So I frequently hear that these forums are used by Beth for feedback, so here's something about Skyrim that bugs the crap out of me.

Your diving, and then before you know it boom, your health is draining rapidly. No indication, no nothing. This is the first game unto which Beth did not endow a breath gauge. It's not a gamebreaking thing, there's not THAT many places where you even need to worry about it, but it seems like such a simple, common sense thing to neglect. In fact, I believe this is the first game I have ever played that permits underwater exploring, drowns you if you stay under to long, but has no way of letting you know when you are going to run out of breath.

If I'm just missing something really obvious, please correct me. Otherwise, for the love of god Beth, please remember to put one in next time. Or if you intentionally left it out, please know that there is no reason whatsoever to not put in something so simple.

Even if it wasn't as clunky as a Breath Gauge, something is needed. I would prefer a visual aid, ilke the appearance of some bubbles on the screen. Three bursts of bubbles, with 4 seconds in between. Follwed by a further three breath bubbles, with 2 seconds in between, at this point the Health starts to drop.

I feel this system could give you ample time to manouvre back towards the surface and giev a nice feel to swimmng and diving.

Yeah I was confused by this as well. Hell, it could have just been your Fatigue. I mean it makes sense. If you sprint right until you hit the water you wouldn't be able to hold your breath as long. And if you spent a lot of points in your fatigue (In Game, something akin to training you endurance), you would be able to hold your breath underwater longer.

There are sound cues.

I drowned harvesting a clam. In 3 feet of water.

We need a Breathmeter.

My first character was an Argonian, so I just assumed the breath gauge didn't appear for them as it wasn't needed. (Although in Oblivion, Argonians had a breath gauge, but it never depleted). But then on my Bosmer character, I noticed there wasn't a health gauge either. I was quite surprised at this, because there is now no indication of how long you have left before you start drowning.

Recommend wearing a water-breathing enchanted object until breath-o-meter is re-established...

Never bothered me to be honest. I go down for a few seconds and then head back up. If I need to be down longer than usual, which is extremely rare in this game, I take a potion or count it out. If you drown in 3 feet of water that is just pathetic. There are audio ques and your health starts going down slowly giving you time to get to the surface. If you missed both of those a breath meter is hardly going to solve your main problem, not paying attention.

That's what she said.... sorry I could not help myself!

I always keep a few water breathing potions on me. If I ever start losing health in water, I pop a dose of it.

Can you take potions underwater? Never tried, but you can't attack anymore.

Yeah, they removed all restrictions on potions, even the measly limit from Oblivion. Ironic that one of the best ways to prevent drowning is drinking something.

Oh that is sig worthey. I've noticed that the sound queues seem a bit too little too late, though I could just be deaf!

I was a bit perplexed at the lack of a breath meter, too. Given how breath meters are ubiqutious, the omission is a bit odd. Maybe they will add one in a patch, or more obvious cues that you are on the verge of drowning. Though it's not like it's that hard to find a waterbreathing spell or an item with waterbreathing on it.

I know right? my breath meter is always useful when i go swim at the River, Why don't they exist in Skyrim? D:

I didn't think the Health gauge dropped all that rapidly. I had that happen tonight and I had time to get to the surface. Unless you have a potion or the right dragon priest mask, you can't go too deep. Some things just have to wait until your character has learned how to do them. It takes some time to make your build.

In real life, I have an actual ability to discern when I am tired of holding my breath long before I start feeling actual pain or start trying to breathe underwater. The obvious and appropriate way to mimic this innate awareness of one's body is a breath meter.

I was incredibly surprised when I saw there was no Breath meter indication. It`s something that goes into my lol cats picture of `Eh? that makes no sense at all`. I even thought it must be a bug in my game since no one ever mentioned it until now.

What I mean is, there is so much handholding in this game with GPS markers, triangles, Fast travel, etc, etc stuff the Player doesn`t actually need and isn`t realistic, but EVERYONE has a good idea of when he`s running out of air while underwater. But Bethesda Devs left that out?

Eh? Why? they wanted to be suddenly realistic and omit a breath meter with no option? It makes no sense at all.

I can only logically assume that they ran out of time when the Publisher or Boss told them `time is up!` and have simply never got round to fixing it. In fact underwater stuff has quite a few bugginess in it especially with NPcs.


Now I play with all these things off and have become quite adept at swimming under water and estimating my breath time (I never do it on low health of course), so it doesn`t bother me, but it`s still a very strange omission.

About the audio cues: I don't hear jack all until you start drowning (i.e.: health starts depleting). Are there other cues, you know, maybe before you start gurgling and choking?

And once again, to reiterate, this isn't a big issue. I know there's more than enough time to get to the surface before your health depletes completly, and I even mentioned that there aren't really that many spots where it might even be an issue. I was just baffled that the would leave out something so simple and (I thought) integral.

I could have sworn I saw a breath meter (looked like a clock but with all lines instead of numbers) at the top of the screen.It was really small but it was there or have I lost my mind?

It seems like such a simple thing, I don't know why they wouldn't put something like that in this game. Its never bothered me though, its not like I ever go underwater for over 2 seconds.... its just weird that a breath meter doesn't exist. They do have noise indicators though. You hear your character gasp for air for a second. Thats your hint.

Thing is in real life you`d know you were running out of air well before you actually started drowing. Omitting the meter is actually unrealistic.

This is actually the very first flaw that I noticed in this game. Needs to be done, so many times have I noticed a ship deep underwater and came very close to dying because I didn't know when to come up for air. Good thing that you are somehow able to drink potions underwater.

Duke Nukem 3D and Quake never had breath meters back in 1996... nobody complained...

How bad would that svck if you were playing DiD?