No they don't; no magicka for it. You think because your melee character can cast novice spells at level 5 it works that way right up until the end of the game? Without speccing into magicka, magicka regen, magicka reduction perks a pure melee class can't keep using magic.

You keep thinking in a vaccuum. There is no classes, we're talking about skills - Destruction in particular. And how its weaker than all other damage types.

A melee character can pump out magicka points, use magical perks, and wear heavy armor with magicka on it. Magicka regen barely works in combat, if at all.

A conjurer or illusionist or alteration master with the other damage types other than destruction will always be better off at higher levels. This is a fact. Destro SLOWS HIM DOWN.

Why is everyone trying to make this into a competitive game? Comparing Mages to Warriors?!

I understand that Mages that go pure Destruction want to feel more powerful, but like others said Warriors can't just level 1handers. We have to use Heavy/Light armor, block or points invested into 1handers or 2handers, Smithing, etc.

I've tried playing a pure Warrior. I truly have. Try making a Warrior type only using 1/2handers with heavy/light armor and maybe block. It's very difficult to pull off. We need some experience in Archery for Dragons or other ranged NPC's. Maybe investing some points into Restoration for healing as well.

Warriors don't get slows. We need 100 in 1/2handers for some sort of paralyze for CC. We can take damage and dish it out face to face, but we suffer against other Mages/ranged unless we have some points in for block to negate magic damage.

We suffer too. You're not the only ones. We have to spread points across different abilities to be somewhat strong.

So you guys complaining that pure Mages can't compete against the world, try playing a pure Warrior. It's not easy. We need to adapt just like you guys need to.

The comments this thread produced are... well...

I am playing a Warrior in the late 30s right now. I have to spend perks in 4 relevant trees. My question is why shouldn't a Mage have to?

I currently have my perks tied up in Heavy Armor, One Handed, Blocking and Smithing.
If I was running around with Lockpicking, Speech, Pickpocket and One Handed I wouldn't be doing as well as I am.
I don't see why a Mage with Lockpicking, Speech, Pickpocket and Destruction would be doing any better.
A Mage with Alteration, Illusion, Conjuration and Destruction would be doing quite well on the other hand.

The big difference I see is my abilities are primarily passive and the Mage's abilities are not.
Warrior certainly takes less work than a Mage. But when has that been different in any RPG?

Dungeons and Dragons Warriors had armor and a sword. Mages had massive lists of spells, bags of potions, wands and staves.
Most Mages use snares to kite, use pets to distract or use roots and nukes. Ever play a Wizard in the original Everquest?
The Arcane Warrior in Dragon Age is the only time passive based Mage that comes to mind and they're pretty much Warriors...

Mages choose to play a very active class.
I am sorry but you're not going to just get to hold down flamethrower and do what I do when you decided on playing the class with the least passive perks in the game.

There is a point where even when the difficulty is on minimum you get absolutely destroyed.

mages CANNOT kill things at high level. no matter how much they trained or perked up each skill, they will only ever scratch the enemy's HP before running out of magicka.

Try playing a level 70 mage. use the console to give yourself spells levels etc. now, try to finish a dungeon.

Now play the same dungeon using your regular warrior (mabye even a lower level one)

It's easier isn't it? i am correct then.

The mage has more options and can attack from distance. While warrior has yet to get close to start dealing damage, which is especially difficult when you have a strom blowing in your face being casted by a mage that slows down your movement. (that's why I need the ability of enchaintment so that I were able to enchaint my armor for magic resistance, otherwise I die within seconds after facing a mage.)

Heavy armor and smithing is top priority for a warrior. Goes right after the blcoking skill. They are used constantly and not just once, as you say.
I'm not sure about what set of spells the mage has for his armour.

Noone said anything bout pure classes. The thread title discusses Destruction and how it is the worst damage type on Master.


Your illusion master, conjure master, resto master, alteration master will alway do better by using a 2H,1H,Shield/Sword, or Bow instead of Destruction. Always.

For people pointing to Impact and saying Destro is fine, no. When you reach 100 Destro, you shouldn't be spamming an Apprentice level spell to stunlock everything because that's the best strategy for you to use. That's effectively saying that you should max out One-handed and then throw your daedric sword in the river because you found a steel sword that stuns.

Destruction is the mage's damage school and it's scaled down because it's meant to be intermingled with the other schools. People who are focused on melee or archery won't have the magicka to delve into the other schools in any significant way, unless they hybrid and average about their stat and skill distribution.

Destruction only does less single target damage and doesn't require you to invest in HP and Stamina plus stealth and crafting perk trees. It leaves you more room to take on a lot more supplemental magic schools than melee/archery would.

I can point out a couple examples of how is scaling is not quite balanced.... to preface the discussion I'm a LV33 BattleMage in full Legendary Dragonscale with 250HP and 350M. Relevant skills are 50 Light Armor (Couple Perks), 76 Destruction (+Fire Perks), 44 One-handed (+Bladesman), 51 Conjuration (+Atronarch perks) and 46 Archery (No perks). I'm also using a legendary ebony longsword, bow and arrows. OK...

1. Doing a Thieves Guild quest where you have to shadow the Argonian to the East India Co.... I faced a Bandit Marauder Archer who was using a Hunting Bow and Steel Arrows and it only took 2-shots for him to kill me. He was also able to 1-shot my Flame Atronach. Conversely, it took 6-fireballs to kill him and when I tried arrows it took 8-10. I'm mot sure how this can be called balanced.

2. Now, when fighting a Frost Dragon, it still only took 6-fireballs to kill it. Granted, frost dragons are likely weak to fire, but in this case the Bandit Marauder is as powerful as a Frost Dragon....

In conclusion I think human enemies can have skills and perks too. This would explain why his 2-shots with inferior equipment were equivalent to my 8-10 shots with far superior gear.

1. This entire argument flies in the face of TES. We never "had" to conjure before. That is a different play style.

2. None of your playstyels you listed had to use 2 damage types other than Mage. Infact someone who takes conjuration doesn't even need destro, - it actually gimps them. Take another skill instead.

No, bow is the mage's damage school because with a few perks and a bound bow you roflstomp.

If you are truly claiming that the game is impossible on the easiest difficulty for a mage then i will concede the game is imbalanced. You are the first one i ever heard of who even tried playing on novice so i wasnt aware the issue was this grave.

It's not just one damage playstile. The shield deals a lot of damage too. What suppliments are you talking about?

I will admit, my information is coming from other posts on this forum. I myself have not actually tried playing mage due to the massive amount of imbalance that i have heard of.
However, i either remember someone saying that they could not do it on novice or think that in theory that is possible due to all the data i have.

A mage with alteration, restoration, illusion, and/or conjuration is [u]always [/u ]better off taking another damage skill other than destruction for Master difficulty at higher levels.


Do you not see a problem with this? Do you not see that destro is the "crap" skill that actually bogs characters down no matter what class or hybrid at higher difficulty/level?

As an aside, it's amazing how this was never an issue back when we could make our own spells.

The only gear and enchantments that are relevant reduce the cost or increase regeneration. Regeneration does not work in combat, it is largely irrelevant. Cost is only an issue if you intend to spam spells, which only one skill needs (Destruction) and that skill does not scale so there's no point in bothering with it unless you plan on not leveling past 30. Arcane Archers (like mine) and Spellswords (like mine) have absolutely no issue throwing Master level spells around. They just don't use Destruction, and they're far more effective because of it.

If you take archery, blacksmithing, enchanting AND stealth perks I'm sure it beats the crap out of destruction. If you just take destruction you can take 3 more schools of magic with it instead. Sounds balanced.

The problem is that destruction is fine until you've maxed it out, so most people dont see the gravity of the issue. You can beat the game with Destruction just fine, as long as you do it at low levels.

But it svcks when something that used to work a certain way stops to function normally later on. This isn't an issue of destro vs Archery really. What people are asking is simply for Destruction to behave with consistent reliability.

Pouring alot of points into Destruction because you see its an effective skill early on... only to see it wither to worthlessness because of scaling is a terrible bait-and-switch mechanic. Surely no one thinks this is okay.

To say that no-scaling destruction is fine is to say that in the early game, Destruction is massively overpowered, and that would be wrong. Destruction is balanced with the other damage skills early on. Its late game that this is totally out of whack.

So yes, some changes are needed in a patch, to keep various playstyles viable. Not even competitive, just viable.

Can you imagine if I just took One Handed, Illusion, Restoration and Alteration and I wore cloth armor?
I'm pretty sure I'd die just as much as a Mage trying to use Destruction with those trees.
Probably even more because I actually have to get into melee range to do damage.

One Handed alone is not strong enough to carry us through the game. Complimentary perk trees carry us through the game.
Armor perks compliment One Handed perks. Smithing compliments Armor perks and Enchanting/Alchemy compliment Smithing perks.
If you don't take perks that compliment what you want to do, you will not do well.

I think the difference may be that a warrior gets higher skills per level because he is leveling up using fewer skills.

Are we playing the same game? It doesn't work that way. Period.

I am not at the level 50, nor am I mage.
I am saing that you can't be specialised in Destruction only and be good. You have to have skills in different abilities. Destruction is just a part of the Mage's profession. Just like a sword is just a part of Warrior specialisation, and not one-skill-win-all.

Ummm, that's exactly how it works.