Well, if you really want to wear the Shrouded Armor, then go for the pre-enchanted Shrouded set, which, unlike the Worn Shrouded set can be improved through smithing. You will need Arcane Smithing, so that is two perk points. I'd recommend taking them both from Bladesman.

Here is what the UESP says about Bladesman:

"Bladesman gives a rather minor increase to damage--having all three levels of this perk only increases your average damage by 10% of the weapon's base damage, or at most 2.1 damage per attack."

The reason is because Bladesman:

"Only affects base damage of weapon--smithing, skill, perks, etc. do not affect the critical damage."

See: http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:One-handed

So, Bladesman does not sound that great. If you take a couple perks from Bladesman to get Arcane Smithing, you should be able to get your Shrouded Armor to the cap by using enchant and alchemy to fortify your smithing.

The problem is that it's pre-enchanted. I can't enchant it for zero spell cost that way.
Anyway, I love to improve deadric artifacts as good as I can before hanging them on weapon racks/ armor stands, so I used my free perk point from the last tweak and took one out of Bladesman to perk Arcane Blacksmith. Here's the build as it is now.

http://skyrimcalculator.com/#90354

Any final recommendations on the Health/Stamina balance?

That sounds like a great idea actually. If you can get your hands on the Muffle spell early on you'll have 50 Illusion at no time, along with Quiet Casting - thus influencing your stealth capabilities greatly. I also adore the Rose of Sanguine or any Elemental Atronach Staff for long range summoning, albeit not influencing your Conjuration at all I believe, it is great in creating diversions. In terms of armor, I'd see myself using the Arch-Mage Robes of the College of Winterhold with a pair of Nightingale Boots or Cicero's Boots, perhaps even the Ebony Mail if you aim at high level armor and protection, despite it being Heavy Armor along-side any type of boots really. I think you can give up on some of the perks on the Stealth, maybe have only 2/5. With high Sneak levels you are practically invisible to people even if you are in front of them, with Muffle it becomes even greater. I also don't understand why you need Enchanting perks, unless you do that for the 100% less Magicka for Conjuration? I'd suggest Gloves and Helmets with Archery Enchantments, if you already plan on going this direction. These are also quite common [at least for me] on the 25%+ ratings. Another thing to note is that Radiant Raiment sells one hell of quality goods, check them out regularly. Hope any of my ideas / tips help you on your way.

Overall the latest build looks good to me, but I agree that 5/5 on Stealth may be overkill. Toning that down would free up perks for other uses. Two points in Restoration for Respite would allow quick stamina regeneration for power attacks, sprinting and archery zooming.

As far as the OP question on how to allocate between magicka/stamina/health, a lot of that depends on how much he is going to rely on free-casting. With 100% free casting you don't need more than the 100 starting magicka. The Archery zoom and one-handed power attacks can drain a lot of stamina, so maybe more health/stamina than magicka? Lot of it depends on how you play.

I should point out that according to the UESP there is a current bug on Elemental Potency and if you take that perk, your summoning staves (like Sanguine Rose) will not work.

My 'main' character started off as a Marksman but I soon started using Destruction as well. I can tell you that it's insanely fun, and honestly, if you level up your health and carry enough healing potions you can use mage robes while shooting enemies perfectly well. To make the most of that sort of build though, you'd need to level up Magicka, Health AND Stamina (Stamina helps when zooming in and slowing time with the Eagle Eye Archery perk), which can take time. Wearing a necklace or ring for magicka and also a necklace or ring for health helps a lot with that.

I leveled up Smithing and Enchanting to 100 now, Alchemy is on 84 so far. So I'll stick with the 100 magicka. Maybe 200, so I can cst a bow/sword in prison, if neccessary. At first I will balance Health and stamina, question is, which will be more important in the end. I'll figure out myself, I guess. And I don't use summoning staves, so the bug doesn't affect me at all. So how many points should I take from Stealth, and where should I add them?

How much time did it take you to get Enchanting to 100 and Alchemy to 84, and how did you do it?
You can keep it on the 100 - 200 limit, I personally use Rings with Fortify Magicka so I'll have a little bit more.
You can take 2 points off of Stealth and use them for Restoration Novice and Respite - Healing is a starting magic for all races so this combo will be useful both for health and stamina regeneration.
About Archery, I suggest going to Angi's Camp, 5 points of Archery for free, despite having to pass her tests.
On the One-Handed tree, the Paralyzing Strike is really unnecessary, Backwards strikes are a pain and you can do better with something else, I'd personally also think over the Armsman and Critical Shot perks once more.

I agree on the value of Respite. All my characters (except those who for roleplaying reasons don't cast any spells) take Novice, Apprentice, Regeneration and Respite perks, just so they can get a quick dose of Stamina (via Fast Healing) in battle.

I'd leave the points in Armsman because he is only going to use bound weapons. Without being able to smith or enchant your weapons, he's going to need all the Armsmen he can get, especially since he plans on playing on Master.

200 magicka sounds good, with the rest going to health and stamina. Being able to cast your bound weapons in jail might be useful someday.

Thanks for the replies!


Well, for Smithing and enchanting it took me about 2-3 hours. I farmed some gold, went to Adrianne Avennicci in Whiterun, and bought all her Iron Ingots and Leather Strips. I forged Iron Daggers until the mats ran out. Then I went to Dragonsreach, bought all soulgems available, enchanted all the crafted Iron Daggers with a random enchantment, and sold them. That way I made some money which I could invest into buying all of Eorlund Gray-Mane's Iron Ingots and Leather Strips. I crafted daggers again, enchanted and sold them. When both Gray-Mane and Avennici ran out of mats, I waited 48 hours, so the Ingots and Strips would restock. I did that until Smithing and Enchanting was on 100. It's important to sell the daggers to as many different vendors as possible, so they don't run out of gold for trading. For Alchemy, I just ran around and collected mats, and threw them together to create random potions. This takes quite a bit longer, about 8 hours to now, that's why its not on 100 yet. To get 100 Sneak, I just backstabbed Hadvar in Helgen Fortress until the job was done. Pickpocket was pretty easy too, I just planted an amount of gold in my victim's pockets and stole it back. Quicksave and -load prevented me from getting busted.

The critical shot perk - I think you're right about that. But where to put the points? Restoration won't fit into concept, because of a lack of magicka, plus it would make alchemy pretty useless, except for brewing enchanting/smithing potions. So I'll stick with Alchemy in terms of healing. And I see no reason to reconsider Armsman, its important for one handed. Did you mean Bladesman? That would make more sense to me, since you put it in one sentence with the Critical Shot perk.


As I said, I'll leave the healing (And also stamina refreshing) to potions. They're quicker to cast if set on hotkeys, and makes swapping weapons/spells unneccessary. Also I can save points for health/stamina, choosing restoration as a third magic school would force me to put more points into magicka.

It's 200 Magicka then, maybe a little less, depending on the spell cost for the bow.

Okay, summing up, I can save 2 points from Critical Shot, 2 from Bladesman and additional 2 from sneak. So that's a total of 6 points I can put into something else. Maybe smithing, so I can wear dragonscale? That would solve any armor problems easily, I guess, and there would be 2 points left. Any other ideas?

Bump. Anybody?