All of these topics look like this:

Randomperson: Destruction svcks, it does no damage once I hit X level and I keep running out of mana!
Nonmagicplayer: LOL, ur a nub, L2p, Mages r not supposed 2 one-shot stuff. If u want 2 do that, turn down difficulty!
Randomperson: Uh, I don't want to one-shot anything, I just want my damage magic to actually damage things and it doesn't do that very well!
Elitistapologist: All you need to do is max out Enchanting and then you can stunlock everything.
Randomperson: I don't want to have to use some other random tree just to get another to even work at all, that doesn't make sense.
Elitistapologist: You can't expect to beat the game with just one skill. Warriors NEED Smithing, Enchanting, Alchemy, Restoration, Archery, Heavy Armor and a sword and a shield or they cannot possibly get by!
Randomperson: My damage isn't even anywhere comparable to melee or archery damage though. I do more damage with a bow!
Elitistapologist: You don't have to get close though, so you have the ranged advantage!
Randomperson: My Warrior kills anything in 1-3 hits, and it doesn't matter if I have to get close or not, because I'm at the armor cap and don't take any damage anyway!
Elitistapologist: You have the ranged advantage and can stunlock enemies for ten minutes.
Randomperson: Archery does more damage and has better range. I don't need to "stunlock" anything with it when I can just kill something outright.
Elitistapologist: You have the ranged advantage over melee and can stunlock for ten minutes!
Randomperson: ...

At level 60 you won't be one shotting powerful enemies, so you definitely need enchanting. Therefore in order to compare it to archery or melee you need to give them enchanting too.

Why does enemie meele and archery level but not ours ?
I mean if you deliberetly dont upgrade your gear, enchant it, get skill enchanting on your gear or use pots the dmg of your weapon will stop at one point (when you hit 100 on the skill and max perks ) the same situation as with destro.



I know but I was comparing destro to the situation of the archer that was given as an example. I know the premies was total BS and it was biased to punish my mage in favour of the archer but I did that to show that even with that sort of situation a mage still can deal more dmg than the archer.

Well, it's still clear that destruction cannot stand on its own as a method of dealing damage while the other combat skills can. Once you run out of magicka, that's it, no method of dealing damage through that school. Coupled with the fact that you need to spam spells to kill things, something is clearly wrong. I still think a flat % bonus with each tier of spells would work as that would give us damage without making other mages too godly.

I keep reading those posts and I dont see anything about destruction magic bypassing the armor rating of ennemies...oh well...the only thing that annoys me about destruction is... cloak do not get bennefits from dual casting and elemental dammage perks...I think its the same for runes...If they fix this in the next patch I will be happy...Maybe faster casting master spell...I am not sure yet...

Ours does level. When you hit a higher level,in archery, one, or two handed, you do more damage. Destro damage does not level. then figure in how many perks there are to raise the damage for the other skills. Destro has 2. dual casting to make them more powerful and the elemental focus ones that up it by 50%, that's it.

Since enemy level scales, at higher level their health increases. Does this mean that if I don't use an entirely different skill tree or abuse pots to keep up my magicka, within a few seconds my damage output effectively drops to zero?

The fire spells are the most efficient for damage when facing many enemies in the game. The damage is quick and the damage isn't split to deal
amongst other factors. Granting you can exploit certain enemy weaknesses- Lightning and Frost are not "raw damage spells", as I have JUST
pointed out in the previous sentence. Yes, they do damage, but they are also designed based on utility.

Maybe if there was a lightning and frost spell that did nothing but DIRECT damage, not split into any other factors- I would agree with you.
However, no matter what "rank" of said spell of either you use, it will always split its damage into other attributes. (magicka and stamina)

They may release a patch that fixes the problem with scaling, but I doubt we'll ever see more spells. The lack of decent spells also gimps those who wish to use destruction, or any type of magic. The removal of the spell making system was one thing, but you'd think they would have made up for it by keeping a lot of spells in-game for us to use. Instead, we end up with a fraction of the spells we had before and few that are actually of any real use.

We just have to hope they get it right in the next game.

Maybe linked to the fact nearly every single opponents in the game wears rags as armors with at best some single boss per dungeon wearing a couple steel parts.

The fact that the OP thinks destruction should allow to you stand in their face and cut them down is silly. Oh no, you have to use spells from other schools. Oh no, you have to run away if there's too many and whittle down the crowd.

Why on earth would you want it to be so easy that you can just stay in the room as the number of mobs gets high?

My 56 mage, playing on master difficulty is having a lot of fun. Fights are not mindlessly easy. I have not crafted a 0 magicka cost outfit. I actually have interesting battles where I have to actually worry about not dying.

The OP is not asking for balance. They are asking for an easy button. Go ahead and mod yourself one and leave the game alone for me.

I am asking for balance. As it is melee do more damage, and have maxed out damage reduction from armor. Mages do less damage, and die in one hit from the highest level mobs (maybe 2 hits with mage armor). How is that balanced?

Mages in the TES world are far different from the kind you see in MMOs. In TES, magic is immensely powerful. So much, in fact, that enough of it allows you to defy death, or even become a god. If you're wearing heavy armor and are well-versed in destruction magic, you should be able to just cut down every enemy in your path.

I can't see any of the wizard characters in Morrowind throwing around fireballs and then running away. Even less when I read about them in the lore. Why magic has fallen so far is beyond me.

http://www.gamesas.com/index.php?/topic/1293704-the-people-who-say-destruction-is-fine-havent-played-it-at-higher-levels/page__view__findpost__p__19497731

once you hit lvl 100 and perk what you wanted your level of dmg will stop rising.
If you trully scaled like you like to think then if you hit 100 skill in archery and perked it on say lvl 25 and do 100 dmg without smithing/enchanting/alchemy then the same bow on your char lvl 50 should do 300 dmg. Does it work that way - anser is no your still at 100 dmg.
Your meele/archery dosnt scale its you who works on upgrading your dmg not the game making it better just by leveling.

The same goes with destro once I perk the dmg perks my destro wont do more dmg. I need to work on my own to make my dmg greater the same way you need yet you guys are hell bent on denying destro mages that privilage.

It requires 100 enchanting and grand soul gems or a LOT of luck finding gear with the right 25% enchant on it.



So what you're saying is you think mages shouldn't have to actually use their spells they should just stand there and everything explodes around them? You realize melee has to spam attack right? They don't do anything otherwise. The same is true for destruction, if you want to kill stuff you have to cast your spells. The faster you cast the faster they die.

I don't have to "spam" anything as melee or as an archer. There's a big difference between having to power attack 1-2x and then hitting auto attack 1-2x or shooting a bow 3x compared to having to use the same spell 10x - 20x. Keep your head in the sand though and keep up with the overexaggerating hyperbole.

How many YouTube videos have you seen of people one-shotting dragons with magic?

In TES, magic beats everything. So why is it that in Skyrim, warriors and archers can do far more damage than mages? Why is it that mages have to work so hard in order to even damage enemies efficiency with their spells?

You mean a silly mage who does nothing to buff his defenses dies in 1 hit. If you are considering a melee who makes the effort to get good armor to max out his defense why are you comparing it to a mage who does nothing to help himself stay alive? How is that in any way related to balance? A mage can hit the physical damage mitigation cap and can do far better than the melee on elemental damage mitigation. The fact that you don't want to spend the perks to get it does not mean the game lacks balance.

No, I'm saying that destruction, at higher levels isnt very destructive. I'm saying that a problem that was never there before in any other ES game, is now here. I'm saying that destruction is a mages primary damage dealing skill. There's no way to increase it other than alchemy. My support skills have nothing to do within the context of the damage dealing from just one skill. The support skills do their own thing, they don't increase destro damage, like they do for the other damage type skills. Although to your first sentence, what do you think a end level pure mage, that's a master in a few schools, not to mention destruction would, or should do? Everything would explode (fire storm) around them, although they would actually get a lot of damage done to them, opposed to how it is now.

You cannot do it without a high level enchanting because you cannot the "Peerless Destruction" mod on rings, somehow it stops at the grade right above while there are rings of peerless archery or conjuration.

Mages aren't supposed to use armor. If you notice, all of the armor skills are in the warrior tree. The alteration talent mage armor, which is a magic skill, requires that you wear no armor. If you want to be a pure mage, then you can't use armor. It's that simple.

That makes you squishy, which means that you should at least do decent damage as a mage. That's not the case though, because melee/archers do way more damage. If you're saying that less damage mitigation and less damage is balanced than your idea of balanced is clearly off.

NOT TRUE.

In fact you can find it and when you do you will laugh because the text is bugged. It will actually say: "Ring of Peeless Destruction"

I'm not talking about the 2 armor skill trees. A mage can hit the mitigation cap without wearing light or heavy armor. Learn to play then open your mouth.

Pretty much. Mages are supposed to be glass cannon casters. As of now, they are glass cannon summoners. The flesh spells at higher levels are a joke (ebony flesh started svcking at about 30-35), only the master level spell Dragonskin is any good after 50.