lockpicking makes me wish for a pry open/kick in feature for my barbarian...it should be really noisy and alert all to your presence to keep a balance, requiring multiple kicks for higher level locks

Weirdly enough, I have been able to open every Expert Lock, at any lockpicking level with just one lockpick, usually on the first try. I used to go through 3 to 5 on Master level locks, but that has diminished since my skill has gotten above 50, but if any lock is going to break a pick now, it is a Master level lock, not an Expert one.

While I don't see myself spending points in this tree to save a bit of time (as I have plenty of that), I can't argue against using lockpicking as a perk dump if one sees nothing else worthwhile to spend points in. Hell, throw in some for the pickpocket tree to get the +100 carry weight perk while you're at it so you can carry the extra loot you spent less time getting.

Also, off-topic:
I read this in Steve Buscemi's voice and it made my day. Thank you.

Treasure hunting = money

Lockpicking = xp

It's all good. I wish I was as good at picking locks IRL as I am in TES. I don't think I'd ever use that excuse again. My keys svck

My thief character will be taking all the pickpocketing and lock picking perks.

I love to roleplay too much to let efficiency get in the way.

You need to practice more then ...

Lockpicking has been too easy for me since the start. No perks (still level 1) and no skill boosting apparel and yet i never use more than maybe 3 lockpicks on *any* lock. Ever.
Never bought a single lockpick in over 250+ hours on my current character. The minigame is just too darn easy ...

Yeah, I agree.

Bethesda needs to follow the Fallout example and make lockpicking impossible if you don't reach certain levels and/or perks.

I did this. That was pretty beneficial early on when combined with that stone that gives +100 carry weight also and 0 weight for armor you're wearing. I typically leave my house at around 100 weight so I haven't had to make multiple trips to a single dungeon even one time. When I was still playing the playstation version without doing this I often had to make multiple trips.

That's... actually a pretty good choice of voice.

There is that. I felt somewhat guilty about being a thief with no perks in the second most obvious thief tree of all skills (pickpocketing of course being theft every time you do it whereas picking can just be dungeon delving).

I said master chests take a number of picks. Not only is 1 technically a number, but are you telling me you always get the master chest done on the first attempt? Highly unlikely without stacked buffs of some sort or a single super enchant brought from potion/enchant combos. I mean, sure, I could technically create an enchant that would completely outstrip the need for any perk. I could also use a console command to pop a skeleton key in my inventory. Heck, console command the perks (in order, of course) and there's no need for this discussion.

As someone who thinks the game is easy enough without loopholes though, I'm not about to cheat at it. How boring would that be?

As for skill, this doesn't come down to skill. It comes down to chance and understanding how to maxmize the odds of finding the sweet spot in the fewest amounts of tries. If you view the lockpick range like it's a clock face then you have anywhere from 9 to 3 that the sweet spot can lie. Even at 100 lockpicking ability you still need to try 9, 10:30, 12, 1:30, 3 with the understanding that the 9 and 3 positions are the least valuable spots to check as they cover the smallest zones but can technically find the sweet spot if it's just out of the range of the :30 spots. This means that 10:30, 12, and 1:30 all have an equally high chance of giving you a general location of the sweet spot.

On a master lock, your pick breaks much faster, you may be able to have two attempts at just finding the spot. Let me know if you're able to get more attempts out of a pick on a master lock than that. Keep in mind that it isn't a 33% chance each attempt since 9 and 3 are both valid options and it isn't 20% since 9 and 3 aren't full zones. You likewise can't claim that it's 25% if you count 9 and 3 as half zones since they must be tried seperately. So good luck finding the actual odds of any one spot being the sweet spot.

Now, say you try one of the zones and the lock moves. Odds are you aren't in the exact spot. You then don't know if it's up or down from your position. You can acurately gauge the distance by how much the lock moved when you first found the zone, but you still have a 50% chance of going the correct way (counter clock-wise or clock-wise).

So, statistically I shouldn't get any better at lockpicking than I already am unless you have a better method. My overall trend is right in line with what the average should be over a large amount of attempts. The initial task of finding the zone is around 27% per try since I try the three most common spots first and my attempt at finding the sweet spot after identifying the zone is 50% unless the zone is at the 9 or the 3 in which case the my odds are much better. There is also the occasional time when the pick is just a hair away from the actual sweet spot which is especially narrow.

Now, with the perk that places my pick in the zone to begin with I find myself never using more than 3 picks. But that's because I then have the 50% of being right on the first pick and then have two picks to gauge the right spot if I'm wrong on the first attempt to the point of pick breaking.

Yes, this is all a math problem in statistics which is why I know if something someone says here is bogus. Significant increases in lockpicking skills beyond the 100 lockpicking level could reduce the zone finding to 33% with a followup 50% chance of going the right direction and then perhaps one more pick to hone in exactly. That's how you could get the 3 picks without any perks but again, I don't cheat or use loopholes and I'm not going to enchant my main armor to benefit lockpicking and I'm not going to switch armor before picking a crappy lock that likely doesn't have anything I want in it.

That'd certainly make it actually matter.

It is, choose to believe or not, I don't care.

This

It takes me anywhere from 4 to 15 picks for a Master Lock... given that I have over 100 picks by level 20 it is not an issue. There doesn’t seem to be that many Master locks and I pick up more than 20 picks between them...

No, what i told you in my post was "i never use more than maybe 3 lockpicks on *any* lock".

That's master locks. With no perks or apparel boost. Hence my comment about your lack of practice ...

My response was in regards to your jest that I have a lack of practice when I merely said it takes a "number" of picks which could be anything due to vagueness. Haha.

Given the numerical evidence I presented, my question is then how you alter the odds. Primarily, the same question I'm going to ask Gabriel below, how many pulls on average do you get on a master lock before the pick breaks.

Without bonuses then it is statistically unlikely to hit the mark in 3 tries on average. How many pulls do you get per pick on a master lock? A difference in this could explain a significant reduction in the odds per pick. In other words, if you are telling the truth and have accurately gauged what your average is (rather than giving me what you get sometimes), then you're doing something differently that is changing your odds per pick. I sometimes get two tries out of a pick on a master lock (the picks break much faster on them). Otherwise, I've demonstrated clearly why it is statistically improbably otherwise.

It's either that or... can you guess what number I'm thinking?

Don't worry about them, just some MMO-attitude trolls competing in the forums.

Then I suppose I'm very lucky.
I still don't care, it doesn't take more than 3 picks on average to get a master lock open for me.
Then again, by the time Master locks show up frequently i do have 100 in Lockpicking too, no perks though, so that might be a reason why it's easier.
Doesn't mean I don't have time where a lock can't be a complete ass, but generally it is 3 picks.

I don't care for statistics, I know my gameplay, I cannot show a montage of how I picked locks as I don't have a video program nor do I want Skyrim to have less framerates than it already does.
So if you think I'm lying I'm fine with it, I know how easy it is for me and that's all I care about.
If you just find it highly unlikely then I suppose I'm just lucky.
If you don't belive in luck then I suppose Godzilla is helping me out somehow.

Save, lock pick. Reload, locpick

tilde, unlock
I don't do lockpicking unless I'm in a mood for it. It's not even realistic if you think about it...is there some daur running around oiling these millennium old locks to keep them functional so the next treasure hunter will give his dungeon dwelling a good review?

Light fingers. I get about 3 pulls on a master lock before the lockpick breaks.
Two picks is usually enough to hone in on the area where it moves. Then it's just one more pick to open the lock.

If you think the perks are worthless then something it can be used for is: Role-play purposes, Side Perks, lock picking is a noncombat related tree, this will ensure a less overpowered character.

You're just lucky on average over a long period of time? That's not "luck", that's what we call an outlier. Again, go ahead, guess the number I'm thinking. It's been the same number this whole time.

This would make sense to me. This is the only way to increase the odds per pick without cheating.

I don't know why they didn't make it like FO where you couldn't pick and expert lock at all if you didn't have 75 in lockpick. Make it so that you can't pick expert locks unless you have the expert perk.

Makes sense to me.

Thanks for that image, just about snarfed down my can of coke on that one.