But magical energy has to transcend physics or it would be present in our world. It cannot reflect real energy in all regards or it wouldn't be magic. In any case, all I was trying to do was make sense of a logical quagmire. If you really want to equate it to real energy you can simply assume that the energy expended to sustain a passive enchantment is negligible next to that required to cast a force towards an opponent and therefore the enchantment would outlast the tangible piece of armor or clothing.

I hate cliffracers op. I hate them so damn much.

Also enchanted weapons never bothered me. I jused used them untill the charge was gone then spent the gold to get them recharged. Not like I had a shortage in gold. Haha.

I will do the same i did on Oblivion , enchanted weapons=vendor and use ebony or daedric stuff ...

If it's magical energy that transcend physics, then we can have permanently enchanted weapons. But with normal energy, the amount required to constantly offset 50 pounds certainly wouldn't be negligible.

Next to that required to cast a fireball which can explode in a diameter of up to 10 feet it may be.

Oblivion's approach added an annoying and meanial chore to gameplay, I did not get any extra entertainment out of having my sword run out of "ammunition" after each fight and needing to "reload" it. I really don't see what was wrong with recharging over time, running out of charges for your weapon was still a real concern that way as it recharged slowly and you might not necessarily be able to wait until enough power recharged to use it again before you needed the enchantment, so the charge mechanic wasn't pointless, and if you run out of enchantment charge, you had the choice to either wait until it recharges or recharge it manually, that seemed like a good system to me, so why change it to being forced to recharge items manually or not use enchanted weapons at all? It just makes it needlessly annoying and removes a potential strategic choice from gameplay (Do I want to recharge my item or wait?) In Oblivion, I often didn't bother with enchanted weapons at all not because the need to recharge them was crippling, but because it was so annoying, and I play games to be entertained, not be annoyed, yet there's absolutely nothing entertaining about needing to constantly recharge your enchanted items, a task which really involves very little challenge once you have Azura's Star and a soul trap spell, the former of which required only level 2 to get.

So naturally, when reading the Q&A thread, while it had a lot of good news, I was rather annoyed to read that not only had Bethesda decided to keep enchantment charges like Oblivion, but the apparently didn't realize that a lot of people didn't like that.



And yet here I often see people using the lore as an excuse to criticize gameplay changes that could be beneficial, or defend bad gameplay mechanics. Even if you arge that Bethesda doesn't let the lore stop them from making the best game they can, it seems not all fans realize they shouldn't.

As long as we have Azura's Star or some equivalant, it won't bother me too much. Though, I do hope charges last longer for weapons this time around, because Azura's Star or no, it was still annoying having to recharge practically after every small encounter.

Pretty much this. Charge a weapon for a bit fight on the way there a wolf attacks you and your charge is at zero. I wish you had to activate the special charge instead of it being passive

Soulhunting was demoted to a chore in Oblivion, thus I ignored recharging completely. (still had to enchant my sword so it could hurt wraiths and such)

Powerful enchantments were useless, because of the limited charge.
Weak weapons were useless, because their effect was not significant enough to justify the constant need for recharging.

In all honesty tho, I don't think the recharging was the real problem. IMHO the tedium was just another symptom of the insane level scaling in Ob.

the dual wielding system should improve upon the oblivion system as a whole. i have a feeling that it will have a real tangible impact on developing a system for keeping offensive enchantments as part of your sustainable arsenal. not quite sure about my enchanted bows, but it would help if they let me enchant my arrows somehow in addition to my bow.

this

The recharging in Oblivion was annoying. Especially when you're using an enchanted weapon to capture new souls to enchant other equipment, because when the enchanted weapon runs out then you have to use those souls you captured to enchant your new equipment to recharge your current equipment. There definitely needs to be some change to the system, although I'm not sure how to go about that.

I also don't like how it takes away the unique relationship between the soul you use to enchant the item, and the item itself.
When you have to recharge your weapon with other souls, everyone's soul is just measured in units, like a gallon of water. The soul should be more unique, because it's the very identity of a being.
It also doesn't make much sense to me that you would lose "soul" by using the enchantment. I can see how it would need to recuperate, but why would parts of the soul get lost in the process?

I also don't like that you have to find enchanted items to use their enchantmens for new enchantments. That makes it impossible to make a truly unique enchanted item, because everything you can create already exists in the game.

No, don't like this system at all.

I liked Oblivion's system. It took a little effort, but it gave balance to the powerful weapons and powerful staffs like Apotheosis and it wasn't too difficult to manage. I do a lot of loot farming so I have a cache of Varla Stones at my home in Anvil, plus I try to keep Azura's Star filled at all times. I keep one Varla stone in my inventory all the time, too, although I rarely use them.

I enjoy this method of keeping items enchanted.

That sounds like a pretty cool idea, experimenting with different creatures' souls for different enhancements.

I like WoW's enchanting for weapons, wish they had something similar to that in Skyrim. Charges are just..Annoying. At least I'm rolling a Mage so I don't have to worry about enchanting my weapons when I dual wield spells B)

This. So much this. This to damned near everything Beth does.

I have no issue with weapons needing charging. But I think the system should be relatively complex and multifaceted.

Weapons should recharge at least a bit over time. As has been pointed out, magical energy literally falls through holes in the sky. Weapons should be able to tap that energy for their own needs. However, the amount of energy they can draw in that way should be relatively limited. Think of it like solar power - without enormous and carefully designed collectors, the amount of energy that can be tapped is relatively small. BUT IT IS STILL THERE.

It should then be possible to draw even more energy from things that emit more energy - the guardian stones maybe, the equivalent of ayleid wells (if there is anything like that in Skyrim), chapel altars - anything that radiates magical energy should "feed" the weapons and increase their rate of recharge. Maybe include a spell that can be cast that would transfer some amount of the character's magicka (or even health or stamina) to the weapon to aid in recharging it. And then, on top of all that, have a soul gem recharge system, for particularly powerful items or things that are pretty much tapped out. If they're going to have this notion that weapons use up energy and require the replenishment of that energy, then that energy should be available from any reasonable source, even simply basking in the magicka radiating throughout mundus.

That would've made sense in the world AND would've taken a lot of the pressure off of the tedious chore of kill / soul trap / recharge. It would've been a win/win. I see absolutely no excuse for not doing it.

Another way to view a soul is as a soul, like the one in a mage. When using an enchanted item, you are not converting the soul into magical energy, but are drawing on the soul's magicka reserves. The soul would recover its magika as a mage would, with rest. As it is, Morrowind's enchantments work one way, and Oblivion's and Skyrim's work another. The way magic is practiced in Oblivion, maybe Soul Trap fails to capture the entire soul, and snatches only the soul's pool of magicka. Maybe the entire soul is captured, but the art of enchanting as practiced in Cyrodil and in Skyrim is defective, and the soul is actually converted to energy, or leaks out with its magicka.

First post on the forum! Youhou!! =D

I see three "natural" way to manage the enchantment. First off I see magic as a flow, the mage merely guiding it, with more or less precision depending on his skill. A fireball is the form you give to the magic, its power will depend on your ability. So my first idea would be to allow the player to charge his weapon with his own mana (ex: you have your weapon in your right hand and the charge spell in your left one).
My second idea came from a Hack'n Slash named Titan Quest, where you were able to use "aura" which drained you mana and use a "reserve" (ex: you use you "fire weapon" aura, you sacrifice 75 mana out of 1200 and the aura leech 1mana/s, when you cancel the aura your mana can replenish to its full capacity). So back to the second idea, why not "linking" our enchanted weapon to our mana core? When you hit a foe it's your mana which is use by the weapon.
My third idea is kinda a mix a the first two. In the Eragon's book, the magician are able to charge gem with energy to store it. therefore a battle mage will use a gem in the handle of his sword to have an energy supply ready with him. In Skyrim we could include the gem in the creation of the weapon (ruby->saphir->emerald->topaze->diamond->...), these would serve as battery that we would be able to expand and charge, the enchantment linked to the gem. We could use the soul gem to expand the capacity of the gem. Hum perhaps an example would be great...

Imperfect Saphir: usability = 60%
Perfect Saphir: usability = 100%
I create a sword with an imperfect saphir in the handle with a capacity of 400. I use a big soul gem on it (let's say it add 1600 unit of energy charge or 300 of energy capacity). First you want to recharge your weapon, you have 1600x60% = 960, which will be used to charge your gem. If you want to expand the total capacity of your gem, you have 300x60% = 180, which will be added to your total capacity, 400+180=580 of capacity. There could be a logarithm curve to "limit" the capacity, you would still be able to augment your capacity but at a greater energy price for a smaller result, or something like that.

It's just an idea, I write the example and everything on the spot, if this work, in a mod for example, it'll need a lot of work and calculation.

English is my second language and google chrome's language dictionary is my friend so if there are any errors (and I'm sure there will be) I'm deeply sorry for it

To be perfectly honest, this was a big problem for me, and caused me to do something I normally wouldn't and exploit the duplication glitch for unlimited Varla Stones.

I agree, this system need to be rethought, natural recharge sounds good, but would it be based off in-game time or what?

What is an inconvenience?

Well more like having entrapped soul thats still has personality is defective and was purified during better magic researching, since before soul trap was Mysticism spell it was not completely explored and understand in mechanic and then Enchanters found way use pure energy of souls.
For example Daggerfall has Disadvantage Soul Bond thats as all disadvantages shift item limits in enchanting and allow more powerful enchanting created but in cost of certain Disadvantage.
The more powerful of a creature, the more powerful the item can be. Certain creatures have extra advantages and disadvantages forced upon you for using them to enchant your items. If your item breaks, then the creature is released, and will attack you.
For example Daedra Lord soul add additionally to player used enchant properties such features
Potent vs. Daedra, User takes damage in holy places, Extra Weight
So soul bond allow use more powers in cost of more sentient and willful soul thats can potentially rebel against master.

In Morrowind process of enchanting and soul trapping become more advanced, Enchanter found way to clean soul from it personality and leave only it soul power and ability to restore it magicka energy.

In Cyrodiil mages use only pure energy of soul without of any personality left, seems in Skyrim they will work in similar way, perhaps because their arcane knowledge now mostly based on remnants of knowledge from Mage Guild, what use more utility way to work with arcane energy then Telvanni Mystics and Enchanters what use more Old Ways of Arcane researching, thats also explain why they know more ways to enchant items and why constant enchants was more hard to achieve while Cyrodiilic mages make constant enchants accessible for all, in Cyrodiil enchanting is sort of crafting while in Daggerfall and Morrowind it also has some ritualistic and arcane mysticism.

Well I understood why they use Oblivion style enchanting from gameplay purposes also its limitation from creating uber items, balancing economy since Soul Gems can cost now and be more rare so and magical items will become more valuable while inability create own spells and requirement break enchanted items to learn it spell effects instead of easy purchasing of spells for enchanting, will move economy and exploration also.

But why such nice features like certain Advantages and Disadvantages from Daggerfall and slow enchanting regenerations will work awesome as some middle and high levels perks, while charge usage decrease with leveling of enchanting skills work awesome as good reason level enchanting skill.
Why not use it?
Easy achievable constant enchants return also in Skyrim, so my hope on cast on use enchants decrease, why limit ways of use our creativity in such manner, cast on use have only few problems (100 success chance and no casting delay such problems easy to fix) why decrease such features especially now when spellmaking is out for sure?
I hope Skyrim scripting system will powerful like OBSE so such features what devs don't want to implement by various reason will return with mods.

If magical items didn't require souls to recharge them, The infernal City would have made for a pretty boring book. :shakehead:

It is annoying at times yes but it makes you think, plan ahead and more importantly lore related. If they implemented another system, lore fans would be raging!

I want the control over what happens and when. There is no way I would want to sit around waiting for an enchanted weapon to recharge when I could just use a soul gem and have it fully usable again and head out - or continue fighting. Not being able to do that would be as bad as having to find a place to sleep to regain Magicka. There's also no way I'd want my enchanted weapon to run out of enchantment in the middle of battle. "Excuse me, Dragon, I'll be back later." Preparing for battle, using Summon to call forth Daedra and then trapping their souls until soul gems or Azura's Star is full isn't difficult. It also increases skills and gives a chance to fight in different ways while doing the activity. I just don't find it an inconvenience. It's part of maintaining my gear.

Added: If the devs decide to change the way we enchant our gear, I'll probably be fine with it as long as what we're doing doesn't go backwards. I don't want to wait for recharging anything, not weapons, not Magicka. I want a way to do it myself right when I need it.

:tes:

I think people need to remember that it's pretty likely that there will not be Varla stones in Skyrim considering they were relics from Ayleid ruins, who were a more magically oriented people than the ancient Nords. Also, we can't becompletely sure that Azura's Star will be in this game. However, there is a good chance that Beth will come up with something unique to supplement these losses and I'm sure that that are plenty of surprises that will come concerning enchanting given that it is now a skill; maybe some interesting perks?