General questions

[Jamirus]

I have a few questions:

1. I the quest "Walking Nightmare" you obtain the "Skull of corruption" after killing Erandur. What does the skull do? I know i can absorb the dreams of sleeping people (or the guards in dawnstar who can apparently talk and sleep at the same time, while standing up.) But when the skull is powered, what does it do?

2. Has anyone else ever had an experience where a courier who came to them was naked? Any erotic Couriers, anyone?

3. Why are ward spells so inefficient? I have a lesser ward and a steadfast ward. I can actually hold up the lesser ward for a decent amount of time before my magicka is drained, but it breaks after one hit. A steadfast ward lasts a bit longer but still can't endure much and takes my magicka at an alarming rate. Nothing to say of the stagger effect which you get after the ward breaks, which completely fluffs you up. I'm thinking of grinding my restoration to give wards more of an effect, which leads to my next question.

4. Is it wise to grind up skills? I've had experiences where i couldn't handle many enemies in the game because i had grinded up skills too much and my level shot up, which made the enemies strength shoot up too. My armor and weapons weren't powerful enough to damage anyone. Does that still apply to a mage? Will i become ineffective in battle if i grind my restoration up a bit?

5. Why is it that whenever i use a firebolt at an enemy, they go flying away. I mean, they go flying further then Fus ro dah'ing them would cause them to fly.

 

[CHUBBY_RYNO]

I will attempt to answer your questions the best I can, in order.

1. The Skull of Corruption: This Staff will gain damage as you fill it with the dreams of people. Starting at a base of 20 damage and increasing to 50 damage when fully charged. A unique effect of this staff is that it is able to damage multiple enemies at the same time, although this can be a negative affect because it can also harm friendly NPC's.

2. Naked Couriers: I have also had this incidence and I believe it is because both yours and my character are quite possibly some of the most eligible Bachelors/Bachelorettes in Skyrim.

3. Ward Spell efficiency: These spells, like most magic based skills are affected by several perks. For example I can cast my Flames Destruction spell at the cost of 7 Magicka per second because I have the novice destruction perk which cuts it's spell cost of 14 in half. But at the same time I cast Firebolt at 41 Magicka per spell cast, which is not lowered in any manor because I do not have the Apprentice destruction perk. This also applies to your wards, with the lesser ward costing 34 Magicka per second with no perks and negating a total of 40 damage, while the steadfast ward will cost 58 Magicka per second with no perks and negating a total of 60 damage. Your issue here is a matter of perk placement, spell Magicka cost and your total Magicka.

4. Grinding Skills Good/Bad: Grinding skills is all a matter of balancing and the skills you are going to grind. For example while it may seem wise to grind up your Restoration to gain some perks in that skill, you must also take into account that while you may end up 3-5 levels higher, you still have the same One-handed/Destruction skill level you had those few levels ago. This is not the same for the enemies you will encounter however, because they level at a constant rate. (Example: You have the One handed skill of a level 20 character: but your character level is 25, All enemies encountered have the skills of level 25 characters) As a suggestion, grind with balance, if you raise your restoration 10 levels, increase another combat skill a similar amount.

5. Firebolt gives you wings: The spell Firebolt and several similar destruction spells, act as explosions. When you cast Firebolt on a near dead enemy, especially when duel casting and having the impact perk. Will cause the target to sometimes take off like a rocket do to the sheer force of the spell. This effect can be used to your advantage if you wish to remove certain unwanted enemies by launching them over a cliff for example.


I hope this helps answer your questions Jamirus!

Sources: http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_Wiki

 

[Jamirus]

1. I know the Skull does more damage but how do you attack with it? All i can do is absorb dreams.

2. I'm an old, grey haired Altmer. lol

3. I do have my perks like restoration Novice spells and Apprentice spells magicka cut in half. But still it takes quite a lot of magicka and breaks easily.

4. So if i have 50 destruction and 30 restoration, i could grind restoration to 50 and i'd still be strong enough to defeat enemies? If yes, would that apply to the other schools of magic too?

5. I mean, usually when an enemy has low health i'd fire at him and he'd die, but at the same time as his death his body just goes flying, not allowing me to loot it usually.

 

[CHUBBY_RYNO]

1. I know the Skull does more damage but how do you attack with it? All i can do is absorb dreams.

2. I'm an old, grey haired Altmer. lol

3. I do have my perks like restoration Novice spells and Apprentice spells magicka cut in half. But still it takes quite a lot of magicka and breaks easily.

4. So if i have 50 destruction and 30 restoration, i could grind restoration to 50 and i'd still be strong enough to defeat enemies? If yes, would that apply to the other schools of magic too?

5. I mean, usually when an enemy has low health i'd fire at him and he'd die, but at the same time as his death his body just goes flying, not allowing me to loot it usually.

1. You can attack with the Skull like any other staff, Similar to a staff of Firebolt. although it is unique as the dreams act as charges, (example: I cast the dream i absorb from a sleeping individual can be used to damage the enemy, but my next cast will now do less damage). The staff isn't quite effective however, I would recommend almost any other weapon in its place.

2. You're Beautiful in there eyes

3. I am not sure of your total magicka pool, so I will use 250 as a example. So lets look at the stats.

• You have a total of 250 Magicka
• You have the perks Novice and Apprentice Restoration, which halves Magicka usage for certain spells
• The Spells you are using are Lesser ward which will now be casting at the rate of 17 Magicka per second, and Steadfast ward which will be casting at a rate of 29 Magicka per second with the perk.

Now with simple mathematics, we can calculate how long you keep these wards up at constant rate.

250 Magicka Divided by 17 = 14.7 seconds : This is the total time you can cast Lesser ward by its self.

250 Magicka Divided by 29 = 8.6 seconds : This is the total time you can cast Steadfast ward by its self.

Now as we can see above, the Steadfast ward will drain your Magicka at a much faster rate do to its higher Magicka consumption, this is the same with all spells. Now for the reason why your ward is breaking so easily.

Ward Spells, all have a total amount of damage that they can take as I mentioned before.
Lesser Ward = 40
Steadfast Ward = 60

The Reason why your wards break is because when a incoming spell makes contact with the ward, it takes damage. Now this damage that is done is based on The difficulty you play on. While this may sound strange I'll explain. There are 5 Difficulties you can play on currently in Skyrim. Novice, Apprentice, Adept, Expert, and Master. This difficulties affect the amount of damage you do, and the amount of damage your enemies do. For Example while you play on Novice Your Damage is 2 times what the weapon/spell damage on the item card says. While your enemies will do half the damage the item or spell card says. Ill leave a simple list below of the multipliers for damage, your damage is represented by Y and the Enemies damage represented by E.

Novice: Y = 2.0 E = 0.5

Apprentice: Y = 1.5 E = 0.75

Adept: Y = 1.0 E = 1.0

Expert: Y = 0.75 E = 1.5

Master: Y = 0.5 E = 2.0

So potentially you may say.....how does this even come close to effecting my wards.........Well if your Steadfast ward takes a hit from a firebolt spell, Well since you play on adept for example, that spell will do 25 damage to your ward, this means if your ward takes just two more hits from that same spell it will break, causing that stagger affect you despise. I hope this covers everything haha

4. Yes grinding your restoration up a several levels would not stop your ability to fight enemies around you with ease, Although you may want to consider training Alteration if you have ignored it so far, it is a skill that is very useful for magic type characters.

5. This is the effect I was explaining before, when you hit them with the spell, they die and go flying do to the explosion caused by the spell. Now I don't know of a way to stop the explosive effect, but you could switch spells when you notice your enemy is about to die, perhaps to flames or Firewall?

 

[Jamirus]

1. Well that's pretty plops. I wish i had of kept Erandur alive now.

2. I know about all the difficulties and magicka usage. But it just annoys me about how they are so expensive to use as well as not being able to use them efficiently. I don't see any point to using them anymore.

3. Restoration has been grinded. So has conjuration. Allow me to do the same with Alteration, cuz obviously Magic resistance and Mage armor and atronach will be very useful.

4. I usually end up finishing them off with two firebolts but i'll try anyway.