Ah, yes, the Magic Mysticism School of magic. Just be thankful I didn't design the magic system. There'd be no elemental effects: no fire, ice, or lightning. "Lore" always takes a backseat to aesthetics.

:banghead:

I was going to post that!

Huh? According to my best guess as to how spellcasting works in-story, elemental effects fit Destruction pretty well, even if the magic schools are just there to teach beginner students/balance gameplay.

As long as mark/recall/intervention and levitation returns, I can forgive it.

If passwall shows up I will welcome the change.(Doubt that'll happen though)

Passwall would be cool, but it would make the level designers cry.

Sadly, mark, recall, and intervention probably won't be returning, since the Fallout 3 fast travel system is still in. I guess you could just roleplay that fast travel is teleportation?

It's not the same... :cryvaultboy:

The only thing I'm wondering is what they would replace the 3rd INT booster with. Alchemy does uses points that can raise INT with ease. That'd be the only thing I'm worried about if Mysticism is gone. The skills I'm not worried about. Maybe Illusion will get even more important then it was in Oblivion.

Enchanting, maybe?

Same

I hope so, I hated having to join the Mages guild in order to use Enchanting.

Then you'll be pleased to know that the screenshot of the skill menu in the GI article clearly included Enchanting.

It won't work like that anymore. The whole leveling system has been altered to rely on perk-ups and not raising attributes.

Read the Redguard comic. One of the pages has the destruction spell I'd use instead. Elemental magic is bor-ring.

Really, man I hope the Mag comes in the mail tommorrow. I'm missing out on so much Info.

The same as Paralyze has anything to do with illusion. No, more.

I see notes on multiple AI alert states on that whiteboard.

No, wait, that's just the stealth warning messages.

Where have you found this information? I google Skyrim all the time, and find nothing about the game (except for the trailer).

Paralyze is an illusion effect. This means that the one affected by it is not actually paralised, but he is convinced he is. Wich, for all intents and purposes amounts to the same thing.
If soul trap were to be an illusion spell it would rely on the affected being under the illusion that his soul will be trapped in that gem the mage is holding if he dies. An illusion so strong it would actually cause the soul to migrate into the gem upon death on its own accord. Once the soul resides in the gem the normal barriers would apply and it would be trapped there.
Powerfull stuff indeed, illusion.

True enough.
Although you could give your target the illusion that he's paralysed, while he actually isn't...
But still, Night Eye doesn't make much sense either.

because it was just junk spells that belonged in other places anyway?

I think about magic schools in the same way I think about science. If someone decided that Biochemistry would be merged into Organic Chemistry, or Cell Biology merged into Microbiology, I really wouldn't care because they fulfill similar, if not identical, roles. It's not really changing the way magic works, it just changes the way they are sorted. In fact, I would say that Mysticism breaks logic. If the spells within it are so different in function and use, how does one exactly become good at it? One can be good at Destruction because all of the spells do the same thing, destroy. One can be good at Conjuration because all of the spells summon things. In Mysticism, all of the spells do different things. Do you automatically become good at detecting life because you're good at teleporting, or moving objects remotely? No, I think there are better ways to group the spells in Mysticism and make them relate more closely to other schools. Hell, if they wanted to bring teleports back, you could probably fit them in Conjuration, because you summon yourself from one place to another. I think it's better to come up with ways for the Mysticism spells to fit into other schools than to let them sit in the island of misfit spells.

lore-wise at least, there is no differance between the different schools of spell effects (Thaurmology, Necromancy, Alteration, Conjuration, Destruction, Illusion, Mysticism, and Restoration) besides a general common thread in the affects. However, many of the spell effects from Restoration could easily be considered necromancy if it was about the effects and not the way it is cast. These schools were set up by the Mages guild. Now that the political morass that was the mages guild is dead, their stupid schools have probably been redivided.

Magic sounds less creepy than Mysticism.

"Barney the magic dinosaur" sounds slightly less creepy than "Barney the Mystical dinosaur". I bet its political (not politics).

My thoughts about magic system:
1) Bring back Mysticism and put Enchanting into it.
2) For the sake of argument, think of Destruction as Elemental magic instead.

Mysticism - Deals with the very substance of magic itself, and "unnatural magic":
Absorb, reflect, drains (from destruction now called elemental), and dispel magic. Sense life and magical properties (like if enemy sword is enchanted you can see it), item recharging, binding souls, enchanting limited and constant effects. Elemental shields. Mark, recall, and intervention spells. Suddenly mysticism isn't all so empty anymore, but the mother of them all, like it should be. Note that the classes Battlemage, Mage, Sorcerer, Witchhunter, has mysticism listed as a major skill, so it's nothing that should be easily ignored imho.

Alteration - Deals with altering physical properties of physical non living things:
Open locks, lock (new), telekinesis (moved *from* Mysticism ), feather (on your physical items to make them lighter), water breathing and walking (by manipulating what water is), burden, disintegrating weapons and armor (since they are physical objects), and normal (non elemental) shield (redefine the damage value of a physical weapon). Glow (new) will cause some object in the world (even a bring on the wall) to glow with light. You can cast it on your own equipment causing it to glow, but will nullify any Chameleon or Invisibility effects.

Restoration - Deals with altering stats and skills of living tissue:
Absorb (minus magicka, covered by mysticism, since that is the very essence of magic), fortify, restore, and resist. Night vision (from illusions night eye), animal eye (new), and heat vision (new), are all effects that deals with your own living tissue, so it is put here.

Conjuration - Deals with the occult; daedra, summoning, and the undead:
Probably doesn't need much explanation, but I think Bound should be covered by something else than conjuration. Maybe last a lot longer, but covered by rune stones and scrolls only? Summoned creatures should last a lot longer to compensate, but should no longer rely on the casters knowledge about you, as the system is already faulty.

Illusion - Deals with affecting other living things, influence them etc:
This is probably the "looser" wrt have the weakest observable powers, but probably the "winner" wrt having the most significant hit on gameplay. A good illusionist may never have to use a weapon. Paralyze has how longer effect, and resistance to has much higher effects

Elemental (rather than destruction) - Deals with the ability to manipulate the elements:
With so much moved from destruction, you might find destruction very low yield. But instead we add some new features to it. Shapes:
* Touch - Novice - not really a shape, but the most basics of applications. You're able to channelize the element through your body only at this point.
* Ball - Apprentice - where you throw a ball of some effect towards a target, and is destroyed when it hits something.
* Area - Journeyman - similar to ball, but also affects a certain (limited) radius. It also lasts until impact.
* Line - Expert - where you put down a line of effect towards where you point. Height determined by skill. Enemies may attempt to jump over it.
* Ring - Master - where a ring of effect expands outwards from you, growing in height as it consumes the elements of the area.
Where elements are the five elements of Fire, Frost, Water, Earth, and Shock. So there is still a lot of fun possibilities with Elemental (Destruction) based magic.

Cure disease doesn't belong in magic, that is potion only (as medicine) or by divine forces.
Drain (from destruction) doesn't belong in magic, only as poisons.
Alchemy skill renamed to Herbalism to avoid confusion. Alchemy is often misunderstood as "magic", where it in fact is a lore based on natural medicine which in the game has been listed under Intelligence as a governing attribute. Which *does* make sense even if it's not magic. Keep in mind that Intelligence did not affect the result. If there was a Nature/Survivalist specialization, I'd put it there. If there was a Social/Lore specialization, I'd put it there. For now, I'd put it into Stealth, due to it's poisons.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbalism:
"Herbalism is a traditional medicinal or folk medicine practice based on the use of plants and plant extracts. Herbalism is also known as botanical medicine, medical herbalism, herbal medicine, herbology, and phytotherapy. The scope of herbal medicine is sometimes extended to include fungal and bee products, as well as minerals, shells and certain animal parts."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemy:
"Alchemy, originally derived from the Ancient Greek word khemia (Χημ?α) meaning "art of transmuting metals", later arabicized as Arabic word al-kimia (????????, ALA-LC: al-kīmiyā’), is both a philosophy and an ancient practice focused on the attempt to change base metals into gold, investigating the preparation of the "elixir of longevity", and achieving ultimate wisdom, involving the improvement of the alchemist as well as the making of several substances described as possessing unusual properties."

Which one fits better with what you do and what you achieve (if we take away reflect damage, reflect spell, light, and feather, but night vision and similar "effects on body" is allowed)?
http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Alchemy_Effects

So, I *really* don't think of alchemy as any kind of "magic", as it deals with natural substance rather than magical substance. The effects which appear in the magic list could well have appeared in a natural list. But the effects I want removed, does not fit well into the natural category.

That's just how *I* look at things. Anyone can make their own opinion and prove it "right", weather it fits the lore or not. But removing mysticism completely is outrageous. There are spells that fits better into mysticism than where they are currently located. Maybe we'll understand better once we see the complete skill and perk lists, but if we have to wait until release, then it's obviously too late. but, what can we do in this third era of removal?

I don't get this "if it's not used as much as the others, remove it" mentality. If nobody used it it's because the spells aren't very useful or they are too magicka consuming, it should be been given some better stuff.



Just shooting ideas here, but telekenisis is bloody useless, why not allow it to be used to pick people and animals up and launch them. Perhaps you could move your soul and existence into other people's bodies for short periods of time? Soul binding was always sort of limit. It's just a lousy mentality, rather than removing stuff they should work on improving it.