The OFFICIAL Anandtech Forums TeS V: Skyrim Thread

[thespyder]

Any tips? I am currently trying to play a full mage through the game and having some problems. Specifically, the spell damage does not scale or compare against weapon damage.

I have an Orc Barbarian that, with a two handed weapon at 20th level can do well over 150 per swing. And a stealth based Kajit character that can do more than 400 at a hit at 24th level (Assassin's blade dual wielded using Dwarven daggers).

However my Mage at 28th level is doing 90 points of damage with Incinerate and it appears that is the capped max. My Kajit can do that much with a bow attack. And both of my other two have SIGNIFICANT more hit points and armor (which doesn't need to be re-cast every minute and won't magically disappear during combat).

Any suggestions on what is wrong here? Even with "Infinte Magicka" and at range, Mages just don't scale anywhere near the other styles of playing. what am I missing? Or did Bethesda merely not think this one through very well?

 

[zinfamous]

The people that play mages in this thread tend to walk around with conjured bodyguards from what I have read, so maybe that helps. it seems that two dremora lords is autopilot.

 

[dennilfloss]

I don't mind magical damage being less than close-up swings and hacks as I'm dishing it from far away whereas tanks dish but also receive more. Of course, they wear armour and I don't. The lesser damage I inflict I see as a challenge.

 

[pontifex]

i don't have any problems. have near infinite magicka at this point. the perk that adds a stun or whatever on hit really helps too

I don't use any conjured pets nor do I use any companions. pretty much pure destruction. I don't even use other spell trees except restoration for healing.

 

[Slew Foot]

I'm a desstructo mage. I use light armor enchanted so that destruction spells cost 0. Dual cast incinerates hit for about 300 at range and I can fling them like mad. Also spit out a dremora lord or storm atronach to tank for me and I'm virtually invincible.

 

[Imp]

The people that play mages in this thread tend to walk around with conjured bodyguards from what I have read, so maybe that helps. it seems that two dremora lords is autopilot.

One Dremora Lord seems adequate for me to clean house. Dremora Lord plus companion. And this is with no perks in any magicka skills.

If anyone wants to level whore, pickpocket has to be one of the easiest skills to level. I went from 50 to 100 in about an hour by pilfering all the castles/town halls in the city. Each item over 100 value appears to be worth an entire level.

I just enchanted all of my heavy armor and there must be at least 3 or 4 items that add two-handed damage. Haven't been wearing any yet since I'm power leveling my mage skills, but he's going to be Jesus Christ once I put it all on.

 

[dennilfloss]

Just rewatched the trailer. After 250h of game play, it still pumps me up and the Dovahkiin still sounds like he's yelling MUSTARD JAR!! :biggrin:

 

[zinfamous]

Just rewatched the trailer. After 250h of game play, it still pumps me up and the Dovahkiin still sounds like he's yelling MUSTARD JAR!! :biggrin:

I do like that trailer. I'm generally proud of the fact that I never make decisions based off of advertising, but Skyrim is the one example where an ad totally sold me on the product.

I was sure that I would not get this until way cheap on Steam, and that I probably wouldn't like it anyway (issues with Morrowind), but that ad changed my mind, lol.

 

[s1njin]

Having a great time w/ this. Running a female Wood Elf Archer class with some sneak built in. Threw on the skimpy armor mod from the nexus (cause if I gotta look at ass all night, it might as well be womanly and pleasant). I'm really enjoying the openness of the game. And I'm getting better at the sneak around - 1 shot kills. Barring that, I pelt them as much as I can and pull out a one handed axe to finish them off.

 

[JackSpadesSI]

The people that play mages in this thread tend to walk around with conjured bodyguards from what I have read, so maybe that helps. it seems that two dremora lords is autopilot.

Right. Pure destruction isn't really adequate (I know people make it work, but it is certainly harder than a melee character). But, if you play as a more general mage (all magic schools) then you'll be rather overpowered.

 

[JackSpadesSI]

The bugged quests have nothing to do with the misc. tab. Any quest can be bugged, though its becoming obvious they didnt play test or debug the quests typically found under misc. as thoroughly as the rest.

I have so many (ok, like 3 or 4) quest items for miscellaneous quests stuck in my inventory. Thankfully, and ironically, another bug makes quest items weightless in inventory. But, weightless or not, they're a tremendous pain to look at all the time!

(I'm playing Skyrim on Xbox 360, so I can't use the console to remove the items from my inventory. But, that's beside the point - the player shouldn't have to mess with things like that in a properly debugged and QA-checked game!)

 

[Atomic Playboy]

Any tips? I am currently trying to play a full mage through the game and having some problems. Specifically, the spell damage does not scale or compare against weapon damage.

I have an Orc Barbarian that, with a two handed weapon at 20th level can do well over 150 per swing. And a stealth based Kajit character that can do more than 400 at a hit at 24th level (Assassin's blade dual wielded using Dwarven daggers).

However my Mage at 28th level is doing 90 points of damage with Incinerate and it appears that is the capped max. My Kajit can do that much with a bow attack. And both of my other two have SIGNIFICANT more hit points and armor (which doesn't need to be re-cast every minute and won't magically disappear during combat).

Any suggestions on what is wrong here? Even with "Infinte Magicka" and at range, Mages just don't scale anywhere near the other styles of playing. what am I missing? Or did Bethesda merely not think this one through very well?

The "Impact" perk in the destruction tree makes all the difference. It causes a dual-wield spell to stagger literally everything, including dragons. When you have gear that makes your spells cost nothing and a perk that makes your spells stagger your opponent, nothing can hit you. Dragon getting ready to breathe fire? Stagger him with a spell, then keep hitting him repeatedly until he's dead and he'll never get a chance to recover. Sure, you can conjure up dremora lords or atronachs and bring a companion along to tank for you, but realistically, you won't need to when any hit stops your opponent completely.

Incidentally, make sure you get the perks in the destruction tree for stronger spells (augmented flames, frost and shock). The Aspect of Terror perk in the Illusion tree also adds 10 points of damage to all fire spells, but that's of questionable value since you need two other perks to get it and by that point your destruction spells are generally pretty deadly anyway.

 

[thespyder]

thanks all for the tips. My mage has Impact perk and maybe I just haven't been using it properly as I haven't noticed it making much of an impact. But I am going to go back and pay more attention.

I am not for companions or summonables (mainly for the same reason as I don't like the armor spells.... duration) but it is definitly another area I can work on.

personally, I just invisioned that the lack of hitpoints and armor should equate to more punch power. I guess that isn't the case.

Although I am finding weaknesses with my other characters as well. My Stealth expert is currently going through a Dungeon fighting Undead. So far the pattern seems to be Restless followed by a Wight and then a Ravenger. The Restless I can one shot kill with my bow. The Wights take three hits and the Ravenger takes 6-7 hits (damage is 38 x3). and it seems set up so that even with a Stealth of 94 plus several items augmenting it and all of the Perks (except Shadow warrior) in the Stealth tree, I still can't sneak up on any of them (not even the Restless) for a double dagger attack. I guess that was done to increase difficulty.

 

[Markbnj]

I have so many (ok, like 3 or 4) quest items for miscellaneous quests stuck in my inventory. Thankfully, and ironically, another bug makes quest items weightless in inventory. But, weightless or not, they're a tremendous pain to look at all the time!

(I'm playing Skyrim on Xbox 360, so I can't use the console to remove the items from my inventory. But, that's beside the point - the player shouldn't have to mess with things like that in a properly debugged and QA-checked game!)

I agree, it's miserably broken. Btw, if some of those items are for quests you haven't been assigned yet, you can Google the item name and then go accomplish the quest. I got rid of three items that way. The fourth is Pantea's Flute, and it looks like I can't get the quest to get rid of it unless I actually join the Bard's college (which I'm assigned to do, even though I had no intention of doing so, because again the quest system is so ridiculously busted and ill-designed).

Btw, one of the items was called something like Kahtsvein's Fang, a dagger. Turns out you have to hang onto that until later in the game, however it also turns out that though you can't remove it from your inventory the normal way, you can place it into a dagger display case. So that's how I got rid of that item. It's brightening my place in Markarth.

 

[zinfamous]

Although I am finding weaknesses with my other characters as well. My Stealth expert is currently going through a Dungeon fighting Undead. So far the pattern seems to be Restless followed by a Wight and then a Ravenger. The Restless I can one shot kill with my bow. The Wights take three hits and the Ravenger takes 6-7 hits (damage is 38 x3). and it seems set up so that even with a Stealth of 94 plus several items augmenting it and all of the Perks (except Shadow warrior) in the Stealth tree, I still can't sneak up on any of them (not even the Restless) for a double dagger attack. I guess that was done to increase difficulty.

weird. My shield & sword warrior is at ~84 in stealth right now, perks up to backstab and 2x bow, and sneaks up on just about anything. Deathlords walk right up to me and can't see me.

Of course..I now have Boethiah's Ebony Mail.... :sneaky: If you want sneak, you need to get that. It's heavy armor, but it's instant sneak. I don't have any of the dark brotherhood armor, yet, so I wouldn't know how to compare.

 

[JackSpadesSI]

I agree, it's miserably broken. Btw, if some of those items are for quests you haven't been assigned yet, you can Google the item name and then go accomplish the quest. I got rid of three items that way. The fourth is Pantea's Flute, and it looks like I can't get the quest to get rid of it unless I actually join the Bard's college (which I'm assigned to do, even though I had no intention of doing so, because again the quest system is so ridiculously busted and ill-designed).

Btw, one of the items was called something like Kahtsvein's Fang, a dagger. Turns out you have to hang onto that until later in the game, however it also turns out that though you can't remove it from your inventory the normal way, you can place it into a dagger display case. So that's how I got rid of that item. It's brightening my place in Markarth.

Nope, it isn't merely the case that I'm unaware of the quest related to the item. I'm pretty sure they all went down this way: find item randomly, Google to whom the item must be returned (I have no qualms with doing this), return item, get reward for having returned the item, item still remains in inventory.

 

[thespyder]

weird. My shield & sword warrior is at ~84 in stealth right now, perks up to backstab and 2x bow, and sneaks up on just about anything. Deathlords walk right up to me and can't see me.

Of course..I now have Boethiah's Ebony Mail.... :sneaky: If you want sneak, you need to get that. It's heavy armor, but it's instant sneak. I don't have any of the dark brotherhood armor, yet, so I wouldn't know how to compare.

Yeah, 99.9% of everything I encounter is completely oblivious to me being there (and I don't have any of the special Thieves guild armor yet either). But in this Dungeon, EVERYTHING sees me. or more, doesn't see me but when I go to attack they all of the sudden notice me. I really think it is something specific to this dungeon. I say that because most of my combat is either one hit kills or a rage cast to thin the ranks followed by a sneak kill.

I find it hilarious that I have encountered a number of people going to "The Wedding". i happily rob them BLIND and then have them talk to me like I am a peniless peasant. I have more gold than they do....

 

[Markbnj]

Yeah, 99.9% of everything I encounter is completely oblivious to me being there (and I don't have any of the special Thieves guild armor yet either). But in this Dungeon, EVERYTHING sees me. or more, doesn't see me but when I go to attack they all of the sudden notice me. I really think it is something specific to this dungeon. I say that because most of my combat is either one hit kills or a rage cast to thin the ranks followed by a sneak kill.

I find it hilarious that I have encountered a number of people going to "The Wedding". i happily rob them BLIND and then have them talk to me like I am a peniless peasant. I have more gold than they do....

The NPCs in general are brain dead. They're really no more advanced than what we had in Morrowind. I'm all for awesome visuals and immersive soundscapes, but I would have happily traded half of the bad voice acting for NPCs that know we've met before, or know that I have been appointed a Thane and don't treat me like a vagrant, or even that just know it's 3:30 AM and aren't out wandering the streets (do the NPCs know where their children are?).

 

[shortylickens]

They are slightly more advanced in that they have schedules. But other than that, no, not really.
AI has taken a back seat to multiplayer. Even in SP games the programmers usually dont bother with anything unless its blunt and in your face. Like the conversations of passers-by.

 

[thespyder]

LOL. My point was more along the lines of "I just robbed you blind but you are too dumb to know it", but yeah. NPC's are pretty stupid in game.

it is kind of a wierd thing for me. I generally don't play Multi-player games because they are all so sanitized and PCized and "lets make it fair and everyone play nice". You can't have any consequences against another player because that wouldn't be "Fair". but then that really kills the whole emersion thing (for me) in that you can't stop a bully, or be one because nothing you can do to the other guy is perminent. PVP ends up killing one or the other guy, who only comes back 3 min later as if nothing happened.

yet for Single player games like this, where you can take out the bad guy (or be one) they only ever take a back seat as far as advancements are concerned. Since AIs are not a main focus of an MP game, no one works on them significantly for SP games either. And more and more MP games are all that anyone comes out with.

 

[Markbnj]

I think adding all the voice acting actually constrained them. It would be tons more expensive, not to mention a lot larger on disk, if you provided voiced conversations that branch through all the different possibilities, i.e. one guard convo if you're unknown, another if you're a thane, another if you own a house, whatever. Personally I think it was a poor tradeoff. The voice acting is pretty bad to begin with, and especially with generic NPC conversations it doesn't add much, especially after the 300th time you've heard something.

 

[JackSpadesSI]

The NPCs in general are brain dead. They're really no more advanced than what we had in Morrowind. I'm all for awesome visuals and immersive soundscapes, but I would have happily traded half of the bad voice acting for NPCs that know we've met before, or know that I have been appointed a Thane and don't treat me like a vagrant, or even that just know it's 3:30 AM and aren't out wandering the streets (do the NPCs know where their children are?).

It drives me crazy whenever I go to the mage vendor in Dragonsreach (or is it singular Dragonreach?) and he says something like "you know, if you've got the aptitude for it you should join the Mage's College in Winterhold" even though I've finished that quest line and I'm wearing the proof right in front of him! Argh!!!

To a lesser extent, I'm also annoyed by the lack of NPC evolution based on my actions. For instance, there is a Pickpocket trainer in one of the cities in northeastern Skyrim (I forget which one). She's a poor beggar. Well, I trained with her from level 20-50 so I know for a fact that she's quite wealthy now. Why does she still live on the streets and beg for Septims?!

 

[Red Storm]

To a lesser extent, I'm also annoyed by the lack of NPC evolution based on my actions. For instance, there is a Pickpocket trainer in one of the cities in northeastern Skyrim (I forget which one). She's a poor beggar. Well, I trained with her from level 20-50 so I know for a fact that she's quite wealthy now. Why does she still live on the streets and beg for Septims?!

Manwhores and Skooma.

 

[Atomic Playboy]

thanks all for the tips. My mage has Impact perk and maybe I just haven't been using it properly as I haven't noticed it making much of an impact. But I am going to go back and pay more attention.

Although I am finding weaknesses with my other characters as well. My Stealth expert is currently going through a Dungeon fighting Undead. So far the pattern seems to be Restless followed by a Wight and then a Ravenger. The Restless I can one shot kill with my bow. The Wights take three hits and the Ravenger takes 6-7 hits (damage is 38 x3). and it seems set up so that even with a Stealth of 94 plus several items augmenting it and all of the Perks (except Shadow warrior) in the Stealth tree, I still can't sneak up on any of them (not even the Restless) for a double dagger attack. I guess that was done to increase difficulty.

The Impact perk only works when dual-casting the same missile spell. You can't be using firebolt on one hand and lightning on the other; you need to assign Firebolt (for example) to both hands. When you dual-cast correctly, your character will put his hands together in front of him and a single spell will be produced. It's fairly obvious when it works correctly, as whatever you hit with it will have an exaggerated stagger animation.

As far as stealth goes, apparently the kind of armor you're wearing makes a difference. Armor produces noise, but the amount of noise varies, and it's not listed anywhere in the game; I think heavy armor is significantly louder. I enchanted some gear with fortify sneak and muffle and even though my sneak level was very low, I could be standing directly in front of an enemy and they wouldn't see me. Apparently any gear you enchant yourself with the muffle enchantment makes it 100% silent, so it's probably worth doing if you plan on playing a stealthy character. Fortify Sneak is obviously pretty useful as well.

 

[thespyder]

The Impact perk only works when dual-casting the same missile spell. You can't be using firebolt on one hand and lightning on the other; you need to assign Firebolt (for example) to both hands. When you dual-cast correctly, your character will put his hands together in front of him and a single spell will be produced. It's fairly obvious when it works correctly, as whatever you hit with it will have an exaggerated stagger animation.

As far as stealth goes, apparently the kind of armor you're wearing makes a difference. Armor produces noise, but the amount of noise varies, and it's not listed anywhere in the game; I think heavy armor is significantly louder. I enchanted some gear with fortify sneak and muffle and even though my sneak level was very low, I could be standing directly in front of an enemy and they wouldn't see me. Apparently any gear you enchant yourself with the muffle enchantment makes it 100% silent, so it's probably worth doing if you plan on playing a stealthy character. Fortify Sneak is obviously pretty useful as well.

Yep, so I knew about the Dual casting thing. I pretty much exclusively do that. Still haven't noticed it being that significant an impact. But I plan on going back and paying closer attention to it.

About stealth, I have the perk that "Muffles" armor sounds. And I have enchanted my elven chain with stealth enhancing abilities. Both of which work great in most cases. And i have no complaints. Just this one Dungeon "Appears" to be antithetical to this as every monster notices me "Just" as i am attacking. I have noticed this phenomenon before as in another dungeon i would get a b-line arrow attack on someone from quite a distance away (i.e. no way they could have spotted me) and the target would invariably move just as I fired and this invalidating the X3 damage bonus. I think it is probably something written in to certain encounters to prevent stealth experts from ruling the game.