It's not, its just better level-scaled.


Yeah, unfortunately You're most probably right...

This. While roleplaying with a rusty sword all the way through is fine for a few hardcoe RP people, I suspect most players of Skyrim were rather disappointed with the 'exceptional' and 'unique' items that appear in the game. As mentioned already, and many times before in many, many, many threads on every Skyrim forum in existence... the way crafting works in the game mostly ruined the fun of the loot you find from dungeons and quest rewards. I roleplay to some extent in any game that encourages it, but I am also enticed and urged onwards by the possibility that the next master-locked chest I open, the next Draugr Overlord I kill, the next long and arduous quest chain I complete... may reward me with something significantly better than anything I already have, at any stage of the game. Sadly, this aspect of gaming is utterly missing from Skyrim, and I sorely miss it. The only reason to clear all those dungeons out there, is to sell the loot for gold. And after you already have 300,000 gold and nothing to spend it on, then what? Meh. Not much motivation or inspiration to keep on going, there.

If they had left crafting as a simple method of adding minor to moderate improvements to your weapons and armor, and improved the amount and qaulity of random and unique items in the gameworld, including set items, magical enchanted items, and true rare/unique items, all of which may have the possibility of being better gear than what you can buy or craft, then Skyrim would have been a vastly superior game, in my opinion. Dungeon diving would have had a lot more replayability interest, and I would always run them with that feeling that "there could be something nifty anywhere ahead, so lets go clean this place out and see what we can find!" Instead of "oh, ok. another run through this same old dungeon where I know there will be nothing for me but some more gold I no longer need." Meh.

It probably would have been easier for them to balance the game and the monsters you fight with this kind of system, than the current one where all the skills, perks and crafting exploits (or whatever you want to call them) quickly make any difficulty in the game a complete joke. Done right, a proper loot system, with properly reigned-in crafting capabilities, would put real challenge back in on the higher difficulties, and give the player an interesting and exciting incentive to dive into those dungeons and improve their characters to be able to defeat the harder monsters in them- instead of, as others have related, just spending a couple hours beefing up a craft and quickly having the best items it's possible to get, game over.

It's quite a good feeling to know that there are still ppl who think similar as me .

As far as making gear goes, I wish that when you upgrade something through crafting the appearance of it would change. Like when you upgrade ebony armor from Epic to legendary I wish it would actually look different, better somehow.

I also find the unique items in the game a bit lacking although there are a good many. It does take a while to get them and some are only gained through certain quest lines such as Thieve's Guild quests or Dark Brotherhood quests which only certain characters are going to take. Then you have things like the Mace of Molag Bal which isn't something everyone is going to want to get even though it is very powerful. My warrior would like it but he refuses to lead someone to be sacrificed. But there certainly aren't enough random uniques to be found inside dungeons, caves, forts, ect. Some of the ones found this way are so weak that I hang them on my wall but would never consider using them in combat.

I agree. The Elder Scrolls series was dumbed down lots from Morrowind, wasn't it?
I remember the excitement I had when I accidentally came across a glass water breathing, night eye, and detect life helm in the middle of the ocean in Oblivion. Finn Gleam helm, wasn't it?

Finding a glass helm with all those neat-o effects at level 3 was quite the boon.

I think I love you.


Daedric Smithing should have only been improving Daedric weapons. Allowing players to craft whole armories of Daedric removes a lot of the "Omg it's Daedric" mystique. There should have been a few examples of "Guaranteed Daedric" in the game though, For example, completing the Civil War quests, or becoming Thane of Solitude. High-end stuff.


As for unique stuff, yeah, what the hell? Pale blade looks like Draugr Blade?! Chillrend is a recolored Glass Sword (With a cool Aura I admit).

I wonder if this falls in the territory of "We can totally change it later in patches" but probably not.


I'd kill for some Daedric without the huge shoulderspikes... Steel armor had a variant without Pauldrons, why can't Daedric do it?


The defense was still scaled. It only had the appearance of a Glass Helmet.

There's a few cases of "Totally unique items" in Skyrim though. Predetor's Gace comes to mind. Easily one of the most difficult-to-find items in the game.

Unfortunately this game does nothing for me in terms of random loot. I am certainly a loot guy but once you hit a certain level you just see orcish / glass etc. Once and a while you'll find a daedric weapon. Randomly enchanted really isn't something amazing to me because you can just enchant it yourself. I think having a bigger item variety and randomness to it would be better. However I guess that's why we have games like Diablo, Titan Quest, and Torchlight?

Haha, I was able to quote all of that right up until the halfway point - Ordinators never like me

Too bad Diablo 3 looks like "Baby's First Coloring Book". Really removes a lot of the atmosphere. Kingdom's of Alamur had the same problem. Giant weapons + oversaturation is a terrible combination. WoW only (Barely) Gets away with it, because the scale of MMO games dictates you need easily recognizable hallmarks of classes/enemies/weapons.

This gives me a mod idea hmm..

Indeed. When Diablo 3 hits the streets, Skyrim will likely never see my monitor again. Replayability is nil. Seen all the scenery, done all the quests, cleared all the (same every time) dungeons. No real incentive left to keep dinking around in Skyrim, after that. You know there's nothing new or different left to do, nor any unusual or better items left to find, period. What little RPG'ing variations there are, don't even come close to making the samo-samo (completed) gameworld interesting again. When I put my cursor on the Skyrim icon on my desktop, I feel like there should be a popup saying 'Cleared'.

Yeah, I've noticed that on the vids, too. But I've also seen that some folks have already come up with video adjustments that get rid of that pastel hazy barney crap, and make the world and objects in it appear more normal and realistic and darker. Looked pretty darn good, actually, in the demo vid I saw of it.

Here is a tube of what the graphics filters can do- pretty nice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UuAll4lKmBw

I loved those guys, they had one of the coolest armors in the game but there was something about them that made You think twice before attacking them. They were like "touch me and I'll rip your head of and stick it on a pike". The guards in Skyrim with their armor are not worth it.

The reason finding these unique items in Morrowind gave a more satisfying feeling was because the common stuff was all bad compared to the more powerful unique stuff. The developers seemed to shy away from this method so you can basically use anything you enjoy the most and it can be just as powerful.


For myself, i like using standard Skyforge Steel and Nord Hero weapons. I like that they can be just as powerful as daedric, because i like the the humble look. Theres also such a large variety of 'good' stuff in Skyrim, it makes finding the unique stuff less rewarding in a way. Why should i care about finding orc armor at a lower level if wolf armor fits my character better? It all just evens out in the end: More standard crap items, and finding good unique stuff later on, or a large selection of all good gear.


Another contributing factor was Morrowind's focus on stats and numbers: having a weapon that hits a little harder or much harder would mean a world's difference for surviving. In skyrim, you can best some enemies by actual player skill, so finding something that hits a little harder means less of a difference

The way crafting interacts with the rest of the game simply wasn't well thought out, and marginalizes the exploration and questing parts of the game. Before anyone says it, the whole "I'm the best smith ever so I should make godly items" argument is one of the dumbest things I've ever heard.

It's saying that after two days I'm the best smith in all of Skyrim, better than even Eorlund Gray-Mane who is considered the best smith in Tamriel and whose family has been working the Skyforge for DECADES. This isn't just a balancing issue, but an issue of internal consistency and in-game logic as well.

Sure, it makes it worthwhile to put time into crafting the stuff. Yet it also makes it NOT worthwhile to actually explore the world. I could in theory make the best gear in the game by never leaving Whiterun.

You can argue that there are other reasons for which to explore, sightseeing, combat, whatever, my argument is that by subverting the reward system, you're effectively killing a part of the internal mechanisms and progression paths of the game. The internal mechanisms and systems making up a game are supposed to work together to bring a more enjoyable experience, not work against each other.

Exactly. Aside from it's cool graphics, after you've played the game for any length of time, it becomes more and more evident what key things were left out or done poorly, as much as what was done right. This really nags, once you realize what's missing. It takes a while to accomplish, but after you've explored it all once, this game is quickly used up. There are a few key motivators that keep gamers playing long after they've completed all the base content in a game- and the lure of finding cool rare loot that's hard to acquire and could be anywhere out there if you just keep playing and looking... that is one of the bigger ones for a lot of people. Truly sad that it doesn't exist in Skyrim.

And the OP and various other people now know why I prefer Oblivion over Skyrim. Skyrim also made the dungeons all brown and horrible with limited enemy types (Draugers EVERYWHERE, YAY!? or Humanoids. Where are the ghosts and wild monsters etc.?) and limited variety in traps.

i remember in morrowind there were two shops i always had to loot on every char i made, the first was an armor shop in balmora, im surprised i even remeber that but i loved that game lol, anyways the armor shop had some nice warrior like armor with a little wood elf running the place, i forget the shop name and the other town, i can't remember, had some nice items, i never even came close to finishing the game sadly, i dont think my computer will even run it anymore lol

I agree. It gets old when you find some generic weapon with enchanments. Doesnt feel new and most of the time isnt even worth using.

in skyrim i never found an item i'd actually use, i'd just buy armor from shops since it was faster and gold is too easy to get until i was a higher level i just smithed my gear after that

Speaking of Diablo III... Have any of you played Torchlight? It was made by a bunch of Diablo II team members. Basically, it's Diablo with WoW graphics completely stripped of any plot or meaningful character interactions. Anyway, the loot system in Torchlight reminds me of Skyrim... at first, the stuff you find is genuinely useful and it's always possible that the goodies you find in chests or on dead mini- bosses will upgrade your loadout. Soon though, the stuff you can enchant and improve yourself completely blows away anything you can find in the wild. Sound familiar? I dearly hope Diablo III isn't the same way.

Haha I'm guessing that You mean the Meldor . When I played MW I remember there was a trader in the same area, Ra'Virr. He had a very cool weapon, best I've seen so far back then. Finally I decided that I want it. I killed him claimed his property and the house .

That's what I want in Skyrim. I want for e.g. one of the Jarl's to have a cool, unique armor and the only way to get it would be to kill him.

dont know if anybody has said this, but it probably didnt help that the game came out in 11/11/11, as they had to do it once they said they would and i dont think they had finished skyrim then and rushed it, leaving several of the last things (such as unique items) out, hopefully they can sort this in the dlc, but i agree there is far too little unique things, for instance in oblivion i remember doing a quest about gravediggers and finding one guy had "debaser" and then after looking there was a cool mace in the corner, or finding "chiilwind" from the farmer felt awesome as they were great but in skyrim chilwind requires you to do the thieves guild and thats about the only time i felt a thrill of discovering something like i did in oblivion.

WRONG lol there were two that guy that cures you of corpres deseise has one too lol

lol lol ololol