It's only lacking something in the same sense that it also lacks race cars which doesn't let it be a driving game. If someone said skyrim was a racing game because you could ride horses, I'd respond with the same type of deal.


I can't paint the exact dividing line, that's just too difficult. HOWEVER!
If the game had more ways to diversify characters(currently it is very much every character can do everything) then maybe that would be enough. And not just in terms of fighter/mage/stealth, but also in terms of philosophy, opinion and so on. If the game had more interesting choices than "I'll do it" and "I'll do it later" that would also be a step in the right direction(yes yes, I know some quests have minor differences, but they're too few and too little).

It'd the old TES problem of someone being archmage/grand fighter/master of the thieves guild/assassin/chosen one/arena champion. BUT YOU CAN CHOOSE TO NOT DO ALL OF THEM!!!11. I mean, even morrowind had this problem, and that game still had some pretty strict requirements for gaining the higher ranks in a guild.


Back in zhe game. I became a vampire and stashed all my dragon loot in a cabinet at the mages guild. Hope it won't get wiped to be filled with a pair of fine shoes. As for the vampire bit its pretty disappointing. The bonuses are nice, but its not really worth the hassle.

Anyone know what to do with centaurion dwemer cores? Found one behind a master locked door, and another on a boss type thing, so I figured they'd have some cool use, but no luck so far.

And regarding the new skill and level system. To be honest, I think it's pretty dull. The majority of the perks are just +25% increases to damage or whatever. There are some cool ones, but the majority ain't. I've got 5 unspent perks simply because there's nothing fun to spend them on. It's certainly not worse than Oblivions or morrowinds though.

@Hassat
The exploration is definitely better. Lack of level scaling means that different locations actually behave differently *gasp*. There's also more environments than forest(there's forest, plains and snowy versions of the two now). Most dungeons have some unique set piece as well, which prevents them from feeling entirely generic, but after going through my fourth burial hill thing, I'm pretty sick of them.

The game is also way better at pointing you towards some of the more interesting dungeons with little fetch quests, providing some motivation(still very slight) to go there other than "for the lulz". otoh, they're all(almost all) completely linear as far as I've seen.

*Staunchly ignores thread*

I'm a werewolf!

It's pretty awesome. It was part of a prominent questline, so I'm slightly disappointed to know almost every player will get this choice early on, but whatever - I'm super happy to be a werewolf. It's so well implemented, really nicely polished and with lots of great features. I love how you have to feed on corpses to heal yourself and sustain your frenzy longer, and I love how you sprint faster than a horse and it gets locked in third person so you can see how huge and awesome you are compared to the piss-ants you crush effortlessly. I love that I can't disable beast form again, I have to wait for it to wear off. I love how random people keep asking me about the fur growing in my ears or remarking that I smell of wet dog.

And holy shit did they ever fix the stealth. It was completely useless in Oblivion, but here it's completely viable. I'm playing most of the dungeons like Thief! Well actually more like Deus Ex, since on the occasion when I fuck up the stealth I just break out the sword and shield or the destruction spells and unleash hell until nothing is moving anymore. The single best change they made was to make enemies run over to their friends' corpses after a sneak attack, instead of instantly homing in on you, which enables you to take at two enemies out in the same room without blowing stealth (though if there's more than 2, you'll want to retreat until their AI resets like a normal stealth game). The level design definitely contributes to it a lot though, they've been very good about placing enemies to make stealth viable (with their backs turned or in separate rooms, etc.)

Bows are much beefier now, combined with the ranged backstab perk they really are sniper rifles, so I'm one-hit killing most enemies. Once in a while I'll run into a semi-boss or a proper boss and I have to break out the entire arsenal of potions, poisons, spells, powers, and shouts. It's fun! Surprisingly perfect difficulty balance, really - particularly considering my main skills are stealth and archery, which would've given me a completely ass-whooping in Oblivion.

And I'm surprised to find myself appreciating the linearity of the dungeons. They're much more deliberately designed this time around, instead of just random labyrinths made out of bland tilesets - you can tell Bethesda hired like 15 dedicated level designers for this game where before they had none, as the dungeons have much more personality and narrative to them. Their linearity serves as good pacing variation from the wide open world outside, and it's a huge relief to know you never have to backtrack a huge distance because you missed something way back when - especially appreciated the admittedly somewhat ridiculous fact that every dungeon ends back where it started - it's silly, but it's great level design.

Fuck, they even improved horses, and I thought those were all right to begin with.

The only poorly designed thing in this game is the UI, which does its best to make up for sweeping improvements across the rest of the game by being really really horrendous. I struggle to think of a worse example of interface design. Can't wait for Bethesda to release the Creation Kit so their fans can fix the UI, but for once they won't have to fix much else as far as I'm concerned

I'm super thrilled that Bethesda has finally managed to make a genuinely excellent game.

It's good to see somebody who's having a fur-kin' good time.

Oblivion has crashed my PC and the action centre (HP or W7) says it was shut down to protect the computer. So my hours of searching for, then installing mods, has been for nought, as I've uninstalled everything. I think I've moved another step closer to my non gaming days.

@Jonas

Could you answer my show of hands? Please pretty please? =P

@ Jaedar

But you _can't_ actually do everything. Turns out, level progression slows down at level 50, and there's a soft level cap at 80.

This gives you about 6 skills to master in the game. So if you want to be a master of the 3 crafting skills, you get 2-3 skills you can master in addition, and you're incredibly reliant on the crafting. If you want to master magic, you can, but then you don't get any armor skills, no weapon skills, and no stealthing is open to you.

If you simply spread your progression evenly accross all 18 skills, you'll never grow them to more than adept level, at most.

I can imagine some of you going, but why is there a level cap, that's an artificial hindrance, etc.

Well, let me stop you right there. All interesting quests will likely be over by the time you reach level 60. This will only be a problem for people who grind without any quest progression, and they will have to do _a lot_ of it, because they're the only ones who will likely run up against the limit before everything interesting in the game is exhausted.

What I'm saying is, if you postpone something for later? You might not get to do it in this playthrough, so you might (effectively) be electing not to do it at all.

Its not worth mastering any one skill (by that I mean getting all the perks). Personally a mix of Destruction and Restoration work really well together (points into Magicka regen that way you're regenerating 50% faster if you get it high enough, not hard if you use trainers). Destruction depends on who you're fighting as the spells do different things, Shock good against mages, Frost good against fighters, Flames good against mobs of enemies/AOE. Illusion works great when combined with Pickpocketing, lockpicking, helps get rid of pesky guards ect, also allows you to make stealth magic kills which is helpful, plus you can use enemies to fight for you. Alteration, Enchantment and Smithing work well together, but its more worth going down the daedric path as opposed to the glass. Combat skills are a waste, compared to Magic you do far far far more damage to any of the combat skills with the exception of archery which can be useful for when your magic runs out (which is rare at least for me!) I noticed archery can be very effective- moreso than melee. Armor skills aren't worth getting, especially if you're using illusion (because you can just use the enemy to tank for you), most people go for the "Weight" ones, but not worth it, I've never had problems with my inventory.

Magic is OPed, and eventually you'll be able to make your own armors and clothes that can make your Magicka regen so damn fast that you can spam Expert destruction spells (that do like 80 or something damage per second and have AOE effects)

Pickpocketing is easy to level up, so much so that it feels exploitative just using it, and very much so when you can use it on Trainers, and honestly I approve of doing this because it saves so much damn time grinding.

Skyrim needs its own thread

@ Mr Cyberpunk

What level are you at?

And yeah, I agree that it isn't worth the perk points to completely fill out most trees...

My roommate found being a destruction mage started getting difficult at around level 25...

My current strategy against mages is to SHOUT at them, run op to them, hit them in the face with my shield if they're already back up by the time I make it to them and then run a blade through their face.

Alternatively, I could shout-sprint up to them and do the hitting in the face thing. Also I seem to have contracted vampirism, which I may or may not have healed from by praying at the temple in Whiterun. I am currently saving up to buy a house, I need but 500 gold, which I can probably get in a single dungeon run. If only the shop-owners would have some money left... Anyone know when their balance is reset?

So?

It's not like you need to max every skill to do everything. I'm level 20, and throughout the entire game I have never felt "man, if only my char build was different, I could do this". I can sneak, I can fight, I can persuade, I can intidimate, I can cast spells, I can open locks. About the only thing I can't to reliably is pickpocket, and that's only because I don't care about it.

Yeah sure, you can't get every perk in the game, but you really don't need to. And I'm playing at Expert.

Interesting to see someone who thinks magic is OP. I find illusion worthless though. Calm/rage/light? What use are those spells? I'm sure there's some stuff worth it at higher levels but HNNNNNNG grinding. Same with alteration imo.

@Jonas
I see someone likes the game a lot.

I would raise my hand enthusiastically but I'm too busy ignoring the thread!


Yep

But now it's a different thread .

And the perks start to sound a lot like The Witcher II...

@EER

So what do you think about the revised skill and perk system? You like it? =P

It's actually pretty similar to The Witcher 2, yes, with the addition that you have to unlock the perks by using the skills enough, before you can buy them.

So you would've prefered if the game was more vigilant about making sure you could do less of those things?