It was a joke.

Here's the answer GIVE US THE DAMAGE SCALING BOOSTS THAT NPC MAGES GET. I'm getting my ass kicked with the spells they use wiping out half my lifebar and mine are only doing tiny amounts of damage.

If you cap magic resist then those spells they use will be lower dmg than your own spells on master. Master = 0.5x dmg by you + 2x dmg to you.

I don't mean to rain on anyone's parade here, but what's the point of this? Why are you tearing Skyrim apart into little bitty fractions simply to find out what the most effective way to play is? That sorta defeats the point of an RPG.

So what if magic is slightly less effective at killing dragons than a 2 handed sword? 2 handed swords are way less effective at making you invisible than magic. There are advantages and disadvantages to every playstyle, which is why you are free to make your choice of either, or you can mix and match. I makes me so sad when people reduce games like SKyrim to pixels and fractions. Sad panda ->

I thought they'd improved the destruction damage by now.

Wow, all these charts and DPS calculations for a game designed to be less "spreadsheety"

Now that's funny

I played a dual wielder, stealth archer, two hander, destruction mage, and sword and shield character before making these plots. I already know, through experience, what the most effective ways to play are, that wasn't the point - this game does not need spreadsheet anolysis to come up with strategies that break the difficulty curve, I had an overpowered character (dual wielder) on my first playthrough without doing any anolysis or looking anything up. The reasons I did this were to get some reliable numbers for the whole "destruction is underpowered" debate, and, because I'm a modder, to get something to base my own balance tweaks on once the CK is out (provided Beth doesn't beat me to it.) I like challenging games, and if everything is as it should be I'm not going to be letting excel anywhere near them, but if something seems off, and the developers have been gracious enough to provide me with the ability to fix it, I'm happy to break out the numerical anolysis. Looking at the way a lot of these numbers played out, I'm sure Bethesda did some numerical anolysis of their own when developing the game (at least I would hope so.)

We need a fortify destruction damage enchantment. That would balance things out. Mages would have to make the decision to either cast spells indefinitely or cast more powerful ones.

I agree, but its max strength should probably be more like 15% rather than 40%, looking at what happens to melee damage if you fully utilize crafting (the melee/archery enchants should be made weaker too.) There's a mod out right now that also allows stronger enchantments to be placed on cloth than on armor, which I think is a great idea. If I could get 10% or 20% more damage by wearing cloth, I'd be a lot more likely to try out a cloth+alteration armor build for both destruction and melee. I also like the fatigue mechanic that Dragon Age Origins used - heavier armors had higher fatigue ratings, which increased both casting cost and stamina cost (the mod I mentioned adds the increased casting cost, but I don't think it does anything to stamina costs.)

Oblivion Had a spell effectiveness reduction. As for the spell fortification, it would be great if they made it along with adjustments to the melee/ranged damage range.

Nope, that's actually the whole point of an RPG - to become as universally powerful as you can within the given limits. What you probably are thinking of is roleplaying which, contrary to common belief, is totally different to the term "RPG"...

And the problem is not that it is slightly less effective, it's that it's like 10 times less effective, which is outrageous even for a single-player game where class balance does not matter that much. And remember, for the love of whatever you have dear, we are NOT talking about magic. We are talking about DESTRUCTION. Which only contribution to your character is damage and enemy control, both of which are vastly inferior to what weapons can do.

Some of the discussion going on here is silly.

1. A pure mage is never, ever, ever going to grab a bow and arrow to poison his targets before using magic.
2. Balance should not be an issue. Swords are strong, arrows are deadly, but magic is absolutely insane. The strongest characters you hear about in-game are either battlemages or some other type of mage. It's supposed to be far more powerful than anything else you're capable of wielding, yet it's inferior to other forms of damage dealing.

Honestly, it doesn't matter how you look at all this. Even if you use every possible tool at your disposal to increase your damage output as a mage, it can not only be matched, but beaten with melee weapons and bows. You simply do not have enough ways to increase your damage, and your dependency on mana means sacrificing useful enchants for cost reduction if you want to spam.

Destruction is only beaten when you combine melee/archery with either smithing or enchanting (maybe not even with enchanting). Why is it a surprise to some that when you combine two skill trees, the result is stronger than one tree on its own? Of course a daedric sword smithed to legendary with 100 1-h and smithing is better than a firebolt spell, because it's the resultant of two perk trees. That means that if you want to head that route, you need to spend double (ish) the perk points, giving up the chance to make your character more versatile (although admittedly, most 1-h'ers would use smithing as well regardless). Destruction is not inferior to 1-h, it is inferior to 1-h and smithing, which is only reasonable. It is'nt fair to compare 1 combat skill to 1 combat/ 1 support skill and be surprised at the result. If you were to take conjuration as a support skill (in the vaguest sense of the word, as it technically increases your dps, even though it is'nt -you- dealing the damage) and combine it with destruction, e.g. maximum damage dealt possible with 100 destruction shooting firebolt + 100 conjuration with two summoned companions also dealing damage, and put that on a graph alongside 100 1-h/smithing, the result would be much less one-sided.

A smart mage will use potions to increase damage with destruction, just like a smart warrior will use smithing, there is zero difference, people are just too lazy to use alchemy. Find a daedric sword, and use do not smith it, it will be very weak, and well under the 180 damage dual wielding incineration does, and if you use alchemy, you can easily regen your magicka without having cost reduction enchants, just liek a warrior uses stamina potions. Simple. People are ACTUALLY complaining about having to use the MOST in depth skill tree in the game, and at the same time saying the game is not in depth enough...ridiculous.

Actually, there is. A smithed weapon lasts forever. An enchanted piece of armor lasts forever. Thus, the damage bonuses from those two professions last forever. For destruction, you get...perma free spells and the requirement of having to carry around a hefty supply of potions all the time. The enchanting part isn't so much to increase your damage but to make sure your damage doesn't drop to nothing in the middle of a fight. And the potions...well it's a little ridiculous to have to carry around an infinite supply of potions just to be able to do comparable (read: still worse) damage. Sure, they're nice for boss fights and all, but guess what? Melee and archery can use potions for boss fights too! And that's in addition to their always-on damage increases.

Good stuff here. I am interested in seeing how the damage numbers compare with full smithing/enchanting/alchemy. BUT, without cross boosting the crafting skills. So no Enchanting Fortify Alchemy or Fortify Smithing and no Potions of Smithing or Enchanting. It is my opinion that the cross boosting is what is driving melee/archery sky high.

As for modding I think two simple things will balance it out a lot - cap all fortify skills at 50%. Even the ones that drop spell cost. Lower the cost of destruction spells, and make some more variety of spells - stronger Runes, Flames, Cloak type spells.

I agree with the point about 2 skill trees vs. one. Imp, have you taken non-smithed swords as your base? So: weapon + skill tree at 100 and nothing else?

I don't get the whole 'ton of potions' people are claiming a mage needs? I'm a pure mage and I have both mana reduction (-55%) and mana regen (200%) and I almost never run out of mana - even in boss fights with hordes of enemies - and I use destruction almost exclusively. I'm currently level 43.

My mana regenerates enough in almost every battle that I am fine - and for the few that it doesn't (hard to think of the last one) I use highborn.... but I really can't remember the last time I ran out of mana. I carry zero potions. I carry zero weapons. I only can summon a Frost Atronach at level 43 (to give you an idea of how often I rely on summons).... I primarily use the armor spells and destruction .... mainly non-dual cast fire.... bolts, balls, incinerate and walls.

????

The plots in the OP show the damage resulting from maxed out smithing and enchanting, but no cross boosting. The ones I posted later on are the fully boosted numbers (alongside the no smithing or enchanting whatsoever numbers). And you're right, the cross boosting causes a huge, imbalancing increase, particularly the smithing potions (roughly +100% smithing, for about +10 base damage) and the smithing gear (+25% x4, for another +10 base damage.)


The "no crafting" numbers assume that you're still wielding a daedric sword at 100 skill (even though finding one requires level 50+, which might not come until well after you reach 100 weapons skill.) I think its reasonable to assume though that your weapon is going to get better as your level increases, due to loot.

The fact that you can boost your damage through other trees is more important than the fact that it takes more perk points to get your damage up as a non-mage. By the time I'm high level, I usually have perk points to spare unless I'm being "creative" with my build, and trying to max one handed, destruction, restoration, blocking, armor, and crafting or something. Going pure mage leaves you with tons of points and nowhere useful to spend them. What would be nice would be if enchanting could boost destruction damage, and if there were a magic buffing skill anologous to smithing. Like spellcrafting maybe.

I thought this thread would be bursting with activity, all the others were. What gives?

It started with graphs and numbers and it scared ppl away

lol, I do agree that scalign would also help to give us mages a little more variety of spells to choose from too again. The "replacemtnt" method doesn't leave us with much if we want to remain "competitive" with the enemy and other weaponry.

RPGs, roleplaying games, role playing games, or whichever way you chose to spell it, are no different no matter how you chose to spell them. Only the people who play them are, and that was my whole point. Play it as a role playing game, and you won't care for a second if you get 3 points more damage per second using two swords rather than a flame spell. I've never given it a single thought in-game, I've just played the way I like to play and adjusted my skills, perks, and playstyle if I got in trouble

That's an incredibly bad example you use there. Using conjuration to get a pair of summons to deal damage in addition to destruction magic is effectively using two damage dealing skills to compete with one damage dealing/one support skill. So for a mage to compete with a warrior they've got to add damage from outside the destruction school? Does a warior type character need to take one handed and two handed to be effective?

Well thank god you stepped in with a good example, for a minuite there I thought you were just being one of those 'negative for the sake of being negative' types.......oh wait.....

Does it really matter? Conjuration increases the damage you are capable of dealing, just the same as smithing. The fact that they are classed as either damage/support skills does'nt really affect anything, it's the fact that it is possible to use them both at the same time that counts. You could use illusion I suppose, although i'm not experienced with it and am not sure what you could do with it. Regardless, the point I was trying to make is that a damage/support combo is more effective than just damage, which is a no-brainer. Combine destruction with a support skill, and it won't be as outclassed so significantly.

Don't forget that conjuration is just as available to warriors in this game as it is to destruction mages (fortify conjuration gear means they don't even need to waste points on magicka.) There really are no destruction-specific support skills, and the melee/archery specific support skills are overpowered. That's what needs to be addressed, not the destruction base damage, which is actually pretty good.




I think it's probably a lot more fun to rip apart a poorly supported argument. I just posted data, there's nothing really to argue over.