How is Destruction broken? : V - Skyrim

» Fri Jun 08, 2012 5:51 pm

Because spamming the same spell 20 times in arow is not fun.

» Fri Jun 08, 2012 4:20 pm

It is not broken, it's just not as overpowered as going for swords or bows, or whatever other weapon. If you feel like making a mage, go ahead, your character should do just fine, just don't expect to plough through everything within a second.

This is the correct answer. I just finished an Expert difficulty playthrough as a mage (no armor or anything). I did find that I relied on Conjuration more than Destruction, mostly because Dremora Lords are just ridiculous. But I think I could have done OK with straight Destruction too, especially if I had worn armor. By comparison, however, I quit my Master difficulty stealth archer playthrough before I finished it because my character got boringly overpowered. Even on Master difficulty, I was 2- or 3-shotting everything, and nothing was hurting me at all.

If you happen to be playing on a PC, though, I'd strongly recommend picking up tejon's Simple Skyrim Spell Scaling Solution, which swaps potion and enchanting effects for magic users, making it so that instead of (relatively worthless) magicka cost reduction enchants, you get (much better, but still not overpowered) potency increase enchantments.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 1:49 am

With weapons you can increase your damage with the following:
Choosing Weapons Made of Stronger Materiels (Ebony, Daedric, etc..)
Raising Weapon Skill
Choosing Weapon Perks
Smithing
Enchanting Damage
Enchanting Fortify Weaponry Skill
Potions
Stamina Based Power Attacks

With Destruction Magic you can increase your damage with the following:
Choosing More Powerful Spells
Choosing Destruction Perks
Potions

Clearly there are way more options for increasing damage with weapons than with destruction magic. Also you can continue to do considerable damage with weapons after your stamina runs out. With destruction magic you are screwed when your magika runs out. It may be fun to reoleplay with destruction magic but it is completely out classed by weapons. Ironically, the best way to deliver magical damage is through a weapon. With the right selections you can dual enchant magical damage perks on weapons that do +81 damage for each enchant. That's on top of all of the weapon damage that is done.

I forgot to mention that weapons benefit from both fortify weapon skill potions and damaging posions while destruction magic only benefits from fortify destruction potions.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 3:56 am

I am satisfied with how destruction works, especially with the perks.

Playing with both hands does the trick, always. Even more so for mages. For instance, have a good ward spell left and ice spikes right. Activate your ward, then change to healing (right) and attack again while you update your health. It's more adventurous, more risky, but I am doing well. Shouts are also great in difficult times. Just when my magicka is really low, I grab a sword. And from distances, I always try a bow to weaken opponents before they get up close. Destruction is satisfying enough. Make sure you have all three forms destruction spells, as beasts/enemies all have their own weaknesses. It's not funny to encounter a flame atronach when all you have is some flame balls to launch

» Fri Jun 08, 2012 10:19 pm

I see what's wrong here. The internet has spoiled the game for you. You've read that your maximum damage potential with a melee weapon appears to be greater than your percieved maximum damage potential with a spell and like the "Oblivion" player second guessing the concept of Levelled Loot you don't seek the item you want until you're sure that you'll be picking it up at it's maximum level value... but in the process... only aquiring the item when it's no longer of any real benefit to you.

How is Destruction better than weapons?

Well the Warrior, Thief and Archer carrry weapons.

The Pure Mage IS the weapon.

Stripped of your armour, sword, mace, hammer or bow you're dead.

Amazing what you can learn from a 'blind man'.

Also those people complaining 'damage doesn't scale'... it does. Just not the way you were expecting it to.

That's how a higher level Mage drops a Frost Troll with the same Flame Spell available to all of us at the beginning of the game.

(If it needs spelling out the larger magicka pool allows for greater damage).

Azrael The Nord witht he Sword

(Edited for strange text wrap effect that turned this into a wall of text)

ok using your examples, lets see how your mage does with no magicka.....XD

also lol do yo uthink that troll will be jus tsitting there letting you spam flames on it for 5 minutes? Nah it will kill you ten times before your flames deal enough to kill it I bet.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 12:51 am

I don't really see how a warrior can use any sort of powerful conjuration skills without gimping health and stamina in the process. The magicka cost is just too d&*% high. Either they have to use armour with enchantments that decrease the cost, or they have to have a magicka pool. The enchantments are taking away from those that aid warrior skills, and a magicka pool comes at the cost of health and stamina. Of course these can be offset by potions, but so can anything. This may not apply so much for archers, for whom stamina isn't such a big deal, but it definitely applies to warriors. Archery + conjuration seems to be an OP combo, but i don't think warriors (sans crafting powergaming) have it too easy.

I was facing off against a mage in a daedra's shine who would kill my sword+board warrior in 1 shot. There was basically no way to get in close against the mage without dying. Sure, if I also perked destro, or archery I would have a chance, but isn't that the limitation of the warrior? Some of these problems can be ameliorated with high resistance gear lategame, but that just means that enchanting is almost NECESSARY for the warrior to stand a chance against such enemies. FYI my redguard placed a lot of emphasis on defensive trees (heavy armour, block), perking both substantially.

That being said, I don't like how destro is designed myself. I don't like the idea of long waiting times to cast the powerful spells. It may look cool, but in terms of gameplay it isn't that fun. Secondly, I don't like how impact is basically the be-all-end-all perk in the tree, since it diminishes the gameplay. Percentage chances are fine, but 100% is excessive. Lastly, I don't understand why you can't enchant increased destro damage. It seems to be a silly choice. having that option would allow people to pick between the high damage output, high cost mage vs the low damage, high output mage. Enchanting gear with increased damage would remove your ability to launch zero cost spells.

So while I agree with those complaining about destruction, I don't do so because I think it is too weak (I would sooner say that the lategame weapon/archery damage is exessive). Instead, I would argue that destro just isn't that fun to play (its most efficient use is mindless and boring). To combat this, I would either play as a battlemage or a conjuration mage, so you don't have to see the worst aspects of the school.

Who talked about a warrior in the classic warrior sense? We are talking about a destro user vs a sword user vs a bow user, not a mage vs a warrior vs an archer. Because Skyrim gives you the freedom to combine any offensive skill with any defencive with any supportive with any utility.
Now, about the mana costs: 100% cost reduction all the way. It takes 4 enchantment slots for 100% reduction of 1 school, so what? You still have 8 of them...
Also, to continue on what I was trying earlier: a mage, with robes, hood etc and dual swords one with drain magicka and paralyse and the other with drain magicka and drain stamina. Same build as a classic all-around mage, only 1-h instead of destro. Wouldn't it be tons better than the equivalent mage using destro for direct damage?

And that is what I'm trying to say, and ppl just don't get it. When someone compaires destro and melee/bows, ppl immediately change it to a mage vs warrior/archer discussion. That's not what it is. The difference between destro and archery is the same as the difference between an iron and a daedric sword: They do EXACTLY the same, but one simply does it much, much better. The difference between destro and melee is that between an imperial bow and a daedric sword: they do the same job, only one does it far worse but from a bit further away.
If you understand that, you'll understand what people have been complaining about (which I see you more or less understand already) : it's not that it does less damage, it's that it is not as good as weapons as a whole. Over the years, destruction magic -or whatever is it's equivalent in various RPGs- has become known for nuke spells and huge AoEs, but costs and requirements that leave the caster very vulnerable - in short, the tool of "glass canon" mages. And it did so because it works. That doesn't mean that they had to, in fact a change is really welcome, but they have to make whatever they think of work. And they didn't in the case of destruction. It doesn't matter if it's damage is weaker than weapons, but it should compensate with something else. And it doesn't, because the one thing it's good at -crowd control with impact- weapons do better...

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 7:37 am

I still contend that people oversee a good staff as a backup for any destruction mage, you get the damage enhancement from your perks and you can spam a lot of damage in a short time. Stunlock briefly with dual casting, switch to staff and give them 75-100 damage at an attack rate much faster than any bow or spell.

» Fri Jun 08, 2012 6:57 pm

That fall's into the "using weapons" category, since there's static damage on staves anyone can use them equally well, reguardless of stats/skills.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 3:23 am

ok using your examples, lets see how your mage does with no magicka.....XD

also lol do yo uthink that troll will be jus tsitting there letting you spam flames on it for 5 minutes? Nah it will kill you ten times before your flames deal enough to kill it I bet.

Good luck and it doesn't take anywhere near 5 minutes.

Try playing as a Mage sometime.

You'll surprise yourself.

It's fun.

Don't fall into the "negative hype" trap that stopped so many players from being able to enjoy "Oblivion" because they didn't understand or approve of the developers choices.

Azrael
The Nord with the Sword

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 2:22 am

That fall's into the "using weapons" category, since there's static damage on staves anyone can use them equally well, reguardless of stats/skills.

Of course, but a melee-expert would opt not to use them, since they are more effecient with their primary weapon. For a mage, with perks that boost their damage, it makes sense to use them. Just like any other class will use weapons and equipment. Comparing destruction mages without any equipment to other combinations with equipment isn′t really a fair comparison.

» Fri Jun 08, 2012 6:51 pm

Good luck and it doesn't take anywhere near 5 minutes.

Try playing as a Mage sometime.

You'll surprise yourself.

It's fun.

Don't fall into the "negative hype" trap that stopped so many players from being able to enjoy "Oblivion" because they didn't understand or approve of the developers choices.

Azrael
The Nord with the Sword

nice try I have a level 44 Mage....

» Fri Jun 08, 2012 10:03 pm

I see what's wrong here. The internet has spoiled the game for you. You've read that your maximum damage potential with a melee weapon appears to be greater than your percieved maximum damage potential with a spell and like the "Oblivion" player second guessing the concept of Levelled Loot you don't seek the item you want until you're sure that you'll be picking it up at it's maximum level value... but in the process... only aquiring the item when it's no longer of any real benefit to you. How is Destruction better than weapons? Well the Warrior, Thief and Archer carrry weapons. The Pure Mage IS the weapon. Stripped of your armour, sword, mace, hammer or bow you're dead. Amazing what you can learn from a 'blind man'. Also those people complaining 'damage doesn't scale'... it does. Just not the way you were expecting it to. That's how a higher level Mage drops a Frost Troll with the same Flame Spell available to all of us at the beginning of the game. (If it needs spelling out the larger magicka pool allows for greater damage). Azrael The Nord witht he Sword (Edited for strange text wrap effect that turned this into a wall of text)

Nope, I don't do that. The best gear are self-crafted gear anyway, which I get at about hour 15 of my gameplays, and have fulley enchanted by hour 30... no reason to wait for anything...

Now, comparison destro and weapons in various levels:

lv1: novice spells are more or less equal to what weapons are available
early levels: your best spell (firebolt etc) does noticeably less damage than the smithed weapons you'll have by that time, but nothing too excessive - still, range equals the 2. However, magicka costs bring the balance towards the wapon side.
mid-levels - as the weapon user starts to increase their smithing fast, weapons become conciderably better than fireball and the rest of the spells. The magicka cost is possibly 0 at this point, but that doesn't say much, and destro levels much slower than enchanting and smithing. At least destro gets impact.
later-levels - the weapon users have already gotten their final weapons and have already started putting their first enchantments. That means that they can do many hundreds of damage per swing, compaired to the poor damage of expert destro.
ending levels -With full enchantments and smithing, weapons already do more damage than it's even necessary to 1-hit kill almost anything, can crowd control better, and can even be used to heal the weilder. Destro mages are just out of the game, though with impact they can at least kill stuff easily...

Greater mana pool does equal greater damage indeed, but not greater DPS. Yes, I know many anti-MMO puritanists here hate that word, but if we are going to talk RPG, it needs to be used.
DPS is the best way to describe damage. Yes, if get 200 rocks and keep throwing them to a thin brick wall it will eventually collapce... or, you could try a shotgun and do it a much faster. Getting 100 more rocks increases your chances of getting that wall down, but it doesn't make rock-throwing any better at bringing the damn thing down...

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 12:51 am

Good luck and it doesn't take anywhere near 5 minutes.

Try playing as a Mage sometime.

You'll surprise yourself.

It's fun.

How is having 1 usefull spell (expert level bolt) and pretty much a requirement on having to power level enchanting "fun"?

Even fantasy action games have better offensive magic systems.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 5:42 am

How will this help you in an dungeon? Enemies does not use the player rules for damage.

Weapon damage is pretty capped, base damage for an daeric warhammer is 31, this can be improved to 41 as an master smith.

Powergaming using max strength smithing gear 4*29% improvement and an 148% improvement potion this gives you 264 extra points who gives you and damage increase of 264*0,05=13 points, or 54 damage for the warhammer.
An daerick sword do 14 in base damage and the max improvement is still 10+13= 37 in damage.

Yes an master with all perks will do 1.5(from skills) *2(from perks) more damage or 3 times base damage.
for an master that is 42 damage for swords and 93 for warhammers.
with 100 in smithing it's 75 for sword and 123 for warhammer. Does not look so overpowered to me.
Even with powergamed crafting 111 with an sword. 162 with an warhamer.

Your numbers aren't right. I am making bows and swords with over 500 damage. Add another 160 damage for dual fir/frost damage enchantments. This is witout any restoration potion looping. I don't think you are counting weapon perks and fortify weapon skill armor enchantments.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 3:28 am

To be a good mage in skyrim get your enchanting to 100 then enchant all your stuff to reduce magic cost for a specific skill and magicka regen and you will be able to cast spells with little to no cost and with destruction you will be able to stun lock anything forever with the dual casting stun perk.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 2:30 am

My opinion is that destruction is either broken or the mages you go up against are overpowered as hell. In my destruction tree I (LV 43) had double fire augmentation with dual casting. Cast a dual cast Fireball at a storm wizard and did minimal damage and used up quite a bit of magika, cast it three times and was out of power and the storm mage only decreased in health by about half. He cast one single handed Lightning bolt at me and knocked me down to near death. So after i failed miserably at that i tried switching it up. I dual cast Lighting bolt on a fire mage, three shots I'm out of power, he hits me with on Firebolt and I'm nearly dead.

So in conclusion Destruction may not be broken, it the enemies that use destruction that are broken. personal opinion.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 4:36 am

Thats just how they level scale enemies, they get big bonus to damage and health. Instead of getting better weapons like in OB. So yo uget the cases where Bandit outlaws and stuff using long bow's and Iron arrow out damage your elven bow's and stuff.

» Fri Jun 08, 2012 6:44 pm

My opinion is that destruction is either broken or the mages you go up against are overpowered as hell. In my destruction tree I (LV 43) had double fire augmentation with dual casting. Cast a dual cast Fireball at a storm wizard and did minimal damage and used up quite a bit of magika, cast it three times and was out of power and the storm mage only decreased in health by about half. He cast one single handed Lightning bolt at me and knocked me down to near death. So after i failed miserably at that i tried switching it up. I dual cast Lighting bolt on a fire mage, three shots I'm out of power, he hits me with on Firebolt and I'm nearly dead.

So in conclusion Destruction may not be broken, it the enemies that use destruction that are broken. personal opinion.

you need very high level enchanting to be a mage which is a problem and once you get that enchanting high you can become very OP and not spend any magicka on most of your spells

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 1:42 am

Who talked about a warrior in the classic warrior sense? We are talking about a destro user vs a sword user vs a bow user, not a mage vs a warrior vs an archer. Because Skyrim gives you the freedom to combine any offensive skill with any defencive with any supportive with any utility. Now, about the mana costs: 100% cost reduction all the way. It takes 4 enchantment slots for 100% reduction of 1 school, so what? You still have 8 of them... Also, to continue on what I was trying earlier: a mage, with robes, hood etc and dual swords one with drain magicka and paralyse and the other with drain magicka and drain stamina. Same build as a classic all-around mage, only 1-h instead of destro. Wouldn't it be tons better than the equivalent mage using destro for direct damage? And that is what I'm trying to say, and ppl just don't get it. When someone compaires destro and melee/bows, ppl immediately change it to a mage vs warrior/archer discussion. That's not what it is. The difference between destro and archery is the same as the difference between an iron and a daedric sword: They do EXACTLY the same, but one simply does it much, much better. The difference between destro and melee is that between an imperial bow and a daedric sword: they do the same job, only one does it far worse but from a bit further away. If you understand that, you'll understand what people have been complaining about (which I see you more or less understand already) : it's not that it does less damage, it's that it is not as good as weapons as a whole. Over the years, destruction magic -or whatever is it's equivalent in various RPGs- has become known for nuke spells and huge AoEs, but costs and requirements that leave the caster very vulnerable - in short, the tool of "glass canon" mages. And it did so because it works. That doesn't mean that they had to, in fact a change is really welcome, but they have to make whatever they think of work. And they didn't in the case of destruction. It doesn't matter if it's damage is weaker than weapons, but it should compensate with something else. And it doesn't, because the one thing it's good at -crowd control with impact- weapons do better...

In regards to enchantment slots, you need 100 enchanting so that has to be really late game. Up until that point, you have 4-5 slots (shield?). Not all of these slots can be used for decrease cost. So in all likelihood, a warrior shouldn't be getting 0 cost conjurations. I think this is relevant because without 0 cost spells, they need a magicka pool, which comes at a cost of the health and stamina used most often. Furthermore, I suppose a melee focused character could invest in cost reduction for conjuration, but it would kind of seem antithetical to their role anyway. I make this point because I don't think you can just say, "a warrior can use conjuration too!" Yes, they can, but it comes at a higher cost than for a mage. Just like enchanting and smithing both give benefits to 1-hand, magicka regen and magicka pool give the mage an advantage for conjuration. This advantage may not be enough to compensate, but it does exist. Similar advantages exist for the archer who gets sneak bonuses that mages cannot. So while I think there is merit to discussing the skills as "pure damage dealing", we should be careful. Destro spells have effects in addition to damage. Weapons can be enchanted, but the mage doesn't have to enchant and can spend perks elsewhere instead.

At the end of the day, I mostly agree with you anyway, but I feel that any problems with destro damage are second to the fact that the skill + perks aren't well designed from a gameplay perspective.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 1:44 am

Here's one of my problems with Destruction. I don't feel powerful.

I play a mage in just about every game that gives me the option. One of the things I always like about it is that even though I might be so weak that a fly can lay me out, I feel like I have incredible power just waiting at my fingertips to answer my beck and call. And I can unleash it with incredible destructive force.

I don't get that feeling in Skyrim. Some of the higher tier spells approach that feeling, but they burn through magicka so quickly that they're rather impractical. In order to make them practical, you either have to down magicka potions like some sort of crack fiend, or you have you enchant your gear up the wazoo. And if you don't do either of those, then you're stuck relying on a lower tier (but more efficient) spell coupled with impact to stunlock your enemes. And no matter which way you go, you're still pretty much forced to rely on help from companions and/or conjured help.

» Fri Jun 08, 2012 8:17 pm

After reading 60 posts, I'm getting the feeling that the "Destro is fine" crowd relies way to much on arguments along the line of "Destro is great because Alteration, Illusion, and Conjuration have über spells!!". And while that's true, it's also not particularly relevant.

Yes, you can use the Sanguine Rose, spawn a bait in the middle of a room, and then throw fireballs after it. Yes, you can do that but how much damage are you actually doing per fireball or per lightning bolt or per ice bolt? My level ~44 Breton sword'n board warrior is currently using a legendary Dragonbane sword with a base of 139 damage. That's before enchantments are added, with 180 smithing (max + 4 items @ +20% smithing), and only +55% to one-handed damage. Keep in mind that smithing can go quite a bit higher than 180 (my enchant was only 75 at the time, with max enchant + potion of enchant my smithing gear would be better, and then add a potion of +50% smithing...), and that you can make four items that each add +40% to one-handed damage.

I don't know exactly where this ends up, but I'm guessing it's on the funny side of 200. Now remember that it's a one-handed sword, meaning a rather fast attack speed. Obviously I could make myself a Daedric sword and put on a nasty enchantment (or rather two nasty enchantments once I get Enchant to 100), which would make things even more crazy. And I could spice that up with the Destro elemental perks. You think I'm done? I can then throw in the white phial of +50% to one-handed damage and I wouldn't be surprised if it stacks with regular potions of +x% to one-handed damage. Orcs can throw in a berserk too, just for fun.

All of this is of course just theoretical because I won't ever need that sort of damage in the vanilla game. It's massive overkill. I'm just curious if any Destro spells actually get that high. Or to put it differently, how well would a mage survive if he relied exclusively on Destro for offense and did not invest in Impact?

On a somewhat different note, I'm actually thinking of turning the skill cost reduction to 75% and have a go with an Altmer pure mage. This takes spells down to 12.5% after perks and means I can enchant whatever I want on my armor and still presumably afford the spell cost. Not perfect, I suppose, but it will probably have to do.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 7:35 am

I don't really see how a warrior can use any sort of powerful conjuration skills without gimping health and stamina in the process. The magicka cost is just too d&*% high.

Actually, with the perk and 100 in Conjuration, it only costs 106 Magicka to summon one Dremora Lord. All you need is to get a tiny bit more Magicka or a single item to reduce Conjuration cost to make it usable for any race with 0 level ups into magicka.

» Fri Jun 08, 2012 10:32 pm

"Physical" offensive and defensive skills scale with your skill score AND perks.

Magick (of any kind) receives a rather flaccid discount for the skill score, and the damage does not go up until you pick up appropriate perks. In the endgame, damage delivered by melee weapons and bows vastly outstripts that of destruction magick, because weapons themselves improve, and they benefit from the double whammy of damage-increasing perks (like Barbarian) and damage increases from skill score.

Of course, enchanting gear with Fortify Destruction mitigates this issue by giving you mana-free spellcasting, but that is considered an exploit.

every five levels, and casting cost goes down with every five levels, so there you go, without looping alchemy smithing and enchanting, you cannot get those bows that do 300 damage, no matter what anyone shoots out their ass. Im doing an archer atm, and smithing is at 80, with alchemy and the enchanted items i found for smithing, and my bow still only does 80 damage, so wtf people are on about, i have no idea, they are just lying.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 1:32 am

Destruction magic is horribly underpowered compared to weapon damage but may be viable at lower difficulty levels.

The only magic spells of any school I find particularly useful are dead thrall(2 more followers) and grand healing(aoe heal). Mass paralysis is nice too but requires a large investment of perks of magicka. The rest of the master spells are forgetable.

» Sat Jun 09, 2012 12:01 am

I'm playing a mage on Expert and Destro is just boring. The only effective strategy involves cost reduction, stun locking and some kiting because my cost reduction isn't 100% (don't forget Alteration is magician heavy and I'm using it too). Conjuration adds an interesting and effective tweak to this but it eliminates half of the already very limited spell selection due to friendly fire. It's so incredibly boring being relegated to either spamming my most powerful spell dual cast over and over or conjuring something to fight for me while I spam a weak spell over and over.

A complete lack of variety and the already limited available spells becoming useless as you level is what ruins destruction.