FYI, skill levels do impact certain things. For example, higher enchanting results in increased power for the enchantment. Same with Alchemy. Etc.

Also... ummm, imagination is limitless by definition. That's the entire point of imagination (i.e., it isn't bound by logic). Why do you think that Sony's current marketing slogan is "Believe that anything you can imagine, you can make real. make.believe"? And why Tripshots' video, "Nebula," featuring Hatsune Miku, shows her as a deity who knows everything, yet she must join with an organic version of herself in order to gain the power of imagination and thus become omnipotent as well as omniscient? Imagination is what is not known or perhaps not even thought... until someone thinks of it, no matter how illogical or outlandish it may seem.

Creating a character is a much more dynamic experience in Skyrim because it's not just about what points you increase in a bland menu somewhere; you flesh out your character simply by playing your character the way you want to play him. Just like real life, your character is defined by your ACTIONS.

And all the major quests (not misc quests) I have done have given me at least 2 choices. Which is pretty much the average amount of choices I get in ANY CRPG I have ever played.

If you want to see a really bad RPG with not a single element of choice or character development, just look at any JRPG like the Final Fantasy series. I don't even know how those can be considered RPGs at all, since you don't make your own character and tell your own tale; every time you play them, you will have the exact same experience. The same can not be said for Skyrim.

For rpg lovers is a dumbing down , for the little kids with soacked marmelade hands that cannot think about some customization beyond the face of the character , is an improvement , cose they woudl be soon get bored , pity that on the other hand at least for us rpg lovers the fun is more in the customization and the roleplay other than just hack and slash around , making the whole game pretty boring and flat ...

not at all couse even ibefoure you could improve your skills playing and gaining levels so the only thing they have done is taking an already bad character development system and cut pieces out , making it more even more bad , so you keep developing ( to an extent) as befoure but you loose completely the characterizaion from the beginning ....

They shoudl have instead made a totally new system more appealig and more deep than this "oversimplification Apple like app"...

Like I always say in these kind of threads, TES is becoming "arcady'. I believe TES(pc) days are numbered at this "streamlined" pace.

I think I'm the only one to agree with you

oh... I'm not the only one here, cool

Let me just say that I LOVE my D&D. But the one thing I hate about it is that, while it tries to be realistic in many ways, the one failing it has in that department is character development. In it's rules you do not gain skills by using that skill; you gain them from am arbitrary point system. You gain experience for killing a beast, and somehow that made you better at knowing about Religion or making a hammer, or choose a feat that is completely unrelated to the actions you did to gain a level. And this is a tradition many RPGs use. It's OK, but it is far from perfect. It makes zero sense, and doesn't define your character at all, except in terms of the game's mechanics and what that character can do in certain situations.

I MUCH prefer character development style from Ultima Online and Skyrim, where you start off as just an average person in the world, and through hard work, master whatever field you set off to master; whether that be blacksmithing or casting magic. It adds more depth than just a bunch of numbers you have to constantly crunch to make sure you're building your character the "right way." In the real world, do you gain experience points and arbitrarily make yourself better at skills you've never used? [censored] no! You have to actually use what skill you have, practice, and get better.

The only reason I can see a traditional character development method being better than Skyrim's (or UO's for that matter) is for the purposes of Min/Maxing a character, and to me, that isn't roleplaying; that is being a nit-picking video game nerd who has to be the best of the the best of the best simply because the rules allow him to.

I wish I were dedicated enough to throw out evidence of it, but yeah, I definitely believe it has been. What's worse is that this game will undoubtedly be their biggest financial success so they'll continue down the path, too.

They'll lose me somewhere along the way right around the time that I can no longer see Elder Scrolls anymore and it simply becomes another "game". They've still got a good way to go before they come to that I guess.

No, certainly not dumb down, it's been the most interesting of the Elder scrolls series in my opinion, so you can't spread sheet your character, big deal, I always found that aspect to be insanely boring, but Skyrim has offered something much more mind stimulating and enjoyable in my opinion and that's the puzzles and investigations.

In the end though, it comes down to individual taste and interest, nothing to do with dumb down, an aspect has been lost and someone is gonna be upset, an aspect has been added and someone is going to be happy.

Oh these threads, how I love thee... :rolleyes:


Really, people complaining about "lack of RPG elements", "removing the complexity" or whatever... you don't know how an RPG works. Yes, you might have played a couple, but you don't know how they work, you don't know what makes them RPG, because the number of stats certainly doesn't.

So you only choose to raise between Health, Magicka and Stamina. Guess what, that's exactly what the depth was before. 1 out of 3 or 3 out of 8 both doing the same thing. You raised them to get more health, get better at magic and hit faster and harder. The only difference in Skyrim is that your choice is a lot more obvious now, no need for long explanations of what the selected attributes have actually done.

Oh no, +% of skill success, extra features for using spells are boring? Oh sure, raising an attribute so it raises your other things was much more interesting. Yeah, high intelligence suddenly made your spells more powerful before, right?


Doing 3 things to achieve one thing is NOT depth, it's redundancy. So I think D&D should be considered a lesser RPG than Morrowind, because it's more straightforward with its statistics? There are no weapon skills, only traits, damage is solely decided by Strength and the weapon you use, only endurance raised health and intelligence was the basis for Arcane spells. You couldn't play a stupid mage with big power, you couldn't play a weak yet skilled swordsman without perks traits.

So you cannot describe your character? How so? Doesn't your skills and perks describe you? Doesn't the fact that you are a skilled thief is shown by being good at sneaking, lockpicking and stealing? If they cannot describe your character, how come a weak mage, untrained in weaponry cannot easily kill a skilled warrior, only with a dagger, or he cannot just sneak past them without any spells?
Skills and Perks DO describe your character. If you create the same character every time, it's not the system's fault, attributes wouldn't change anything either because even attributes only raised if you use the skills they are connected to. You could start out as a mage before and still sneak around a lot, forgetting your starting skillset, you could easily become something completely different.

So this is more like an FPS now huh? Why you don't have choices, your character is always the same, the game is completely linear. Oh it's not an FPS but it's "becoming one". [censored]. How do we have lesser choice? How are we "forced on a path"? What is that thing that you cannot do anymore because the game is too simple for it?
Again, we don't have choice, or how the do we have less choice?

In other words:
IT'S NOT DIFFERENT AT ALL!


So especially if you go on how the game only looks "pretty" or how you have lesser choice, you are either blind or obviously haven't played the game.
So either open your eyes, or go back to your room, moping about how "the good old days" are gone, because you obviously cannot see how this is the two sides of the same [censored] coin.

Yes I believe Skyrim has been streamlined.

What a great and condescending way to start off a post.

Stopped reading

Wow, Bukee, way to be a condescending a-hole. Good job.

For the record, I do not equate the perk system to the traits/proficiencies/feats used in D&D. Also, lockpicking and combat have lost many of their p&p derived elements (compared to Morrowind; Oblivion was where they really made big changes). As for the character creation argument, some people prefer their character pop into existence tabula rasa, allowing them to develop everything about their character through game play. Others prefer to allocate skills and knowledge at creation and to come up with back-stories that explain how this knowledge was attained. D&D let you create a character that had actually lived and learned before the game plot. To a certain extent, so did Morrowind and Oblivion. Skyrim allows this to a much reduced extent, for better or worse. So, your assertion that "it's not different at all" is incorrect.

Every background you could come up with for an Elder Scrolls character, in all but one of the games, would have to have a part about being arrested at some point; because in every TES game other than Daggerfall you start as a prisoner.

Arena: You're in a dungeon for some reason.
Morrowind: You're on a prison ship after being exiled to Vvardenfell for some reason.
Oblivion: You're locked in a cell in the Imperial Palace for some reason.
Skyrim: You're captured along with a bunch of Stormcloaks just because the Imperials are arresting everyone who comes across Skyrim's borders; either in or out.

At least in Skyrim, they explain WHY you're in chains. The other games do not, and it's assumed that you most likely weren't a very good person. In Skyrim, the only thing they force upon your background is that you were coming to Skyrim for some reason.

No...unless you consider it smart to run around morrowind or cyrodill and jump like an idiot to increase your skills...
or increase 3 attributes just so you can get higher this or that, while wondering about the pointless math behind the scenes...

I would consider this new system in Skyrim much "smarter" as it is more intuitive, more useful, and less cryptic. In my job (in real life) - the simpler I can make a task to get the same outcome it is called being "smarter" not dumber.
Skyrim is less complicated, but that is a very good thing - because this is a game, not a job, and I dont want to sit down and study the skill/attribute mechanics prior to levelling up to ensure my character will be what I want, while balancing the attribute impacts on skills I use, and those I do not use at all. I want to play and explore and fight, and make an interesting and customizable character - which skyrim provides - without the attribute nonsense in previous elderscrolls games - as attributes were just a means to an end. (i.e. higher damage, higher health, more spells cast per second, etc..) which perks provide very well - and make it more fun/rewarding.

I'm getting off the forums and gonna play some Skyrim, but before I do I would just like to offer something to those who want more number crunching and stats:

http://progressquest.com/

Considering what you're asking for, this should be the perfect RPG for you. It is nothing BUT setting stats. The game literally plays itself and allows you to BE anything and DO anything.

Have fun.

yes the stats have been dumbed but for better, tes games never had before a good combat, and know i see myself enjoying it. it's not like what has been done with dragon age 2 were they obliterated a fine combat system to replace it by a beat em up one, that unfortunatly was terrible.

Look at this map of the mainquest for daggerfall:

http://www.uesp.net/dagger/hints/walkthro.shtml

Completely non-linear, with many branching storylines determined by choices presented to the player. You see in Daggerfall roleplaying wasn't solely left to your "imagination", you actually influenced and changed the storyline depending on what role you played. It's like a "Choose your own Adventure" with room for many different roles that would show you different parts of the game world respectively thus allowing novel and unique replay value.


Now look at Skyrim's Main Quest... a straight line. No choices, any race or role gets exactly the same thing, every single time. No meaningful dialog options. Roleplaying is left purely to your imagination, and your ability to delude yourself into thinking conversations with NPCs went some other way than they actually did.

So of course the series has been losing RPG elements (which players now have to imagine as existing, and if you aren't imagining then you allegedly "aren't playing the game correctly"). I'm enjoying Skyrim for what it is, but as an RPG it's rather shallow and disappointing especially after Bethesda oversaw production of a gem like Fallout New Vegas.

It's not only the magic that has been stripped down just to make place for shouts in this game. It is also other content that makes Skyrim different (unfortuntaely a negative different) from former Elder Scrolls games.

Diversity usually was a constant part up to Morrowind. This has been cut down a little in Oblivion, but not as bad as within Skyrim now.

I've never bothered to compare the two, you're example really says something about the state of Skyrim. It really is a shame what gamesas did to the series.

This is what I see as the main problem with Skyrim in regards of RP. And I'd like to emphasise, its my personal opinion, and I don't voice it here to bother those of you who dosen't agree. I write this because the more people who say what they think is good or bad about the game, the bigger chance for the dev's to make a better game (for someone, maybe not me) next time.
I love Skyrim, this is the game I have been waiting for since Morrowind, and I don't mind the game mechanics and their changes. I loved the stat system in Morrowind, and I think it would have been a great improvement to have them in Skyrim as well. But Skyrim is another game, so it's fine that they choose to go another way with it. But the NPC reactions (or the lack of them) and the conversation options (or the lack of them) pluss the straight questlines are a real downer.
So I think (my personal oppinion again) that TES series has lost ground RP wise. I felt much more engaged in my char when I felt my actions reflected in the rest of the game world.

And, on a side note, this thread makes me sad. It's so much flaming that I used a long time to decide to post at all. Some of you guys can be so mean. I know this is the intardnetz, but still, its nice to be civil.

You really can't complain about a numbers system being there and requiring spreadsheets when you are purposely trying to game the system to get the absolute best. There's nothing pushing anyone along that path if they didn't want to in the first place instead of just following along your own choices and playing the game as you wish to.

It's not a difficult concept to grasp. We want freedom we had in making our characters how we want them. The perk system and gutting the attributes is exactly not that, this new system is all about false choices that only serve to further limit you. You might not realize it but several of those perks also completely eliminate any purpose skill levels had beyond serving as a gating system.

Perks made it go from linear scaling to breakpoints with no upsides. If you want to get into systems not making any sense then why does having 99 Destruction make my master level spell cost 600 magicka (example) and then only 300 at 100 coupled with a level up?

The way I look at it and most of you won`t agree...

Morrowind is like a flawed up diamond, Oblivion and Skyrim are polished up pieces of dung, Sure they all look nice, but in the end the diamond is a diamond and a piece of dung is [censored].


I do agree with you. And chances are when skyrim is done this hype, I`m going back to Morrowind. Hell I play on xbox and still haven`t discovered or done all the questlines. That is a true RPG.

They did it to win the stupid masses unfortunately. You can call it "streamlined" all you want, but less choice is still less choice.