Magic has more tactical advantages, mainly it is more useful in close quarters.

Also, do exploding bolts still explode if you miss, I doubt it...

Yes they do.

Read again. You've actually just validated the point I was making. YOU, the player, YOU are seeking the most powerful this or that, therefore YOU have determined that anything "less" than what you want is "obsolete". IMO, Destruction is NOT underpowered at all. You have the ability to pump it, and your magic using ability, to the point where you can kill a roomful of powerful Draugr, yes, a roomful, with one or two shots. Can't be done with a crossbow, or any bow. The trade off is that you have to be MUCH more clever in combat than the plunk and run archer, or charge-in sword and board night, or the overwhelmig smash and bash barbarian. That's roleplaying, and you're not doing it if you think magic is "gimped".

Um... without adversaries? That's not an RPG, that's a click-click on the pretty pictures adventure, and, thankfully, that's not Skyrim. ALL RPGs have battles, always have had, always will have. Older RPGs were turn-based, "dice roll" based, where the modern RPG has chosen to go with a more interactive (IMO, much more fun) route that you call "action". Skyrim is hardly a pure actioner, hardly the mindless button masher that most action games are. Skyrim is what TES has always been about, the player creating the story with assistance from the game, as close to PnP RPGs as you can really get in a CRPG, IMO. Big deal, no fiddling wth "stat" numbers. If your requirement of an RPG is to presentyour characters' numbered stats to you, you're missing the whole RP part of RPG.

What? I hope you're talking about basic Drauger to Restless Drauger.


Ugh.. This thread isn't about role playing. Its mostly about game balancing. Most people agree that Destruction is weak, when something is only really viable using a single play style(Double Casting stagger with 100% cost reduction) then there is a problem. Of course spamming 50 double casted incinerates that always stagger in about 10 seconds flat is going to be powerful.

But if you try that strategy without having the broken cost reduction of enchanting then you'll run out of magika incredibly fast, and you'll be in trouble. Unless you have about a thousand magic potions that you use in the middle of battle. Or you use the high elf ability.

And what about single casting?

Dual fire balls for mass group attack, lets see a crossbow take out six bad monsters at once.

By what you say, if we take the severely underpowered Destruction school, and combine it with the grossly overpowered cost reduction from the Enchanting tree, it is still much less viable than a a fully smithed-up, legendary crossbow?

I don't know about you, but I've found both to be powerful, but not game-breaking, and certainly taking no precedence over one another. Crossbow's are excellent for that first shot (and the next few if at proper distance/terrain), but the reload ,and the piss-poor movement speed you get while reloading makes it circumstantial. Whereas Destruction offers more damage in a short time frame (sure, with cost reduction) and I maintain all of my movement speed, allowing for the dodging of enemy projectiles and shorter recovery.

Not to mention you can make use of resistance penalties (Ie; Ice Spike vs a Flame Atronach) most with destruction and on the fly, while Crossbows require a lengthy load time to switch between bolts, and the elemental bolts are usually in a short supply.

I use both (not on the same character, mind you), and it never occurred to me that one of them replaces the other.

This ^^^x2

This post comes across saying bluntly that crossbows render destruction magic useless. Really, that can be said about many things. Argonians could breathe underwater (can they still?) does that mean they render waterbreathing artifacts useless? Nope, cuz not everyone wants to be an Argonian. The crossbows looked neat at first and I will use it now and then. But it's definitely not a magic users weapon of choice typically.

But, we alll like what we like.

Yes, I'm sure everyone agrees with you. Magic is horrible in Skyrim.
This is "that" thread disguised as a crossbows are OP thread whilst really revolving around destruction magic being bad.
I don't think crossbows are OP, I will have to disagree on that notion. It's just magic, magic is bad.

You say crossbows do more damage than destruction.
What doesn't do more damage than destruction?

I think upon answering this you'll find that destruction is underpowered and crossbows are just fine.

Well yes.. I suppose this is "that" thread. But it still is a pretty sad thing. I love magic, especially destruction. I just hate that its so easily outclassed in this game(IMO).

I guess this is a "Crossbows are awesome/over powered, and destruction magic is weak, but shouldn't be" thread.

It wasn't obsolete before crossbows were introduced?

It was, but now its more obvious.

You obviously have no idea if you made that first comment, draugr deathlords aren't hard to take down on master using incinerate. 3-4 dual casts or 10 single casts.

Most people have no idea how 'weak' destruction is, they use it once, compare it to the broken crafting system and copy what idiots say on here.

I don't use 100% cost reduction, nor do I constantly dual cast, yet I play on master dealing more than enough damage. The problem is clearly the magicka cost, but the damage is far from 'weak', it is superior to crossbows.

Crossbow is no good for my mage with no Archery perks though, by the time I've reloaded the enemy has already hit me, assuming I didn't miss, in which case I'm screwed.

As a mage, I've pounded Draugr Deathlords with a couple of well-placed fireballs, dual casted, yes, but nowhere near 100% cost reduction. You would only need 100% cost reduction if you're trying to play a mage as a "charge in and bash 'em" barbarian type. Different tools SHOULD require different tactics, that's part of the richess of the game, of any RPG. Otherwise, you're talking about each weapon type, sword, arrow, spell, whatever, being essentially the same as the next, just with different graphics. The elegance of balance is much harder to attain the way it WAS done over how so many complain it SHOULD HAVE been done. Because of this, nothing is likely to change in Skyrim. And, I sure as heck hope this kind of actioner/console mentality doesn't bleed into the next TES release.

i personally HATE magic. beside the fact that its awfull to aim with, it also requires you to build your character around it. i only recently picked up skyrim so i probaly wont handle it to its fullest potential, but genral melee and archery is MUCH easier. i shoot1-3 crossbow bolts at the enemy, focussing in major threaths, and then just melee them down. so far it worked against dragons and hordes(read: 5-7 at the same time) of draugr and vampires, while using maybe 5 minor healing potions max with the charactar overall. weapons can be enchanted to hold roughly the same effects as destruction magic, and my friends legendary deadric sword with frost n shock enchantments both ruin enemies stamina, magica, health, and slows them down. we easly ruined some draugr overlords(or were it deathlords?) and a acient dragon with it so i thought it was quite effective. magic ont he other hand seems to run out of magica suprisongly fast.

LOL, well, if you're building up health and stamina and casting high powered spells, yeah, that happens. Can't say I run out of magicka very often with my mages, though. Investing in MP early on, I'm generally at or over 500 when I've "finished" the game.

Sneak and a dagger have made crossbows obsolete. Because numbers.

See what I did there?

If you're playing the PC version of Skyrim install Midas magic, Skrim Monster Mod + more spawn mod (a pluggin for SMM) and crank the dificulty up to master level. Then enjoy the new crazy hard level of diffulclty of Skyrim and the pure awesomeness of your OP destruction magic.

The game is single player. All people are complaining about is min/maxing DPS

The solution is easy if you're on PC: If you want a mage that has spells more powerful than any phsyical weapon, use a mod that tailors the game to your playstyle. Or roleplay and not use crossbows. The only "obsolesence" is when the DPS mechanism is in the player's hands.

if you're not on PC, the real issue is something that your character might use is better than your spells. But that's your character, not all the NPCs in the game. You as a player are using something that your character will experience less DPS with, not a thing that makes your character invalid

The bolts don't do elemental damage according to the damage of the crossbow, each bolt has it's own amount of separate damage. Here's what I mean. The dwarven crossbow does 22 base damage, modified by skill and perks. Upgraded, my dwarven crossbow does 67 damage, with the exploding bolts adding 14 damage, plus 15 fire/ice/lightning. That's all you get, 15 damage. Nothing more, currently destruction does not affect the elemental damage from exploding bolts.

Destruction spells always stagger when you dual cast (the right ones obviously but still) so I fail to see how always can be superceded by anything. Not to say I don't agree with you, but I don't think it is crossbows that are making destruction magic obsolete, I think it is the fact that destruction magic does not keep up with your scaling enemies worth a turd. Fireball is an adept level spell, I have the 50% boost to fire damage, and I have to smoke mid level baddies 4-5 times to bring them down, as opposed to a hit or two with my broadsword. I feel as though the bow would produce better results over destruction magic, but i have no real experience with it.

Basically, here's hoping they just boost the base damage values for all spells and reduce the magic cost as well. Here's also hoping they test it out thoroughly so they don't overcorrect and make destruction magic a world ending skill tree.

it is pretty bad how every other weapons is gets better the high grade of material is made out of, and crossbow is just of nuclear effectiveness from the get go.

i mean come on, its fires at EXACTLY the same speed if not FASTER than other bows.

destruction spells will never be useles.
with the right enchanted items, you can do a infinite Ka, me,... Ha, me,... Lightning Storm!!!

I like crossbows. but magic will never outlive its usefulness to me.

I just don't get magic on Skyrim anymore.. I can max out Destruction and get killed like a twig. Yet all those NPC's with max Destruction kills me in seconds. o.e..
It's impossible to be a mage in skyrim unless you are a Heavy Armor Magic with max enchanting. o.e..