Firstly
http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1083965-soul-gems-what-are-they/page__view__findpost__p__15794817 reminded me about what I've read regarding enchanting items in TESII: Daggerfall. The process is inherently dangerous; if your weapon or armor breaks, there is a chance that the soul used in the gem to enchant your weapon is released and attacks you; your weapon would lose its enchantment.

Another possibility is to increase the danger by adding any souls from soulgems used to recharge an item. So, if you initially used a frost atronach to enchant your item, then if it breaks, a frost atronach will spawn and attack you. If you recharged your item with a rat, then if your item breaks, both the rat and frost atronach might spawn to attack you.

And by "breaks" I mean totally broken, 0/2000, etc.

There could be % chance of the souls escaping, possibly depending on your enchant skill (if such a skill is brought back for Skyrim). The higher the skill, the lower the chance that when the item breaks, the soul(s) will escape and attack.

Secondly
I think I'd like to see the feature that if you apply a negative enchantment effect, you should have more "room" to put in a bigger positive enchantment. For example:

I have a pair of boots with a capacity of 50 enchantment points.
I can put on a positive enchantment effect of Fortify Speed 20pts for 30secs on Self. That takes up all 50 points.
~OR~
I can put on a negative enchantment of Drain Magicka 10pts for 15seconds on Self. This is 25 points. But, because it is a non-beneficial effect, it ADDS 25 points. So, I effectively would have 75 points.
Then, I can put on Fortify Speed for 30pts for 45secs on self, which costs 75 points.

The TESIV and TESIII enchantment systems would be like:
okay, so you added the negative enchantment that costs 25 points. Now you only have 25 points left for your positive enchantment.

Spellmaking could use this advantages/disadvantages system, too!

It seems a little ridiculous to have to fight the soul of whatever was in the soulgem every time the armor breaks. Really, the thing is dead anyways, I don't think its weakened soul is in any position to come bursting forth from its prison. And when you actually enchant armor, as far as I know, you destroy the soulgem to create the magical effects.

As for the enchanting effects, yes, I think negative effects should contribute a bit towards positive effects. I like to make ironic items as well, and that could could really facilitate that. A sword with heal on touch? Hellz yeah...

Well, when I mean "break" I mean totally broken, 0/x number of hit points of the weapon/armor. The soul wouldn't try to escape if it was just, like, 156/300 hp.

Depends what game you look at. TESIV treated souls like batteries. In TES2, souls were actually the creature (you see this in TESIII: when you fill a soul gem, it bears the name of the creature whose soul you trapped).

The soul is what powers the body. When a mortal creature (such as man or mer) has its body slain, the soul is released and usually travels to the Dreamsleeve to be recycled and put back into a new body; this recycling process washes out all sense of identity (memories, etc.). When a lesser daedra's mortal body is destroyed, its soul is cast back into Oblivion, from which it must make its way out; it retains its identity. http://www.imperial-library.info/content/guide-daedra.

Anyway, you're using the soul to power the enchantment; the soul has not gone to Oblivion or the Dreamsleeve, it is not "weak" or anything. Think of it like you are binding an NPC and using their magicka pool to power your spells. I'd be pretty pissed off if someone did that to me... It really adds back the moral issue that was more prominent in TESII, and adds a bit of excitement and danger to playing with souls. Souls are a powerful currency (Clavicus Vile, the Sload, etc.)

For the cost thing i say no and here is the reason.. lets use some kind of real Thermodynamics in someway where magicka = energy Grand Sould Gem = 1000 kJ Firedammage using 1000kJ = 10 dammage

you put 1000kJ towards the enemy it means it does 10 dammage to the enemy

you put 500kJ towards the enemy and 500kJ towards the caster. it makes 5 dammage to the enemy and 5 dammage to the caster but 1000kJ was used either ways

Doesn't make any sense to me.

I'm all for souls escaping when the soulgem breaks.

The positive/negative bit seems odd. Enchantments aren't measured by how 'beneficial' they are to you, but in how much magic they consume.

You're not a min/maxer?

:huh:

1000kJ
+ 2000kJ fire damage on Target
- 1000kJ frost damage on Self

Maybe think of it like exothermic/endothermic (exergonic/endergonic). But in a more metaphysical setting. :bonk: It's been a while since I took Chem1 (got Chem2 this spring semester, though).

Luagar, you raise a good point. On one hand, yes, how could the item "know" if a spell is beneficial or not? On the other hand, we have mechanics from Daggerfall, and a sort of logical reasoning that it makes sense to balance advantages with disadvantages (though, perhaps, not in a TES game). I mean, if we were talking about any other game, what would your thoughts be? Souls are such a murky area in the lore, especially since some of the mechanics are inferred based on game mechanics, which have been inconsistent across TESII, TESIII, and TESIV.

@Luagar: Re Min/Max: It's like in DnD when you're rolling a character. You have a certain number of points to distribute across your attributes. Min/maxing is maxing all your relevant stats, while neglecting any attributes that are not essential. For instance, you'd dump your points into Constitution and Strength, and neglect Charisma and Intelligence. Your dice rolls for INT and CHA will suffer the -2 penalties for low attribute scores, but you'll do great slicing and dicing goblins. Alternatively, you can avoid dice penalties by raising INT and CHA, but you'll have lower dice bonus because STR and CON won't be as high. At least, I think that's what Darth Ravager means...

Giving yourself disadvantages or making use of dump stats in order to make yourself much stronger and take even more advantages in the areas and skills your character makes the most use out of is min/maxing.

So, you could make your character unable to read in order to take a combat feat.

Or not spend any points in intelligence in order to have more points to spend in strength.

Or with enchantments, an example would be applying a Constant effect drain personality 10 points in order to have an additional 10 points to apply to a Constant effect fortify strength enchantment to the same weapon.

You don't need personality for your character build, so you make your weapon give you a penalty in order to gain an even bigger boost to something you actually use.

Here's another proposal: What if you had a chance to increase you enchantment points at the risk of a random negative side effect? If you're enchantment skills is high enough, you can take that risk.


I always wanted to make a recall sword. :lmao:

I've never been a fan of that in any game I've played, especially when I'm trying to 'roleplay'. It helps that I try and stay well rounded.

Interesting idea- the souls escaping part, I mean. I like.

The min-maxing on negative enchantments, not so much. The item can handle so much enchantment energy, and positive or negative is still adding enchantment energy to the item.



Yes indeed, you destroy the soul gem. The soul is trapped inside the soul gem which is destroyed to release the soul into the item where it is then bound just like it was in the soul gem.

Think of putting a lion into a zoo- it's hauled there in a small cage (soul gem) then put into its display pen (enchanted item)- destroying the transport cage after that does what to the lion? Yep- nothing.

This. I don't think the enemy should respawn as it was once you killed it, it could be a ghost version...or atleast a weakened version of that specific enemy, for example with half it's original health...

Ah, one of few reasons why I never use Soulgem in Daggerfall. Its dangerous to tamper with if one is not careful and break the weapon/tool of an enchanted item. The other reason is simply the fact that one is playing with a soul of a creature to do your bidding, traping in the item forever if the item is on constant repair or not use at all. Not really evil, but very, very dark in so many ways.

Because of this, I went with the alternate solution to enchantment with just using item's inherent enchantment space where I don't need a soul to put power in. So in a way, I don't mind adding the escape soul function as long as we added the other part of enchantment involving not the need to use the Soul Gem to enchant stuff to begin with.

But that goes against the conservation of energy! The magical energy comes from the soul gem, and the frost damage on self effect requires magic energy. Your sword isn't giving energy to the soul gem so that it can make a more powerful positive effect. All magical effects require mana.

By your idea my character should be able to cast spells that damage their health to regain magicka. Wut. Sure, drain health maybe, but negative effects are still effects that require mana to be effected.

Hmph.

But yes to the soul escaping part.

If we're trying to use logic to explain magic, perhaps we can somehow stretch the soul's power and make it more efficient...of coarse trying to do so could come with an inherit draw back.

no and no, i dont like having to bother for souls escaping its just bothersome and not fun

and no besides there are no "points" for enchanting like morrowind now we have sigil stones or similar stuff