Hi!

I am thinking about creating my first character. With MW, it was possible to use magic and armour, but now I see that armour hampers the effectiveness of spells. OTOH, playing the game as a pure mage is easier than MW, where you need a reasonable skill in combat especially at the lower levels.

I'm watching my son play - while waiting for my new computer to arrive - and his mage is doing well. However, I would like to have more combat with my character and was thinking for a change of having a Nord female, instead of the Imperial female I play in MW. My initial notes show that I'd be better off with a Breton for the higher initial intelligence and starting skills.

Please share what characters are working well for you all. I would be really interested to know. And if anyone is playing a mage/combat character. I figure you need some self healing ability at least.

(PS: Is it just me or are the old faces to be found no more at the Elder Scrolls forums, but just here.....? There seems to be a lot of new names on their Ob boards, with increased flaming, etc)

I think the beauty is that all three major types are truly viable here, where they weren't so much in MW. In MW, being a strong fighter with a few enchanted items was too easy, while archer was too hard.
In OB, archers can really kick rear (even though I never play archers as a rule, I might have to try one out eventually).

I'm playing a redguard social fighter (fighting skills with speech/merchantile) with sign = steed. He really goes toe-to-toe with most opponents and wins almost all battles easily. Tough foes are taken down with adrenaline rush (a fairly unbalanced power). He sucks at magic, though. I look forward to playing a straight mage next time around.

I use a battlemage. The magic does work and I think getting levels in armor skills stops it from making magic bad. I think its pretty effective, especially the summons. For one thing, I can practice and raise conjuration and a weapon at once by summoning monsters to kill. Theyre easy until they know what you're trying. You can also get a lot of souls that way. The magic attacks can do a lot of damage. At the same time, I can do a lot of damage. Seems good to me.

Leveling your armor level decreases the effects it has on your spells, but I'm not sure if the decreasing effects are gone if you manage to get to level 100 in whatever armor you have...

Well, I'm a fighter/mage myself. I use Destruction/Alteration/Restoration aside with Blade/Heavy Armor/Block and it works just fine. My armor skill is around 90 if I remember correctly and the magic effectivity is 95%. So if you train your armor you can cast close to perfect spells. The only problem I'm experiencing is that since I'm emphasising on willpower-spells I have very little intelligence and thus very little magicka, this means I can't cast any specifically powerful spells.

Personally, I will rely on stealth. But Ill create a battlemage as well. And by the way, youre right about the Ob boards.

I posted a huge discussion on character creation
HERE

I was hoping to get feedback on it. Basically, I went at it starting with an initially weak character with no skill over 35, but with a maximum possible level of 50 or higher and a sign like Mage or Apprentice. My theory was that the maxed out character would be more powerful because of higher HP and Magicka. All the signs with stat bonuses and such dont seem useful because you can LEVEL and get the stats up...

I have been thinking after this thread though... if you start with a "weaker" character and the enemies level with you, then perhaps the game will be very difficult right up until lvl 45 or so. Maybe you NEED a sign like the thief, or maybe you need to pick majors inside you area of specialization in order to have that "edge" that will allow you to beat the enemies of your level.

Basically, do you need to specialize in one or at most 2 areas in order to allow you to Make It through the game?
If so, I would say make a purist Mage. Eventually, when your magic is maxed, you can begin the Combat and Stealth skills, but I dont know....

This may actually be the first game where I dont just min/max a char and maybe I will actually play an "archtype."

I cannot wait to experiment. If anyone can, please check out my Character Post, and let me know your thoughts on my theories. This is such an INTELLIGENT forum site, many thanks to the moderators that police it and remover gibberish (lol, including my "introduction post" that I erroneously posted on the boards...)

Cadaver

@cadaver,
I read your post but I don't min/max so sorry I didn't reply

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One thing I will say is make armorer a major skill and level it whenever possible. You might want to do the same with light armor if you're a mage. I did neither my first time around with my social fighter (next time I'll leave out speechcraft as the minigame is easy, and maybe mercantile too - you make enough money even if you get ripped off all the time).
Two reasons: 1) armor impedes spell effectiveness until your armor skill is very high. 2) You can't fix magical armor until your'e a journeyman (lvl 50) armorer. I hate having my wonderful armor (I have one set to maximise strength and another for stealth) gets beat down and you can't fix it until you complete your dungeon crawl and head to the city for repairs.

I play as Nord Barbarian. I'm currently level 12, and I use an Elven shield along with an elven sword. I use the Dark Brotherhood armor. My character works perfectly for me. I'm doing thieves guild quests right now, and I'm raising my sneak, and security skills pretty quickly. I don't think you will have a problem with using a Breton. Are you sure about being a mage? I have to suggest Nord or Imperial if you are going to use Battlemage..
ES Forums:
The Elder Scroll forums are plagued by idiots. They do not know how to think for themselves. They see one person doing something, and think it's a good idea to do the same thing. "Oh well this guy posted a thread when a thread on the top of the page was about the same thing, so I can do it too". "Oh, this guy is flaming someone and he doesn't get flamed often, so I think it's okay to do it too". I hope they drown in a pool of their own stupidity.