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LombardiSpot

New Member
Personally any pure mage should be High elf, due to the start of 150 magicka (all other races have 100) and the racial ability, by far makes them the best mage and not just at start either cause the 150 is 5 extra levels of stats to put in hp so your that many levels ahead of what any other class can legit be at level 81.
I agree, Highborn is amazing in difficult battles, like against an Ancient Dragon, or Dragon Priest, etc. You can have 600 magika and it will quickly regenerate in battles. Dual-Cast a Expert Destruction Spell, wait a moment as your enemy is staggering, and your magika recuperates. Very effective.
 

LombardiSpot

New Member
Dual-Casting a Greater-Ward with Dragon-Hide on and you can stand in front of an Ancient Dragon blasting at you and take ZERO damage. The Ward doesn't break either. I'll have to check, but I've been doing this without the dual-perk in the restoration tree.
 

Hacksaw

Member
I read your guide, and got thinking about how I levelled my mage, which is currently sitting at about level 30 with destruction and alteration still at low levels.

I brought illusion up first, and concentrated on crowd control spells. Even while all my other magic was weak, I could pacify enemies and have time to recover mana or heal. I still don't have quiet casting and probably never will. I haven't seen sneaking around as a high priority.

Next I brought up conjuration. I followed the atronach path up to twin souls, but now all I ever use is two dremora lords. I try not to summon them often because it basically takes the challenge out of the game, but they are there when I need them.

After that I worked on restoration. With crowd control and summoned daedra, I got by having weak healing, but I finally decided to level this one. I'll need it if I'm going to focus on destruction and stop summoning.

My destruction and alteration are both still fairly low, and I think I'll work on alteration next. I was going to get mage armor and atronach like you suggest, but I'm rethinking mage armor. When I finally get the dragonhide spell, the mage armor perk will no longer be useful as it doesn't affect that spell. And atronach? I'm up in the air over that one. If I develop skill with wards (difficult for me, a real test of timing and reflexes), the atronach perk will be diminished as I will only rarely be getting hit with magic.

Ultimately I want to develop destruction and use it to beat most enemies. Using crowd control and summoning is effective, but its also no challenge at all and therefore not much fun. I can't wait till I'm throwing around big explosions. :)

Overall, I'm finding playing a mage very challenging (if I stay away from conjuring), especially after just finishing the game with a straight-up warrior. I have to watch the physical threats, and a surprise attack will often kill me before I even react.
 

LombardiSpot

New Member
I have to watch the physical threats, and a surprise attack will often kill me before I even react.

The surpise attacks are when I find myself running backwards, point my crosshairs at the ground right in front of me (while running backwards) and lay down a Dremora Lord in front of the enemy. This often stops them and gives me a chance to armor-up, etc.
 

rcallan9

New Member
Hey guys,
I've been reading a bunch on here about making a mage, etc. and had a specific question about a very specific set up.

I'm trying to make a Mage/Assassin build, BUT mainly with a dagger, not Illusion
Here it is: Skyrim Perk Calculator - Plan the perks for your Skyrim character before spending them!

So I'm wondering if this guy is spread too thin. I figure I will focus on Destruction, Restoration, and Illusion primarily. At about level 25, I'll move into Enchanting and Alteration as well as One Handed (for daggers) and Sneak perks.

The way I play right now is sneaking around (to at least build the skill) and then use destruction (Im a level 3...just started a new account). I figure I'll use Illusion for bigger crowds. I'll skip conjuration and use the Sanguine Rose.

The goal I have in mind is to eventually be able to sneak up, stab some fools, throw fear or frenzy down and then unleash hell with destruction.

SO...THE QUESTION

1. Alteration armor or enchanted light armor? Additionally, should i focus on either enchanting or alteration and not both?
 

LombardiSpot

New Member
I don't need armor or enchanting. I had only the first enchanting perk until I was level 46. The only reason I spent a my 6 saved perks in enchanting is because I didn't go the illusion route and I wanted to take advantage of dual skill enchanting (20% destruction / +50 Magika is pretty nice on a ring and an amulet, giving a total of 40% destruction cost reduction combined with that Dragon Priest masks that give another 20% and the Archmage robes). But I later found a ring that also provides 25% destruction cost reduction. So I imagine you might be able to find some items that will help you cast adept / expert spells abundantly without neededing the enchanting perks, then you can invest in the illusion perks. But without the cost reduction, it can be hard to do entire battles with the high-level destruction spells without stopping to drink potions. But if you are a Mage / Assassin, I'm guessing your need for abundant casting of destruction spells is less in a battle because you are employing other strategies.
 

LombardiSpot

New Member
Funny aside, illusion was helpful at the end of one of the quests. The guy at the end was supposed to be friendly to me, but I guess I must have killed one of his family or friends because he started attacking me. I dual-cast a calm spell on him and he started congratulating me for finishing the quest and rewarded me. That was really cool. The best use of illusion in the entire game for me.
 

mcfrg

Member
rcallan9:

Usually it's better to focus on just a few skills. You want both magic and melee, so there will be a trade-off in power to both of these skills if you consider what items you wear and how you will re-distribute stat points and even perks. If you want a powerful destruction mage, then going for a big magicka pool, high magicka regeneration and high cost reduction is probably the way to go, otherwise, you'll notice that you'll often struggle with magicka. Even a pure mage will struggle with magicka until much later in the game when enough cost reduction items has been found/bought/enchanted.

I'd suggest you not rely on destruction, and instead see it as a bonus because you'll most likely have some magicka shortage problem. Illusion spells on the other hand cost less magicka in the long run. The problem with Illusion though is that it requires a heavy perk investment in order for its spells to work on most enemies.

You could be going alteration and wear only non-armor gear. The benefit is basically a bonus to magicka regeneration from robes that normal armors doesn't get. It's not a small amount either compared to other items; you start with 50%, then you'll find robes with up to 150%. This will allow you to cast more spells and rely on spells in combat. Other items could be enchanted with fortify magicka which will increase your regen rate, and cost reduction which allows you to cast more spells. A combination of all of these bonuses in items is quite good for a mage, but I suspect that your assassin will be using mix of other enchantments.

Disadvantages of using Mage armor perks:
  • Each time you want good physical protection, you'll have to cast a flesh spell and the spell only lasts for a limited time.
  • Later in the game, it's easy to surpass 300 defense which is max you can get without wearing armor so your perks could be wasted if you start wearing armor instead.
  • You won't get the mage armor bonus if you wear any light -or heavy armor.
  • Flesh spells can quickly drain your magicka pool.
This is enough to advice against using robes. If you happen to be in a lengthy battle, it wouldn't be that great if your armor rating suddenly drops to zero, especially if you often find yourself low on magicka. Of course, you could always switch back and forth between robe and armor.
 

Kruise

Khajiit will smell them coming.
What are the best Conjuration and Alteration spells? Like the Raise Dead/Zombie or Atronachs?
Depends... At high levels, you can have Permanent Atronachs and Permanent no go to ashywhendie Dead Thralls. I personally prefer Atronachs. Dead Thrall is capped at level 40 I think... Atronarchs also are immune to their element.
 

crimsonblade2k

New Member
I am in the process of creating a better Mage or Battle Mage since I wasted quite a few of my points on skills that I don't even use when I started the game with my current character so im for a retry. I found its always nice to have your Enchantments as high as possible since you can reduce the amount of magicka by a huge amount, I got mine to zero eventually (freecasting). I would not stress magicka too much maybe to about 300 or 400 tops then place priority on health and less on stamina. I like the kind of setup you have here it makes sense, This is my current armor set:

Dark Elf- 50% resistance to fire
Falmer Helmet- Destruction 29% less to cast, Conjuration 29% less to cast
Circlet- Destruction 29% less to cast, Alteration 29% less to cast
Deadric Armor- Destruction 29% less to cast, Conjuration 29% less to cast
Necklace- Destruction 29% less to cast, Alteration 29% less to cast
Ring- Conjuration 29% less to cast, Alteration 29% less to cast
Deadric Gloves- fortify one handed damage by 48, fortify archery damage by 48
Deadric Boots- 55% resistance to frost, 55% resistance to lightning
Deadric Sheild- 55% resistance to frost, 55% resistance to lightning

I forgot my weapon sets but they are elemental, my character has no illusion perks and I only have some beginner alteration perks everything else is mostly in the right place but ill probably have 20 more perks to use if I didnt mess it up lol
 

LombardiSpot

New Member
crimsonblade2k, I'm curious, did you go that route while doing missions and combat. I mean, was it a path that you would learn as you combat, or did you have to go into hiding and just make a bunch of daggers, enchant and make potions before even stepping out into the field. And then it would seem that once you had such a character, he would be nearly invincible and then combat would get boring real quick. I would just discourage people from taking that later combatless route because it would take all the challenge out of learning as you go.
 

crimsonblade2k

New Member
LombardiSpot, I leveled my skills as I play and I always make it a point in any elder scrolls game not to loose sight of the challenge and take it as I go, once I had this particular character maxed out I raised the difficulty, I still get one shotted, I still die and I still have to hustle to win a fight, going into hiding and and trolling the game is not my idea of fun. I'm happy I created my character as is because it took alot of hours and mistakes to get to this level.
 

HaiiroOokami

New Member
If you get enchanting to 100 ( taking 5/5 Enchanter, Insightful Enchanter, Corpus Enchanter, and Extra Effect) you can enchant fortify magicka and fortify destruction 25% on 5 or 6 pieces of light armor/clothes and jewellry and cast ALL (even master level) destruction spells for free (no macgicka cost) mking you able to crank out master level destruction spells While, if you have armor equipped, increasing your survivability for those attacks that get through the volley magic thrown out, unless you took mage armor, then it is quite useless, but you can also enchant any other magic school to have free casting like this, I have 5 of the fortify magicka/destruction and one magicka regen/fortify magicka, I have a ridiculous pool of magicka and barely use any of it (unless I need to cast an expensive heal). You can also increase your blacksmith att. by crafting the iron daggers to farm enchant exp, iron ingots and leather/strips are inexpensive compared to buying iron daggers, so it helps your pocket as well. Just thought I would point those things out ^-^
 
I don't do dual cast/impact. Mostly for Magicka Efficiency, you get more bang for your buck doublecasting, and just spamming the same spell over, and over gets old pretty quick. I also don't Enchant up to free magic, because Bethesda put Magicka in the game for balance, so removing it makes it all too easy. I know, the standard advice all over the 'net is "Fortify Destruction 100% dual cast Impact" but that's not really playing a pure mage so much as a glitch suit turret. It's a no brainer, and Pure Mag is supposed to be the Intelligence build.

Instead, I like to combo different spells, my favorite so far is Ice Storm, and Flaming Familiar. The latter is pretty much a fireball on legs with a 6 second fuze, and the former detonates him on contact. Now, there isn't much of anything significantly resistant to Frost, AND Flames, you get the DOT from those still burning, and slow from the IS.

Also, both can be used indirectly. FF will run around corners, while IS goes right through cover, so that annoying archer that keeps ducking behind a rock? Tell him to Chill. It really helps to use Aura Whisper so you can see what you're aiming at, though. Cover is even better than capped out armor, because it stops all damage, and they can't see you, in case you're feeling squish in just robes.

I also like to kite enemies onto Runes, and/or Wall spells. Just because it's called "Wall of Flames" doesn't mean you have to use it likeat. An Altmer in robes with nothing but magic in her hands runs faster than any other playable character, so you don't even have to sprint, nor look at the enemy. Just cast them at your feet, and run over them, with enough magicka, Giants are relatively easy if you're patient.

Destruction caps low, but you can prevent your character advancing by limiting the number of skills you level/perk. You don't Have to go up to 81, nor even use every school. Pure Destruction is a little light on the defense, but paired with Restoration, you can Ward, or heal. Alteration is okay on defense, but I always find myself dying when it wears off, and I lack either the time, or magicka to recast before being 1 shotted.

Illusion is just fun. You can't use it alone, but with a decent follower, and careful strategy, you don't have to fight anything personally, ever. Invisibility, and Muffle can completely replace stealth, and both still work on everyone. You can alternate casting Calm, and Firebolt to wear someone out (not unlike Impact turret, or Hack&Bash.) Conjuration can replace, or add to your follower to kill the survivors of the Frenzy moshpit.

My most powerful Pure wizard is BAMFO, Illusion, Destruction, and Conjuration. Illusion is mostly for Invisibility, and Frenzy. Destruction is almost only for Augment Flames(2) to enhance Fear, Flaming Familiar, and some enchantments. Conjuration lets you "Teleport" your Dremora Lord by recasting him where he's most needed. Meanwhile, you drop Invisibility, and have the running speed to relocate before it wears off. Wuld is also close enough to instant, so he's pretty much a teleporter. (Hence the name.)

Not unlike a Nightblade, only instead of using Illusion to backstab individuals, he takes on entire armies without being targeted, much less hit. As soon as you break cover to recast, Wuld, and drop Invisible again. Maybe throw an Ice Storm to slow everyone down, or Frenzy to clump them all together, but that's basically it. Easilly built below level 30. No armor, 100 health/stamina, and an almost inexhaustible supply of Magicka, he's just as deadly in a loincloth.
 
Another glitch you can exploit, rather than 100% off a school, or 2 is Spell Absorbtion. A Breton with the Atronach Stone can get a mad minute of complete invulnerability to magic, poison, disease, shouts, and all of them recharge the blue gauge, even while you're casting. (Unlike Highborn, and other Regenerate Magicka effects other than cleaning the pools around Winterhold.)

Real handy against Dragons, or more especially Big Bad All. For Alduin's Bane, I stepped out of the Time wound with nothing but the Kell, hit him with my new shout, and defeated him in seconds using this trick. You know where he's going to land, right? Hose it down with Frost, augmented to 75DPS each instance. He's got such a big footprint, that means several of them at once, all of which sap his Stamina so he can't take off again. Clear Skies as soon as your shout cools down to counter the meteors, and don't get too close.

All he can do is breathe on you, which is fine, because this is a pretty high drain spell, so it's nice having some more to soak up. You won't run out, I swear. A smaller version of this is Ward Absorb, which can power destruction in the other hand. I prefer Lightning, because it's a hit-scan (you don't have to lead the target, because there's no projectile lag) and none of them are resistant to it. If you wear 1 piece of Armor, make it Nahkriin, it really helps this combo. It also works with Spellbreaker, but you can't cast through it like Restoration Wards. Keep in mind, dragons always warn you before they shout, so you have just enough time to get the Ward up. Save your magicka for when there's something to absorb, though.

Now, a few things to keep in mind for this build: First, Archers will be your bane. You have no protection against physical damage, and Wards don't even slow arrows down. The simple solution is Bolt them first. Again, Lightning is a Hit-Scan, so they can't dodge it, or Ice Storm through cover at the ones who are using it. Warriors can also destroy you, but only up close, so kite them around. Save mages for last, since they will be pumping you full of Magicka.
 

Teritus

Giving it to you straight since 1869
Do you really have to use Illusion? I don't like that skills..

You don't have to of course, but it's just something else to tinker with if you want, and it can be useful in certain situations.
 

Joel Schneider

New Member
Hi, I'm new to this forum so i'm not so sure if this is the right forum (lol)
I'm just about to start a mage and i was thinking of going with either high elf or breton but im not so sure,
with my mage i want to use shock mostly with seconday being fire.
and a few spells from other schools.
Can someone help me with my mage!?
 

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