Yeah, I've played plenty of characters where I don't take ANY crafting skills up. What I end up with assuming I use sneak is I still make quick work of enemies even without smithing/enchanting/alchemy. The skills scale well and they have perks that can add up to 100% damage to them.

Regardless, I don't want Destruction to become melee weapons, but it should scale, and there isn't exactly much else to compare it to. Destruction is the only direct form of magic damage besides shouts.

As for Spell Making, I wholeheartedly agree that they need to add not only more spells,but more effects. That's what I meant by variety, I don't want them to just add more does x amount of fire damage (although I'd even settle for that), I want them to give us back spells like Open Lock, and Weakness spells. I don't see why they would take stuff like that away from Mages. I'd imagine that having even something as simple as weakness spells in Skyrim would have made being a Mage that much more strategical at early levels, and much much stronger at later levels. Which is exactly how the game SHOULD feel.

At this point, I'd buy a spell making DLC even though it should have been in the vanilla game, but whatever.

Sure, I'm aware of it. Haven't used it myself. Seems pretty silly in the first place, and in the second place only a few of my characters actually use Restoration.

Really, though, the reason I have never tried it is because I have never felt like I needed it. The game is easy enough already, isn't it?

Unless you're playing on Master, I guess... but in that case, mightn't it make more sense to turn the difficulty down a notch or so rather than resorting to a very 'gamey' trick?

You must have seen me post this a dozen times by now, but I find use for Flames in my hotkeys, even when my Destruction is in the 90s and I'm capable of casting Incinerate. My last Destruction mage never touched Illusion, so there was no Aspect of Terror synergy happening. Flames is nice at higher levels because it is an incredibly low-cost way to finish off enemies who are near-dead without having to resort to another Incinerate spell. It's a way to manage your Magicka.

I apologize, Udey, but I think I've failed to follow your argument here regarding the resto-loop... Are you claiming that that should be the model for damage capability? As in, because there is this exploit, all bets are off and nobody should think about what would be a reasonable amount of damage dealt by particular spells/weapons at particular levels? There has always been a back-door way into insane damage and/or invincibility in TES games. But that didn't mean we didn't have benchposts for what a high-level spell 'should' be able to do, for those players who weren't going to use those tricks.

Of course, if you're saying that it's too bad we don't have a similar exploit to apply to Destruction magic, then I guess I would agree... but I think what would be better is the simple addition of other spell effects and then spellmaking to achieve the ridiculous stuff.

I'm not opposed to ridiculous damage, mind you - I just think, on Adept, Destruction seems effective and fun. And yes, it could be better.

Virtuosus - that 'assuming I use sneak' is a pretty big assumption. Stealth kills are just about the safest, most predictable kills to pull off at high Sneak levels. Sure, you're using an unimproved, unenchanted Daedric sword... but you're also getting a 3x bonus, or 6x with the perk.

Agree with everything else in your post, though.

Sigh same ole thread...

People appear to forget that meele wouldn't be half as effective if you couldn't also combine it with smithing. Who has a warrior but only uses one or two handed? Without armour....

Point is you need to use all the magical schools. Destruction works just fine, it's not over or under powered. Combined with Alchemey or enchanting it can become just as OP as any other build.

And yours is the same typical response of someone in denial. Completely ignoring every bit of evidence proving destruction is unbalanced.

Such as?

I know it can get tedious typing the same things over and over, Lexandro - I do it all the time on these threads. But you have to give your own evidence if you want to be convincing. Or at least provide a link.

I can anticipate that you'll be comparing damage figures, and yes, I'll concede that destruction spells probably can't do thousands of points of damage per cast, like you can get by doing crafting exploit/loops with weapons. But is that the only criteria for 'balance'?

I listed sneak because it is yet another tool to increase damage that everything but Destruction has. Again, if you look back at my post where I said:


Personally, when I picture a Mage, I picture somebody who can dish out large amounts of damage using their limited reserves, but at a cost: In this case, Magicka.

I've always pictured a Mage doing large amounts of damage (bigger than a melee ever could) but their drawback being that they run out of magicka quickly. However, in Skyrim this is not the case for some reason. I would be perfectly fine if Destruction did huge damage but had you run out of Magicka in 5-6 Incinerates or 1-2 Master spell. It seems Bethesda chose for Destruction to be weak and allow us to bring costs down to 0 to make up for it though, which is just the wrong way to do it in my eyes. Not only does going the enchanting route completely render perks and the only scaling part of the skill useless (Destruction's form of scaling is: the higher the skill goes, the less magicka spells cost), but it even makes the point of choosing to raise your Magicka every time you level moot.

I personally have to limit my enchants to only reduce spells by 50% maximum because it just feels wrong to cast spells for 0 cost.

Another thing I dislike, there's almost no benefits to using Cloth on a Mage anymore. In Oblivion your spell effectiveness was lowered for using armor, but only by like 5% with high armor skill. In Skyrim, the only benefit you gain by using cloth is Magicka Regen on your chest that your enchanting can never achieve (levels of +100% or higher) which don't matter because in-combat regen is terrible, or again, your costs are 0 for spells and you don't even NEED regen. They gave us stronger mage armors but even Ebonyflesh only gives us 300 (perked) which is pitiful (compared to using armor at least) unless you're using the Master spell.

Skyrim's entire magic system is flawed and looks very rushed to me.

No, damage is not the be all and end all of balance. As I have pointed out many times, there are several problems with magic itself not just destruction. There are a number of frankly moronic decisions taken by Beth with regards to magic. Excessive casting times, patheticly low time limits on skin spells, perk options that are rendered useless and wasted at later levels (such as magica reduction vs casting gear) etc etc.

The entire magical system in Skyrim needs a massive overhaul imo, not just destruction.

Solutions I would think viable are ;
skill scaling increases for directed spells regardless of school (The same as NPC mages)
reworking of specfic spells to improve them to a point where they synergies properly within the school tree (eg dragonskin),
making destruction more robust by giving higher skill versions of earlier spells (eg flames~>immolation / trap spell > deadly trap spell etc).
Addition of a +damage enchant for all magica schools with directed attacks,
major cost reductions in magica required to cast,
reducing casting times on dual casted spells,
giving multi-spell casting synergies (ie gamejam vid)
Increased timers on spells

Spell damage should be comparible to or better than the equivalent weapon at the same skill level +similar level smithing bonus. That is to say a master level spell should do the equivalent of (or more than) a deadric weapon smithed to the standard "legendary" level. With the option of a similar +damage enchant that weaponry has available if the player wishes to push the damage up further.

Melee does damage using 2H.
Casters do damage using Destruction.

Melee uses armor for defense.
Casters use Alteration for defense.

Melee weapons outdamage spells at every turn, even more so employing sneak attacks and smithing.
Armor is permanently at 567 (once you reach cap), alteration spells only cap out your armor for a minute at a time, with cast timer + magicka usage.

How is magic even remotely close to being viable compared to melee, unless you actively seek a harder playthrough by gimping yourself to rely on magic. The latter case can by no means serve as a measuring stick for deciding wether magic is a valid choice or not.

Sure, you can get through the game relying on just magic... how much easier would it be if you were relying on melee though?
Shouldn't the game be equally challenging for both melee and magic builds, effectively being a choice of playstyle rather effectiveness?
Or is magic working as intended by being subpar in every situation compared to melee?

I honestly want to play a magic user in Skyrim like I did in Oblivion. High burst damage, weak if someone slams a mace in my face. This is not how it is in Skyrim though. Skyrim magic is like trying to kill someone using a dull knife instead of just skewering them with a proper sword.

I don't enjoy playing a gimp.

Fair enough. But of course Sneak is another entirely separate skill. Currently we have, as you note, Alchemy to increase Destruction damage as well as Enchanting to decrease the cost. If we also had Sneak increase destro damage, wouldn't people be upset that "You can only play a Destruction mage if you use Alchemy, Enchant, and Sneak!"?



Agreed in principle. I think Destruction mages are capable of dishing out enough damage, but I agree that there is much more resource management required than someone who specializes in, say, heavy armor and dual wielding. At a certain point, that heavy-armor-dual-wielder is just going to waltz over everything. (I recently got to that point by lvl 18... quit the character soon after. Boring.)

Anyway, you really hit the nail on the head - limited reserves of Magicka. That's what we have now, though, isn't it? You definitely need to manage your Magicka resources as a Destruction mage.

The whole cost-descreases-with-skill mechanic has been around for the past 3 games, and I like the idea of it. Your character gets more efficient as he levels. But you're right that Enchanting screws this mechanic up at higher levels. Fortify Destruction enchantments could instead increase the damage of spells... but then we'd probably need to reduce the Magicka cost, since those costs were clearly designed with some mitigating reduction in mind.



Well, wearing cloth makes you quicker on your feet I believe. I wear it with most of my mages for that reason, as well as for the enchants. As a Destruction mage, you have to be able to avoid incoming attacks while throwing back your own. Yeah, there's the Steed stone to negate heavy armor weight, but there are better stones to use.

I haven't done the math on in-combat regen (I was an English major), but I think it does make a difference, even if it isn't as noticeable as out-of-combat. Of course, if you enchant your gear to zero cost, nothing matters anymore. It's Skyrim's version of 100% Chameleon. Nice that it's there, I guess, but I stay well away from it.

I agree with most of those ideas, except for the 'major' reduction in Magicka cost. Go ahead and leave the Enchant backdoor to zero cost for people who want it, but I like needing to manage a Magicka pool. Hell, in Morrowind *begins rocking in chair* our Magicka didn't regenerate at all until we rested! And we walked uphill both ways to Vivec!

Magic has always been fine for every thing except master difficulty. When playing on master it is possible to spam stun lock but this is not as fun as master level melee, sneak or archery.

Its already shown that the casting costs are far far to high, and this is especially true for dual-casted spells. Without a major cost reduction the destruction spells themselves would still have highly exorbitant magicka costs when directly compared to other schools of magic.

They need to lower base casting costs, and make a cap on spell cost reduction, and then make Destruction scale.

It would make Magicka and perks to reduce costs actually useful, it would make our spells do more damage at higher levels, it would be balanced and best of all, it would give Destruction a sense of progress. I think everybody would be happy with that, it wouldn't be too OP. Heck, the only time I see it becoming OP is at high levels such as 50+, which it SHOULD be, by level 50 you'd think you would destroy everything by then anyway.

See, I find investing in Magicka on level-up and taking the Magicka-reducing perks already to be quite worth it. I can see how it wouldn't be worth it if every character you make is going to max out Enchanting and go that route. But that's fine - let it be an option.

For example, when I first bought Fireball, I could only cast it a few times in combat (my memory's hazy, so I can't recall exactly how many I was able to fire off). But it became my main damage-dealer after a few levels and perk investment. To me, that doesn't seem terrible - you invest in the school, and you get more efficient. There is a sense of accomplishment that comes with that. Until then, yeah, you either hope to kill the bad guy with your one or two Fireballs or whatever, or you dual-cast it once, then switch to your more efficient spells. Or you opened up with a rune and let your pool refill.

Maybe the way I level is giving me better results. I usually make pretty focused characters, who rely on 2 to 4 skills. Perhaps if you spread your skills out too much, the return on damage isn't as effective. Of course, that would be true for any skill.

Anyway, I'd hate to have the cost lowered to the point where you didn't have to worry about such things at all.

@jaber, My resto comment just referred to your citing of "caps" on damages. (FYI there is no needed restoration skill to use them) It did not have a greater argument it was just the basis of your rebuttal to my previous post. ((In addition any game comment I am making is from the assumed difficulty of master, anything is easily workable on adept or lower (IMO) and that may be some of our misunderstanding). Destruction can truly suffer on master - workable? yes, powerful- meh...)

I am done with this thread though, there have been many many destruction threads exactly along these lines now. I can say, with no doubt whatsoever, that a scale system not only fixes the damage complaints and removes the need to invest in heavy reduction or poisons/fortify pots, but it also fixes other issues like runes
- which totally are a big deal as they are a strategy element. I think if we polled most PC users either a vast majority or close to every one of them who uses destruction in their build has a scaling mod installed.

It "works" as is, you know what would make it super fun?
1. Scaling
or
2. Spellmaking
or
3. Fortify-destruction-damage enchants.

Casting 2-3 of your biggest spell is how it should be, but they should also do high damage for that cost. However, Bethesda couldn't make them do high damage because they know the possibility to make spells cost 0 magicka existed, so they probably toned it down big time knowing that you can make stuff cost 0 and that's how we ended up with what we have today.

If instead, enchanting made them do more damage instead of lowering cost, I believe that Destruction would be in a much, much better place right now, Magicka and perk that reduce Expert/Master level spells etc would be of much more use. Currently, however, I haven't invested in ANY of those perks unless they are required for something else, ie Alteration requiring the Apprentice Casting perk to get Stability.

Any combination of those three would not only make it fun, but a rewarding experience.

And no, I don't mean fun in the sense of one shotting things, before you guys point out that all we want is to be OP and make the game too easy, because it's not what we want. (Well, some people enjoy that but I don't and therefore it isn't my reasoning for my beliefs on this topic.)

Yeah, no desire to play Master difficulty, so if there are discrepancies there I wouldn't know. Of course, I can't resist pointing out that, if something is too difficult on Master, the solution is right there.

I imagine Beth balanced most of the game for Adept difficulty. I also have a suspicion that they really envisioned players going up to level 30 or so, and then starting a new character. Maybe it's just me, but those early levels are the most fun, and the place where there is usually a good balance between challenge and reward.

Of course, that doesn't justify the game being wildly unbalanced on other difficulties or at other levels.

Rather than any of those 3 points, I'd actually prefer we first saw the return of several spell effects. Without that, spellmaking would be rather lackluster.

Actually even that glitch has a cap. Somewhere past a million... or is it a billlion... % increase the game doesn't have enough digits to support the following number and it reverts to 0. I never actually 'used' any of the items I used that glitch to create, but I did have fun seeing what I could create. Armor that boosts my health by 1,000,000 seemed a bit overboard. The last thing I created was a pair of gloves called the hands of god that improve alchemy by some insane number so any potion created with them is worth 20k+ gold, and the enchant potions you could make with them were a little bit over the top. If anything else it is a really fast way to level alchemy to 100 since it levels based on potion cost.

I believe this is the integer value cap built into a 32 bit architecture, but I am confident you see my point.