What truly is the strongest combat style ?

[Locks066]

Their is so much to do in skyrim and so little perks to spend. I'm more then interested to see how the outcome of this will turn out.

So from my personal exp I would have to say duel wielder by far. Give him 100 smithing and enchanting and he is truly unbeatable. 2 effects on both swords and smithed armor and weapons using 100% armor rating upgrades through enchanting. This is like if i rerember correctly 200 damage per hit with each weapon. Plus the perks along side of that like duel sav and your god. This does not mean he is completly valuable from a distance as a profile like this usally has a hell of alot of stamina.

So whats your thought ?

 

[Gearuvagen]

I think it's whatever you enjoy doing. Yes there are some that have a higher damage output, some that are quicker and some that are stealthy, it all comes down to your preference as a player.

 

[Psiberzerker]

Dual Weild is probably the most powerful in terms of DPS, but that's not all of combat. I voted Spell/Sword because it works at multiple ranges, and you can maneuver. Dual Wield is stand there, and spin, over, and over. Very powerful, but that's pretty much your only Power. I'd rather have multiple options so I can adapt to the fight at hand.

Quite honestly, the most powerful Combat style is Blacksmithing. Win the fight before it even starts at the forge. Powerful, but boring.

 

[Nighthiker77]

Some skills are unaffected by difficulty, like conjuration and illusion.

 

[Perkless in Skyrim]

Any style that includes Illusion. If I can Calm it, it's dead and there's virtually no risk to myself.

 

[orca45]

I have tried everything, from Destruction mage, to heavy armor dual sword, combination of both, one-handed with magic + shout, illusion + conjuration + stealth, etc ... but at the end of the day, in my humble opinion, nothing beats a shadow warrior. You are invisible, undetectable and you don’t need to have a very powerful dagger to kill. For enemies away from you, your bow, while you are sneaking give you the fast killing that not even destruction magic can achieve in one single hit.
Illusion is pure fun; Conjuration is not that powerful; Destruction is powerful but you do not kill in one single hit; heavy armor protects you better than light, but you are not invincible either; dual sword make you kill easier but leave you exposed to mages or necromancers, bows and shouts from the enemy; pure mage makes you dangerous but again, you don’t kill in one single hit, not even if you are able to cast Lighting Storm which is probably the best destruction magic out there.
At the end of the day, shadow warrior make you simply lethal in one single hit, invisible, undetectable, lighter, faster and in combination with archery, you are simply in charge of every single opponent, not matter how powerful they are. They are dead in not time. You probably won’t need magic at all, you won’t probably won’t need to carry health potions and if you combine that with alchemy / enchanting to increase your fortify health, stamina, magic, muffle, light-armor, etc, you are untouchable and absolutely a killing machine in one single hit.
Even if you do not use your alchemy / enchanting to increase what I said, you are still probably the best killer out there because in one single slice or hit, you will kill your enemy and everything comes down to that. You don’t want to hit your enemy 3 or 4 times to terminate him / her, or to use your magic several times, especially when you are facing several enemies and if they are vampires or necromancers, you will not be that happy at all.
I do not want to convince anybody but I just want to support my point : in real combat, a sniper is the most lethal enemy out there, capable to even stop an entire army from advancing, capable to make the enemy absolutely crazy and nut and the sniper in real combat is similar to the shadow warrior in Skyrim. The question they make when they are facing a shadow warrior is : where are you ? That is exactly the question soldiers express when they are facing a sniper which is a shadow warrior with a rifle and in Skyrim, instead a rifle, he is using either his dagger or his bow which stands for the sniper rifle. Just my 2 cents ...

 

[Mr Forz]

Sword Shield anyday, I mean, sure you do less damage, but with the shield, addtionnal block effectiveness, elemental protection, disarming shield bashes and shield charge, not only you pack some hard control but nothing in the world would possibly take you down.

 

[Gunnbjorn]

The strongest combat style is the style YOU enjoy using and that YOU can survive with.

 

[orca45]

Sword Shield anyday, I mean, sure you do less damage, but with the shield, addtionnal block effectiveness, elemental protection, disarming shield bashes and shield charge, not only you pack some hard control but nothing in the world would possibly take you down.

... are you serious ? Nothing in the world ? How about a shadow warrior ? You won’t even know where he is .. IF you are not killed in the first hit ... a shadow warrior is invisible so how are you planning to use your shield on somebody who will attack you by behind and slice your throat ? You simply have not chance at all !!

 

[Psiberzerker]

Stagger is a pretty common, and powerful effect. Just Bashing can turn a duel into a one-sided beating even with a Battleaxe. Great/Critical Charge is a great way to start such a fight, and you can even set up for it from Stealth with Silent Roll. Impact isn't one of my favorites, because of the high drain, but it's a great way to Interrupt Shouts, especially hovering Dragons. Windshear is better than a shield, because it doesn't use Stamina, and you can have whatever in the other hand. Wall of Flames is obscene DPS if you can keep them on the hot spot.

Why aren't Shouts up there? Ice Form is just wrong on anything except Dragons, and I don't have to tell you about Fus Roh Da! Slow Time with Steady Hand beats even Shadow Warrior, out in broad daylight with a decent set-up, no other exploits unless you want to cut out the Cool-down. Alchemy, there's another long before the fight Gamebreaker.

 

[orca45]

Stagger is a pretty common, and powerful effect. Just Bashing can turn a duel into a one-sided beating even with a Battleaxe. Great/Critical Charge is a great way to start such a fight, and you can even set up for it from Stealth with Silent Roll. Impact isn't one of my favorites, because of the high drain, but it's a great way to Interrupt Shouts, especially hovering Dragons. Windshear is better than a shield, because it doesn't use Stamina, and you can have whatever in the other hand. Wall of Flames is obscene DPS if you can keep them on the hot spot.

Why aren't Shouts up there? Ice Form is just wrong on anything except Dragons, and I don't have to tell you about Fus Roh Da! Slow Time with Steady Hand beats even Shadow Warrior, out in broad daylight with a decent set-up, no other exploits unless you want to cut out the Cool-down. Alchemy, there's another long before the fight Gamebreaker.

Well the point is, how can you use your paralyze spell, Ice Form, Slow Time, etc, etc, on somebody that you are not able to see at all ? My character is completely invisible and undetectable; if I can not be seen, how can you wonder that you are about to die ? Do you understand my point ? You can not bash, damage or kill what you cannot see my friend !
If you were in real combat, how can you kill a sniper that you don’t have any idea where he is ?

 

[NiteMare]

stealth archers can pretty OP, but it's preference.

 

[Psiberzerker]

Well the point is, how can you use your paralyze spell, Ice Form, Slow Time, etc, etc, on somebody that you are not able to see at all ? My character is completely invisible and undetectable; if I can not be seen, how can you wonder that you are about to die ? Do you understand my point ? You can not bash, damage or kill what you cannot see my friend !
If you were in real combat, how can you kill a sniper that you don’t have any idea where he is ?

This is a single PVE game, none of the NPCs do that, so I don't worry about it that much.

 

[Gunnbjorn]

... are you serious ? Nothing in the world ? How about a shadow warrior ? You won’t even know where he is .. IF you are not killed in the first hit ... a shadow warrior is invisible so how are you planning to use your shield on somebody who will attack you by behind and slice your throat ? You simply have not chance at all !!

What are you basing this on? Are you basing this on the Shadow Warrior combat style against all of the other listed combat styles, or are you sharing your experiences with it against the common enemies of Skyrim?

Either way, I'll try a more realistic approach, as hard as it may be to imagine it:

Any combat style pertaining to Stealth is risky to go about, because your success rate can be based greatly on your environment; your literal settings, the time of day, what opponents you must face. A Shadow Warrior like yourself would obviously dominate in a dimly lit dungeon, with many dark corners, narrow corridors and big rooms. A typical bandit will be of no problem to you. However, if you were out on an open field, in the middle of day, and a dragon attacks... well, there goes your element of surprise. And you're definitely not one-hitting a flying dragon.

Every other style doesn't have to deal with this problem, because they don't rely on stealth to get rid of their enemies. Warriors just charge right in and kill everything and anything, against dragons of course they'll either have to wait until they land, blocking their breath in the process with their trusty shield, or if shouts are in fact allowed they can just use Dragonrend. Mages summon stuff and throw elemental balls of destruction, or whatever... same thing.

Now, let's say we're comparing these combat styles when stacked up against each other... the most fair thing to do would be to put these people in The Pit (Oblivion style) and see how they square off! Let's pretend they're all maxed out and get everything they can possibly get from their combat build.

Oh, crap... it seems as though the stealth-types have the short end of the stick again. In an arena? There's no place to hide. They're going to see you. No more element of surprise, and even if you happen to magically disappear, with a Sword and Shield Warrior's maxed out stats, they're like tanks. If they really wanted to be paranoid they'd just raise their shield up in a corner somewhere, and have their massive shield and heavy armor absorb the impact of a little dagger, if the Shadow Warrior manages to go unnoticed for that long.

However, if this battle happened to take place in a dark forest of cave, then the Shadow Warrior may come out victorious, because it's the surroundings that ultimately give them their lethality.

I'm not saying Stealth is not the way to be, and that it's the worst style. I'm just pointing out the major flaw it would have in certain battles due to it's dependence on the setting of the battle.

 

[Psiberzerker]

Or, for an in-game example, random Dragon attack, middle of no-where, you got Shadow Warrior. Good luck!

Besides, Steath is avoiding Combat, so it's not technically a Combat style. Shadow Warrior can be used Tactically, you're right about that.

 

[Two Bears]

Well, in terms of raw damage output, you'd be hard pressed to beat a destruction mage. If you add enchanting to give a 100% Fortify Destruction effect, you can shoot non-stop all day. With the destruction perk tree maxed out, you do obscene amounts of damage. The master spell Lightning Storm in particular will do 112.5 points of damage per second with both Augmented Shock perks taken.

 

[Nighthiker77]

I haven't seen any thing or any group of things in game that could take down dremora lords faster than I could regen their casting cost, with no regen gear and no cost reduction gear. And they are NPCs so that would be the same at any difficulty.

All you have to do is stay alive while they do the dirty work. If there's guys they can't get to(like dragons) just switch to storm atronachs. Or 1 of each.

In a gear battle, conjuration zero casting, you'd have to fend off 2 constantly unless you could consistently drop them in less than 2 seconds. I can't see the poll from my app, but I'd say atromancer all day long.

Add sneak and archery if 3 skills are allowed.

Eta: I love stealth but in a dual, mages have detect life and shouters have aura whisper.

 

[Riften Guard]

With the right perks and skills invested the pure archer build is untouchable. You can stagger the oppenent 50% of the time, or paralyze them 1/3 of the time. This allows you to rethink and reposition yourself. Unless your a bad shot. Then it won't matter.

 

[Psiberzerker]

Well, in terms of raw damage output, you'd be hard pressed to beat a destruction mage. If you add enchanting to give a 100% Fortify Destruction effect, you can shoot non-stop all day. With the destruction perk tree maxed out, you do obscene amounts of damage. The master spell Lightning Storm in particular will do 112.5 points of damage per second with both Augmented Shock perks taken.

I love destruction, I do, but in the late game with the same investment, you will do more raw damage with swords, period. You have to get close with them, though, so a Mage can play keepaway, and be fine. I pair it with Block, and have pretty much all I need in combat through the game. No one skill is going to do it all, but there's quite a few couples that sure can.

Illusion, and Conjuration: 100 Health, and Stamina, you can practically Teleport with Whirlwind Sprint, and recast Dremora Lords to make up for their lack of mobility. Leapfrog through long skirmish filled dungeons, like Forelhost staying out of it, but getting it done. Not technically Combat.

Deadly Aim. Plenty if you are any good at it, and have the patience to pull it off.

1H Destruction or substitute Conjuration for Bound Sword, and Flaming Familiars. Romp on Karthspire laughing maniacly. Any defensive skill (Light, Heavy, or Alteration.) Riskier, but this is just hella fun.

 

[Two Bears]

I love destruction, I do, but in the late game with the same investment, you will do more raw damage with swords, period. You have to get close with them, though, so if you don't let them get close, you're fine. I pair it with Block, and have pretty much all I need in combat through the game. No one skill is going to do it all, but there's quite a few couples that sure can.

Illusion, and Conjuration: 100 Health, and Stamina, you can practically Teleport with Whirlwind Sprint, and recast Dremora Lords to make up for their lack of mobility. Leapfrog through long skirmish filled dungeons, like Forelhost staying out of it, but getting it done. Not technically Combat.

Deadly Aim. Plenty if you are any good at it, and have the patience to pull it off.

1H Destruction or substitute Conjuration for Bound Sword, and Flaming Familiars. Romp on Karthspire laughing maniacly. Any defensive skill (Light, Heavy, or Alteration.) Riskier, but this is just hella fun.

Actually, I usually play one-handed/illusion/sneak/archery/alchemy/light armor types. I find it a lot more fun than destruction magic.