stuff. Owned the game for like 3 years now and always had a morally good character so I wanted to try something more depraved.

However, here comes my problem. I really don't like the feel or roleplaying aspect of dagger or bows for this character. Surely bows are powerful but in my mind, Vampires are destruction magic, right? In addition, wouldn't a vamp assassin like to be close to his kills? And a simple knife (dagger) seems inadequate. So in a perfect sense, I would like a sneak vamp with a sword who eliminates people before they even notice and destruction for dragons and range.

So here is the problem... And I have googled searched everything so hopefully I find some answers here. I was doing some tests because I was getting my butt handed to me on legendary, so I attempted to see how much more damage dual wielding power attack was, and it was strong if you could land it ( I found it much more difficult than just one power swing) to help me out in the 20's (once again.. cannot sneak finish bandits and getting destroyed). But I noticed that everybody in town seem to hear the assassination with swords. I tried the same move with daggers and nobody cared. It just seems so weird how the sword can actually make "noise" to wake the dead

• Just how loud are the freaking swords?!


• Is it going to be impossible to sneak with the swords?


• Does sneak skill have any impact on the noise?


• Will invisibility remove me from detection?

I have a feeling that my ultimate Vamp nightblade idea may be ruined and I probably will have to run a dagger off-hand. It just seems so... unfitting. Eventually I will probably forgo the sword all together and have invisibility in the offhand and dagger in the main. I just had the idea of a bad ass vampire lord who could kill entire groups in the shadows and if caught, used time stop. Like I said.. a dagger seems unfitting.

Well, yeah, they will hear you if you are power attacking as your kill move. You can't power attack without grunting.

Also, playing on Legendary is damn near impossible if you don't grind up other skills, such as smithing, enchanting, and alchemy to give yourself the best possible gear.

Actually, and I am pretty sure you can test this.. but power attacking and the grunt doesn't actually give you away. Try it with dagger.. it is still silent. It is just the differences between silent dagger weapons and swords. I know about the other stuff.. I am trying to get my smithing up but by golly.. the 200,000 gold rings you need is difficult. I am almost ready to waste a perk and grab dwarven smithing to make it faster

Dwarven perk is worth it. Raid a few ruins for as much as you can carry, and make dwarven bows. Nchuand-Zel and Mzulft have the most scrap metal.

I love Mzulft. There's so many Solid Dwemer Bars in there that you'd have to modify your carry weight attribute (via the command console) to an insane amount to carry all of them at one time.

The only problem with Mzulft (well aside from the place never respawning) is that you have to progress through the College of Winterhold in order to access it. But the sheer amount of smelt able Dwemer junk in there makes that place well worth hassle of joining that college. My last trip in there netted me about 300+ ingots worth of stuff.

Each weapon has a noise level (silent, normal or loud) that you can look at in xEdit or the CK. Silent weapons do not alert enemies when you attack with them. Normal and loud ones do to varying degrees. I don't recall which weapons have which noise level associated with them, and I use CCOR/ WAFR which changes a lot weapons anyway. But it would be easy enough to check a specific weapon in the CK or xEdit to see what its noise level was and change it to whatever you wanted.

I've done sneak attacks with swords (and maces and greatswords, oh my!), so it's not impossible. Also, a successful power attack from stealth will not alert anyone if you kill your target instantly. However, it's best to draw the weapon out of earshot, and of course you'll have to sneak very slowly. Sneak skill does seem to help, as do Stealth perks, but you'll always be quieter with daggers and bows. On the plus side, massive warhammers don't seem to be any noisier than sleek swords, so, you know, there's that...

If you're trying this on Legendary, the damage scaling really isn't helping you any. For a silent kill to be silent, it has to be a kill. A damaged but living target will immediately alert everyone in the vicinity, and even a critical hit from stealth might not be enough to kill after the damage reduction.

In addition, any potential enemy looking in your approximate direction will see the body fall, no matter how careful you are, and might spot you in the act as well.

As for Destruction, I guess I don't see why that would be a natural vampire thing. But, hey, if that's your jam, Quiet Casting (in the Illusion tree) and heavy investment in Stealth should help somewhat. I'll admit I don't have a lot of experience with this, but my sneaky Illusion mage has managed to stay unseen while casting Flames at enemies (granted, said enemies are usually busy with a follower, or a summons, or each other...). Just don't expect to stay hidden for long. Also, I'm not 100% sure, but I don't think Destruction spells get a damage boost from sneak attacks.

OP, are you on PC? If so, I might recommend "Better Vampires" (allows feeding on awake enemies, with the possibility of an immediate kill) and "Sneak Tools" (sneak attacks seem to be more effective, but are of the "all or nothing" variety). "Shortswords for Skyrim" and "Heavy Armory" introduce shortswords that aren't as quiet as daggers, but benefit fromt the same sneak attack perks. Might be short, but it's still a sword... There might also be mods that stealthify normal swords, but I've never used any so I couldn't recommend one.

I am on the PC, correct. Better vampires huh? I will have to look it up.

I am just having way way more difficult time with this goon... Even my two handed guy had an easier time. It just seems like I cannot get that one handed kill, take maybe 1/8th of their health bar and then they turn around, resulting in bad things (usually a death animation).

On the destruction, I needed a range for dragons and I am a svcker for magic. I just don't know how many vampires that use bow rather than spells.

Back on topic... as far as the sound. I don't know how loud two-handers are but I reckon they would be louder? A lot of people claim that drawing and sheathing your weapon doesn't make a sound. I may have to test this. But for my test I attacked the guard at the gate of Whiterun. I was playing with perks as far as dual-wielding and just a power attack with one hand. I also was testing that if you have perked dual weapons, a power swing with one weapon will do more damage with another weapon in hand (something I saw while researching last night). And this is when I observed that if I attack with a sword and resulted in a kill, it and I was immediately discovered but a quick-load and an attack with a dagger, would go unnoticed. My stealth is 70 right now so I was hoping that stealth would help but does the kit show stealth as a factor?

In a room full of goons, I am doubting that sword sneaking is going to be viable, which is disappointing, even with the boon of invisibility.

Edit: You guys have convinced me of dwarven smithing... I have rid the world of iron ore and it is slow going at only 42.

For range, you could use the bound bow.

There have been times where I'm sitting in stealth, draw a sword without moving, and instantly get an open eyeball (though not necessarily fully open). So either the draw made noise, or I was just seeing the general "sword out" stealth reduction take place. I tend to believe the former, as I have been able to sneak up on targets with a sword in hand.

But, yes, a room full of witnesses will mess up your best attempts and sneak attacks. Invisibility can help, but you need to move out of the area quickly. Even then, expect to get hit once before the enemy loses you. That said, investing 4-5 perk points into the Stealth perk might "break" Sneak in a way that will let you do what you want to do. I never invest more than 2 points in Stealth precisely because higher amounts will keep you stealthy in situations where it really shouldn't (IMO of course)...

The Shadow Warrior perk (requires Sneak 100) and the http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:The_Shadow_Stone might also be of interest, if you don't already have them.

I did a test where I sheathed and drew a sword in front of an enemy and I didn't get any noticed detection... That is weird? I do have the unofficial updates.

Which I realized ruined my powerful vampire/necromage build so really not much use going vampire besides roleplaying...

AND after extensive testing.. the sword sneak attack is a no go.. At 90 sneak, I immediately alert everybody with a sword attack rather than just the dagger. What a disappointment. I am usually a minimalist due to downloading a thing for diablo 2 and it giving me a virus so I try to be careful with what I download. But I may have to find a mod to make a sneak sword.

You would think eventually sneak skill would remove that penalty but probably too many numbers for Bethesda.

This whole vampire/ being evil isn't working out well ha... Even doing the daedric quests are difficult to swallow.

Sheathing and unsheathing a weapon do not cause a detection event by NPCs in the game by default, I'm sure there are mods that could alter this if you really want that feature but you will never be detected by an NPC in the base game just by drawing a weapon.

Regarding weapons, read Turija's post as it seems you skipped it - all weapons have a sound detection value assigned to them, most are either "normal" or "loud" and will trigger an NPC detection at various ranges no matter your skill level. Very few weapons or weapon types are "silent" weapons, with daggers being the most obvious weapon type with that setting. This is not a bug or a glitch but how Bethesda designed the system, if you don't like it you'll need to use some type of stealth or weapon mod that changes what weapons are silent or how NPC detection works in general.

I didn't skip his and/or her post

I was attempting to see if anybody had a value on the noise level of actually attacking and if it improved with stealth. OR if anybody had experiences with a sneak sword as sort of a nightblade character and did it work.

Once again, didn't ignore him at all and I understand silent vs noise. But it makes a difference if I attack with a sword and enemy's in 2 rooms over come running since they "magically" heard the blade or if it is just enemies in the same room. Just was looking for numbers. Furthermore, there is no data out there about the "numbers" unlike many other quirks in the game so I figured I would ask.

But like I said, I may just shelf this goon and try something else. I am really not enjoying the dying to one hits after a fail backstab kill nor the removal of a mule "aka" Lydia since NPC's are so inept at stealth. So if I alert the entire camp.. I usually see the death screen

I would say lower the difficulty a notch. Legendary level doesn't make enemies fight any harder or use new tactics, it only penalizes you by nerfing your damage output and upping theirs. That's a major cause of the "dying to one hits after a fail backstab kill" thing.

I'd also say that for a stealthy character, the Muffle enchantment is a MUST. Sneak attacks may indeed go unnoticed but lots of times it's the movement of your clothing/armor during all of that which gives you away. Muffle lets your gear move silently, and works in conjunction with your sneak skill.

There is no loudness stat for weapons, sword will make no more noise than a dagger.

It's not going to be impossible to sneak with a sword, you'll just have to grind the skill more, because sneak attacks with daggers get an insane damage multiplier with Sneak perks, x15 compared to only x6 with other one handed weapons.

Sneak skill has general increase on stealth, so yes, you will be harder to spot with higher Sneak.

Doesn't invisibility wear off on action performing, like when you attack, or am I mixing that up with older games?

I personally never had problems with getting spotted for drawing a weapon, but it does change your pose for the duration of the animation, which might make you peak your hand behind the corner, and into the enemy's field of view.

That won't get you spotted, and tbh I don't remember the character grunting when attacking while sneaking, but the attack in general will alert everyone if your sneak is low, even if you do kill your target in one hit.

Sneaking characters are pretty hard characters to work with on Legendary, because enemies just aren't coded to allow smart sneaking, and most random, completely silent things will somehow end up alerting the entire dungeon of your presence as if you just spent 15 minutes violently beating the crap out of a screaming cow. I suggest you spend some time praying on the wildlife and small groups of bandits before tackling dungeons, and then you'll reach a threshold where you'll become a god even though you're playing on legendary.

For the time being I'll suggest what someone already suggested- get yourself a pair of boots that have muffle on them.

Definately get muffle along with all the sneak associated perks but what i'd do is use magick for Dragons like you already stated and use smithing and Elemental Fury for mundane foes.


2 max tempered Dragon Bone Daggers Non enchanted used with all 3 tiers of Elemental Fury will do insane damage while still maintaining sneak.


Elemtal Fury is so freaking cool that I use it with my 2H Warrior and its pretty much OP but lotsa fun.


using all 3 tiers with daggers you'll be like a tazmanian homicidal wrecking machine.

It's he. There are no "numbers", just "silent" and "normal" and "loud" as I mentioned. Silent weapons won't alert nearby enemies. Normal will and loud will alert enemies farther away.


Your sneak skill, perks, enchants, muffle won't make attacks quieter as far as I know (although muffle might) but they will let you get back into sneak mode (closed eye) quicker so enemies will stop looking for you.


The reason swords make noise and daggers don't is to give daggers an advantage for sneak attacks. It's a gameplay tradeoff designed to give each weapon its own unique benefits and drawbacks.


If you are on PC, you can easily make swords silent In the CK or xEdit. If you are on console someone might make a mod for that once SSE is out. It's not hard to do, just a bit time consuming.