I'm aware that I am beating a dead horse(only because I wish to see it live again!) but here is some destruction spell information from the wiki.

Apprentice spell-Lightning bolt-51 magicka-25 dmg

Expert spell-Thunderbolt-343 magicka-60 dmg

That's a 6.7x increase in cost for 2.4x increase in damage. There is a definite imbalance in the progression of destruction magic.
Dual casting causes a 2.8x cost increase for a return of 2.2x damage.


How many of you think this is something bethesda could/should fix? I don't care about archery-melee-magic balance at all. I just want this faucet of gameplay properly realized.

The problem with destruction is the stupidly high cost for adept/expert spells, the damage is fine for master, but you have to solve the magicka problem at high levels.

So when people say 'destruction is weak', it's bull, it's the ridiculously high cost of the higher level spells is the problem.

Magic isn't weak, magic is for the weak.

Bethesda and balance have never been friends, but during Skyrim's deveploment they apparently became enemies

But yes, those numbers are quite ridiculous.

Werewolf perk tree

I think the spells are powerful enough, but the cost is ridiculous. Beth should stop worrying about Kinect and fix some balance issues.

idk about you guys but in my game Thunderbolt is 90 dmg and with my enchanted equipment it costs me 19 mana to cast


edit also the apprentice spell your supposed to be talking about is called sparks and im also pretty sure that you have chain lightning and thunderbolt spells confused because in my game chain lightening is an adept spell that does like 50 or 60 dmg

There are two ways you can see this. Either make spells a lot more powerful to fit the expensive costs or lower the magicka cost.

On my pure Destruction mage when I first got Fireball I was like "Awesome! A new spell". I could only cast it 2-3 times before running out of Magicka and it was barely any stronger than my Firebolt, I had only put my attributes into magicka too. I was better off spamming Firebolt and stun-locking to an enemy until death rather than casting a few Fireballs leaving me out of Magicka with the target still alive.

You have 2 perks in Augment Shock perk. Enchanting or Alchemy should make Destruction better, but right now they are the only things making it usable. I would have also liked to seen a concentration spell and projectile spell for each mastery level.

Novice: Sparks
Apprentice: Lightning Bolt
Adept: Chain Lightning
Expert: Thunderbolt
Master: Lightning Storm

actually i dont have any perks into the augmented shock frost or fire and whoops i forgot that novice spells existed lol but the reason why I can use expert lvl spells is because of my enchantments lowering the cost of destruction spells, but even without them i still have 470 magicka so it wouldnt make too much of a difference, atleast i dont think

edit or maybe i do have those perks lol i can really remember, i just know that i didnt really invest too much into destruction

I don't see any problem with that ~none at all. I think that it should become more and more inefficient as you increase the value of it.
It's the cost of increasing the value... I wouldn't think that it should ever be 51 for 25 damage, and then 102 for 50 damage.

** Other than that, I've not played the game enough to be able to judge on balance or make comparisons.

I think they should fix it. If they are going to bother balancing things that arent fully broke unless you purposely do it like smithing then they definitely need to fix magicka costs, maybe kick the damage up too.

But why?

Master level spells SHOULD be expensive to cast. It's the damage that should be increased by orders of magnitude. I reckon you're supposed to be about the most powerful mage in existence by the time you can cast what is supposed to be the most powerful spells in existence. Should cost lots. But should be amazingly powerful. JMHO

If the mahicka cost would increase directly with the damage there wouldn't be needed 2 different spells. You pay extra magicka for dealing more damage. If it was the other way around it would just be OP.

Also as you progress in the game you get acess to stronger magicka reduction gear and stuff and that should balance things around.

The thing is, this isn't a mild decrease in efficiency. This is simply inflation on a great scale. From the beginning of the game mages are limited by their magicka supply and that is their primary limitation. This weakness is imposed to make up for the power of destruction spells and their range. However, in skyrim, destruction is only impressive around lvl 5 when you start using apprentice spells and bandits have double digit hp. This quickly stops being the case, and backpedaling is slower than forward movement, nullifying these advantages. As a result destruction lacks any real saving grace, besides impact, and if you want to stun lock fools all day you should probably just play a rogue in WoW. With physical characters, enchanting/alchemy/smithing give an unnecessary edge, with mages it barely makes them viable and even then it has to be used in a oddly specfic way(-destruction and impact). If you whent the equivalent route with any other class you'd be extremely powerful, but incredibly one dimensional eg.1 handed.

If you're on PC pick up the Magic Scaling mod.

Its pretty much how magic should have worked from the start imo. If you're not on PC well.. Buff enchanting/hope for a fix?

Perhaps the best way to put it is this: Playing a character utilizing destruction is an incredibly inorganic experience. You lose all sense of immersion in your quest to make it viable. By the time you've grinded enchanting and made your uber gear and are stuck with the lackluster payoff, you are probably going to want to restart with a new character. The experience and the adventure have become second to babysitting this sub-par skill.

I speak for the trees us console users. We would really appreciate it if bethesda would stop cutting down our truffula trees balance destruction magic.

and i just checked my profile and i dont have any of the augmented perks in the destruction school and my expert thunderbolt spell still does 90 dmg

Why should it be amazingly powerful instead of just more powerful that a lesser mage can cast. IMO a powerful mage is usually one that doesn't waste power and has it in reserve when it's really needed. (How many spells did Gandalf cast in the entire three books of LOTR plus the Hobbit? Were they noticeably powerful?)

Consider it this way... Two mages square off, and are in a situation where spellcraft will decide who survives. They can both cast a minor fireball for a modest amount of power expended; both would get burned a few times. However, one mage can cast a fireball that does twice the damage as the other mage's; but costs five times as much power to cast. They have the advantage, but it will cost them to use it; it's also not something they would use lightly, or at all if they could help it.

In the end both mages could lob minor fireball spells at each other (expending the same amount of power) until they were both badly burned and dying; but the more powerful mage could lob their 5x more expensive fireballs and kill their opponent before being so brutally burned themselves.

I can't argue against the want for ub?r powerful fireballs at a fair rate of exchange (power for damage), except to say that for fiction, that seems even less believable in context.

dear devs: i guess you have seen the avalanche of posts talking about the same issue. Next patch coming on . I would like but i think ther is no time for spellmking ,So
the easy solution a see is this:

1. Allow gear enchanted with fortify destruction increase the damage output. And put a magicka decrese cost limit , it sholud be 70%.
2.Give this perks a buff of 200% not 50% -Aumented flames aumented frost aumented shock.Put desintegration , Intense flames and deep freeze on 20% of enemy health.
3. Reduce the impact perk form 100% to 50%.

Agree with 1 and 3.

But 2 is ridiculous, destruction would be so overpowered, you'd hit for 180 damage single cast or 396 dual cast, given most enemies in skyrim have a weakness you would be 2 shotting everything you come across on master.

The fact you even suggested that suggests that you haven't even used destruction at higher levels, well I have on master and the damage is enough. 3-4 dual cast to take down a draugr deathlord on master, that's a lot, you can do this from a safe range. You try that with an unsmithed 1h with no enchanted gear, see how he puts you on the floor.

You don't need enchanting to use destruction btw, master destro gear 22%, ring of peerless destruction 25% and circlet of peerless destruction 25%, those are good enough for continual use of destro.

They also need to reduce the base cost of adept, expert and master spells.

Maybe its my nostalgia for how i was able to clean the imperial city with only destro spells, but i think putting desintegration , Intense flames and deep freeze on 20% of enemy health. is reasonable.

1. I agree but they should be 2 seperate enchants.
2. I agree but it should be 100%, like every other offensive ability gets from perks, 200 is insane.
3. I also agree.
4. Possibly add in illusion or sneak a "Double dmg when casted while undectected" perk, or just make it default.

However on topic, the reason it costs DRASTICALLY more and only hits a tiny bit harder is the same reason deadric arrows cost DRASTICALLY more (and are harder to find) then iron arrows. Its something truely special and should be used appropriately.

The real problem is you feel you HAVE to use it as a caster because destruction is so weak. Destruction cant be enchanted to do more dmg (all other attacks can), it cant be smithed to be better (everything else can be), you get 50% bonus dmg from perks instead of 100% (like every other way to attack), and the biggest factor is the lack of a sneak multiplier (that again, every other attack can get).

And yes, theres people who play a mage on master and do great, and thats cool, but mathmatically its extremely inferior.