Ive been on the forums here for the better part of the last 4 months. Since Skyrims release I have noticed a large number of people complaining about a large number of things from glitches to PC performance problems to interface to combat and balance.

The complaints about combat and balance have been bothering me. Some complain that one thing is more powerful then the other, or this is better then this and so on. They talk about balance as if it actually matters. However I would argue that the imbalances in this game actually makes it better. When I play a mage, I want a different experience then playing a knight or a rogue. I don't just want to use different abilities. I want to experience the differences, the good and the bad.

Some people expect this game to be balanced, but this isn't World of Warcraft. Playing different characters are supposed to BE different. I don't care if swords to more damage then fire bolts, because if I want to use fire bolts I will. And if that means I have to adapt to the game then Bethesda has succeeded in making me feel like a different character. It makes me want to try every possible combination out. That's what TES has always been about.

In closing, I encourage people to just play the game how they want to, instead of comparing everything and over thinking it. Its an amazing game that will keep many of us busy for years to come.

I love how people do their best to break a game and then complain about it being broken. I used to have a lot of friends that played D&D the same way. They make the character, choose the feats, and assign the skill points in a way that it's OP and then go "This game svcks, it's so broken."

Has everyone forgotten about the spirit of fun in gaming? I often handicap myself in games just to keep the difficulty up. If I realize what i'm doing is making it too easy, I find ways to make it more challenging, like using crappy weapons.

In Oblivion I made armor with chameleon power on every piece and made chameleon potions as well. I'd have over 100% chameleon and NOTHING could see me. You could literally walk around slaughtering everything and NOTHING would attack you. Even the end fight sequence with the town being under attack, I was invincible.

Was that "fun" ?? Yes, for a bit, just to lol and my godlikeness, but end of the day I knew I created that issue by exploiting game mechanics and my next character didn't use chameleon at alll.

What i'm getting at is, the only person you're competing with in an SP title like this one is yourself, so stop being an idiot and asking them to nerf your own ability to NOT BREAK TEH GAME lol.

Well... I don't have time to read all them fancy werds 'n' such but, if you concentrate on the negatives... they will eventually consume your Spirit.

Well, I think that you're saying what a lot of us have been saying in those threads.

Speaking personally, I started with a main char using bows, sneak with magic support, and although it was fine, I am doing okay so far (level 18). Then, yesterday, I thought I'd give that so-easy-it's-dumb DW warrior build ... and, to be honest, it's been humiliating. Yes, I can kill wolves and trash bandits easily enough, but I tried to do a cave today and got killed ten times straight by a couple of the new goblins (whatever they're called) ... had to leave the quest for later. This character has been killed by ice wraiths and spiders as well in the wild, and this is bearing in mind that he's properly talented, with decent basic weapons and heavy armour. Guess I wasn't meant to play warrior.

I'm going to give mage a try just for fun ... it will have to be Illusion-based I think. Coming back to your point, though, if we're going to have differential gameplay between warrior, rogue and mage, isn't it right that the warrior, with the dumbest gameplay, should be the easiest, and mage (with a big toolbox of spells) should present the greatest difficulty. Facerolling Destruction spells just feels wrong for the "clever" characters.

while i agree that imbalances are good, but specificly the way that destruction is imbalanced is that there is no convienant way to acquire stronger spells while stronger melee weapons will come naturally. at least thats how it seems to me so far.

This is what I am talking about.... it doesn't have to be convenient. Everything is life inst fair or balanced. Being a mage means making sacrifices and playing differently.

Yep. Should not be the same experience for different character types. Everyone has become accustomed to the idea of classes and all the rights and privileges due to them, but this is not a class-based design. It is skill based, so why should so-called Destruction mages be able to take down the baddies without relying on melee combat ability or other schools of magic? Why assume specializing in only one school of magic should put you on par with someone who has specialized in an array of combat skills? Why even think you should be on par with a similar build in ANY other game, including former TES titles? Why even think magic alone should be able to get you easily through the game?

I wanted to play a stealthy archer assasin. At no point, before playing the game, did I think I would have to rely on magic to reanimate some corpses to survive, but I did. Sure, I know you can play such a character relatively easily without relying on magic, but then I would have had to give up my enchanting and smithing. I like enchanting and smithing, not because it gives me better weapons and armor. I just like the sense of accomplishment I get from creating something I can sell or use. But that also means I can't handle most combat situations without some very creative strategy. So be it. As Sid Meier once said, "A game is a series of interesting choices." Skyrim definitely offers you a bevy of interesting choices.

I just want to +1 this thread because its what I've been saying in the other threads above destruction buffs

This isn't life it's a video game.

If a game isn't fun it's broken. And not being able to improve your destruction at higher levels is definitely NOT FUN.

I don't want destruction to be as powerful as the totally imbalanced smithing & enchanting melee builds, but having it be at least as powerful as regular melee would be nice. I say at least because Magic has more limitations, you cant use it with no magicka while you can still attack with no stamina.

The game is not broken simply because skills are different. It may not be fun to you, but it is to me. That's the BEST thing about this game, if you don't want to use magic cause you don't know how to properly use it or don't like using it because you think its underpowered, then you don't have to. There are many different ways to play the game, find the one you like and play it. If you feel like trying something new, keep in mind that its supposed to be a separate and different experience.

You don't understand, I DO want to use magic, I just want it to not svck at high levels.

That's not so hard to comprehend is it?

Do you have any reasoning why destruction shouldn't get any better after level 30? Because I'd love to hear it.

I don't get why this is so hard for people to grasp.

Making your character the best he can be, is FUN.
Having that character then end up trivialising the game, is NOT FUN.
Realizing that your favourite playstyle gimps your character, is NOT FUN.
In a well designed game, you can still optimize your character without breaking the game and choose a playstyle without feeling gimp.

The only balance problem I have is how let's say you go against 3 bandits in the wild. Just "Bandit" not looter, warrior what ever. 3 guys who should be EXACTLY the same but for weapons. I split them up so its always mano e mano. Handle 1 or 2 piece o cake but 1 is almost ALWAYS way overpowered. Between heavy armor with high skill and an elven mace with very high skill I hit for basically 3-5% damage on a guy wearing fur. He hits me with an iron long sword for well over 45-60% and I'm in dwarf armor. Now at my level that's 100-150hp a hit. I dont mind picking fights vs dragons, frost trolls, giants and such but falmers and small frost spiders or small charras shouldn't have much of a chance. Hell I had a mud crab last night hit me for 1/3 of my hit points. There are difficulty scaling problems, it seems like a glitch because not everyone experiences it and hopefully it will get fixed.

I'm glad there are options. I'll be playing the game probably as much as I played Morrowind... Countless times. So I'll eventually want to makes these items. But for the now, I'll play through three times as my paladin, then my mage... then my thief/assassin legit. From there, it's anything goes if I want to.

This, a thousand times this. Min/maxing is fun, playing your unique character without thinking of numbers is also fun, breaking the game by playing your character naturally is not fun, and being unable to play the character you envision because of number walls is not fun.

I agree with the original post.


in my opinion the reason the destruction doesnt scale because by itself it would be overpowering. I remember in oblivion you could spell stack and create spells that would take out anyone within a 100 ft radius with one hit..


mages who only want to use destruction is like a warrior only wanting to use a sword....however, a true warrior knows to use not only his weapon in battle, but take his armor and shield into consideration.

just like a true mage knows not only to use his destruction magic in battle.. but to use his other tools such as his other schools of magic, daggers and staves.

Who are these mages who only use destruction? I haven't seen one person saying they only want to level up destruction and nothing else.

People want to use destruction as their only OFFENSE and that's a perfectly acceptable goal. A sword and shield warrior only has to use swords to cause damage, shield and armor are for DEFENSE. Meanwhile, a mage uses restoration and alteration for DEFENSE and should expect to be able to get by using destruction as OFFENSE, but it doesn't work.

finaly someone understands it at last :foodndrink:

TRUTH

Conjuration for help and distractions
Alteration for buffs and debuffs
Illusion for making it harder for the enemies to do much
Destruction for taking away health
Restoration for defense

Make sure you invest in perks that lessens the strain on your magicka.

Either you're playing on novice, are only doing the MQ, are excellent at kiting, or you really love getting killed repeatedly.

But why should a mage have to spread his points and perks over 5 skills to be effective when a warrior just needs 3 (or 2 if he's doing dual wielding)?

Then there's the issue of how that character would be better if he just dropped Destruction completely, it takes up valuable perks and leveling it makes your enemies stronger without giving you any added benefit, that means at high level destruction is WORSE THAN USELESS, IT'S ACTUALLY A HINDERANCE.

To add to that, if you've got a character that has conjuration, illusion, restoration and alteration, you're much better off focusing on 1 handed weapons and fighting with a bound sword than destruction. You will do more damage overall, you will have more magicka for your other schools of magic, and you won't be helpless when you run out of magicka.

This is all I see.

People: We're not having fun with magic and you designed it. Can you please make it fun by bringing it to a parity where it's useful?
Other people: RAWWWR NO BALANCING BAAAAD!!!! AHHHH NO ONE BE HAVE FUN TIME EXSCEPT WUT IS IN GAME PROGRAM!!!!!! RAAAAWWWRRRR!@!!!!!! NO U BALANCE SINGLE PLAYER GAME!!!!

/fin every single thread ever.

Sure its a gross simple over exaggeration but explaining my point in over twenty different threads (probably more) gets tiresome.

I am playing on Adept difficulty. I do die sometimes in harder fights. I do some kiting, I use my potions, switch out my spells and adapt to the situation. It gets my heart pumping every time because I actually have to work to survive. If I wanted to 1 shot everything I could just turn the difficulty down.