I find what works best is to create a character with qualities you can really relate to, basically a fantasy projection of yourself as you would exist in the Elder Scrolls world.

Seven bloodlines, seven Major skills :shakehead:

What in the heck are you even talking about?

Seven bloodlines, seven Major skills? Is that why Morrowind made you choose 5 of them? :huh:

Actually I think I was wrong about that, it′s thirteen bloodlines so forget what I said :facepalm:

My Significant Other - who plays and mods for both Morrowind and Oblivion - has a theory that people who play RPGs are more likely to suffer from some form of OCD than those who play other games, or those who don't play games at all. I was doubtful at first, but I'm beginning, slowly, to agree with her. Dungeon Siege had this inventory that was divided into a grid and items would take up differing numbers of grids. I spent hours just rearranging my stuff on that inventory page. I could have hit a button that would have automated the whole thing for me but that would have taken all the satisfaction out of it for me. I think I almost got more enjoyment out of fiddling with my inventory in that game than I did actually playing the game.




There are two schools of thought on this matter. 1) Major Skills selection is a roleplaying mechanic that is meant to express something essential about the character. 2) Major Skills selection is a meta-game interface that is meant to inform the game engine how to compute leveling up.

The longer I play the more I have drifted from position #1 to position #2. I think it's because the longer I play the less interested I am in creating and playing characters that do not change. More and more what interests me about roleplaying is creating characters who change in response to the events they experience. Creating a game character who never changes is as uninteresting, and feels as superficial to me, as watching a film or reading a book about a character who never changes.

The more I focus on character development the less important that initial selection of Major Skills becomes, because my character is likely to be using a very different set of skills at the end of her story than she did at the beginning (just like most of us do in real life).




Me, I think playing a game for the sake of beating it is uninteresting. I would quickly lose interest in any game that I tried to play that way. I just couldn't maintain my interest. I played Half-Life once (that is, I "beat it"). I have no desire to play it again, it's over. But I'm still playing Morrowind and Oblivion. The reason for this is because I'm not 'playing the game.' I'm roleplaying. Yes, I run into roleplays that I'm dissatisfied with at times, but I'll take that over a game or an approach to a game that, I feel, only allows me one shot at a satisfying story.




This is exactly my attitude too. When I play a character in an Elder Scrolls game I am composing a narrative. At the outset of a game I come up with a new character and an outline, just as if I were writing a novel. The game is an improvisation on my outline. Sometimes the narrative hews very closely to the original outline, sometimes it shoots off in directions I never anticipated. And like all narratives, my character's will come to an end at some point, the story will have been told. And, just as when I finish a book and then pick up another book, so I will retire that character and pick up another character.

To me, roleplaying games are not about combat, and they're not about stats and classes and levels. Roleplaying games are about personality and story. In fact, combat often gets in the way of my roleplaying. So do stats and levels and all the other technical things that define roleplying for some players. To me, roleplaying does not happen in the game mechanics; roleplaying happens in the imagination.

I certainly agree with you on your idea of roleplaying. I am the same way.

I also get what you're saying about a character changing over the course of the game. When I did my Morrowind run through, and "beat" that, I watched how my character changed, from the moment he got off the boat, until the moment he faced off with Dagoth Ur. He was a different person.

Getting off the boat, he was a criminal who had essentially been pardoned who cared for nothing but himself. The only reason why he even met with Caius Cosades was because he didn't feel like having the Imperial Legion tracking him down for the rest of his life. So he began working for Caius Cosades, and investigating these Nerevarine prophecies. As he dug deeper and deeper, his interest grew and grew. But more importantly, followers of Dagoth Ur began to hunt him down. As such, his motivations for revealing the Nerevarine prophecies and fulfilling them became personal - he wasn't so much interested in fulfilling the prophecy as he was tracking out his new enemies (Sixth House) and destroying them. His feud with Dagoth Ur became a personal grudge.

I've even thought about ways that could work in Oblivion. I haven't beaten the main quest, but I have advanced far enough along in certain questlines (main quest, Mage's Guild, etc.) that I do have a pretty good idea how my character would react to certain situations. With this specific character, a good chunk of the early goings are "scripted", just because I've done it so many times, and I know what this particular character would do. The first time I played with this character, I stumbled upon a really good roleplay opportunity. When I join the Mage's Guild in Chorrol, and do the Recommendation quest, there is a great "character defining moment" for me. I get the Fire on the Mountain book, and give it to Teekeus. But then when Earana asks me to steal it back for her, I do so, and give her the book. Then, after the quest is completed, I really RP. See, the RP of this particular character is that he is all about power. This character is a "power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely" type of character. Think Jean Grey / Dark Phoenix, or Anakin Skywalker / Darth Vader. Consumed and corrupted by dark power. As such, it is MY character who wants the Fire on the Mountain. So I stalk Earana, murder her in her sleep, and steal the book for myself. I know there is no gameplay reward to having the book, but RP wise it's great. It triggers the Dark Brotherhood for me, as well as being a fun character moment for RP.

One thought that I had was that -this- moment could be the moment my character learns about Destruction magic, from having the Fire on the Mountain book. As such, he's able to learn about Destruction magic, and begins using it even though it's not one of his skills.

The other thought I had was that when it comes to Destruction vs. Alteration, I'd pick Alteration as the skill, because Shield spells are more definitive of my character than throwing fireballs. The other thought then is, I'd actually use the entire school of Destruction magic, whereas with Alteration, all I would use is Shield spells. There's nothing else in that school of magic that applies to my character and what he'd do. So instead, I take Destruction as the major, throw my fireballs around, and then just cast Shield spells with Alteration. And I justify not taking Block because, even though I use it, I'm not using a shield with it. I'm using 2 handed weapons.

So when it comes to this build specifically, I need to decide which route I want to take. Either take Alteration as my skill, since Shield spells are very definitive of the image of the character that I have, or take Destruction, since I would utilize more of the actual school of magic, where as with Alteration it's simply one line of spells I am using. However, Destruction isn't quite as definitive to the character concept I have. Tossing fireballs around isn't exactly -out of character-, but it's not essential either. It's more along the lines of "throwing fireballs at bad guys is fun to do in game, so I'd like to do it". But I think that needs to be taken into consideration as well, because my character build -should- reflect the gameplay style I want to use. Which is why I'm using Sneak / Marksman even tho I am a heavy armored tank.

And again, like I said, the reason why this is so much of an issue for me is because I think I'm OCD in real life, not just my games.

So after 1000 different restarts, I think I may have found out the cause of my problems. It has been my insistence upon including the Sneak / Marksman combination. It's been essentially altering my playstyle away from what I envision my character being. I envision my character being a brutish tank mage, and I like the stealth / marksman game play mechanics in this game, but the way I play stealth has not been meshing with the way I want to tank. I did some test run throughs without using Marksman / Sneak, and I have to say, combat now has been much more enjoyable for me. It feels much more visceral. I'm still using semi-stealth tactics, via using Mysticism to detect life, and pre-plan my attacks, but busting around a corner, throwing a fireball at an unsuspecting victim as I charge them with my 2 handed claymore, and then summoning a zombie in front of their face just as they get a chance to react, is more in tune with what this character would do, than lurking in the shadows, picking people off one by one with a bow & arrow. Picking people off one by one with a bow & arrow and dictating combat that way certainly is a fun playstyle, but it's not for this character. But I do have characters in my mind who certainly would play that way.

My problems really did boil down to trying to do too much with 1 character, instead of focusing on what and who the character would be.

Cutting out Sneak / Marksman, I now believe my character is set to look something like this:

Name - Khulain
Race - Redguard
Birthsign - The Atronach
Specialization - Combat
Attributes - Endurance | Intelligence
Major Skills - Blade | Block | Heavy Armor | Conjuration | Mysticism | Alteration | Destruction

Being Redguard will certainly hurt me in the magicka department, and this playstyle is going to be much more magicka dependent than the one utilizing stealth, BUT I feel that Redguard fits the RP of this character more, and gameplay wise I like the racial ability much better than those of more balanced combat / mage races (Imperial, Dark Elves), and I think the boost to strength and endurance will certainly help me in my main focus, which is still to be uber tank.

Now I am just trying to decide on a class name. In Morrowind, the class is called Summoner, because it's much more based around summoning creatures, stealing souls, and enchanting items. But in Oblivion, Conjuration is more of a support skill than a focus skill. Magically, I am all over the place, what with Conjuration, Mysticism, Destrucion, AND Alteration. I've thought about taking some Warhammer inspiration and calling him a Blood Knight.

I know how you feel. After my character I have at this moment finish with the guild she in, she will tie up loose ends, I will be starting up an other character.

At this moment I am playing as a Nord, Lady, Monk and she is going through the Dark Brotherhood quest. After I done with her I start a different character. She been through a lot. She went through Knights Of The Nine, the main quests, SI, the arena and going through the dark brotherhood.

The next character I be doing is a Breton and will be doing the Mages Guild from the start go. Do quest that I cannot do with the with the character that I am playing through at this moment.

By doing that it keeps me interested in the game.

Yes, very good observation. In my Oblivion playing I find that only the Dunmer build tends to be a jack of all trades. From a role play point of view the other races tend to specialize on one form of attack, only the Dunmer can put blade, bow and magic into the equation. This, of course, is only IMO, and anybody can play any race how they choose.

It is good to see that you spent time to see how the character would feel during combat. Taking out bow & sneak makes sense for the tank. Combat shouldnt come into play when considering RP, but unfortunately something does nag in the back of the mind if it doesnt feel right. The Redguard sounds fun- an Atronach that is trying to make his way through the world.

The Sneak / Marksman does make some sense for the character, because I do picture him as rather cerebral, and also ruthless. Attacking from the shadows out of sight before engaging in combat is something the character would do.

But the way I play stealth, however, is playing it like the character is a glass cannon when that's not the case with this character. This character wants to be right in the middle, in the thick of things. And I noticed when I was stealthing around, trying to take people out one by one, I wasn't getting myself involved in the "melee" aspect of combat. Thus, I was becoming more of an archer that happened to wear heavy armor than an actual tank.

I have determined that it isn't that I can't stick with a character- it's that I won't. I like the chargen process too much. For that matter, I like the conceptual stage too much- imagining new characters, envisioning their possible journeys through this familiar imagined land we all share as a virtual home. This is really enjoyable stuff for me, so why "fix" it? My roleplaying experience is no less deep for it.

Every once in a while, however, a character I create for the fun of it really connects with me, then I stick with them for a while. It's great when that happens, but I love my short-lived characters just as much as the long-term ones.

I had this problem and at the end of the day, much like someone has already said, its about wether or not your heaving fun. There were a few things that really bothered me about my enjoyment of the game and things that I thought "but I NEED to do this!". Simples things such as looting every mob I killed or taking a look at what they dropped. I would enter a cave and after every mob I killed no matter if it fell or what, I would go after it and loot it and I quickly got very bored and hated that I always did this. To get out of this habit, I simple kept telling myself that this isn't a Diablo type game and only loot if you see the guy is wearing/equipping something that you think is interesting. But the MAIN reason that broke this habit was at the end of the day, its what I found fun. I found I had more fun by just keeping on progressing rather then stopping at each mob, looking down and looting. I loved just bashing and carrying on, bashing and carrying on.

And thats just one example, with regards to characters, no don't feel compelled to stick with just the one, its about variety and creating different kinds of characters and hopefully having a different experience because your playing that character a bit differently than your other ones. I tend to switch back and forth and have many characters and yet only completed the main story twice. At the end of the day, its your game, its my game, its our game, we play it how we want in the way thats fun for us.

^ Faraith, that is a great example that you used about looting everything you kill. I was doing that, and using the junk to create bad potions and alchemy, and acouring caves and dungeons for ingredients, and its like "hey, my character isn't an alchemist, why am I doing this???" my character doesn't practice Alchemy, so is there a reason why I need to loot all the rat meat and bone meal I come across?? That's a good point, my character would kill and move on. Get plenty of treasures from chests, and only look when he thought there might be some good gear on someone. I may try that. It does feel awkward to just run by that stuff but yea. I think you bring up an interesting point.

As far as ny characters go, I've realized that my characters are all built around 3 skills. Conjuration, Mysticism, and Enchant. I absolutely love summoning things and I play some form of summoner mage in any RPG i play. Diablo 2 = necromancers and druids, Everquest = necromancers, Warcraft 3 = undead, WoW = undead warlock, warhammer tabletop = vampire counts, etc. The Mysticism and Enchant come from a character concept i had for morrowind about a dark mage who summoned and harvested aouls. That's what i like to do, and what i like to rp. Outside of that is just filling the character up with other skills to build just what type of summoner i want. Pure mage? Shadow knight type of warrior necro? Or an arcane assassin who lurks in the shadows and hunts his prey unseen? The latter 2 are the type i really like to play, so its just a matter of finding the rest of my build for that. My problem was trying to throw all of those concepts into one character, when really it was 2 different characters rolled into one.

Okay so I am really enjoying this build (the only thing I think *might* be missing is if I tossed in some Illusion for some command and frenzy spells, but not vital), but I am learning quickly that a Redguard that casts a ton of magic is quite a challenge. A part of me is thinking of re-rolling as a Breton and getting a beefier magicka pool, but then the Endurance is going to be an issue and I won't be able to tank nearly as well. But now that I'm getting some spells that are more powerful than just beginner spells, I am noticing that I an popping a Welkynd Stone after pretty much every battle.

Though I'm sure in the higher levels, it should all balance out, as my Intelligence will increase anyways, plus I'll get higher level Mysticism spells and can get into the Absorb spells which will help out. It will be a challenge but probably a fun one.

No Iam not like that at all. I have had atleast 4 characters over level 50 and a few other thirties. When I make a character I usually take a few trial and error ones to get that right one. Sometimes even wiping like 3 level tens before I feel I got it right lol. So I usually do that and stick with him until I get bored of the game, wait 6 months and pick it back up with another character to max out.

Yup, I get that, not as bad as you, but I had my Imperial Archer-Knight, who was awesome, and I finished almost every quest in OB, and continued to play him, even when I made new characters, I always ended up back with him, the furthest I got was a Khajiit theif that got up until the greatest Heist quest, which glitched and broke. But the other day I found myself a new perfect character, a Mage-Archer-Swordsman guy. He is the only one in two years that I have managed to really like. bliviongate: :rock:

When I played WoW I was always making new characters but in Oblivion I'm pretty good at making someone and completing the story. I've played for many hundreds of hours but I think I've only made 5 or 6 characters.