You can't really complain that magic is ineffective when you're limiting yourself in its use. That's equivalent to my character not using a shield (which he doesn't) and then saying that warriors are underpowered.

What do staffs do this time around? Do they just shoot spells again?

Yeah, they just shoot spells.

I think that really is the key. If a player is unwilling to make choices to increase a character's ability to deal with the world it finds itself in, the player can hardly complain about the character being weaker than characters without out such restrictions. If the game difficulty is the same for everyone, regardless of what choices they make, why have the choices at all? It is right that the game allows me to create an character who wants to run around almost naked and learn about locks, but it would be wrong of me to believe that such a build should should be able to fight as one designed to fight.

My favorite character to run is a mage/theif/assasin. If you use your stealth well, sneak up back stab, and then a quick flame and that takes out my problem. Betwen robes, necklaces, and natural bonuses recovering majika is not an issue for me usually. And if I do get in a pinch, I always have plenty of potions. Which brings me to something else I'm relying more and more on- alchemy. I'm doing so much more of it now. And those potions I make are much easier and cheaper then trying to find or buy. If you equip your character right, use your stealth, and have the right clothing, magic is much easier then oblivion.

I also play as a mage on "expert" difficulty (though I do use a bow and a dagger sometimes, just to be different) and I find it a very fun class to play. And I use almost exclusively destruction magic, and usually fire magic (unless I'm up against a flame spirit thing... atronach?).

If you're having magicka problems. Put all your level points into magicka, wear items that all have either a bonus to magicka or magicka regen. Stock up on magicka potions (all the diff types) and you should be fine. When I do run out, I either switch to a dagger/bow (I like the ones that absorb HP, but maybe there are ones that absorb magicka? Haven't found any like that though), back off for a bit, use a staff (some of these are really powerful and awesome) or use a shout (unrelenting force/knockback, or that one that makes you immune to damage/unable to attack are goods ones). Also, there is a shout that is basically a teleport spell, (whirlwind something...? Can't remember the name), that zips you forward about 20 ingame metres. I sometimes use this when up against other mages with powerful wards. Zip to them and hack at them with a absorb hp dagger/sword while using restoration in the other hand. Using destructive magic against mages with ward is fail and you just run out of magicka.

A meatshield companion is invaluable. If you have a companion, a horse, a dog, and you summon a creature yourself, you have like a mini army . Companions and dogs are OP, lol. Pretty sure Lydia and my dog could take out a dragon without me helping, or maybe just healing them a bit.

I didn't use the magic system in Oblivion that much, but I'm loving the Skyrim magic. I'm sure it can be improved though, would certainly like some more variety in the spells.

Really, the base mechanics of the vanilla and console version are almost perfect, including the magic system. What needs work is A.I. across the board, from NPCs and companions to mammoths and rabbits. Everything in the world needs to act more realistically then the current few predetermined responses.

Spellcrafting was great for those who played the game as intended and experimented. However, masses quickly learn on forums and from friends how to make a few 'I win' exploits and burn out on the game fast. Anything exploitable should be as impossible as possible within the vanilla version. It is basically protecting the lower tier of customer, the base buyer, from himself.

Everything else for the PC user will be quickly sorted out with mods. For now enjoy the challenge of playing pure destruction higher then adept which can be drawn out compared to melee/bow, but again, we are talking about a single player game. If you want to be Tim the Blaster, you'll have to be more then just a fireball user to dominate on expert in the vanilla game for the benefit of the 10 million other players out there.

OP, if you get some good equipment (go exploring a little bit), playing a Pure Mage is not difficult. You also have to have a plan going into battle and know what skills you want to use where. Using the "Perks" system can makes you substantially power. Two perk points gets you 50% reduction on Novice and Adept casting costs, and that is only two points. I am at Lvl 13 at the moment and while I have had some issues here in there (mainly against other Mages), there has always been a way around it. Don't forget Conjuration class where you can summon Atronarchs, Zombies, and Familiars.

Translation: don't have an argument so I'm going to grossly oversimplify yours.



The fact is, every other means of doing damage has ways of becoming far more efficient and potent. You can enchant your swords in such a way as to make them ridiculous. Without spellmaking, there's no way to do that with magic. If your enemies aren't dead by the end of your mana bar, you have to either wait or consume potions, and there's no way of increasing the damage output of spells once you've perked them. Once perked, they're still VERY underwhelming when compared to dual-wielding, for instance. Dual wielding with one-hander enchantments, don't even get me started.

The fact is, I'd trade all the shiny new flash for spellmaking in a second. In oblivion my spells weren't pretty, but at least I could make them more potent than the default.

You mean like ...

Wall: Wall of Flames/Storms/Ice
Hindrance: Paralyze, Mass Paralysis, Turn Undead
Misdirection: Calm, Fear, Frenzy

?

I'm playing a pure mage and i'm insanely powerful. you're probably just bad at the game.

edit

for the record im playing on master

I am playing as a Battlemage and I find myself torching enemies before they even get to me. I'm playing on the difficulty that's right in the middle, don't know what it is called.

Magic is hugely upgraded from OB. Too much, in some cases.

Best funnest magic system in a video game ever.

I normally avoid magic in video games but with Skyrim it's freaking awesome!

Are you kidding me? I've been a pure mage since release and am currently level 24, have had no real issues, and only died once so far.
Which is why you run. Get items that boost your mana regeneration and keep potions handy. I've not had a problem with this mechanic at all.
Which again, is why you actually sink points into your spell school perk trees, and if you're still having problems then maybe you should consider enchanting an item where it's cheaper to cast spells from a specific school. I've not had a problem with high magicka costs.
I've not had this issue before either. Maybe you should stick to spells suited to your skill level, i.e: Don't go casting adept destruction spells when you're only a novice.
I have mixed feelings about the removal, so I can understand your frustration in this regard. Mods will come out eventually, but it's not dampening my experience all that much honestly.
Well, I've been a pure mage nonstop and haven't had any problems that you're describing. If you can't stick with a pure mage build, maybe it's just not your style of gameplay or something, because I'm loving all of it.

Here;s a situation I came across. Now, as a Pure Magi, I put every point into all my 5 spell selections, and get Dual-Casting up asap, and buy every spell I can.

I'm alone. I'm now facing 3 mobs that could easily shred me to oblivion.

Am I dead? Heck no, I know how to play my class.

Quick! Fear one of the mobs and Calm the other. Now It's just me and one left. Still, difficult fight as we're in a closed space and not enough space to move.

I cast stoneskin for armor, and as I have the armor buff that allows my stoneskin's ability to be doubled when not wearing armor, I now have 120 armor rating.

Now watch as I summon my blades and chop everything up.

Guess I won.

just became archmage as a pureblooded mage using destruction only and i think it was way too easy. i even cleared sightless pit (south west of winterhold, south of saalthar) at lvl3 merely using flames only. i actually tried other stuff but none went as smoothly as spamming flames, when you know how to kite your opponent. considering the magic system, i really miss the possibility to create your own spells (or did i just miss it ingame? hint me on that). that takes out a lot of neat ideas i made up during installation.

soo after all i can just say horrible monster pathing beats low magicka regen. it really should NOT be possible to kill 4 Falmers at once at Level 3 or beat the second to last quest in the archmage quest without getting hit a single time, 4 hours of playing should not reward you with the arch-mage title. the robe and the mask from M.. are pretty damn sweet though. Have fun playing the college quest-chain, its pretty damn epic!

Maybe in the beginning, but bows absolutely do not scale in later levels without perks. On my Bow Assassin character, I made the mistake of having a lot of fun during the Thieves Guild questline, spending a lot of time leveling pickpocket, lockpicking, and eventually speech because of all the loot I was selling. I made a ton of money, and it's fun to pickpocket the clothes off of people, but it's a gimmick.

Once I had my fun I realized that I had leveled 20 times and couldn't kill anything scaled. I couldn't even do enough damage to keep my two companions up during the latter part of that quest chain and then getting wrecked by the baddies.

Without even raising my archery skill (~60), I used the console to remove some of my lockpicking and pickpocket perks and added bow perks instead (with a couple left over into light armor for some survivability) - It made a huge difference, and returned that character to viability.

I'm a mage, pwning and having a lot of fun.

I find playing a pure mage completely adequate. I haven't used one melee or bow and I'm level 11. My mage is incredibly strong and destroys everyone.

I miss spellcrafting too, but I'm glad it's gone.
The big issue with Oblivion was that everything was so sterile and nothing was special.
But now since spells are set, there is a thrill at finding a new tool or getting one as a reward. That's something you could never have if you can just make everything yourself.

This. Higher levels on Master is much much more difficult as a Mage than the 2 other archetypes = this is a fact atm.

I have 250% + Apprentice (i'm not sure how much that is) and it's still not enough to kill as fast as a Warr/Rogue (not to mention VERY big problems vs Necro mobs who use Ward)

The problem is the inability for magicka to regen while you charge a big spell.. some of it should come back.

holy cow... that was annoying me so much, had to use menu every time i had to drink a potion... thank you.

Well there's your problem right there. You think your character is real.

I never have Mana problems in this game.

I hate conjuration and do not use it. I just stick with fire and Ice. Even at Master, everything goes down in 1-2 hits, Don't forget RUNES!!!. I went with casting cost decrease enchantments in destruction so I can cast my massive AoE fire ball 1000x before I dent my mana. Plus the mana decrease perks. Plus an absorbtion shield because anyone who has decent magic resists usually is using an enchanted blade,staff,or spells themselves. In the rare occasion when someone uses a mana leech on me, I might have to activate my racial elf ability but this is very rare. I have never used a mana potion and had to stop carring them when I reached 200 mana potions.

Secondly, I do not use a campanion because they get pissed with all my AoE's and generally block my shots. But I am working on a super fire/ice resist set of armor so I can use a companion because I need a pack mule.

Mages are really overpowered in this game. Dragon Dead in 5 dual shots. Make sure you use their weakness. Fodder dead in 1 AoE. Boss dead in 2 hits plus a good rune. Ocassionally use my shout to knock them across the room just because it is crazy fun. Even better is to paralyze them then shout them across the room and send everyone they hit go sprawling.

Anyone use Frenzy, super useful for multi boss battles. Nice to make use of all their minions.

Stagger for dual casting made the game too easy. I am playing DiD game and when my time comes I will not take that perk again.

Cast Fire Cloak and Xflesh.
Optionally, summon an atronach.

Chain stagger enemy with dual firebolts while flamecloak does extra damage.

Everything dies.

My gear and perks gives me like +250% regen and +150 magicka though, so equips are kinda important. Level 28.

Haven't honestly found much use for fireball, though. Really aren't that many enemy groups, it has friendly fire, and it uses four times as much magicka as firebolt for about 75% more damage. Meh.


They should have made spells get better as your destruction increased, though. I miss double sparking it up like palpatine. The novice spells were super cool.