I found it to be quite disappointing and too short? And no real perks to being archmage. Then throw in the fact that they cut a [censored] ton of spells and spell creation from the game and its just one huge bag of disappointment.

most people found it short and disappointing. theres very few on these forums that didnt to be honest.

theres also been countless threads on it. we dont need another one...

Yes. That and the Companions were both terrible quest lines.

I had a lot of joy when I could finally kill that stupid arrogant high elf. It made me forget how short the questline was, and buried my anger caused by those floating sperm things attacking Winterhold and killing all the townsfolk six feet underground.

I found all the guild questlines, that I've played, to be a disappointment. Way to short and you never really learn what the Eye of Magnus is or what it does. Though I did like the first part where you start as a student and the dungeon crawls, but besides those two things it was pretty bad.

Yeah you kind of have to take it upon yourself to pace it properly and the requirements for some of the side quest/training quests and eventually mastery quests won't be met until long after your character has probably already beaten the main guild quest. I'm sure they were trying to avoid forcing people to do those as a pre-requisiste to advancing but perhaps if there had been more meat to the main guild quest one could have advanced through it with better pacing and the options to:

1)Practice with and help some of your classmates - which are availible but often people have already reached archmage before they notice them or they become availible

2) Attain mastery in one or more school of magic - you can do this and there are quests for it, but again most people will find them long after completing the eye quest. If it was more likely (even if not required) that one would have done one or two of these before-hand then becoming Archmage would feel more deserved.

3) The main guild quests themselves could have benefited from one or more fleshed out intervening and related missions - particularly if classmates or an instructor were involved. This would help you possibly care a little bit more about and feel like you know these characters.

Except for number 3 you can take it upon yourself to do them like that and in that order, but you shouldn't have to make such an effort and have foreknowledge of the quests for the pacing to be better.

the way i did it was i tried to do at least 1 quest for every college member before i reached arch-mage. the enchanter guy was the hardest. they were actually pretty detailed and interesting. the easier ones were things like tolfdir and the apprentices. u do have to watch out for j'zargo's quest tho. it damn-near killed me... others were just tedious and made me have to get 100 in that perk to get a quest from them (destruction trainer made me get pretty high before i got anything from her)

Yeah, as I said you can pace it yourself but you have to be proactive about that and realize those quests are there. I'm not saying it should force them on you, but it should do a much better job of making you aware of them and encouraging doing them. They're not related to the main quest though and I still think one or more additional main guild quests which included members of the college could have been beneficial. The side-quests that exist there are quite entertaining and some of them are very much worth doing - too many blow through the main missions without even realizing they are there though. I particularly enjoyed getting a unique summoneable shade and the blade "keening." Also the anti-undead fire-cloak was hilarious when I realized I had forgotten I had a follower and was sort of cooking them too.

It felt like the archmage died too early. My ascension to archmage status was way too fast. There needed to be two quest arcs for it to make sense / feel natural.

Also the quests you get outside the main arc are boring.

I think Bethesda goes a little over the top when it comes to these things. The main character is supposed to be important, sure, but handing them leadership of an entire guild after only a few short quests? Along with being the Dragonborn and all that, it's really too much. Adding to the replay value with a limited perk system was the wrong way to do things. Instead, they should have limited the guilds you're able to join, or at least the ranks you're able to obtain. That would easily allow them to continuously generate random, but fun quests for our characters instead of making them master of everything, but unable to do anything.

Morrowind had it perfect with the Great Houses, and the fact that they haven't learned from that worries me.

I beat it. Twice. Today.

I thought it was short. Not sure how I can say the quest was disappointing. I can say it's short but I enjoyed it

yeah..it seemed rather ridiculous that i was promoted to arch-mage when none of my spells are above apprentice level.

Yeah, but you know how it is. Then people would be whining that they want to be the leader. No one's ever happy.

After a half-finished quest line?

In Oblivion, you actually needed to raise your magic skills to advance. Seemed weird that I didn't need to raise my skills at all to become Arch-Mage.

That's not true at all.

It isn't? I must be thinking of Morrowind then...

I found the questline to be pretty exciting actually. I still agree on it being to short and the fact that your given archmage status so fast outta place.

Personally, I found all of the questlines in the game short, really short...

I was totally into the Eye of Magnus thing. I wish it was longer.
Yeah man. Oblivion was basically do recommendation quests, kiss ass for a bit, and then kill a powerful hellbent necromancer and then Traven steps down.