I don't think DPS is the issue at all, the issue is base costs, higher level spells become extremely inefficient. The other issues are impact being overpowered, spells that don't benefit from impact being basically obsolete, and higher level versions of low levels spells not existing other than certain exceptions. It shares some of these issues with other spell schools but gets hit the hardest since ia destruction user will rely on casting frequently to deal damage, rather than only occasional casts for support.

I can maybe see they're logic here - Fireball is damaging enough to remain useful even late in the game (unending AOE stunlock doesn't hurt either) which really only leaves flames and firebolt. Firebolt gets upgraded, they must have just thought super-flames would be too easy. Not sure how to decrease the range of a spell, but if I could I'd add a high level version of flames with shorter range. That's pretty similar to the Wall of... spells though, so maybe they figured they had it covered.

Yeah, when you factor in spell costs, the argument for Destruction being UP gains weight. It's a real balancing act to keep blue on your bar without resorting to potion-spam or other so-called "cheap tactics", but it can be done. You can always switch to a staff, for example... it's not like soul gems are incredibly rare or overly difficult to fill. But there's a lot of people that feel that they shouldn't have to pause the game and chug, or switch off from spellcasting to a different weapon, and I can understand that. Using casting gear can definitely feel like a "cheat".

-Loth

Yeah, I'm one of the ones that thinks magicka management shouldn't require potions or staffs. It sort of comes down to dps again - no matter how good you are, your magicka only regens so fast, so you're limited to whatever your damage per magicka stat is, multiplied by your magicka regen rate. Which I'm sure is a very low number without fortify destruction gear. If its balanced to require you to hop around for 30 seconds between each cast, it just makes for a tedious experience.

Here are another couple of plots, with an extra data point at 100 skill for dual wield power attacks, one-handed non dual wield, heavy bows, and light bows, showing what the smithing/alchemy/enchanting synergy does to damage. The original curves show smithing improvements resulting from 100 smithing skill, but no smithing fortified gear or potions, and fortify damage enchantments without taking any fortify enchanting potions. Wearing 4x25% fortify smithing gear, and taking a +100% smithing potion, raises the smithing improvement from 11 to about 32, and fortify enchanting potions will raise the fortify damage enchantments from 4x40% to about 4x50%. It's a pretty major increase in overall damage, and doesn't really require anything I could call an "exploit", like intentionally looping or anything. Just getting your skills to 100 and making what you can make.

http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii167/bl3count/rangedsynergy-1.jpg

http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii167/bl3count/meleesynergy.jpg

This still doesn't show what weakness to fire/frost/shock/magic poisons will do to destruction damage, because I don't know how strong those potions can be made or how elemental poison + magic poison will stack.

I like having an extra set of gear for smithing, it makes sense from a role playing/immersion standpoint, and I like having a reason to wear it (fortify smithing enchantments) but its pretty obvious that it really messes with game balance at this strength.

When you do take this into account, destro dps values plummet.

Definitely, but there are a ton of ways to effect magicka management (making it hard to plot), and anyone that's seriously making a go of destruction has to be doing something that basically makes it a non-issue, either using potions, cost reduction enchantments, or just dancing around the cave waiting for their bar to replenish.

What you'd probably need to balance it, and make all those -cost enchantments unnecessary, would be to raise magicka regen rates, and lower spell costs, to the point where you could continuously dual cast incinerate. Then maybe give fireball much higher damage, but also a high cost, so you're choosing between either expending most of your magicka to quickly do a lot of damage to a number of enemies, or just grinding through the fight with a moderate damage spell. If you can't finish a fight with a moderate damage spell before running out of magicka, the system is a bit flawed - it isn't so much magicka management as forced alchemy/enchanting.

I thought mages were DPH? Damage per hit, that is.

How are you stacking these potions? Archery is too slow/risky and I can't get close enough to melee without dying. For me the potions don't seem to help much. This is especially troublesome in tight areas with multiple enemies. That is where destruction fails the most. No crowd control without using conjuration. But using conjuration is a major damage dealer in and of itself and once you start down that path you start to see the true weakness of destruction.

Yeah, all the data I've seen for them is damage per hit, but I went in game and timed how quickly I could cast spells, since damage per second is really the only way to get a good comparison between destruction and other damage types (I didn't just do this for use in these balance arguments, I'm planning on making my own destruction balance changes once the CK is out and needed something to go by.)

Omg, the debate about abortions in the Vatican have started again...:: shields his eyes ::

Seriously bethesda knows, im sure they will do something, if they dont, oh well, im fine with the numbers, I use alchemy and enchanting like a smart mage.

As long as the poison applied varies from the previous poison ( magnitude or diff effect ) same poison effects stack.
So you can use a 100% weakness to magic and 100% to element and then use 100%weakness to element and 50% slow the total you get now is 100% weakness to magic and 200%weakness to element and 50% slow. If you apply a weakness to poison that will boost all the poison applied after it by its magnitude.

So you can use 67% weakness to poison + 100% weakness to magic or element ( not sure which one it was that worked in this combo) and after than use another 100% weakness to meagic / element ( that didnt combo with poison ) the you will ge 100% + 100%x67% (boosted by poison) so a total of 267% boost to your one element spell. You can buy one element weakness poison from vendors or make them yourself with alchemy for more than one effect.

A destro pot with a loop can go to 184% but if we only use avaiable gear and pots without looping its gonna be something like ~150% add to that 267% from shooting two poisoned arrows and we got a total off more than 400% more dmg per spell hit.

198 dmg incinerate x 5 = 990 dmg per hit - more if the target already had a default weakness to the used element.
If we use lightning then we get a boost of 15-20% because of the disintegrate perk than kills an enemy when his health after getting hit is below 15-20%

That's still somewhat lower than dual wield power attacks, but well into the "I am god, this game's too easy" range.

Re: Poison Stacking...

Like DieBySword said, the poisons stack when they have an alternate differing effect, or are different effects anyway... the only real limit to how many effects you can stack is how many custom poisons you make, and how quickly you can apply them before the first ones start to wear off. This is why a paralyze poison is nice to start off with if you are killing a dragon, for example. Tag it with a paralyze, and then start stacking differing effects with a bow. Custom poisons can have multiple effects, and as long as you don't copy the exact same 2 effects from poison to poison, they will stack. After a half-dozen or so weakness to poison/magicka/fire effects are stacked, one firebolt or whatever will do insane damage. I don't know the exact math, but I remember that someone posting in another thread said he figured he did like 24000 points of damage with a thunderbolt, or some ridiculous number like that. I do remember it was something incredibly over-the-top.

-Loth

Its extremely silly to stack dozens of poisons on your target when you can just drink weakness to magic "potions" yourself, and fortify restorations and top it off with a fortify one/two/marksman potion and just do millions points of damage yourself without ever putting yourself at risk.

LOL I'm not sure I'd want to "weakness" myself like that right before fighting a dragon, though... one puff from that lizard, and you're reloading.
-Loth

Considering you'll be one shotting the dragon; it'll be dead before it even has a chance to attack.

And high level mages are likely to be one shotted anyway; so using weapons with sneak bonuses is just more practical.

True, if your aim is good.
-Loth

I looked into the power attacks a bit more, and the way I was calculating the dual wield power attack bonus was off. I thought each attack was 3 hits at double damage each, but its actually 3 hits at about 2/3rds damage each (plus a bit). Here's the new http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii167/bl3count/meleesynergy-1.jpg (also updated the OP).

You should probably do these without smithing and enchanting. Some people don't use those skills because they make the already powerful melee too powerful.

You said you did this assuming that smithing and enchanting skill kept up with damage skill. Do you mean perks or skills? 100 enchanting with no perks is probably less powerful than 60 enchanting and one point in the first perk.

If you mean skill only, that's fine. I have yet to take a single crafting perk on any character because of how much it breaks the game.

So I take it everyone here hasn't found the hidden Temple of Destruction with the statue of Magnus that makes Destruction 100% more effective? You have to work for it, but it makes destruction much, much better.

After Playing a Melee, Sneak, and a Mage on Master, I can say That Destruction needs a buff. All three had Max enchanting and alchemy, with a set of crafting gear that was made with a +32% enchanting potion, as well as other gear made with potions of equal power. With the first two having maxed out Smithing as well. After some comparison fights, I saw a Large gap in DPS. After drinking one of my super powerful Fortify destruction potions, Lightning storm took 2-4 times as long as my melee or stealth characters to kill the same dragon with one-handed or bow. And they did not have to stand there and charge+concentrate on the spell.

Here's are some that show damage without any sort of crafting bonuses (just better weapons according to skill level, which isn't exactly accurate but I didn't feel like looking up the leveled items) alongside damage from fully taking advantage of crafting (wearing fortify smithing gear, and taking fortify smithing and enchanting potions.) "NC" means no crafting, "syn" means synergy (the 3 crafting skills work together for a huge bonus.) Unless you're looping, your damage should be somewhere between the "NC" line and the "syn" line (though there's quite a spread, so that isn't exactly useful.)

http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii167/bl3count/rangedcrafting.jpg

http://i264.photobucket.com/albums/ii167/bl3count/meleecrafting.jpg

These plots, and the previous ones, assume that you're taking all the relevant smithing and enchanting perks as they become available (actually I just started at 0 improvement at 0 skill, ended with the highest strength enchantment you could produce at 100 skill, and linearly interpolated between them, but that should be close enough.)

elaborate

Whoah whoah WHOAH, where is this?! Or are you just trolling? Cuz I would LOVE to know where this is, and I use fortify potions, so im fine without it, but STILL, wtf, and WHERE THE FU!?