I'll be playing pure mage at some point, but even a pure build needs something to support it.

I have to ask, do you actually know what fubar means?

Yup, and I think it fits quite accurately to Bethesda's botching magic so thoroughly... as since Spellmaking is gone the broken magic system is literally beyond the player's ability to repair within the game itself.

'The college is often blamed for the Great Collapse and is therefore widely distrusted. It is often believed that it was the students at the college that caused the disaster and that the proof of this is that only the college remained untouched. The college has since been cautious as to avoid provoking the population of Skyrim. Many nationalistic Nords also do not trust the College because of the fact that the immigrant Dunmer make up the vast majority of the members within the faction. Additionally, most Nords view magic and its practicioners as spineless and weak, as stated quite humorously by a feuding couple upon entering Winterhold.'

A lore reason for spellmaking to not be in the game. If someone were to go around making spells willy-nilly, that would not be cautious. With Skyrim being the home of the Nords, it would be disrespectful for other races to come in and start changing their ways, just to suit themselves.

FUBAR means F.u.cked Up Beyond All Recognition... it's not beyond recognition at all. At best, it's nerfed, for want of a better word.

I dont understand people here. Everyone is bashing this person but he has explained everything so clearly. Elderscrolls have ALWAYS been about the exploits!! How many times in morrowind and oblivion did you find your self hopping like a freaking rabbit to your destination?? Or Making huge amounts of potions outside of skingrad in the tomato fields and vineyard?

To the OP, you have brought up some very good points and no one should accuse you of "breaking the game". To get good at something you practise, so by all means make alot of armour or enchantments. You shouldnt be punished for playing that way tho. There should be alternate means of EXP and like you said, questing is missing that HUGELY!!

People are so very rude on this site and are extremely OBTUSE. Theres no sense of community in this place because everyone is so crude to eachother and not understanding.

The only thing your forced to do with this system is to learn at least one combat skill (One handed, Two Handed, Archery, Destruction).

I Agree, your better off not grinding and the only thing you will lose out on is Daedric stuff, Ebony is only a couple of points weaker so it's not that big of a deal.

Who's obtuse here? The one who wants Skyrim to be a Diablo clone, or those who appreciates it for what it is?

You can't compare levelling in Skyrim to levelling in Oblivion. In Skyrim, everything you do, pretty much, levels you. In Oblivion, it was only your Major Skills that levelled you up.

You're not being forced to do anything. Derp.

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2: ...the "AR" in Fubar can also stand for "All Repair". The term Fubar originated in WWII.

3: Nerfing something to such an extreme degree as Bethesda did with magic in Skyrim goes beyond lore. When a major style of play is weakened to the point being ineffectual, basic game mechanics are broken. I have never seen a game maker exhibit so much effort to break gameplay. Bethesda hit bone when cutting up magic.





You are forced to either forgo all locked chests or have unlocking them raise your experience.

whether you know it or not, there are still major and minor skills in skyrim. The main ones you choose to level are going to end up being your major skills, and the ones you neglect, well they are your minors. And those Minor skills are not going to level you any substantial bit once youve reached level 50. At that point everything you love to level is done. Sure you can still level, but you have to grind the helll out of your minor skills and in 4 RL days you might manage to level up once.

Dont get me wrong people, I love Skyrim, but there are some issues that arent perfect. Choose to ignore them or not.

Im still going to boot up skyrim tonight but I just needed post my thoughts and gripes so that bethesda will see that people are giving them CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM. Thats all it is folks, just little bits of info from their fans that they can take into consideration.

My 2 pennies: my warrior character is level 39 and I'm running out of skillups. As I dual wield, I'm missing out on block. My main skills are:

One handed: 100
Heavy armour: 85
Smithing (O NOES): 100
enchanting: 79
Lockpick: 65 I think
Speech: 60

Am I bothered about running out of levels? Nah, I'm having too much fun. My next character will be a light armoured rogue/Mage who goes summoning, spell-flinging and then enchanted sword n board when it's time to get up close and personal. After that I'm gonna do some very strange DiD characters. Maybe even a naked nord

If everyone acted all peachy keen and never said one thing that was bothering them about the game, well, then we would still be using the same horrible UI from morrowind and the animations would be the same and nothing would progress or improve. So dont bash people and try to understand where they are coming from

So, you're mad that you can't level up any further because you grinded your skills instead of actually playing the game. Wonderful.

And the point for bringing that up was...?


Again; your point is? It can also mean 'All Reason'. Your turn...


Actually, I think there is too much freedom. You forget, there's a civil war going on. The use of magic is not frowned upon by the Empire, with the exception of necromancy and Daedric related magics. The Stormcloaks, on the other hand, are not fans of magic. If anything, they should be more ready to attack a magic user.


If you keep doing something, of course you're going to get better at it.

I thought this was satire at first. His way of mocking the actions of those who grind to get their skills to 100 instead of actually using them...Now I'm not so sure anymore. OP, you may as well just use the console to set all your skills to 100.

I'm sorry to hear that you were disappointed. When I first leveled a skill to 100, I didn't feel like I was completely stopped. When I reached level 50, I was afraid that I would not be able to level up but was pleasantly surprised when I reached level 51. With the leveling system, if you want to reach really high character levels you have to branch out. I enjoyed this because I had to change my game play to proceed leveling up. This allows me to discover aspects of skills that I either like or dislike. All in all, I wasn't forced but had to adapt.

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Only smith what you need?
Do you create equipment for all your 100 followers as well to be able to craft orcish?

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I only have one follower, and crafting two instances of dwarven [everything] does not take me NEAR orcish.
You. Cannot. Avoid. Grinding.
Not if you want to craft orcish gear, or even ebony.
It requires you to craft well over 50 items just to get to crafting orcish.

1 dagger.
1 sword.
1 axe.
1 briastplate.
1 helmet.
1 pair of gloves.
1 pair of boots.
The exact same to your follower.
1 two-handed axe.
1 axe for your mom.
1 axe for your grandmother.
1 axe for your great grandmother.
1 shovel for Kim Jong Il
1 dagger as a present to your wife.
1 dagger as a present to the jarl.
1 leather bracer as a present to the queen.
1 leather bracer as... whatever.
1 iron dagger just for grinding because you want to craft orcish.
1 iron dagger just for grinding because you want to craft orcish.
15 more iron daggers just for grinding because you want to craft orcish.

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Don't get me started the grind up to ebony or daedric.

That right there is the problem.
It does not level naturally -- it is leveled unnaturally.

Skills that make your character much more powerful should not be leveleled for practically free, or even for a profit, in TOWN -- without limitations.
It's akin to one-handed swords only leveling the one-handed skill when fighting ragdolls -- and not when fighting regular enemies.
You can only level the skill outside combat, and nothing stops you from going for skill level 100, apart from a guilty concience.

Because it's about CHARACTER development. If you just want to worry about an arbitrary number next to your name, then go for it. TES games have always been about the journey and the experience. The new crowd of players seem to be concerned only with loot mongering or levels. If that all that's cared about, people are missing 90% of the game.

Only by choice. At any point, you can level up some of your 'minor skills'. Do it early enough, and it can be a boon to your overall level.


Welcome to the soft cap. If you levelled up at a contstant rate, you could be level 80 within a matter of 14 solid hours play. The increase in 'exp' needed to level up has been around since there levelling was created, pretty much. There's no point complaining about it. If you want to level up, then surely you'd be willing to do ANYTHING to do it? And if you do ANYTHING to achieve this, then you can't complain. Bethesda catered to those that love levelling by supplying you with ways to do, what are you complaining about?

Jesus )(*^ ing Christ..is this how people game now or what?

Just play the mf'ing game and stop min maxing lol, you created this problem yourself, it's s an open-ended single player game, and it ain't diablo, if you aren't new to RPG's I assume you knew a little about previous TES titles, so why on earth would you play like that?

For all the talk about how "TES series has changed", I really hope they don't build the next game around OCD min/max gamers like you.


Are you for real? I almost think this is a troll attempt...

The point of the game is to play and enjoy the experience of the game! if your idea of enjoyment is grinding and progressing efficiently to some end goal, TES-style games will ALWAYS disappoint you because they really aren't about that kind of play.

I have a smithing level of 19 max, actually. I have made a complete set of hide armour, a complete set of Iron armour, an Iron dagger, an Iron shield an Iron sword and a steel sword. My overall level is 4 because I started a new game. On my first play though, I only made 15 daggers, max. and haven't touched smithing, since on that save. So I'd appreciate it if you took that back and directed your comments where they are deserved.

EDIT: And I'll deal with levelling Smithing to get the better armours when the time comes, until then it is still just a supporting skill

Think about it like this:
He believed the crafting system was as advanced as the combat system, that it would take time and effort to completely level the skills, and that he would quest and fight a lot before he would stand a chance to be the best smith and enchanter in all of Tamriel, who EVER lived, including gods.

Like I said; When you're going for Orcish, you're going to have to grind.
I did not say anything about those that did not want to use the smithing beyond steel or dwarven.
Not to mention ebony.

"When the time comes".

"time comes".

When is it time to create orcish?
I didn't find anything about suggested optional rules in the manual, not in my options menu, suggesting that there was a time to start grinding daggers in order to create orcish gear.

You're admitting it's a grind, and that you CHOOSE to delay that grind to the future.
Why does your character delay his destiny as the god-smith he has the potential to become?
Because he wants a challenge?

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YOU are the min-maxer -- you're just min-maxing your character's power to stay on the curve, by studying and planning your character's skills.

I try to follow the natural character development in the game, only to find out there is none for many of the skills, like smithing.
Without looking at numbers or planning, smithing can reach level 90 in few hours.

I have been forced to plan my characters to NOT be overpowered, which was hard when my current character is a sneaking conjuring archer.
(All my characters are ex-D&D characters)

I've never really had a problem - so long as I'm level 20-30 when I complete a guild I feel I'm high enough, most of my characters are retired at level 40, though I do notice how slowly things go at this point.

Most only get one skill (their "primary" skill e.g stealth or one-handed) to max

That said I've only played two so far, and I'm not quite done with my thief before I start a mage

You never.... EVER... need to grind in Skyrim.

If you want a powerhouse character.. then grinding will get you that... but you can't really complain that after maxing out your characters skills that you can't level up anymore.

Yah... the game can be tough if you don't.... that's the point. If you must you can always scale back difficulty so you don't get one hit killed instead of trying to out-grind scaling enemies *roll eyes*

Instead of buying up mats to power level smithing... try killing all beasts you see in your travels and collecting the leather. Hit up mines and collect ore.... You WILL level up smithing at a reasonable speed this way without the same "grind"

You shouldn't be able to make Orcish armor until you start already seeing it dropping actually.... and dwarven arms and armor can be crafted en masse (at least a full set anyways) if you just hit up a couple dwemer ruins....