im not even sure aside from making bound weapons soul trap and tougher the [censored] summon atronachs further away perk its mostly useless better perks be spent on allowing you to conjure such things for less magika how ever if you like dual wiellding and conjuring its ok other than that useless hell if you get the rose of sanguine it makes conjuration pointless after a while :intergalactic:

Magic is better in Skyrim. Most of the spells in Oblivion were utterly worthless, redundant with other spells, or just pure stat boosts. They've stripped magic down to pretty bare-bones, but each effect is more unique and enjoyable to use.

Oblivion = Quantity > Quality
Skyrim = Quality > Quantity


Certainly, there are some spells I kind of miss from previous games, but the majority of them I can easily live without, or no problem saying good riddance to.

Wow........... really?

I mean you didn't like spell making? Because the handful of spells you now spam now feel more unique O.o? Wouldn't a spell you created yourself be actually more unique? Quality? You mean graphics perhaps?

I'm going to break my not posting here anymore rule, yet again, since this is another issue that is very important to me. (As a TES player.)

Even b4 release, I was here fighting this battle, and ppl told me, have patience, wait and see, blah, well, here we are, exactly as I predicted. (Months b4 release..)

I have NO problem with the new "casting" system, I like it, however, my ONE condition for accepting the removal of spell creation WAS NOT MET.

I simply wanted variety, variety to replace what spell creation offered.

But, not only did we lose SC, we lost large amounts of useful spells, and even worse, got nothing like "Assassins Rush", "Magic Missiles" etc, to spice it up.

The biggest offense, is how weak destruction mages are, can you play one and win, sure, but, it's not fun. The real problem being that NPC mages far outshine PC mages, because their spells properly scale with skill\level. Meaning, my PC feels mediocre no matter how much I train, which makes using this school less fun that it used to be. (I don't necessarily want to be uber, but, I would like to be able to match anything an NPC mage can do with training, otherwise, the game is basically using cheat mode.)

Hopefully, mods can easily add new spells, etc, and I already have mods that adjust destruction into something more viable (as a main weapon), and SC, well, it is sorely missed.

Basically, magic in Skyrim kinda svcks, which is a shame, because the system itself has great potential, it just never lives up to it.

(Merrari\Otheral\Etc, keep fighting the good fight, I feel roughly the same.)

You're a fool if you believe this.

Gotta say...Beth really ran and tripped with this one.

A noble intent-of making Magic Feel less Number crunchy- ended up with a magic system of limited functionality-especially with Destruction.

The basis of a great system is here, but instead of the spell arsenal growing it becomes obsolete. Spell used at novice level become useless later on, when they shouldn't ue to the fact that spells have individually different methods of dealing damage. The additional effects to the magic spells like shock and frost was a nice touch, but doesn't save the system from it's crippling lack of scaling.


Honestly, if the spells scaled better the magic system might be better off-it would actually feel like a growing toolset instead of throwing away the old spells for the new ones.

I am indifferent to spellmaking as I never used it. But it's loss could have been mitigated if the system was better propped up.

It is just that they didn't plan much spell making into this TES, this one have a storyline which your character was suppose to be a Nord, they enchanted melee combat by a large amount, bow and spells are just secondary weapons now. It is just the way it's meant to play, I don't like it but then again as if this game is not rigged enough with enchant and smithing, the spell making part would just increase the riggedness.

The things that they added to the game in terms of spells themselves would have actually increased the flexibility and endless possibilities that spell crafting had. Nothing that they did would have counted as a trade off for getting rid of spell crafting. (Or even the other spell effects for that matter).

That
Oblivion = Quantity > Quality
Skyrim = Quality > Quantity
argument is not valid as the current system only made them look pretty and interesting. They are more bland, boring, and generic than ever. I walk about until I see an enemy and cast my summon then spam dual firebolt till the targets are dead. Oh, and maybe heal if I need to. Quality of magic in Skyrim? Its just as equal as older generations. The quantity however is devastatingly lower. The "quality" that people are falling for is just a standard graphical improvement that is to be naturally expected as technology advances. I cannot emphasize the fact that the changes would have made spell crafting even more interesting and useful than it used to be. Especially given that some spell effects are made useless simply by level scaling.

In Oblivion I had over 30 hot keys and enjoyed choosing how to fight the next battle. Now I can hardly imagine using more than 3-4 hotkeys. Any more would be for random mundane things.

can't make spells in skyrim? WTF!!!

God damnnit wtf FAIL. lame f-ing lame

Im not going to enjoy modding the game just to get to the lvl of functionality oblivion had. I like how they fixed some bad things, but got rid of staples? wtf fail wtf facepalm sadface

Skyrims magic is really lacking in variety, but I'm sure as heck not going to miss Oblivion's magic either. I actually get what Todd Howard meant by spreadsheety. Every spell just felt like a point on a table of effects and magicka costs. People say Skyrim has lost the magic, but I Oblivion had the least magical magic system I've ever seen. It was also so linear, formulaic, and mechanical. And it wasn't just the magic, it was the potions and the enchantments as well. Everything drew from the same narrow table of effects. It felt like soulless min-maxing, and there was barely potential for the mechanics to interact in an emergent way to produce interesting results,

Really. All spell making did was allow me to deal with literally every single encounter with a single overpowered spell. Sure, there were a few neat things you could do with it, but I'd rather have more interesting pre-made spells and better combat balance. If they bring back spell making, I'm okay with that, but it'd have to be far more limited than it was in previous games for it to be balanced.

Compelling argument.

Sorry but I disagree. Dual casting added a lot, even if they didn't implement it as well as they ought to have. So did spells you hold and channel. The ward spells are actually cool despite svcking horribly. Runes, walls, and the cloak spells were also a solid idea, they just happen to kind of svck as well. Having spells stagger and slow enemies is also new and creates more interesting gameplay(impact is overpowered but still). Yes, they could've done more and done things better, but in spite of the flaws it's still definitely a more involving system than Oblivion's was and a significant step in the right direction.

Also in Oblivion I used less hot keys, due to the spell making system allowing me to combine so much into single spells.

Bethesda wtf!!!! I can't do anything but have outrage on this one, I love this game and defend it from all forms of attack by haters. But facts are facts and the op really went in depth and provided awesome information to show how utterly FAIL magic is on this game compaired to a game that was made six years ago. That's just pathetic.

Woah, let me stop you right there.

The spells in Skyrim are AWFUL and TOTALLY worthless. You end up casting about 3 different spells: Lightning Bolt/Frost Spike/Fire Ball, Summon Fire/Frost/Shock Atronach (sometimes I switch back to fire because the frost atronach is too big to fit through many doorways and thin cave passages), and fast/quick heal.

Its terribly unforunate that other spells like the wards and shields are so worthless. They don't protect enough (100 armor compared to the hundreds that warriors get?) or they're too cumbersome to use (The ward spells are AWFUL because of this. When you most need them is when you can't use them. If you take the time to switch to the ward spell and bring it up to block, you're most likely already dead, or the ward breaks and you get staggered).

The removal of spellmaking effectively neutered magic as an effective system, at least without scaling. The mage starts out trying as many different spells as possible, feeling about for usefulness, and quickly discovers that they're going to be using basically 3 or 4 spells and that's about it. It doesn't help that using spells is so cumbersome, as you have to equip them like any other weapon. As others have mentioned, this ruins characters that use two handed weapons along with spells, because you're constantly switching back and forth and it gets far too cumbersome to keep playing. Even as a mage its cumbersome, because attempting to use two spells at once is suicide, because you lose the stagger from not dual casting destruction spells.

I think magic may be too far gone to even fix by adding scaling to destruction. Its just a fundamentally flawed system because its lost so many spell effects and so many others just don't work out for the player.

I think Skyrim's spell system was a step in the right direction, just not realized or executed well enough. I want to see a list of spells similar to games like Baldur's Gate.

You know I agree with this and the quality isnt just graphical like you guys are saying. Each spell in skyrim is unique. You have the iCy wind spell which is much different than say the wall of fire spell. Both of these are much different from the fireball spell or the frostbite spell. And not just graphically.

ALSO wards were an awesome idea and I actually find them very useful. They are essential for me against an enemy mage. Especially a lightning mage.

I do agree with this, in that I LOVED the idea of runes, walls, auras, etc, but I can't help but believe that spellmaking, in combination with these new effects (which many people had been calling for for a rather long time, long before Skyrim was announced), would have been awesome. Imagine a rune that summoned a daedra when stepped on, or a wall that paralyzed enemies that stepped through it. Dual casting would likely disappear with spellmaking in the game, but I had an idea long ago for something called "overcasting", where holding down the casting button would produce a stronger effect across the board, but made it cost more magicka, so its basically the same thing (you just wouldn't have to use both hands to achieve the effect).

I agree, I think they their intent was in the right place. Before I realized that scaling for magic was awful (because I wasn't high enough level to notice it yet), I was having quite a bit of fun with the magic system. Its neat to run around and cast spells and dual cast them and use wards and all that stuff, but the horrible crushing truth of level scaling brings about the realization that it just doesn't work. Runes svck (they don't do enough damage, even if you get them as fast as you can they still don't compare to the three bolt spells), wards svck, and the skin spells svck. That's something I did notice. MANY of the spells that the player gets access to are useless before you even use them once. I've gotten spells and used them once and realized that they didn't do enough damage for how much magicka they cost. Then I go back to the old mainstays of the bolt spells (in my case, Lightning Bolt).

its ironic actually but due to the decrease in the amount of spells spell crafting would have been perfect actually :intergalactic:

Wow (again)..... really really really???

Seriously though... spell making did not allow you to deal with every encounter in an imbalanced way it just gave you more flexibility - which is great. Mana costs / attributes of spell you created were well balanced too.
You can't possibly want to spam 1-3 spells in each encounter and really believe it's more balanced because you lack the flexibility to do anything else.

Limiting the gameplay choices to get challenge? Do i have to explain why this is ridiculous?
I can't believe you truly want this.

Believe me, I understand there are issues with the damage and cost numbers, but I'm talking about the mechanics themselves. There's no spell in Skyrim that succeeds in being more utterly worthless than, say, burden in Oblivion. Because burden was always a worthless mechanic - NPCs never carried enough gear that it'd ever be worth a damn against anyone but the PC. The spells in Skyrim that are worthless are only worthless because they don't do enough damage and/or cost too much magicka, not because the concept of the spell is bad. Although I have to admit, the magicka damage aspect of shock seems to run into similar issues since NPC mana seems to be too high for it to make a difference. I can't say for sure though since I never bothered really going into the tree and specializing in either.



Really really really. I use these spells -

Muffle
Calm
Frenzy
Conjure Dremora Lord
Bound Bow
Fast Healing
Soul Trap

I'll use the courage based ones once I get Master of the Mind so I can buff my dremora too, and invisibility when I get 75 illusion.

In Oblivion I used this -

Fire Damage 5 pts on touch
Drain Health 50 pts on touch
Weakness to Fire 100% 2 seconds touch
Weakness to Magicka 100% 2 seconds touch
Invisibility 2 seconds on self

With a plain invisibility spell just to close gaps unnoticed. I may've added fortify speed to that at higher levels just faster travel. Could add various other things to the above spell at higher levels too, but that's the basic idea. Nothing would react to me killing it, my mana regen was fast enough since I stacked wisdom that I could cast it infinitely.

2 spells, only really needed one, every enemy was trivially easy to kill. Didn't have to exploit chameleon or reflect, could even make a minor version of the spell at lower levels but wasn't necessary with low levels being so easy. Basically, once I hit level 10ish, I could kill everything not only without getting hit, but without being seen.

Well the same could be said about Burden. If a spell in Skyrim is worthless because in relation to NPC health and to other spells you have it does not perform so well, then the concept may be good while the execution fails because of the variables that follow the concept. In the same way could Burden be a spell that works if they would give NPC's more random loot (or less carrying capacity) so that you could slow down or even lock down an NPC with the spell. Damaging Strength was what Oblivion players did when Burden failed them yet Burden was supposed to be the pure version of reducing carrying capacity and for damaging strength it was only an extra that came along with reduced physical damage.

In Skyrim I'd see a possibility for a "Damage Strength" spell that would simply reduce the melee damage an opponent does along with reducing carrying capacity a tiny bit, along with a Burden spell that would not reduce damage physical damage but would reduce carrying capacity by a lot.

Yes exactly. I do understand complaints that Skyrim boils down to the same three spells. This is going to be fixed though. Whether its through a patch from Bethesda or through mods. Heck I've already used a mod that made the novice destruction spells scale up so There usable at lvl 35. Just wait for the mods. Magic in skyrim will be awesome! I wont deny that I would LOVE spellcrafting though. I really want to make a paralyze rune spell. PLEASE GIVE US SPELLMAKING! k thanks

oooo look I can cast 2 fire spells at the same time.

My Morrowind mage laughs and says yes, but I can cast 1 spell that does 100 fire, 100 frost, 100 shock, 100 poison, 100 damage heath....at the same time.
you get to read words scrawled on a cave wall.

They gave us sliders for a reason. Creating a spell didn't automatically give you the most damage and range. You got to choose all that. You were able to balance the game as you saw fit, which is perfect for an RPG.

Honestly, if you can't handle that type of responsibility and would rather see the developers limit freedom in such a way, what convinced you to play TES games in the first place? People like you need to stick to games like Dante's Inferno instead of ruining TES for everyone with your constant [censored]ing about how the game absolutely needs to be balanced so that players (either you, which is interesting, or others, which is really kind of [censored] up) can't just power-play through it.


It's an RPG, where freedom is a staple, and you're complaining that we were given too many options in previous games? Just because you saw them as being worthless didn't mean everyone else did. Not everyone plays the same way as you.

With the old system, you were able to balance it as you saw fit. You could easily have achieved the balance that you feel Skyrim has if you tried, while others could enjoy the freedom in their own way as well. The new system is not nearly as flexible. Now everyone is forced to play Skyrim in the same boring manner that you seem to enjoy. How could you possibly think that's an improvement?

I still believe that the lack of variety or potential variety is a travesty (like I said, rune spells were woefully underused, as were wall and aura spells). It would be really hard to apply those casting types across the board to all sorts of spells, which is why I believe spell making should have been included. I don't see ANYTHING in Skyrim, besides dual casting, that is mutually exclusive with spell making. Everything we got in Skyrim would have worked just as well with spell making. If the developers felt like making a really unique spell that wouldn't really work with spell making, then they could make it and we just couldn't make a spell out of it. Walls of fire could have just as easily been walls of healing energy, walls of paralyze, walls of ward (which would basically be a static force field that blocked X amount of damage), etc.

The new mechanics were interesting, as I said, but badly underused and poorly executed.

Ofc because clairvoyance is more useful than burden. And you found only burden? The op has everything listed. Check them, see what Skyrim has that Oblivion has not, and what Oblivion has that Skyrim has not.