Well I already said the basic build in my first post destruction, conjuration, alteration and restoration are the main skills in the build and I augment it with enchant and alchemy and use marcurio as a follower since he never gets in the way and I use fire and ice while he uses lightning so all the elemental bases are covered. I have over 150 hours sunk into my lvl 67 brenton nightblade so my pure mage is relatively new and only level 30 but its a nice change of pace since my old character snuck around and made people fight eachother with frenzy and then would sneak up and back stab the survivors its nice to have a character that can just run in and drop everything in seconds.

The play style is pretty basic I walk around with detect life out and give it a tap every few seconds when im in a dangerous area. When i pick something up i cast an armor spell and a summon and rune and wait a couple of seconds for all my mana to regenerate then I ready an area of effect spell and round the corner and fire it off. When im in trouble I use my paralyze staff (i keep it topped off pretty easy by finishing things off with a bound blade that automatically steals souls) and fall back and use healing spells but usually i can stun lock everything to death while my frost/fire antronch and marcurio take the pressure off me. I find i can take a hit pretty well too with my iron flesh spell and the mage armor perks.

If something is particularly troublesome or a dragon thats when I start using potions. The one that ends fights the fastest is fortify destruction and if i find that there are too many mages and my wards are getting overwhelmed I use elemental and magic resist potions. Once I use a destruction potion I try to kill as much as possible before it wears off so Ill drink a mana regenration potion so every time I win a battle my magic comes back insanely fast (I wear alot of magic regeneration gear too) and I start blasting my way through the rest of the dungeon. If something in particular has to die NOW like a dragon or two handed characters like have a tendancy to one hit KO me ill poison a bound arrow with weakness to either fire or frost and hit them with fortified destruction spells and everything so far dies fast.

If its the undead im fighting no potions are nesesary since the restoration tree kind of makes them laughably easy and the hard part is chasing them down after they run away. I have actually been avoiding dwemer ruins untill im a higher level (did the same thing with my last character since dwemer ruins were the bane of his existance till he got the last perk in the illusion tree).

As far as alchemy is concerned I like to load up on ingreadiants like crazy so i can add effects to potions i use alot. For my sneaky illusionist i used alot of strait up poision + slow + weakness to poison and lingering poising + poison + slow or weakness to poison. And fortify light armor + fortify one hand or keep them seperate and mix them with either health or stamina regeneration and I would use alot of resist elelemtal potion with either health or stamina regeneration. For my mage its fortify destruction along with weakness to frost or fire and regenerate magic I use the most. I like to mix in slow or paralize or damage health or lingering damage health with the weakness potions when possible and I like to mix in regain magic or fortify magic with any thing I use on my self. Sorry if some of those combos are not possible its hard to keep them all strait.

If anyone is thinking holy crap how do you cary all that the answer is simple. Store ingreadiants and potions your not using in your house by the alchemy table (I use a mod that puts a satchel on every alechem table) After a while you kind of figure out how many potions your probably going to use on a given adventure so dont carry more than you need I personally don't cary more than 5 copies of any potion since belive it or not played right I dont really end up using that many potions to be effective with my mage theyre mainly panic buttons for when i get careless or something doesnt quite work out as planed.

I personally belive that alot of the talk about destruction being underpowered comes from people who found out that your could make enchanment gear that gets casting cost down to 0 so they didnt invest any points into the perks that make magic cheap and try to hold them selves over till they grind out enchant till 100 with insanely cost ineffective spells and then complain that destruction doesnt work and that it costs too much to use other magic skills in tandem with it. The fact that you can use alteration to see like 90% of the enemeis in this game before they can see you and then use either conjuration (summons) or illusion (calm, fear, frenzy) or alteration (paralyze) for crowd control and restoration (wards, turning, healing, passive regeneration) and alteration (flesh spells, passive resistance) for defense you have I would argue many more methods to control a battle then a warrior does and give you plenty of space to juggle enemies with dual cast impact destruction spells and in times of great danger overcharge yourself with alchemy.

As for shouts I use slow time, ethereal, unrelenting force and detect aura (untill i can cast detect undead) most often

What you can never do that a properly built warrror can is simply rush in and spam your main attack a bunch of times and expect to win.

That, my friend, was a great read. Your mage sounds spectacular, and you inspire me to create a specialized Altmer. Destruction, Alteration, Alchemy, Enchanting, Conjuration, and possibly Illusion, I'm thinking. Wonderful work, mate.

Not at all. I consider 50 Illusion a must for any destruction mage.

Aye, agreed! It's also great fun to pack fools together with a stealthy Mayhem spell (do you have any idea how great the range is on that thing?!) and then blow them up with Firestorm, throw in a chaotic Blizzard, or kill the crap out of them with Lightning Storm, especially if you boost your spells with potions!

Magic in this game is too amazing.

True enough. My main point though, was that Destruction is the only school of magic that absolutely requires alchemy to make it a viable primary offensive tactic. Even with 400 points, you still only get a very limited amount of casts with expert level spells. And that's very different from every other tree, magic or otherwise. For example, there are fortify potions for all types of magicka but they're enhancers, not necessities. And as you take the requisite perks as the character progresses, those potions become less and less needed because your skills have increased to the point where they stand on their own. Not so with Destruction.

And while 40+ may be excessive, there have been times where I've had to bail out on certain quests for the sole reason that it became apparent that my Destruction as-is wouldn't see me through. So I carry a lot of them.

Destruction's fun to use but as it stands, it can't be used as one's primary offense without heavy augmentation from alchemy.

So yesterday, after a long day at work, I thought what the hell - my Redguard assassin can wait. I went ahead and started a new game with Ignan Telvanni, a Dunmer destruction mage.

Pretty much went straight to Riverwood after escaping Helgen, gathering ingredients like a fiend as I went, and killing the odd bandit or wolf with Flames.

In Riverwood, I headed straight for the alchemy lab in the inn, did some mixing, and then carried on to the nearest proper city - Whiterun. There I picked up a bounty (was low on cash), did the Dragonstone thing, and became Balgruuf's best bud. Currently on my way to High Hrothgar, after which I plan to pretty much abandon the MQ and head straight for Winterhold to join the College.

Think I'm around level 8 now, and it's been a lot of fun. Perks so far are all in the Destruction tree, with the exception of a single perk in Alchemy. I've picked up Destruction Dualcasting, Novice & Apprentice casting, and Augmented Shock & Flames (just 1 rank in each). I think Destruction is around 40.

The plan for this character is that he's an elementalist - strongly focused on mastering the elements. Fire is of course his specialty, being a Dunmer, but shock comes in second. Haven't used frost at all yet, but I plan to. Being an elementalist means I can RP using certain shouts - not that I think of this guy as Dragonborn; he's just studying to learn about this ancient magic. I'll use all the obvious "elemental" themed shouts - Ice Form, Fire Breath, Storm Call - and even Fus Ro Dah can be thought of as "air" magic.

I've done some sneaking, but only a tiny bit. I don't see it being a very strong part of this character, especially since I picked up Muffle.

Speaking of which, my Illusion is in the high 20s thanks to that spell alone. I think I will still go the route of Aspect of Terror (to me it can be justified as more than a glitch - since fire is scary!), but I'm debating whether or not to grab Silent Spell. I really don't plan to use Frenzy or the offensive Illusion spells, so Silent Spell might have limited usefulness. I guess I could use it to drop down runes without being detected, but I dunno. My heart really isn't in the Illusion school, to be honest.

My other thought with the character was to go Conjuration, and summon Atronachs (and eventually Daedra). Another aspect of this character is that he's Telvanni, so very interested in acquiring this sort of forbidden power. I haven't quite decided if I'll go this route, though. Another option is to just get to the College and make my own staves/scrolls of summoning, so I don't need to really invest in the spells (which would just drain magicka needed for my destruction spells).

I don't think I'll touch Alteration. That makes me very fragile, but if I plan well there shouldn't be too many problems.

I'm actually pretty proud of myself for making short work of a couple of saber cats on the way to Ivarstead. Usually those fights are pretty tough, but in each case this time I was able to drop a rune, let my magicka recharge before the cat saw me, then open up with a scroll of fireball or a dual-cast firebolt. Cat triggers rune, I blast with a second dualcast firebolt, and cat dies. Pretty satisfying when it works!

Another strategy when using fire spells I've found (I think I saw this on UESP) is that you can stack fire damage with itself for quicker kills. Using Flames, for example, let loose with a blast. Your target is now on fire, and thus susceptible to more damage. So hit hiim again with a short burst of Flames, then another, and so on, and he'll die faster than if you just shot a steady stream of Flames at him, if that makes sense.

I also cheated - looked up the ingredients that do Fortify Destruction - so I have a few of those potions now. I used one in a fight with some mages, and it seemed to help; right now they boost my spells by 27%.

Oh, and I'm also carrying around a steel dagger, for use solely as a poison delivery mechanism. Haven't used it much; it'll be for those rare cases when I really need a Weakness effect and the foe is in my face.

I have done a bit of Enchanting - disenchanting, rather - and am wondering if I should really work up that school.

As I said, a lot of fun so far!

This is just not true. I do not use alchemy at all and have no problem. Alchemy is certainly one method of boosting destruction but it's not required. All you need is moderate cost reduction and a few staves for back up. Having some Illusion capability makes life easier but isn't required either.
I don't doubt that you're sincere in describing your troubles and frustrations with magic but there is no reason to beat your head against the wall with alchemy if it's not working for you. This thread (and several others) are all about alternative ways to use destruction. Destruction can be a valid primary skill if you do it right and not necessarily just with repetitive impact staggering.

A few personal attacks and over-argumentative posts have been deleted. Stay civil and constructive please otherwise I will be casting my destruction spells on this topic and some of its posters.

That said, I'm reconsidering Pickpocket. I haven't used it or put any perks in it, and I'm doing fine with my Dunmer despite that (Alchemy and Destruction, obviously, with Alteration and Illusion to compliment/augment). I think I'm fine as it is, but I'm a little concerned with my lack of poison. Another poster pointed out using conjured bows to administer poisons, which I think would be very cool on a pure mage, but I don't care to invest in Conjuration with my Stealth Mage Dunmer when I won't make use of any other spells (I can imagine making Conjuration useful for an Altmer mage for more reasons than the bow).

So far, I've had little issue with destroying enemies sans poisons, but should I have done something else? Should I invest in Pickpocket or find some way to poison enemies? Just use a dagger/bow? Is no poisoning sufficient?

As it stands, having no way to poison enemies, I have not taken the Poisoner perk and instead plan on (so far) only putting seven points in Alchemy.

About the Magic regen potions though, the problem is is that magic regen becomes really slow during combat, and you need to carry a decent amount of potions to offset this, and then more when those wear off...

See where I'm coming from? It becomes a huge inventory sink.


Also, I've seen you be extremely dismissive to just about everyone who disagrees with your standpoint. (ie me) Couldn't you be just a bit more open-minded?

I haven't planned my build out very much, but I think reverse-pickpocketing poisons might be difficult. Well, not difficult per se, but more trouble than it's worth. I mean, if you can get that close to an enemy anyway, why take a chance on *possibly* being able to reverse-pickpocket them, when you can just coat a dagger with a poison for a hit that is guaranteed - and will do sneak attack damage, to boot?

And if you're poisoning someone with a dagger in sneak mode, you're only a few Sneak perks away from just slitting their throat outright.

It's times like this that I *really* miss some of the old Destruction spells from earlier titles. Being able to just *cast* "Weakness to X" on a target instead of having to rely on poisons takes some of the wonky mechanic out of getting the most from your mage.

My Dunmer has only used a poison once, during a touchy mage fight - and I honestly can't remember which poison I used. Weakness to magic, maybe? I think it helped, but it required some juggling since I don't have my dagger or poison hotkeyed (I need all those keys for my spells!). As you've said, I'm finding it easy enough to kill things without poisons.

Potions, on the other hand... Gotta have 'em. Since I'm a squishy mage, I need restore health. Since I'm a Destruction mage, I need restore magicka. I go through those like water, even at a low level. Of course, it's worst when I'm facing multiple enemies or haven't prepared for the fight properly. I think (hope) that my potion use will *eventually* decrease as my potions get better and my casting gets more efficient through enchanted gear, etc.

Incorrect, friend: you don't need a single perk in Sneak in order to successfully pickpocket, reverse pickpocket, or even get that close. That was the point of the Stealth Mage, remember? Stealth is quite easy with either Illusion or Sneak, but I've never used both. I think it may be superfluous, but someone posted earlier about their Illusion/Sneak build, so I probably just don't know how to make the two work well together.

Also, don't sweat it: you won't run out of potions any time soon, and may in fact end up with too many. Already, I find myself selling the invaluable Fortify Destruction potions!

I'll be posting some (hopefully helpful) Alchemy tips on this thread a little later today.

No, my point was that if you're getting close enough to reverse-pickpocket poison onto an enemy, you may as well just get a sneak-attack with a dagger instead. And if you start going that route, you could easily grab 4 Sneak perks up to Assassin's Blade to make the entire pickpocketing trick really pointless.

It's true that you can rely entirely on Illusion to get close, but since you're there, why not crouch, poison your dagger, and do a bit of extra damage to boot?

Aye, a fair argument. RP purposes? That's only conditionally valid.(Edit: I mean that in argument against your point using RP value as a counterargument would be conditionally valid [I think], just to clarify)

I'M FEELING META.

Anyway, you make a good point, but I guess I still disagree. I mean, don't you need adequate equipment for the damage output with the poisoned dagger to equal or outperform what you would do with magic? You practically need to invest in Smithing and Enchanting (as well as Sneak) to make it so worthwhile, which is a different character build entirely.

Cost reduction comes with the adept, expert, master perks, etc. And that's all well and good. But the cost reductions don't seem to match spell levels. In short, Destruction doesn't seem to be on a level with the the other schools. It's a weak stepsister. I get the idea---and I like the idea that a mage should have to be strong enough in at least 2 schools in order to be able to survive any respectable fight. For example, if you crank up Illusion and Conjuration, you can use those two almost exclusively to get through a dungeon. Almost any pairing of the schools (with the exception of enchanting, but that's a different thing) can make you formidable and without ever having to carry a single potioin for enhancement. But that's not so with Destruction if for no other reason than it doesn't cause an appropriate amount of damage and it svcks up too much magicka---unless you're supplementing it heavily with alchemy.

Again, I play exclusively on Master so maybe it's different on lesser difficulties. I don't say that to mean I'm a superior player, because that's silly. But it's worth mentioning just to ensure that we're talking about the same thing.

Indeed. The entire pickpocket tree is, in my opinion (besides the carry weight increase perk) totally useless.

I sunk a few points into pickpocket to get the poisoner perk with my sneaky illusionist and I found it to be kind of a waste personally and that's coming from someone who uses poisons extensively with that character. The problem is that they don't do "extra" damage when administered that way so while i can kill dragons and bandit chiefs with ease with two quick sneak attacks (all my poisons last two hits because of concentrated poison perk) with my dagger at X15 damage + numerous poison effects like damage health, paralyze, slow, lingering damage health, weakness to poison using poisoner and reverse pickpocketing takes way more potions to one hit kill.

Because you have to put enough in their inventory that the raw damage is enough to actually kill. This wastes a ton of potions because not only are you doing poison damage without the benefit of sneak attack damage your using twice as many potions on top of it because your not taking advantage of the concentrated poison perk. That being said its actually extremely easy with high sneak to poison people with pick pocket perks its just really potion inefficient. The only thing its good for is the fact that you can put a paralyze potion in someones inventory and pickpocket them with impunity but if you were going to sink points into pick pocket to do this why would you need to paralyze them in the first place?

Extra pockets on the other hand is a TOTALLY worth it perk as 100 extra carrying capacity is nothing to scoff at and kind of low on the pick pocket tree. I personally find pickpocketing people to be extremely fun which is why i recommend it for anyone who wants to role play a thief but combat wise it is a pretty weak skill. Stealing peoples weapon is hilarious.

Level 82 and still killing things with firebolt only... costs almost nothing and staggers everything. No potions to enhance destruction, I haven't even practiced alchemy yet except for making a single potion because that apothecary forced me into it to get it off my temp quest list.

If you find something that has way to many hps like a Deathlord, just paralyze them and cast wall of fire all over them and watch them burn to death. Easy, cost effective and if done right, Nothing... nothing will ever touch you. Get some magic resistance, either racial, enchanted or off the alteration tree perks and your mid level ward spell will block dragon's fire! If you even give them the chance to say anything, just double fist firebolt them right in the mouth when they are about to say something.

Dont like fire? The apprentice level Icecycle spell works just as good!, lightning not so much, I find it doesn't always stagger and costs more mana.

Only required perks, Novice and Apprentice cost reduction, Impact, and augument Fire/Ice x2. thats it!

Probably should mention that I play on Adept, except for those times when I get overwhelmed and crank it down to Novice just to get through a mob scene. Doesn't happen often, though. So yeah, Master-level Destruction magic I can definitely see feeling underpowered. But then, Master-level almost anything (except sneak) would probably feel that way too. I wouldn't know, regardless.

I've never really explored Pickpocketing. Once I got it high enough to take Extra Pockets, but that was mostly through training. Seems like the high-level perks would be useful - the ones where you can disarm/disrobe your opponent.

Amedeus, Impact is very nice, but by itself I find it often simply delays the inevitable. If the bad guy is really tough, chances are you'll run OOM. It's a nice "pin" option, but I don't want to rely on it all the time. Fortunately, at least for now, I haven't been. It *seems* like I've been killing things at about the same rate or slightly faster than my straight-up warrior characters.

In fact, it would be interesting to watch some side-by-side videos comparing a warrior with a destruction mage to see how long various fights took. I imagine it would be pretty close, depending on the level, provided you controlled for certain things like smithing/enchanting abuse. Sure, the mage is going to have to scurry, but that's because he doesn't want to get smacked around like the big, dumb fighter.

I'd like that, but that requires a whole lot of time investment (unless you're on PC, in which case you can essentially respec your character from scratch), as well as a heavily controlled environment and fight (again, easy on PC).

These kinds of ideas and builds are what make me wish I could manage a party in Skyrim, but alas, I have to go through the game several times and spend dozens of hours just to get characters up to par. Not complaining, necessarily, just that some parts (like the obligatory bit of MQing) get old fast.

Gosh, I need me a good PC. That, or this game needs a PvP arena

I can't agree with the magic+Alchemy argument. It's not going to work for a non-sneak mage. Even with sneak what do you do in a room full of draugr? It's not like you can go around and stick a poison in each of their pockets. And even with the +damage potion it still doesn't resolve the issues around multiple enemies which is really the only time I ever had issues with destruction magic. One vs one destruction is fine just as it is. It's when facing groups that I have issues with it. I got around it with conjuration which is far less troublesome than worrying about potions all the time. But if it works for you and you get enjoyment out of that style of play then more power to you. I can't argue with what one person finds to be enjoyable. I just know it wouldn't work for me.

Saying that you shouldn't have to level alchemy to use Destruction is like saying you shouldn't have to level armor while using one-handed weapons. Armor compliments a close-range fighter, just like Alchemy would compliment a mage of sorts. Scratch that. Alchemy compliments everything, so it is a necessary skill if you want to go beyond regular limits and hit the defense cap/raise weapon damage far over 100.

I understand, but also disagree with your notion: Alchemy does, in fact, synergize fine with a non-sneak mage. Also, did you mean sneak as in Sneak the skill, or as in a mage being stealthy? Either way, I haven't invested in the Poisoner perk or Pickpocket yet (and probably won't), and my Stealth Mage is doing just fine. Yes, I know you can't argue against whether someone enjoys it, but the build itself is actually perfectly viable: I've taken out my share of Dragur groups with no problem. But alas, if you just can't manage to play that way (the way I can't manage Illusion and Sneak together), then I guess it won't work for you

As for Alchemy without stealth, it works perfectly fine. It's a good substitute for Restoration, though neither skill can perfectly emulate or outclass everything the other has to offer; I'd just recommend not using both (another pair of skills I can't manage to get right without getting annoyed). The six Mage skills with Alchemy in place of Restoration still adds up to six skills, which can be manageable, perk-wise, if you're good at (and okay with) spreading yourself thin.

As I wrote earlier in the thread, one can achieve a semi-permanent 460% magicka regen (without even enchanting anything), and generally my mages have at least 250-300%, with a base magicka pool of at least 300. That, combined with potions that fortify schools, fortify magicka and fortify magicka regen can make a mage a nearly unstoppable force (if we consider good magics and useful enchantments)

Actually is a very good choice, i dont use dual-cast, and my mage has a cool gameplay. You do more damage casting two fireballs than a dual-casted one, and its nice having to use ice spells to slow opponents. Just saying.

Which ice sells, specifically, slow opponents?

Frostbite definitely doesn't seem to slow anything down, and even Ice Spike hasn't seemed to make a big difference. Granted, I haven't used it very much. I'd like to rely on frost for slowing, but I haven't had much luck.

Any tips?