Now - regarding balance - the reason that I balk whenever I see "balance" held up as a virtue is that it all too often means pounding every possible character into shapeless pabulum. "Balance" all too often isn't achieved by making certain that all characters have the potential to become more or less equally strong, but by hobbling things so that all characters remain more or less equally weak. That's specifically what I don't want to see. If the "problem" is that mages can become too strong, then don't gimp them - make the other archetypes stronger.

I have no particular issue with "balance" in the sense of relatively equal pinnacles of development - my issue is "balance" in the sense of keeping everybody equally drab, and that latter is all too often what people actually want. I rarely see anyone argue for making one or another build stronger in order to compete - instead, it seems that everybody wants to make the strong ones weaker. That's bassackwards, in my opinion.

And again, if the NPCs can't keep up - make them stronger too. Look for balance at the furthest reaches - don't bring it about just by chopping everyone off at the knees.

Some stats were handled decently some were not. Intelligence was handled better in FO3 than in oblivion, but still it wasn't perfect. Outside of maybe adding a intimidate option to high strength characters strength was handled very well and the current system wont cut it. If I improve my one handed skill but want to be strong how come by 2 handed damage is not going up? I can carry more apparently with a higher stamina, but not hit harder. The problem is stats fulfilled a nice role of having a general talent to a range of abilities, perks don't cover that since they are specific boosts. They might not cover everything like you can in a pen and paper game, but the idea that someone who is agile is naturally better at learning how to sneak, pick locks, and shoot people is fairly logical. You can't do that now, you can't even simulate it very well I suspect. It is a loss from past games and what could have been in this game. And I don't think anyone is saying the game will svck because of this, but a lot of people are saying the game would have been better if they had kept attributes in and even better still if they had improved how attributes work.

What Skyrim is trying to do with how players approach their desired character is totally different with morrowind and oblivion. The most obvious change is the attributes.

There are more viable reasons that attributes are out than trying to make the game more appealing to newbs or those who want everything simple.

First they wanted to introduce perks. Perks are tied with skills. If attributes like strength or agility that affects weapon damage as well as one handed or archery skill perks would comparatively lose its importance. I said comparatively because some argue that Beth could've just fixed attributes not rid of them and still introduce perks. This argument is redundant because by taking out the attributes they can stress the importance of perks, the new feature in Skyrim. It is easy to understand that having attributes+skills+perks is not a simple addition to having skills+perks. They're NOT 'bigger than' relations. They're just 'not equal'.

Second, since perks are tied with skills, we can safely say that skills more or less govern the entire character's performance. In previous series of ES attributes increase reflected how much your character spent time with a group of skills. A character with high strength could've spent more time with blade, blunt or hand to hand, but didn't particularly reflect a single spell. Thus a guy who ignored blade completely and only practiced blunt got better at blade cause blunt raises strenghth. Now I'm not saying this is wrong. It is natural that a guy good with blunt can get better with blade more than a guy who only practiced magic. It makes sense and I agree BUT a game design is not about making sense. It's about how players can interact with the game in meaningful way. Now that skills are the only governing aspect of a player's performance what is reflected in your character's growth is only consisted with what your character actually did in the past. Compared to previous series Skyrim character is a stronger representation of 'you are what you do', and this is what Skyrim is meant to be.

Skyrim is just a different game with different purpose in game design. There's no reason to deny it or criticize it.

Whoa up there a minute..... we're pretty much on the same page here, or at least seem to be.

First, briefly, and with no offense meant, my issue with the virtual rocket launcher of magic is that it reeks of svcking up to the FPS crowd. Turn magic into a weapon pick up, so that players can start the game and rush to the rocket launcher and then say, "COME GET SOME!" There's something fundamentally tawdry about it.

Now - that said, they might well manage to pull off something good with it, and just for the reason you state - because magic really should feel like bending power to your will. There might just be a welcome element of that to it.

Or it might just be a weapon pick up. We'll see.

Now - regarding balance - the reason that I balk whenever I see "balance" held up as a virtue is that it all too often means pounding every possible character into shapeless pabulum. "Balance" all too often isn't achieved by making certain that all characters have the potential to become more or less equally strong, but by hobbling things so that all characters remain more or less equally weak. That's specifically what I don't want to see. If the "problem" is that mages can become too strong, then don't gimp them - make the other archetypes stronger.

I have no particular issue with "balance" in the sense of relatively equal pinnacles of development - my issue is "balance" in the sense of keeping everybody equally drab, and that latter is all too often what people actually want. I rarely see anyone argue for making one or another build stronger in order to compete - instead, it seems that everybody wants to make the strong ones weaker. That's bassackwards, in my opinion.

And again, if the NPCs can't keep up - make them stronger too. Look for balance at the furthest reaches - don't bring it about just by chopping everyone off at the knees.

When thinking of how we actually interact with our skills in real life, perks in our skills are really closer to the reality of the fruit of our actions. When you practice a skill, let's say basketball for easy example, through your efforts your body naturally becomes more agile, stronger, or tougher depending on your position and strategy of play. Also, as you play you begin to pickup certain techniques, raising your skill to a higher level because of it.

I get this to but at the same time i dont think it is impossible to accomplish the same desired effect with out an alterable attrubute bar it could be done in different ways but though i dont dislike the bars being gone because they didnt function well. I dont however think it wasnt possible for them to be used much better.Im also not sure speed is entirely gone just done in a different way as you mentioned armor im sure enchanted equipment .

As far as natural base speed it could well be an in game mechanic as they said all starting base speeds will be the same to me implys base speeds will change .Now i dont no to what extent you could increase base speed and still need a sprint but i still think it could still be possible to increase it to a degree .If it wasnt it wouldnt bother me truthfully because you can still sprint but i can see people missing a crazy fast guy .But i do think i remember hearing something once i cant remember where that it had to be slowed some do to problems with 3rd person mode and back peddleing at the previous rate.



Ya attributes could be tied into perks based on racial differences or they could be a base multiplyer just one or ten for racial differences they could be in multiplyers in the stamina health maggicka bars .There are lots of ways they could be tied in passively to a number of systems to get the desired effect with out ever selecting one directly as well in my opinon.Id like to see that since we know the actual bars are gone .I think thats what the bars could of been good for createing distinction in the races but i dont think that is impossible without the active choice of the attributes either it could be in behind the scenes as well.